One of the primary reasons that so many small business owners miss out on sales, is that their marketing messages lack clarity. When it comes to sales, clarity is king. In fact, one of the oldest sayings in the business is:
“A confused mind always says NO!”
In other words, if you ask a prospective client to make a purchasing decision, before they clearly understand your proposal, they will typically say “no”. That’s why the best salespeople and negotiators always make sure they clearly explain their proposition, in as few words as possible. They prompt prospective clients to ask them questions, and answer them fully, before asking them to make a decision. The clearer a prospective client is about what you are offering, especially regarding how it will benefit them, the better.
Copy writing and clarity
With written marketing, we also need to ensure that prospective clients can clearly and quickly learn what we do and how it will benefit them. However, when we look at most small business marketing, we see pretty-much the exact opposite! It is generally written in a long winded, bloated, pedestrian style, which the reader has usually given up on way before the actual core benefits have even been mentioned. It usually focuses way too much on how great they are, and way too little on the problems facing the person reading their message.
Guess how interested the average reader is in YOU or YOUR business?
Not very!
They came to you because they have a problem. Every successful product or service is designed to solve some kind of problem. If your marketing is targeted correctly, the people reading it will be suffering with the problems, which your offering solves. By clearly explaining how YOU will directly make THEIR situation better, you stand the best possible chance of attracting their custom. The focus should be on them and how you can help them.
Quick marketing tip
Take a moment to review your written marketing and see how long it takes the reader, to find out exactly how you can help them. Check your website’s statistics software and note the pages that visitors to your site arrive on the most. Ensure that your marketing message on those pages is clear and that it gets to the point quickly and without fuss.
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Photo: Hyku
Morning Jim,
A great read on an early Saturday morning!
These are key points; and, of course, these are communicated very clearly
I believe clarity brings focus and actions; and that we should all be VERY clear on the following 4 questions:
- Niche, the “What”
- Market, the “Who”
- Problems, the “Why”
- Solutions, the “How”
Thanks for sharing!
Frederique Murphy
Thanks Frederique!
I’m a new reader/follower and I have to say that I’ve been learning so much from your blog posts lately. I am in the process of redeveloping my website content and trying to figure out how to increase my sales. I’m learning so much about how bad my copy is.
So, thanks for another great post! I’m listening!!
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