Everyone always wants to start the New Year off with a bang. Imagine I offered you a crisp, fresh, $100 bill for every $50 bucks you gave me every single day in 2011. We’d be instant mates (or at least solid acquaintances). Not to mention you’d give me every $50 you could get your hands on.
Unfortunately, boosting your online conversion rate takes serious work, not to mention some creative and good copy. Keep reading and we’ll go over 3 simple (but not necessarily easy) steps that’ll breathe new life into your copy and really boost the sales you’re getting now.
1. Be Picky About Your Prospects
There are around 266,224,500 Internet browsers in the US alone (Internet World Stats) who spent $156 BILLION online in 2009/10. Logic dictates that if you grab just a small piece of that massive pie, you’re doing pretty good. So you pull out the figurative 12-gauge and start blasting away…Wrong answer.
It’s time to break out your laser… and hit them with a guided missile. You see, when you know exactly who you want to hit, it’s a million times easier to find that guy and give him exactly what he’s looking for.
The reason you want to do this? He’ll pay cash. The problem is, finding your ideal prospect takes a whole lot of brain-breaking work.
Here’s a cheat sheet to help you figure out who your perfect prospect is. Break out a pen and paper and start writing:
Define who your prospect isn’t.
E.g. If you’re selling info products on menopause, teenage boys definitely aren’t interested.
Pump your past buyers for demographic information.
Setup a free survey and ask your list for key information like age, sex, income and why they bought your product.
Picture the guy who is really hurting.
You want people who are at the end of their proverbial rope, and serious about buying. The guy who is 80 lbs overweight sees the Fat Burning Furnace and thinks “I honestly/desperately/definitely need that.” The guy who is 5 lbs overweight thinks “I kinda want that.”
Find the “hidden meaning” in other promotions.
Check out sites that have exploded in your niche. Pick through their benefits and pull out what button they’re truly hitting. E.g. “Perfect for someone who doesn’t care about what is actually going on in the world” which translates to “you know what’s going on in the world” and means feeling included and “in-the-know” is important for this prospect. These four tips will start getting you inside your prospect’s head. Perfect for adding serious sales volume.
Step 2. Paint Your Prospect’s Picture
Now that you’ve got a rough skeleton of who your prospect is, it’s time to make him (or her) come to life. Your goal is to be able to close your eyes and see your prospect sitting in front of you, credit card in hand, begging to hit the “buy” button.
To do that you need four categories:
1. Demographic Info
2. Current State
3. Beliefs
4. Desires
Here’s what those might look like for a weight loss prospect:
1. Demographic Info – 37 years old, married, household income of < $60,000, white male.
2. Current State – Knees hurt, feels tired all the time, hates his reflection, is afraid of the beach.
3. Beliefs – Diets don’t work, deep-down there is something wrong with him, exercise is confusing, people don’t like him because he’s fat.
4. Desires – To be skinny with 6 pack abs, to like him, to have women find him attractive.
The “desires” are the element that just about everyone gets right, but knowing your prospect’s current state and beliefs will put you miles ahead of your competition. With those pieces you make your copy “click” inside your prospect’s head.
Step 3. Make Him An Offer He Can’t Refuse
Now that you know exactly who your prospect is and what he wants, you need to make him an offer that hits every one of his buttons.
To do that you’ve got to pull him back to every tantalizing taste of heaven you’ve given him reading your copy. In other words, you don’t want him to simply see what he could be, you want him to feel it. For the guy who wants to lose weight that means:
• A chance to walk along the crowded beach and not even remember days when you hated having your shirt off.
• Look in the mirror and be impressed.
• Feel like Brad Pitt when you walk in the room.
• Want to try washing clothes on your stomach – just to see if it works…
Don’t forget, this is the piece that every word of your copy was built up to. This is the climax. Don’t skimp on it. Please don’t rush it. Now, once you’ve established what all the major benefits are going to smell, taste and feel like… ask for the order. If you’ve got a guarantee, this is the perfect time for it. Then ask for the order again.
Note: Don’t chicken out or beat around the bush – he wants what you’ve got – tell him how to get it! Next, start counting the dollars.
Finally...
Most people want to skip the piece of understanding who their prospect is. Wrong answer. The better you know your prospect, the easier it is to sit down and sell to him. Not to mention, by putting serious effort into figuring out who you’re selling to, you’ll be able to make the perfect offer. It’ll be more like giving than selling.
With these 3 steps you can make a New Year’s resolution that will make you money. Keep testing, tweaking. I hope these tips help!