Alrighty then, we’re now into the part of our Sales Page where we are writing out real copy. The first section listed in our Skeleton Outline is:
[Personal story how the product helped]
In this stage of the process I don’t know WHERE this section will go on our final sales page, we just need to write it out first, and then we’ll “fit it in” somewhere (giggity).
So we need to tell people a personal story how copywriting affected my business.
Well we’re in luck, because when I first discovered what “copywriting” was around 2009, I was running a good sized rave company called HouseOfRave (sold it in 2011 so don’t ask me questions about it’s current state).
Below I am going to tell the story, including screenshots….however I’m gonna add my ghetto ass stick figures to the mix just to make it more interesting:
Friends in the eCommerce industry were telling me, “Neville you should send out email blasts to your previous customers, it’ll make a ton of sales!”
Being a greedy little boy, I decided to try this.
I wanted to make AWESOME LOOKING EMAILS that would get people to click.
I included everything I thought an awesome email should have:
- A sweet ass email template.
- A sweet ass logo at the top.
- An “About Us” section explaining how we’d been in business since 2001.
- Big images with big “BUY NOW” buttons everywhere.
- Testimonials from previous customers.
- And more…..
I was SO DANG PROUD of the first emails I’d created!
“Dang….that’s a goooooood lookin’ email!!”
So with all the confidence in the world I was going to make a ton of money from these fancy emails…I sent emails out to 7,500 previous customers who’d already paid me before (which technically will be your best audience).
I expected a flood of orders, but instead got about 2 orders from each email blast.
This was not what I expected:
“Only 2 orders?? I guess email marketing doesn’t work very well for my business…”
But then I started learning this thing called “copywriting” where you craft a reason for your customer to buy a product from you.
Previously I’d stumbled through business by just throwing stuff up on a webpage and praying someone bought.
But this “copywriting” stuff showed me I could create a REASON for someone to buy right now.
I started studying copywriting furiously!
I read every book I could get my hands on….
….and even hung famous old ads on my wall:
After spending months researching and reading, I decided to put this newfound skill to work on my own business.
I wrote up another email blast, but this time included all the lessons learned from the copywriting industry.
This email was SO DIFFERENT from my previous “pretty and sparkly” emails it actually made me quite nervous to send it out:
“Well it’s not so pretty….but it’s well written.”
I sent it out on a Friday night (often the worst time to send an email), and 2 hours later checked my iPhone.
“Wait….HOW many orders!?”
I couldn’t believe it, within a few hours I’d received 120 orders! This was at a time in my business when I was making between 10 and 15 orders per day, and now I’d hit 120 because of ONE email?!?
I was ecstatic!
Much orders. Very wow. Such cool.
That was the moment my real copywriting journey began.
I applied copywriting to my rave company.
I applied copywriting to AppSumo.
I applied copywriting to friends companies.
I applied copywriting to businesses in different industries.
It was shocking how well it worked despite the industry.
Soon people were asking if they could pay me to teach them to write. I would happily take paid consultations, but soon it became apparent the demand was too big for me to handle, so I created “The Kopywriting Kourse” which would take people through all my processes, and even give them live help to have their copy reviewed or modified.
So that’s how I’m writing my own personal story!
It’s not too short.
It’s not too long.
It demonstrates I’ve used copywriting myself.
It demonstrates copywriting could help their business too.
It does this all in a fun way.
So far in this experiment about writing a sales page we’ve:
- Step 1.) Made a Skeleton Outline for our sales page.
- Step 2.) Figured out what we’re selling.
- Step 3.) Got 20+ “Bold Statements” made for our main headline.
- Step 4.) Written out a “Personal Story” section.
If we smash all those sections together it looks like this inside a Google Doc (which is where I always start writing a sales page):
Hopefully you’re enjoying and learning watching this gradual process of sales page being put together. By the end of this we’ll have a fully written, fully designed, and fully trackable sales page that’s accepting orders!
WOW!!! so nice
You’ll see how when it all comes together, “length” is not really a factor.
We’ll even test the final page with real world analytics to see how it performs, and I’ll share some of the non-confidential findings such as heatmaps, page read time, and scroll maps
Where would you add in qualifying questions(has this ever happened to u? which one of these are you?) or rapport building?
nice one. did you use K for all the C related words on purpose? Created our own style man. Nice one
So it’s really the story that hooks people and takes them down the slippery slope… and before they know it they’re like —”I actually read all that!?” So the headline is the Attention-grabber, knowing what you’re selling makes it easy to stay on point and actually nail your target, and the story develops an interest in the what’s-what that keeps them reading.
I’ve seen a lot of copy without a single image…is it an absolute no, or is there some secret to image placement that doesn’t disrupt the flow?
Thanks for all this amazing info, really simplifies everything…and stick-figure land makes it fun!
Gradually perceiving how this will end up being a business page extremely cool process.
Do you have length proposals for this?
Hey Mukul, you’ll see it all come together soon (all we have to do is smash all the sections together).
The length is irrelevant in the beginning.
We’ll do some tracking analysis once it’s done, and then we’ll modify the length if needed, but for now “Length” is not even something we’re taking into consideration.
I love reading your stuff Neville! I have had my blog going strong for about a month and a half now. And I’m still working on getting through the Sugarman book. (I have tiny people who demand my attention)
All that I am learning has really helped with my blog. When I manage to get people to the blog they tell me they LOVE it!
So thanks for being awesome! Maybe I’ll make money with all this knowledge someday.
That’s awesome Julie, keep it up and keep going and see where it takes you!
I ran NevBlog just for fun for YEARS before it ever made a dime. Doing it for fun and the love of it will keep you going.
Julie, you’ve won a shirt!
Sending you an email :)
Now Neville you don’t have to bribe me to be your friend. ;-)
PS
Sweet! I love shirts! And winning stuff!
thanks for this! why did you decide to use a k in your business name?
I was in bed with your mom late one night and it was her idea.
BURN!
https://media.giphy.com/media/1hBpHdYhBykSBSxIVK/giphy.gif
😏
Omg! I can’t believe you actually reply to all the comments and e-mails you receive! Well, I never leave comments anywhere, but after reading it I felt like it! Thank you for sharing these amazing tips with us!!
Yup, I go through pretty much all of them and respond! Thanks for making my site the first you left a comment on :-P
I can sell lipsticks to hippos with this kind of sales-science.
But only if I could get all the steps in one place – are you going to post that link where we can our hands on..?
Sure am Mirza, I’ll be compiling all of this at the end.
However just blasting ALL of these steps out in one post would result in some 10,000+ word behemoth that most people wouldn’t read, so splitting it up is easier to consume :-)
Hi Nev,
I usually don’t respond to blog articles but ever since I started following you, since way back when, you have been consistently providing me with so much value in your emails, articles and videos. So today I wanna show my appreciation. Thanks! Your stuff really have helped me become a better copywriter.
Cheers!
Why thank you Remco!
I figured sales pages are consistently the biggest & baddest thing marketing people are afraid of so I’d break them down to be friendlier.
Glad to have been a big help, and hope to continue :)
I can’t seem to find Step 3.
Same here…
Found it here :) – https://copywritingcourse.com/write-out-headlines/
Thank you Lesley!
Originally THIS post was Step 3, but I split up the “Figure out what you’re selling” and “Write 20+ headlines” step into two different steps.
If you click the regular blog, you’ll see all the steps in reverse chronological order:
https://copywritingcourse.com/blog/
Slowly seeing how this will become a sales page very cool process.
Do you have length recommendations for this?
Lesley found #3: https://copywritingcourse.com/write-out-headlines/.
Thanks
Thanks Scott!
Hey Kareen, I’ll be doing an entire post on the length of sales pages towards the end of this experiment.
You’ll see how when it all comes together, “length” is not really a factor.
We’ll even test the final page with real world analytics to see how it performs, and I’ll share some of the non-confidential findings such as heatmaps, page read time, and scroll maps!