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:
I used to run a decent sized rave company that sold light up and glow stuff online. It was called HouseOfRave (Hey....I started it in high school and it was the best name I could come up with:
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 Copywriting Course" 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!
P.S. What questions do you currently have about writing sales pages? Ask them below:
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