8 Timeless Principles of Successful
Marketing To Boost Your Sales Online
or Offline

Here’s what I’ve discovered about how to write advertising that sells after studying the results of Billions of Dollars of scientific direct response split-tests…and them applying to my clients businesses.

Ready for it? Let’s dive in…


1. Find out what people want and give it to them

– Don’t just assume you know what your prospects want – do research. A great place to do this is on the online forums where your target market hangs out. That’s because people will be honest and candid about what they really think and want on these largely anonymous online forums.


2. Speak to your prospects biggest problems and burning desires

–Once you have discovered your prospects’ burning desires and biggest challenges make your marketing centred on proving you can help them solve those problems or fulfil their desires.


3. Proof is what sells in marketing

–Focus on proving what you say is true to an increasingly sceptical market place. Banish hype and the excessive use of exclamation marks etc. Remember what David Ogivly said to his male ad executives back in the 1960’s “the customer is not stupid, she’s your wife”. For this reason make a cogent proof laden argument for ‘why’ folks should choose you.


4. Trumpet your Uniqueness

– Because we are in such a saturated market where folks receive over 3,000 marketing messages a day it’s important you offer a unique way of solving people’s problems or giving them what they want. Display this uniqueness in your headline.


5. Create easy first steps

– Rather than trying to sell your product immediately offer a free report, CD or DVD etc. on a topic of burning interest to your target market. Then once they’re on your database you have a potential customer for life. You’ll find that this will give you a much more profitable business than going ‘straight for the sale’.


6. Create Irresistible Offers

– The Godfather of direct response advertising Claude Hopkins said we should make our offers ‘so irresistible that only a maniac could refuse them’. A great way to do this is by adding bonuses or discounts with strictly enforced deadlines. There is nothing like a deadline on an offer to spike response.


7. Practice Chameleon marketing

– A great way to make your advertising more effective is to make it look like it’s NOT advertising because people have trained themselves to ignore advertising when they see it. For example, don’t make your display ad look like an ad – make it look like an editorial. You will find that if you take this “chameleon approach” to marketing you will get up to 200% percent higher response


8. Test and measure everything

– Business expert Brad Sugars has found just by tracking the results of your sales campaigns you can increase your results by up to 16 percent. The biggest breakthroughs in business come when you test and measure new approaches. Then once you discover what works – milk it for all it’s worth.