Arran Events, Advertising and Marketing

Imagine if you had no competition. Wouldn’t that make selling your product or service easy? Of course it would. So how do you eliminate your competition? Actually, the answer is simple I will explain in a moment but first ask yourself this.

How does Mercedes Benz sell any cars? What is the difference between a Mercedes and any other vehicle? Mercedes Benz has a drive train, engine, four wheels, etc. just like any other car. Physically, there is no difference. Yet Mercedes Benz sales thousands of cars per year for three times the price.

So how does Mercedes Benz do it? They don’t sell cars.

I know what you are thinking, “What do you mean they don’t sell cars! Sure look like cars to me!”

When you see someone driving a Mercedes Benz what do you think about that person? Successful, rich, an important person, right? How do you think that person driving the Mercedes Benz feels? They are probably thinking hey look at me I am somebody. They feel good about themselves, they are part of an elite group.

You see Mercedes doesn’t sell cars they sell a status symbol, a feeling, an emotional high. Mercedes eliminates their competition by shining a different light on themselves that separates them from the rest of the car makers.

So what does that mean for you? It means everything when you are promoting your business because you eliminate your competition by shining a different light upon yourself.

What is your niche? What do you offer that you competition does not? Finding and exploiting that niche is one of the keys to successfully promoting your business. I will explain an easy way to find your niche in a moment but first there is another concept you need to understand.

Once you have found your niche you need to let the public know about it. If nobody knows the benefit of your niche than you might as well have no niche at all.

So how do you find you niche? Easy.

I told you I would give you a simple way to find that niche and here it is.

In one column write down all the feature you offer your customer. Next to each feature write down the benefit the customer receives from that feature. Now, look at all the features and benefits and find the one that is unique or see what one you can make unique.

Give a try and give it some thought. You will be surprised at what you will come up with. However, finding your niche won’t do you a bit of good unless you know how to promote that niche.

That is the topic of my next article titled “Promoting your niche” you can view that article here.

Scott Shaper is a professional copywriter and has written numerous copy material for businesses looking to better promote themselves. You can visit his website at www.words-that-work.us

Tags: Adversting, business, copywriting, sales

So often, new business people will print custom designed threefold advertising brochures to give to new customers. I have seen new business owners spend two or $3000 doing this and defend only using half of them because they had changed their business or their prices.

It seems like an incredible waste of money and it may be smart to not print custom designed free folds glossy advertising brochures when you first start your business.

Having been in the franchising business for nearly 2 decades and launched our franchisees in hundreds of cities it became quickly apparent to me that even with our business model a basic virtual cookie-cutter there were regional variations in the things we had to change once we got started that made the brochures and valid.

And this is coming from a franchisor who specializes in everything been the same to protect the consistency and quality of our services that represent our brand name. If a franchisor warns against advertising brochures right out of the gate of a new business, the you can be sure they know what they’re talking about after setting up hundreds of units.

Regional variation is something that is very important and the best industry Association cannot tell you exactly what your response will be in your given community even based on the exact demographics and similar cities and other regions. You see, all politics is local and all small-business marketing campaigns must be personalized. Please consider this in 2006.

Lance Winslow

Tags: Advertising Brochure Designs, regional variation, small business, threefold advertising brochures

Your customer wants a cleaner kitchen, not a kitchen cleaner.

Your customers are interested in benefits, not features. So sell benefits in your sales letters.

The difference between a feature and a benefit comes down to this: A feature is what something does. A benefit is what something does for you.

Everything you have to say in your direct marketing sales letters boils down to features and benefits. With every piece of copy you write, however long or short your copy, you are always talking in terms of features and benefits.

When I worked on the Bell Mobility account, I discovered that the marketing folks at Bell have a policy of always presenting the benefit first, followed by the feature. I had usually written things the other way around. But they had a good policy.

For example, I would have said, “Digital Data2Go lets you receive email with your cellphone, saving you the hassle of finding a phone jack for your laptop whenever you need to check email while travelling.” Bell insisted that I present the benefit first, so I instead wrote something like this: “Never again waste time hunting for a phone jack when it’s time to check email while travelling. Digital Data2Go lets you receive email with just your cellphone.”

I think Bell has the right idea, although there are times when the feature needs to come first.

The tough part in all of this is translating features into benefits before you start writing. Some benefits are obvious. Others require some detective work to uncover. I learned that lesson all over again when I taught copywriting at the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies.

I gave my students an exercise that always turned up a surprising benefit. I told my class that the CN Tower in Toronto, Ontario, Canada was 1,815 feet and 5 inches tall. Their assignment was to come up with as many benefits as they could that related to that feature. Most of them stared at me.

Then they picked up their pens.

Slowly, they started to write.

Each time I ran the exercise, a student or two came up with a benefit that I had not thought of. Here are a few of the benefits of having the world’s tallest free-standing structure in your city:

• attract tourist dollars by charging for tours
• see the whole city from one vantage point
• generate revenue by selling souvenirs
• impress your date with dinner at the revolving restaurant
• host fundraisers (a race up the stairs to the top is a popular annual fundraiser)
• generate revenue from organizations that monitor the weather
• navigate around the city easily because the tower is a landmark visible from almost everywhere
• generate revenue from TV and radio companies by hosting their antennas on the communications deck
• improve the flow of traffic along the nearby Gardner Expressway by locating traffic cameras on the tower
• generate publicity by hanging a banner down the side of the structure

There were many more benefits, some worthy and some just wacky, but all of them were benefits of one kind or another. Together, they demonstrated that products and services, including yours, probably have more benefits than are apparent at first glance.

So hunt for those benefits that are relevant to your potential buyers and current customers. And remember this, every time you craft a sales letter: your client wants a 5/8 inch hole, not a 5/8 inch drill bit.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alan Sharpe is a business-to-business direct mail copywriter and lead generation specialist who helps business owners and marketing managers generate leads, close sales and retain customers using business-to-business direct mail marketing. Learn more about his creative direct mail writing services and sign up for free weekly tips like this at http://www.sharpecopy.com.

Tags: b2b, benefits, business to business, creative, direct mail, direct response, examples, features