Why Your Advertising Doesn’t Work

Advertising Is Not a a Magic Bullet.

BrianRooneyI come across people all the time that seem to have the expectation that once they start running online ads, their bank account should somehow magically fill to overflowing with $100 bills. It’s not entirely their fault. A lot of scammers, fools, and con-artitsts are out there running ads that make it look like our industry actually works that way.

Let’s Be Clear: 

Advertising Does Not Get Results
EFFECTIVE Advertising Gets Results

What are the critical elements that make any ad an EFFECTIVE ad?

  1. The Offer: Let’s face it. Your offer has to be something people actually want or need. (There is some wiggle room on how we define “want” and “need”).
  2. The Copy: The job of your ad copy is to get people to want to  know more. If your ad copy isn’t emotionally appealing, your ad isn’t going to do anything.
  3. The Call-To-Action: You have to TELL People what to do, how to order, how to learn more.

Some of this is a little bit of a mixture of science and art. This is why we constantly talk about Split-Run testing.

But some of this stuff should be obvious.

If your ad copy, banner copy, email copy, etc… doesn’t do SOMETHING to make prospects want to learn more, you’re kidding yourself.

NOBODY wakes up in the morning and says, “Ooooooooo … I hope I can find some links to click on for no apparent reason.”.

It is your job, as the ad creator and copy writer to make the prospect say, “I have to know more about this!”

We’ll all received those emails with nothing but a link in them, or maybe a “click here to get rich” line of nonsense. What do you do with them? Delete, of course!

Any time you are writing ad copy or designing a banner ad, keep this one thought in mind:

YOUR READER HAS ONE QUESTION: “WHAT’S IN IT FOR ME?”

If your ad is giving them a compelling reason to find out more, your ad will get people to click on it. Maybe the compelling reason is a free sample, free trial, free download. Maybe the compelling reason is a solution to a problem they are facing. NOTE: “How To …. ” subject lines work very well. Show people how to solve a problem or make life easier, and they take a look at your offer.

If your ad is not giving them a compelling reason to find out more, your ad will be very lonely.

Here are some more common sense things to be aware of:

  1. Check your Spelling! How do you expect people to think you’re a professional if your ad has a bunch of spelling mistakes?
  2. Don’t Lie! If your ad claims you can make tens of thousands of dollars in 25 minutes, everyone knows you’re not telling the truth.
  3. Double Check Your URL! I see ads all the time where the URL is either missing or incorrect! Even if someone does click, you lose them!
  4. Be Patient! Make a point of actually treating your advertising like a valuable business resource. Test your results. Run your ads repeatedly. Make changes and test again.

If you are serious about using advertising effectively, take the time to step back from the emotional part of why you are in your  business. (Nobody actually cares about that but you). Put yourself in the position of your prospects. What do THEY want to know? What will help THEM? What can get THEM to ask for more information?

Begin by writing your ad copy from that perspective. Test for results. Make changes. Test again.

Any successful advertiser has been through that process time and time again. It’s what we actually do, folks.