Writing an Effective Sales Page
There’s a big difference between getting traffic to your site and getting customers to actually purchase something from you. If you’re only going the ad route, using AdSense or Clickbank or any other type of site to earn some PPC revenue, then traffic is your main concern. But if you have products to sell, then you need to do a lot more than convince people to stop by.
Someone once said the pen is mightier than the sword. And while this person undoubtedly had never been stabbed by a hard piece of steel, he was still onto something – the power of the written word compels you! It really does.
However, many people attempting to sell products assume that the product speaks for itself and all they have to do is yell and scream and type in bold print with weird 64pt font and the sell is automatic. Not so fast, my friends. There’s an art to writing an effective sales page, and it has nothing to do with urging folks to buy your product.
You’ll hear that the so-called all-important “call to action” is a powerful tool that can sell ice to Eskimos, sand to camels and even online casino games to a blackjack site.
Okay, let’s see how well that works.
Buy this product now for $99.99!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s going fast!!!!!!!!! Everyone wants it!!!!!! They need it!!!!!!! You need it too!!!!!
Yeah, that’s an epic fail, especially when we’re talking about big red letters. But don’t get it twisted; the art of subtly doesn’t rightly work either. What it takes is clean grammar, assertiveness, a product that’s actually worth a customer’s money, and a strong pitch that shows off aspects of the product that will improve their lives.
The trick here is to start out telling a little bit of something about your product. Keep it all short, simple and clean. No big words, no long sentences, and no flamboyant punctuation or print. Just the facts, ma’am.
Next up, never list your sales price until the end of the page, where the “buy now” button or link will be located. Showing the price early makes people immediately think they don’t want to spend that much, and thus they probably won’t continue reading. But offering some concise literature about the product, some bullet-point positive attributes and some scenarios in which this product can help their lives will make the customer feel as if they need the product.
Also, don’t get carried away with the “slashed” price. Don’t put a picture up of a $500 graphic and sell your product for $39.99. Why is it so cheap? Can you not sell it for $500 if it’s worth $500?
Last but not least, stand by your product. Don’t simply espouse its virtues; offer a money-back guarantee and let it be known that you’re serious about its effectiveness from the onset.
If you can keep it clean, light, true to the product, and refrain from using any big-letter, big-slashing tactics, then you can write a great sales page that will lead to people clicking that PayPal button.
