How NOT To Scare People

All the time I come across sales letters which try to use FEAR ineffectively.

Its a common misconception that you need to scare the willies out of someone, and then when they’re scared stupid they’ll do ANYTHING so they dont have to be scared.

But remember the old saying “You Must Enter The Conversation That’s ALREADY Going On In Your Prospect’s Head”.

So if you push it too far then they’ll just tune out. What you say must be in tune with what they’re already thinking.

Here, let me give you an example. I’m currently writing a letter for a client who has a course on getting better rentals returns from investment properties.

So I COULD have written about how falling rents or high rentals could end up costing them their investment property PLUS their own home. And how they could be forced into cheap rental accomodation, their entire family into a 1 bedroom unit living off canned food.

But that wouldn’t be realistic, would it. Most people will never come close to this, and what could have been a believable story would have been nonsense.

But what my research revealed is that people are worried about losing face. Having to sell their investment, or cash flow becoming very tight and their children missing out on their activities (I led with this one!). What will their friends and families think?

These are realistic fears, and they’re already playing on my prospect’s mind so they create a believable story.

You see, you’re not there to put new fears into your prospect’s heads. When you write your own advertising your job is to play on the fears that are already there. Put them into words and stories. And now we’ve painted real fears, we can go about showing them how we eliminate them with our product or service.

Next week I’m talking about PRIDE. A very strong emotion you can use to great effect in your advertising.

All the best,

HTsignature1