How to Start Writing Effective Sales Letters

What should you do in order to start writing effective sales letters? If you are considering spending hundreds, or even thousands of dollars, to put the letters into the hands of prospective customers, you could be wasting your money without following some basic techniques.

Over the years I’ve attended seminars read, books, and have done pretty much everything I can, other than take a job as a copywriter, to improve my ability to write sales letters. I will still be the first to admit that I’m not the best when it comes to professional writing, but I have become effective in the markets where I work.

I’ve been asked by many small business owners that I’ve worked with over the years to review their copy, or to help them write a sales letter. I very much enjoy being able to offer suggestions and point out techniques that I’ve learned that will improve the effectiveness of their letters.

Most people could do very well with sales letters if they would just learn some basics that they can apply on a consistent basis. So, what are the basics and how do you acquire them?

First, you need to know to whom you are writing. If you already have a business you probably know more about your business, product, service and customer than anybody else. Writing with that understanding is easy. A good technique is to make a list of the characteristics of your customers, your products and so on. It will help you to become better organized. Second, do some or all of the following:

1. Get books written by successful professionals such as Richard Benson, Dan Kennedy, Joe Sugarman and others that you can read and learn from.

2. Apply your own insight, intuition, observations and common sense, especially with respect to how it applies to the characteristics of your customers, products, services, etc.

3. Translate what you know and discover about selling and communicating in person to communicating in print.

4. Build a huge “swipe file”, with sample ads, and sales letters. You don't need much creativity to write letters, you only need to be good at recycling and reorganizing ideas, themes, words and phrases. Keep in mind that for most small businesses, you don't need the same skill level that top copywriters working for Fortune 500 companies need. You will typically be competing in an environment where the top copywriters are not involved. You may have heard the saying that "In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king."

Most professional sales letter writers give themselves the advantage of careful, thorough preparation and you should too. Here are some general ideas to help you get started:

1. Don't be intimidated by the idea or process of writing. There is no magic to it and you don’t need to be a genius.

2. Recognize the value and power of your unique understanding of your business, products, services and customers.

3. Assemble and organize ideas and samples in a swipe file.

4. Assemble and organize good reference materials.

5. Sales letters are just sales presentations in print, so “think selling”. Successful selling experience helps. If you don't have a selling mentality, get one by reading some good books about selling.

6. Write! Don't worry about writing a letter from start to finish, just write blocks of copy. A lot of great sales letters are done by cutting and pasting.

7. Avoid perfectionism. In most businesses, for most purposes, you don't need a perfect sales letter to get good results.

If you need some suggestions on what to read so you will have a good set of guidelines to follow when writing, feel free to contact me. By doing some preparation before you start to write and following some basic guideline you may not produce the best sales letter in the world, but you will be able to write something that works. And, the more you write, the easier it will get.