Entries from February 2009 ↓

Dear Copywriter,

I’ve got a newsletter that just isn’t growing. I’m busy posting my site on free advertising sites and I’m even paying for advertising, but I’m not getting any new sign-ups. What can I do?

Yours sincerely.

Billy-No-Mates

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Dear Billy-No-Mates,

First off, you’re not alone. I know you are working hard but sadly that doesn’t mean you will be guaranteed success. You need to consider long-term ways to grow your list.

My favourite way to grow a subscriber list is through giving away articles.

Website and blog owners are always looking for content to share with their web visitors. So, there are places called Article Directories (basically a library of free articles) where they can go to find articles that they can use – free. I’m sure you’ve heard of Ezine Articles? Well, that is just one – search Google under ‘free article sites’ for more.

All you have to do is write and submit your articles to these websites.

In case you were wondering just how that will help grow your subscriber list, I was just coming to that bit.

Once you have written your article you can then complete the Author Bio which goes at the end the article (see below for an example). This section is where you can sell yourself and talk about your business. But instead of your author bio linking directly to the main page of your site, link it to a page where you have a signup box for your newsletter.

Ta-da! Now everyone who clicks through that link will be taken to the page where you can offer them your wonderful newsletter (with a great incentive they can’t pass up.) and your newsletter list will grow.

So there you go – happy article writing.

Sally Ormond is a professional UK freelance copywriter, website copywriter, SEO copywriter and advertising copywriter with extensive experience in B2B and B2C copywriting markets. She can be contacted at +44(0)1449 779605 or at sally@briarcopywriting.com for any copywriting project you may have.

Direct response copywriting is everywhere and can take several different forms – such as a direct-mail campaign or direct response ads.

In this blog on direct response copywriting I’m going to show you what it entails.

Many companies employ direct response copywriting so you must make sure that you have different ways for your advertising to stand up.  When you are doing direct response copywriting, you should make sure that you are writing to your reader as you would write to a friend so it needs to be conversational.

There are no hard and fast rules as to how long your writing should be – instead you should write until what you need to say has been said.

Direct Response Copywriting Formula

OK, as the advert says here comes the science bit.

There are three main parts usually attributed to a direct response letter:

• The headline – this must be attention grabbing.
• The offer – make sure you explain in great detail what a person will receive if they take you up on your offer.
• The postscript – this is where the incentive goes for someone to respond immediately to your offer.

The key behind direct response copywriting

The key is that you want the person to immediately respond to the offer that you have presented.

Good freelance copywriting for the direct response market is achieved by focusing on the three main parts such as the headline, the offer, and the postscript. Get these right and you’ll be setting yourself up for a high success rate.

Direct response copywriting can be very effective and produce great sales for you if it is done correctly.