Direct Mail Sales Letter_example.doc

Tips for Writing Effective Direct Mail Sales Letters 1. Read the following tips for writing effective Direct Mail sales letters and rank them from 1 to 15, that is, from the one you consider the most useful and relevant to the least important: How to Write Effective Direct Mail Sales Letters               

Make sure the message matches the needs of the target audience. Get rid of the general information, you risk losing the reader, so get to the point. Be clear and concise, avoid sophisticated words and unessential information. Don’t focus on product features, focus on product benefits. Make it personal and conversational, formal letters won’t help much. Try to generate a response, not yet a sale, you’re only trying to open doors now, selling is the next step. Don’t forget the postscript (P.S.), most readers check the P.S. before they actually get to read the letter, so re-state your offer in the P.S. Make it reader-friendly, use white space, short paragraphs, and bullets, nobody reads big chunks of text. Don’t write more than one page. Make a ‘no-risk’ offer, that is, offer free information, product samples, an article, some tips, etc. Don’t forget the deadline; it usually increases the rate of responses. Call to action, ‘Call our free number … for a free consultation’. Send pre-paid postage reply mail, don’t lose a response or even an order for the cost of a single stamp. Include a guarantee, it offers integrity and credibility to your products or services. Include testimonials of satisfied end users, but if you use their names, make sure you get their signed authorization. Adapted from ‘How to Write Effective Direct Mail Sales Letters’, by Brad Dunn

3. Read the following letter. Tick from the tips above the ones that you think the writer of this letter has taken into account. Do you think it could be a successful sales letter? Discuss in pairs. abridged and adapted from www.instantsalesletters.com

1

Dear Friend, How much is one good sales letter worth to your business? Suppose you could sit down, write a simple letter to your prospects and customers, mail it and then have your phone start ringing off the hook. Imagine...one letter could bring you tons of hot leads and new customers, get them to keep buying over and over again, reactivate ‘lost’ customers, and even provide you with a constant stream of referrals. So anytime you need more business - you simply turn the tap on... it’s like having the goose that lays the golden egg. Sounds too good to be true? Well, it isn’t if you have the right tools. You see, dollar-for-dollar, nothing provides a better return on investment than direct mail and it doesn’t matter what product or service you sell. TIME OUT: Before we go any further, go ahead and sign up for a free mini-course called "7 Direct Mail Secrets Guaranteed To Create A Stampede of New Business!" It's a 3-part email course sent to you every other day. Discover the little-known secrets to direct mail success and how to avoid the critical mistakes that spell failure for any campaign-and lots more! There's no obligation. It's a free gift only for a limited time. Your first lesson will be delivered to email box instantly. Plus, you'll get our Surefire Marketing Secrets Ezine filled with all-new, 100% original marketing tips and strategies to skyrocket your sales! You can unsubscribe at anytime -- but I don't think you'd want to because of reader comments like these: "This is great. 93% of the others I receive are a waste of time and I barely read them. I read this with interest all the way through." - Bob Bly Think about it. A sales letter is the most powerful employee you could ever hire. For about the price of a cup of coffee - it will relentlessly go out and deliver your message perfectly, every time. It will never call in sick. It will never complain. And it will never quit on you. Simply put, a powerful sales letter is like having a little automatic, money-making robot working for you, tirelessly...day and night. But Creating That Winning Sales Letter Is The Hard Part... It could take you years and can cost you a small fortune to figure out just the right combinations that make some sales letters work - while others fall flat on their face. But instead of knocking yourself out trying to come up with just the right sales letter, you can now have an entire collection of hard-hitting, profit-generating sales letters for your business, ready at your beck and call. "Instant Sales Letter Templates" In just 2 ½ minutes you can fill-in-the-blanks of these simple (yet extremely powerful) sales letter templates instead of staring at a blank piece of paper. At Last! Every Sales Letter You Need Is Already Written For You... Maybe you’re a sales rep looking to attract more leads...no problem! Just click on the Business to Business folder and you'll instantly have access to a powerful lead generating letter that pulls in qualified prospects like paperclips to a super-charged magnet. Never cold call again! Now, No Matter What Product or Service You Have To Sell You’ll Find A Sales Letter That’s Already Written For You... But get ready for a shock. These sales letters are unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. If you’re expecting some boring collection of business letters, like those available at any bookstore or on a CD-Rom, you’ve got another thing coming. You won’t produce sales using those outdated, boring letters -- with their stodgy writing: "In reply to your letter dated... and pursuant to... and wherein... blah...blah...blah"

2

These letters may get you an ‘A’ in English class - but I can guarantee you they’ll never sell any of your products or services! So unless you’re looking to help subsidize the post office - you need to use sales letters that sell. With Instant Sales Letters, you’ll get all of these, plus 49 more hard-hitting, profit-generating sales letter templates guaranteed to produce results for you, every time you send them out. And it doesn’t matter if you own a professional practice, service company, retail store, restaurant, or even sell business to business. Okay, So What’s The Cost For This Incredible Resource? Well, realize that this collection of sales letter templates could easily sell for thousands of dollars. In fact if you asked a top copywriter, like myself, to produce 39 sales letters for your business, you’d be charged in the neighborhood of $10,000 to $50,000.00, not including royalties. But I’m not going to charge you anywhere near that amount or even my minimum project price. In fact, your total investment for all 39 money-making, fill-in-the-blank sales letter templates is just $39.97. The money you’ll earn as a result of these proven letters can very easily pay you back hundreds (probably thousands) times your meager investment. This manual actually started out just as a personal resource to use whenever I sat down to write copy for a client or my own company. In fact, I really wasn’t planning on making this available until a fellow marketer pleaded, "I gotta have a copy!" And it’s true; this is the kind of resource I would have killed for when I was starting out. 100% Risk-Free Guarantee: Your success in using these powerful, pre-done sales letter templates is completely guaranteed. In fact, here’s my 100% Better-Than-Risk-Free-Take-it-To-The-Bank Guarantee: If you aren't 100% satisfied - I don't expect...or want...to keep your money. Simply send off a quick email to me and I'll happily refund your money in full. But even if you decide the letters aren't for you - the free bonus gifts are yours to keep regardless, as a "thank you" gift from me. That means you can't lose no matter what! Is that fair or what? That means you can try out all the sales letters at my risk, while you see if they work for you or not. And if they don’t produce, I honestly want you to ask for your money back. And I’ll let you keep the free bonus gifts as my way of thanking you for giving the sales letters a try. There is absolutely no risk, whatsoever on your part. The burden to deliver is entirely on me. If you don’t produce immediate profits using these instant sales letters then I’m the loser, not you. Look at it this way -- $39.97 is really a painless drop in the bucket compared to the money you’re going to waste on ineffective mailers and marketing this year. That’s why... You Really Can’t Afford Not To Invest In These Instant Sales Letter Templates! Get ready to create a flood of new customers, get them to buy over and over, and refer others just by using these powerful sales letters. Why not take 2 ½ minutes now to create a powerful sales letter for your business? Order Now! Sincerely, Yanik Silver P.S. Click here if you've decided not to order. P.P.S. Just think! You’ll never again suffer through the pain and hassle of trying to write a powerful sales letter yourself. Or pay big bucks hiring a top copywriter. Now, you can get everything all done for you, practically handed to you on a silver platter. You simply fill-in-the-blanks...and you’re done in about 2 ½ minutes -- flat!

3