Secrets of Copywriting Seminar:
Fundamentals for Direct Marketing

Get into Your Customer’s Mind

• Where great copy starts (Hint: It’s NOT in the marketing department)
• Beyond demographics and psychographics: How to find out what customers and prospects are truly thinking and feeling
• How knowing what people are looking for will power up your vocabulary
• Leveraging the power of both branding and direct for super results

Develop a Winning Concept

• Does your copy address customer needs, wants, fears? How to turn features into benefits
• Examining lists, offers, and creative: Are they the solution – and not the problem?
• It’s all about relationships: The power of copy to turn prospects into lifelong customers
• Are you unknowingly failing to differentiate between end user, decision influencer, and decision-maker?
• Know what you’re really selling – and use this insight to create viable, compelling offers
• The hard-to-ignore role campaign goals play in developing offers and strategies
• Creating the Selling Hypothesis and Positioning Statement – 2 building blocks of great creative
• Pitfalls in concept development – and how to avoid them

Never Underestimate the Power of Words in Direct Marketing

• Identifying – and overcoming – common challenges that make writing difficult
• How to determine and set up your ideal writing environment – and double your effectiveness
• Simple tips the pros use to break through writer’s block and start writing
• Essential editing advice for making copy succinct – even dramatic

Apply the Long-Standing Principles of Effective Copywriting

• New challenges our “visual society” presents and how you must adapt your copy
• How to get the information and resources you need to succeed – starting with the creative brief
• Stop wasting time! Rules of thumb for writing more efficiently
• Is your audience B-to-B or B-to-C? How your approach must change
• Writing subheads and heads that draw attention like a magnet
• The problem with using humor and puns – be careful!

Develop a DM Package That’s Right on Target

• The essential components of an effective DM package and how to integrate them
• Tricks of the trade for getting envelopes opened
• Organize your letter copy and establish rapport with the reader – 2 useful formulas
• Your concept’s great – but does the look and feel of your letter copy support it?
• 20 titles for reply forms that will get customers so excited about the offer they respond
• The often-overlooked – but vital – difference between a lift letter and buckslip

DAY 2
9:00 A.M. - 4:00 P.M.

Create Interactive E-Mail, Ads, and Web sites

• Keys for creating a brochure that brings your concept to life and sells
• How to stand out in a crowded marketplace using folds, die-cuts and other production techniques
• Which direct mail secrets work in cyber world … which don’t … and why
• 4 E’s for tackling your toughest challenges when writing “virtual” copy
• 8 truths about online media
• What many writers don’t know about avoiding spam filters and getting messages opened and read
• Achieving greater click-through – little-known techniques that will pay off big time
• New strategies for tackling the tough challenge of online advertising
• Understanding ad formats – and how to make the most of limited space
• Copy strategies for creating Web sites that are welcoming and easy-to-navigate
• Beware of the 8-second rule when writing online copy
• How to integrate your media to give your campaign consistency, momentum, and oomph
• 9 important rules for writing successful online copy
• 10 proven ways to generate leads online
• 10 proven ways to get leads online
• What copywriting – and your job – is really all about in the end

Start Applying This Career-Building Knowledge Right Now!

• Individual and group exercises to help you develop your newly enhanced writing/editing and concept-development abilities
• Group critiques and discussions of samples you’ve brought from work — ideas and suggestions you can take back with you and put to immediate, practical use