People have been writing letters since time immemorial. Originally, letters were meant for exchanging personal notes to and from people of various distances. As time evolved, the letter has accumulated different interesting functions, and perhaps the most interesting function of all is its value in business. The prime example of letters used in a business is the sales letter, a viable tool that opens your business to great expanses in ways that are different from other marketing channels.
Because sales letters have been observed to be quite effective in a lot of businesses, many entrepreneurs have joined the letter-writing bandwagon and created their own sales letters. However, not all sales letters became as effective as their authors had hoped. These letters were often written haphazardly, without proper thought in place. There are certain things needed so that a sales letter could be effective.
Here are some tips to make your sales letter effective:
1. Maintain a Trustworthy Tone – the first thing you want from your sales letter readers is their trust because once you win their confidence they will be more willing to transact business with you. A classic way of gaining your readers’ trust is by including testimonials that show that your products or services really work. You may also look for other techniques that would allow your prospects to put confidence in you.
2. Establish Your Credibility – your readers should not only trust you, but they should also believe that what you are saying is very much grounded and has a firm basis. You need to till them how sure you are that your offerings do deliver what they promise. Perhaps you can include case studies or success stories regarding the performance of your products and services. You need to show evidence that you are indeed as good as you say so.
3. Make the Letter Unforgettable – people do not really respond to sales letters immediately, it may take days, months, or even years before a prospect actually makes the move in response to your sales letter. People might not need your product or they might not be interested during the time they received your letter. But you have to make sure that they would remember your letter when the times comes that they would need your offerings. Include interesting tidbits that would make people easily recall your letter when the time comes.
4. Make it Catchy – while the old adage says that one should not judge a book by its cover, people do judge things by their appearances and not so much by their contents. A plain and boring letter would not catch the attention of your readers. You want to make your sales letter pleasing to the eye as it is to the mind. Colors, pictures, and other interesting things are indispensable in sales letters. Just do not go overboard and make a chaotic abstract painting out of your letter, otherwise people might find it too distracting to read.
5. Make it Easy for Your Readers – you might gain your readers’ trust, make them believe you, catch their attention, or ingrain your letter on their minds. But you also have to tell your readers what to do next. You should make it easy for your readers to respond to your sales letter. Give clear instructions on how to contact you using all popular channels whether via email, snail mail, fax, or telephone. Just be sure that all these channels are working well so that you would not lose any prospect and you can easily get back to them.
6. Add Bonuses – people are suckers for freebies and rewards and thus it is usually wise for you to include incentives for responses to your sales letter. Provide special discounts, gifts, or other offers for acting to your sales letter. Better yet, give rewards to the early birds so that people would respond immediately.
7. Personalize – people are very vain and they usually respond well when they are addressed personally. But by all means, avoid using automatic mail merging. People are smarter these days.
A good sales letter can bring your business a long, long way. It may not be long until responses from your prospects begin to pour, allowing your business to boom in no time.
