Sugar-Free Methods for Selling With Words
Packing marketing documents with hyperbole and sensationalism is like bringing wedding cake to a casual potluck party. People are taken aback by the butter cream frosting, frilly edge treatments and impeccably placed rose petals. The sheer volume of sugar sets them up for a crash. Also, the bride and groom replica thing and the plastic pillar supports can be hard to swallow.
When it comes to offering quickly digestible and easily understood messages, it’s best to lay off of the puffery. Potential buyers want substance, clarity and brevity when making decisions about products like portal software or asset management applications.
Here’s how to de-fluff your marketing materials so your prospects know that you’re serious and committed – rather than a wild storyteller or worse, a prevaricator.
- Make claims after you’ve established familiarity with the prospect’s business problems and expertise in dealing with them.
- Honesty, brevity and matter-of-fact tone establish expertise and clear the air of smoke (or frosting).
- Understated selling works well because it’s honest, but it also stands out in the crowd of rah-rah materials.
- State benefits up high.
- Make sure benefits are in a language that the audience understands, and make sure that they address issues that prospects appreciate.
- Make clear connections between features and benefits.
- Tell a complete story. You never know how much or little a reader will ingest. Make sure that you provide all examples, features and benefits that will apply to your intended audience. If you leave out important information, you’ll alienate the one person who read the whole brochure and was looking for that one selling point.
- Make simple offers with a minimum of conditions.
Champagne, pomp, confetti and ribbon cutting are fine for political rallies and building dedications. Marketing writing should be kept simple and unadorned, though. The subject matter will provide the right amount of interest to the right prospects.
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