“4 Questions To Ask To Make Sure Your Advertisingand Marketing Doesn’t Suck”

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Joe McVoy

Ask these 4 questions to make sure your marketingdoesn’t suck!

Most all marketing done by large companies totallysucks!

And all the marketing done by small companies isterrible.

So, how do I know?

First, I’m certifiably old – 67 years old – so I’ve hadplenty of time to make a lot more mistakes than youand see more rotten marketing.

There you go, an advantage to being old . . .

but I digress . . .

what were we talking about? another advantage ofage, we can always claim dementia, mad cow, orsomething else to cover forgetting . . .

OK, back on topic . . .

Most, if not very close to all businesses have no idea if their advertising and marketing is working or not sohere’s how to tell.

There are 4 steps to an effective advertisement or marketing campaign – and these assume you aretracking your results at every step – which very few companies ever do . . .

But that’s a topic for another post.

Here’s what your marketing needs to do:

1. “Interrupt” your prospect

You have to get their attention or your marketing will be ignored just like the other 10,000 advertisingmessages we are all exposed to every day.

This is actually something big companies and ad agencies do very well.

Just look at the Super Bowl ads

They all are entertaining and engaging. Although they cost a couple million per 30 second spot, agenciesjustify the expense by the “reach” or the millions of people watching . . .

There is even a contest after the Super Bowl to see which ads we most liked.

Typical agency thinking.

Most liked?

How about which ad created the most sales?

They would all lose to a typical late night infomercial. Super Bowl ads don’t create sales, they only do“branding” which is agency-speak for “you can’t fire us if you can’t measure the results of our ads”.

Back to the Super Bowl ads – the only ones where I can actually remember the advertiser – are theBudweiser ads with the Clydesdales and puppies. They are fun to watch and are great stories andentertainment.

But . . .

I ask you, did you switch your beer preference due to the ads?

Do you know anyone who did?

I love the ads but hate the beer – I suppose they will justify the multimillion dollar expense by saying theyare targeted to existing Bud drinkers to make them feel good about their beer . . .

A strategy only Billion dollar companies can afford . . .

The next thing any advertising or marketing needs to do is:

2. Engage Your Prospect to Make Sure They Keep Watching, Reading or Listening to your message

In print copywriting they say they say it this way:

- the purpose of the headline is to get your reader to read the next sentence

- the purpose of that sentence is to get your reader to read the next sentence

- and so on until they follow the “slippery slide” all the way to your close and the “call to action” where youmake the sale and the prospect buys.

Back to the Super Bowl ads, they do well at this step too; they keep you engaged and watching the ad, butthat’s where it all stops.

because the next step is to:

3. Educate your prospect as to why they should buy what you sell

The only way big companies do this is to try to make you feel like the only way to be “cool” is to buy theirproduct.

Infomercials do a great job of this by providing proof their product does what they say it does, providingvisual proof and many testimonials from people like you who have gotten great results.

Remember the Veg_O-Matic, the Sham-Wow, or any of dozens of other TV infomercial products?

To sell on TV, you need a product that can be visually demonstrated along with lots of testimonials andproof.

Two commercials from 20 years ago are still in my head yet today:

ONE

One advertised an oil additive that protects your engine even if you run out of oil. The demo was awesome(being a guy) they took a Dodge Viper – a $100,000 car and, after adding their product to the oil, theydrained all the oil out of the engine. . .

then they poured a bucket of sand on top of it . . .

and started the car and did a couple laps on a racetrack!

How cool was that!

I bought some immediately.

TWO

the second was also a car product – it was a car wax that claimed to protect your car’s finish better thananything ever invented.

Their visual demonstration was amazing.

They waxed a $200,000 Ferrari with their wax, and then

poured gasoline all over the car and lit it on fire!

After the firemen put out the fire with their fire extinguishers, they took a rag to the now totally blackenedcar, wiped off the black charred surface and underneath was a shiny red finish!

Totally amazing and convincing.

I bought that product too.

Both these ads are great examples of educating your prospect as to what your product does. Grantedinfomercials need to be visually dramatic, but whatever it is you sell can also benefit from educating yourprospects.

I’ve done consulting for many clients and it works to create a report, web site, or other way to educate yourprospect about how to buy what it is you sell.

If your product sucks, this won’t work, but I’ve done reports for clients to explain to prospects about how tobuy the product or service I’m selling.

As long as your product is the obvious choice once a prospect knows all the facts about your product andyour competitior’s, this works great.

If your product or service is not the best, your issue is not marketing but is making your product or servicebetter.

Any advertising, publicity or promotion of a sub-optimal product that sucks will just spread the word you are

no good.

So, as my client, I’d tell you to fix the product first before marketing it . . .

So, the last step, and one almost every ad or marketing campaign forgets is to

4. Ask for the order

An effective Call-To-Action is one that gets the person reading, listening or watching your marketing to stopwhat they are doing and BUY! NOW!

On of my favorite copywriters, John Carlton, describes it this way . . .

Your job as an advertising copywriter (print media example) is to hook the reader into reading your copy.

Then, the copy flows so well that he/she follows the slippery slide all the way to the “close”.

At the close they buy.

His example of the hurdle you need to cross is to imagine an overweight guy lying on his couch watchinghis favorite team in a playoff game.

He started reading your sales letter during a commercial, but now, the game is back on and his team isgetting ready to make a score to win the game . . .

Your copy needs to be so compelling that he forgets about the game, drags his sorry ass off the couch,gets the phone, mutes the TV and places his order!!

SUMMARY

No, I don’t expect you to be able to write sales copy that good, but look at whatever you are doing now. Doyou even try to do these 4 steps?

You can always hire me to do it for you, but I’m just one person with limited time and a lazy streak – youwill have to tempt me with mucho bucks to get me to work on your marketing . . .

You can evaluate any ad or marketing in 30 seconds by just asking yourself if it does these 4 stepseffectively. Most don’t.

You can reach me at 720-890-8760 or at joemcvoy@gmail.com

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Joe McVoy

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