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Please consider this free-reprint article written by:
James Brausch
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Article Title: Long Copy Sucks And Other Heresies
Author: James Brausch
Word Count: 839
Article URL: http://www.isnare.com/?aid=47656&ca=Marketing
Format: 64cpl
Author's Email Address: support[at]glyphius.com (replace [at]
with @)
Easy Publish Tool: http://www.isnare.com/html.php?aid=47656
================== ARTICLE START ==================
I recently finished a massive study of profitable and
unprofitable sites. The average length of the profitable site's
sales letter was 1.8 pages. The average length of the
unprofitable site's sales letter was 2 pages.
Shorter ad copy was more profitable on average than long copy.
Of course that is heresy. Many, many famous copywriters swear
by long copy. Still� the study was valid and it is a fact�
known profitable sites had shorter copy than known less
profitable sites on average.
I then remembered that I had done a similar study way back in
June 2002. That study wasn�t based on profitability, but it was
comparing length of copy to an action� in that case, a click.
The shorter the anchor text (the clickable text), the higher
the click-thru rate... on average.
Still, I had a decision to make. Would I follow my own advice?
I thought about the hours that I had spent coming up with 10-13
pages of sales letter for the three products I recently
released. I thought about the hours I spent in Glyphius
optimizing each of the dozens of paragraphs. Could I really
just hack up those sales letters based on these two studies?
I realized that I wasn�t quite a believer yet. I needed some
backup data before I was willing to hack up my own sales
letters. Since the results were so heretical, I suspected that
most of you would also need some reeassurance that the study
was, in fact, valid� that I hadn�t read the numbers backwards
or something.
Then it came to me. Without spending the hours I usually do for
one of these studies, I thought of a way to validate it with a
different dataset.
Clickbank has just such a dataset! They know the profitability
of the sites in their network and they show them (loosely and
not completely documented) in that order in the marketplace.
I immediately went to check it out. I used the Money &
Employment category first since it is also the most profitable
category in the Clickbank marketplace. I went to each of the
first 10 sites and did a �Print Preview� and shoved the page
count into a spreadsheet. At the end, I graphed those 10 data
points and then superimposed a linear line on the graph.
The original study data was confirmed. As we went down the list
in order of receding profitability, we also increased in number
of pages of sales copy on average.
Then I quickly went to the Marketing & Ads category. This is
the category that many of us who sometimes sell to each other
(the incestuous market) use. I repeated the study once again.
The graph showed the same linear slope.
OK; I was convinced. I went over and hacked away at my
Glyphius.com sales letter. I got it down to a bit less than 3
pages from it�s old 13 pages. I read it. I was pleased with the
result. It tells what is being offered and let�s them order it.
It isn�t redundant. It doesn�t hide the price until �later� in
the sales letter. It�s the kind of page I like to order from
myself.
How did we get into this mess of believing the copywriting
�gurus� about long copy? It�s really a bizarre thing to be
teaching now that I look at it in retrospect.
My most successful ad copy has ALWAYS been short� no
exceptions. When 911 hit, I put up a page for Gas Masks (I
know� pretty cruddy thing to do� I feel bad now). I sold 340
gas masks in a 24 hour period of time. Did I write a long sales
letter? No; I put up a picture, said �Gas Mask: $235″ and
had an order link.
When I sold my Jaguar last year, did I write a 15 page sales
letter? No; I put an ad in the paper that said 2005 Jaguar,
10,000 miles, premo condition, $53,000 and included a phone
number (not the real details).
When I sold a house last year� the entire ad copy was much less
than a page.
When I sold seats to a $10,000/seat two day seminar, the ad
copy was only a slightly oversized post card.
Why do we think we should be writing a book to sell a $20
ebook? Who started that rumor? Has he been sufficiently flogged
yet? What a waste of time. I wonder how many ebooks have sales
letters that are longer than the ebook itself.
From now on... I'm not worried about the length of the sales
letter. I'll just tell about the product, give the guarantee,
show a customer testimonial and let them order it. If the
average profitable sales letter is only 1.8 pages long... and
the average profitable sales letter is shorter than the average
unprofitable sales letter... that's good enough for me.
About The Author: James D. Brausch recently released a 3 hour
online home study course (video format) on statistical
copywriting. The home study course includes his Glyphius
copywriting software. For more information, visit:
http://www.StatisticalCopywriting.com
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For more free-reprint articles by James Brausch please visit:
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