In 2023, what 5 ideas can you, a content creator, apply from this old-school advertising book from 1942?
First, Why Should I Trust This Book?
– The contributions of Victor O. Schwab to the mail order ads of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie, helped make it a bestseller in the 1930s.
Note: How To Win Friends and Influence People sold over 30 million copies(1)(2) which makes it one of the best-selling books of all time.
It is also one of the 4 books that changed my life that I suggest to beginning entrepreneurs.
– How to Write a Good Advertisement is among the 9 books that the legendary copywriter Gary Halbert recommended in his 9 essential books to read for copywriters list.
Main Idea 5 Ad Fundamentals
Any ad whatsoever, needs to go through 5 steps to be effective, no more, no less, according to Victor.
They are(In Italics is my own description of the steps):
1. Get Attention (Neutrality stinks)
2. Show People an Advantage (Emotion)
3. Prove It (Logic)
4. Persuade People To Grasp This Advantage (Recall strongest points)
5. Ask For Action (No ask no act)
Following is the short general Idea of each of them and how you may apply it in your content.
1. Get Attention (Neutrality Stinks)
Forget Perfect Balance
If you enter a room and a chair is flipped, while the rest of the room is organized – You are going to definitely start thinking about why the chair is flipped.
If it’s in line with a table, you’re just going to pass on. It is the same with advertising(content). If your content is so symmetrically balanced that there’s nothing extraordinary about it, your reader will soon get bored by it.
Action
What can you make intentionally imperfect to attract attention in your next content piece?
Example: In the last video summary I left one headline with a grammar mistake by accident.
Now, in the next video, I may actually do that on purpose. 🙂
2. Show People An Advantage (Emotion)
To get attention is easier than to hold it.
If you want to hold attention – answer the reader’s question: “What’s in it for me?”.
Here’s a story showing how to do just that.
How To Get Anyone To Read Anything
Two copywriters Mr. Dyer and Max Hart had an arguement, and
Mr Dyer told Max,
“I will bet you 10$ I can write a solid page of newspaper copy and you will read every word of it.”
When Max scoffed at the idea he said:
“I don’t even have to write a line of copy to prove my point I will just tell you the headline. It’s All About Max Hart”
Action
In order to write about Max Hart, you need to know who Max Hart is.
That’s why I have prepared a fillable pdf for you, to help define your target audience in about 5 minutes
in case you don’t know who they are yet.
After defining the audience, here’s my question to you:
How can you illustrate the reader’s problems and vision of their solution in the opening as if you were speaking directly to him and his problems?
For example, In the opening of this piece I wrote:
what 5 ideas can you, a content creator, apply from this old-school advertising book, because of assuming you are always desperately looking for ideas to apply just as myself.
3. Prove It (Logic)
"Dr. Charles M. Edwards, Professor in The Graduate School of Retailing at New York University once stated: "The more facts you tell, the more you sell." "
To be persuaded to buy anything we need logical proof.
Why? Because:
1. We may not trust advertisers.
2. We need to justify the purchase to ourselves and others logically.
One example of persuasive logical proof is explaining “why” your product should work the way you claim.
Action
Explain “why” your product should work the way you claim.
For example, when presenting the Define Target Audience In About 5 Minutes PDF in the previous principle, I could say that I know that it takes 5 minutes, because that is approximately what it took me when I filled it out as a test.
4. Persuade People To Grasp This Advantage (Recall Strongest Points)
When your prospect already passed 1. Attention 2. Emotion and 3. Logic, another “small push” may be just what he needs to carry him from thought to action.
In other words, the re-stating of facts in a short, strong way, which the reader often already knows – pushes him to action.
Here’s an example:
How The League of Nations Was Formed
When Woodrow Wilson(U.S. President) wanted to Get Clemenceau(French Prime Minister) into the idea of The League of Nations, Clemenceau already knew the offer’s details, and opposed it.
But, simply by focusing on the one point that Clemenceau wanted – The ‘freedom of the seas’ without too much additional sales, Woodrow was able to reverse Clemenceau’s attitude Towards the league of Nations and get him to start supporting it.
Action
How will you re-state your product benefits briefly, to prepare readers emotionally for the call to action?
My example: In the Tested Advertising Methods video I could tell one sentence about each method at time 10:37 and draw an arrow to its board simultaneously to maintain animation flow. Then I could tie it to the CTA with saying something like, if you liked these ideas, imagine how many more you can get if you get 10 FREE Audiobooks.
Here’s how Nathan from Productivity Game summarizes his video (though he could tie it stronger to his CTA in my opinion).
5. Ask For Action (No Ask, No Act)
You Never Asked Me, Said Henry Ford
Henry Ford talking to an old friend was once suddenly asked: “Henry why don’t you ever buy any bolts from me?”
“Heck Joe” he replied, “you never asked me”.
Some salesmen may be very smooth and persuasive talkers, but they never ask for the sale, not wanting to be too pushy.
And so, the sales are never made.
Other times they do ask but they’re unclear like in the following example:
Come Visit Me SOMETIME Too
Did someone ever visit your home and said something to the likes of “I had a great time, you should come visit me SOMETIME too”? He may have sincerely wanted you to come, but, when is “sometime”…?
Maybe the word “never” would be a better fit here, because you have no hook, no definite date, and so, by inertia it just never happens…
Salesmen may say something like “visit our retailer”, when closing, and leave you to find out the address and the name of the retailer, maybe even the product you want to get.
Don’t be that guy.
Be Clear as a Sunny Day
Instead, present the definite action you want the audience to take, how and when they may do it.
For example, tell them how long it will take to read your PDF and when they should do it. (During lunch? Instead of another focused activity?)
Or
If promoting a few trial lessons of a course, state the link where they may get them (Make a different one for every CTA of course to make it trackable)
Famous YouTubers Demonstrate
Example: Many YouTube channels always ask for some sort of clear action in the end
(Might need more detail, but it is still very direct)
Action
How would you make the CTA in this video even more attractive? (Use the guidance from Be Clear As Sunny Day subhead)
Bonus: Backspace Disable Guide
I’ve found a way to actually disable the backspace key temporarily, to allow you to write without deleting!
Why would you want to do it?
In the last video summary I quoted Patt Flynn talking about creating a first draft which may explain it well (09:52-10:13):
I’ve made a step-by-step guide for you showing you how to temporarily disable your backspace right here.
Summing up
To write a good advertisement content piece
1. Get attention – Because content that is not watched is worthless
2. Get the emotion of your audience by stating “What’s in it for him”
3. Give them a logical justification by stating “why” your product should work
4. Restate everything briefly to refresh their memory
5. Ask for action clearly without room for doubt as to what the audience should do next.
One last thing to help you APPLY what you’ve learned.
How To Write a Good (Content Piece) 5 Fundamentals Fillable Workbook
I’ve made a FILLABLE workbook with the 5 principles of this blog post in case you want to keep your answers to the forms above private, or if you generally want to keep a record of them.
That’s my way to help you APPLY what you’ve learned.
I suggest you do that before reading any more theory so that you may also improve your content, and not just “know” how to improve it.
Thanks for reading and looking for ways to improve yourself!
Keep up the good work,
Yan.