The Winning AdVantage eZine: An Internet Marketing Secret: Using Tie-Downs to Increase Sales

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THE WINNING ADVANTAGE eZINE
Sunday, July 3, 2005
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The Winning AdVantage eZine is dedicated to your Home-based Internet Marketing Business Success.

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Published by Earl Savage
ES World Marketing
http://www.esworldmarketing.com/blog/ezine/
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In This Issue:
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1. Message from the Editor

2. Feature Article - "An Internet Marketing Secret: Using Tie-Downs to Increase Sales"
by Mike Adams

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Dear Reader,

Thanks and WELCOME!

As always, I hope you'll enjoy and profit from reading "The Winning AdVantage".
Please feel free to post your comments at the bottom of this blog post. I am here
to help and welcome any help or advice you may offer.

Cordially yours,
Earl Savage, Publisher
The Winning AdVantage eZine
winning@esworldmarketing.com

P.S. If you like this ezine, please forward it to your friends, downline, upline, etc.
If you have ideas for improving it, please let me know. I'd love to hear from you.

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=>> Feature Article
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An Internet Marketing Secret: Using Tie-Downs to Increase Sales
Copyright 2005 Mike Adams

If you could get your prospective customers nodding their
heads in agreement with every major point in your sales
copy, that would be likely to increase your sales, wouldn't
it?

If you could get people saying "yes" to almost any
marketing statement of your choosing - long before they
even get to the close - that would be valuable to you,
right?

Did you find yourself agreeing with the last two questions?
You've just experienced a sales technique called
"tie-downs."  One very old direct sales principle is to get
people to say yes to multiple little questions.  This gets
them agreeing with you and also gets them used to saying
yes.  Psychologically, they will then be more likely to say
yes when you ask for the sale.  One sales technique for
achieving that is the tie-down.

Why use a technique from direct sales in direct marketing?
In a famous advertising and marketing story, Albert Lasker
was a junior partner at the Lord and Thomas advertising
agency in 1905 when he read a note from John E. Kennedy
declaring that Kennedy knew the secret of what advertising
is.  Kennedy, a former Canadian mounted policeman, was new
to copywriting and not yet known in advertising circles.
But by an interesting quirk of fate, this was the question
Lasker had been trying to figure out.  Lasker met Kennedy,
and Kennedy declared that the secret is, "Advertising is
salesmanship in print."  Lasker and Kennedy went on to
revolutionize advertising and marketing forever with those
words, and Lord and Thomas became one of the most famous
advertising agencies of the day.

No matter how many people are visiting your website and
reading your marketing material, you are still talking to
only one person at a time.  You are still selling one
person.  This sounds like a simple concept, but many
advertising and marketing people still don't get this
secret.  That means that if you understand this, you have
an advantage in Internet marketing.  You understand that
advertising is salesmanship in print.  And you know that
you just need to talk with this one person and get their
agreement to purchase your product.  And with the power of
the Internet, you can do this with dozens, hundreds, even
thousands per day.

Tie-downs are one of the first tools to add to your new
salesmanship toolbox.  A tie-down is a short phrase that
can be added to a statement to turn it into a question.
You use a tie-down to turn a point that you want to make
into a question that your prospect will agree with.  It's
one way of getting your prospective customer to start
saying yes long before you go for the close.

A few examples of common tie-downs include:

Isn't it?
Wouldn't it?
Wouldn't they?
Wouldn't you?
Aren't they?
Aren't you?
Wouldn't you agree?
Don't you agree?
Can't you?
Couldn't it?
Doesn't it?
Right?

If you have been marketing for very long, you have heard
about the concept of "features versus benefits."  Features
are what your product has or does.  Benefits are why your
prospective customer would want those features.  What will
your product do for them?  For example, if you have
something that is metal instead of plastic, metal might be
a feature.  But the benefit might be that it is more
durable, longer-lasting, or unbreakable.

A common practice on web pages that are written as sales
letters is to use a bullet list to present features or
benefits.  Let's just imagine a couple bullet points for
some imaginary "tie-down creator" software.  Most people
would write the bullets as features.  A couple features
might look like this:

- Creates tie-downs automatically
- Adds tie-downs to the end of every statement in a list of
statements

Not very exciting bullets, are they?  (Wow... there's an
example of a tie-down that I want you to say "no" to!)

Now let's imagine how someone might write a couple bullets
as benefits:

- Get your prospective customers nodding their heads in
agreement with every major point in your sales copy!
- Get a prospect to say "yes" to almost any marketing
statement of your choosing - long before you get to the
close!

That's an improvement over writing the marketing bullets as
features, isn't it?  But although that might get their
interest and even get them thinking of how they could use
the product, it doesn't build agreement yet.  Let's try
wording them a little differently:

- If you could get your prospective customers nodding their
heads in agreement with every major point in your sales
copy, that would be likely to increase your sales, wouldn't
it?
- If you could get people saying "yes" to almost any
marketing statement of your choosing - long before they
even get to the close - that would be valuable to you,
right?

Would you agree those bullets do a better job of building
both interest and agreement?  (And did you catch that
example of a tie-down at the beginning of a sentence?)

Now for your homework.  It's time to go look at your
website with a critical eye, while this article is still
fresh in your mind.  Are you selling features or benefits?
Are you using tie-downs on marketing statements where they
would help build agreement that will lead to sales?  If
not, you know what you need to do!


About the Author:

Mike Adams has been building web sites and playing with
Internet marketing since 1996.  Visit his site for Internet
marketing tips, tools, news, articles, and resources:
http://www.timberway.com/

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That's all for this time - thanks for reading!

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Your success is our success!
(c) 2001-2005 ES World Marketing

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We, at The Winning AdVantage, are devoted to helping our subscribers
develop their marketing skills and promote their home-based Internet
marketing businesses and affiliate opportunities. This publication
features tips, techniques and how-to articles on such topics as ad copy
writing, finding good FRËË or inexpensive places to post ads, finding the
best available resources, and other issues related to making money on
the Internet. The Winning AdVantage eZine is dedicated to the
enhancement of your home-based Internet marketing business success.

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