I want your attention
In order for your marketing campaign to be successful, it requires FOUR aspects or qualities. This can be summarized as the Aida Marketing model.
Your first priority, at all costs, is to get hold of your reader’s short ATTENTION span.
Your audience needs to be hooked within seconds of laying eyes on your copy.
This could be with a fancy image or a video – preferably with sound, but the thing which sticks out the most is a suitable headline which will inspire them to want more of what your headline is hinting at.
A good headline mustn’t be too long, and not more than seven words.
Power words are best used in headlines to attract your audience’s attention.
Do you find this Aida Marketing very interesting?
The second point of the AIDA principle is for your readers to grow an INTEREST, and keep them interested.
At this point, forget your product and just focus your attention on your audience, and their problems.
This can be done by the way you compose your copy, which should be easy and simple to follow.
For all that’s sacred, don’t try to show the world your mastery of long and difficult content.
In copywriting, this just doesn’t work
This only serves to put people off what they’re reading. Nobody’s going to check out difficult words halfway through your copy. The easiest thing for them to do is to close the page…and there goes your potential purchase.
One thing to keep in mind is that today’s online readers don’t read a page as they read it from a book.
They are always short on time, they have things to do, and they are not going to spend more than a few minutes on your site, so you have to write in a way that these people tend to carry on reading. Most of your audience tends to scan a page, and then scroll down through it. There are patterns which many tend to follow, and these patterns are your key to keep their attention every time their eyes tend to move around your page.
Use bullets when you can, and break up your text to make particular points stand out like a sore thumb.
Another way to maintain your reader’s interest is your first paragraph.
Is this boring, is this dragging, is this full of crap which nobody really wants to read?
The first paragraph needs to be interesting enough for visitors to carry on reading what you have painstakingly written.
You could have written a 5,000-word article, but if the first few are drippy, you might as well have spent the time writing all that fishing or going for a walk.
Are you glowing with desire?
The third thing on the list is to induce in them a DESIRE for what you’re offering.
Getting your prospective buyer to desire what you are offering is by far not an easy feat.
You can get them to yearn for what you are offering by explaining to them the benefits of your product or service. You need to tell them how it can change their life, their future, and they won’t want to look anywhere else for their needs and wants.
You explain, in layman’s terms, how this will solve their problem, and explain what the result of their purchase would be.
You need to touch their emotional side.
This can be done by showing your personality, which will make you relatable, and trustworthy.
Once you gain somebody’s trust, they will look at you differently. You are no longer a hazard, a potential enemy, or one trying to screw them out of their money.
Use visuals to relay your message which you propose to trigger their emotions with.
This is further amplified by selling the Core Value
Take toothpaste, for example. There are so many different brands out there all selling their wares, but you can sell the core value of your product, like “Brilliant White Teeth”.
Your core value is the solution to a problem…your clients will have white teeth if they buy your goods.
This would be perfect with ‘before’ and ‘after’ pictures, or even by getting testimonials to state their experience. This would be the ‘proof’ you need that what you are offering is authentic.
Prompt them to need and want your product at all costs. It needs to appeal to the audience and trigger their emotional desire to make a purchase.
You really need this, so take action
The last on the AIDA list is for them to take ACTION.
This is perhaps the most important step of all the other important steps.
Why?
Because what’s the point of getting their attention, getting them interested and getting them to crave what you are offering, but then you leave them dangling as what to do next?
Summarize all the reasons for a person to buy your product, including any logo and brand name, if available.
The last step of the process can be a simple Call to Action button which sticks out, contains suitable wording, and placed in a noticeable location of your page.
You can also expand on the benefits even further. Your words have to lead your prospects to click that Call to Action button.
Urgency and scarcity are the order of the day
You can even instill a sense of urgency or scarcity in your copy so people will buy something, even if they don’t really need what you are offering. This could be through a sale, getting people to ‘save’ money on something which they might not really need in the first place. They would also want to get it before it runs out.
These are basic human traits… the fear of being left without, of being left out of something really good, and something which everybody else seems to be going for.
However, if they save some money on the process, it’s a good enough reason to buy it…and why not?
That makes sense to many, and do you know something?
It works!
Including bonuses or freebies will further entice your potential buyer. This gives the impression that yours is of a higher value than that of your competitors… so they’ll opt for your product.
Sounds simple?
Yes, it is, at least in theory…
However, in practice, it’s not as straightforward as that.
To summarize:
- Hook your reader’s Attention
- Keep readers Interested
- Create a Desire
- Trigger Action
