Brilliant copywriting
By Allan Gardyne |
Published 12/2/1999 |
1999 Newsletters |
printer friendly version
How's this for brilliant copywriting
Associate Programs Newsletter #82
I'm writing this in the spare room of my in-laws' house in Dunedin, in the beautiful South Island of New Zealand where Joanna and I will be based for the southern summer.
It's great to be back with Joanna's "Oldies" and their extended family. Uncle George, who paints landscapes and restores violins, has just arrived. It's time for me to go.
CONTENTS:
1. How's this for brilliant copywriting?
2. Brooks Brothers, Franklin Mint and more . . .
3. Are you REALLY getting a lifetime customer?
4. Dirty Tricks Department (4)
5. Viral marketing hits a new low
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1. How's this for brilliant copywriting?
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You have only a few seconds to catch a reader's attention.
Here's a heading which does it brilliantly:
The "Right On The Money" Challenge:
"Drop Me Off In The Middle Of The Net,
With Nothing But Dial-Up Access,
And I Can Make Money In 5 Hours!"
(Discover how you can too...)
After reading that, you'd have to be made of stone to be able to resist reading more . .
It's the sort of copywriting Active Marketplace associates have working for them to sell the new "Right on the Money" book written by Patrick Anderson and Michael Henderson.
The program has the four main features I look for in an associate program:
- An excellent product.
- A site which SELLS.
- A fair commission.
- A two-tier program.
It's a mighty powerful combination.
Read the rest of that fascinating page now:
[UPDATE: This old classic is no longer available. For the latest resources I recommend see http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/categories/Affiliate-Resources/ ]
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2. Brooks Brothers, Franklin Mint and more . . .
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Some well known names popped up among the new listings in the AssociatePrograms.com directory this week.
TEXTBOOKS.COM
Textbooks.com, which says it is the world's largest textbook store, has a site aimed at students and includes second-hand textbook sales. The affiliate program pays "up to" 5%.
http://www.textbooks.com
[UPDATE: textbooks.com was bought by Barnes & Noble.]
BROOKS BROTHERS
Since the early 1800s, Brooks Brothers have been dressing Americans - including Abraham Lincoln and movie stars - in modern, classic clothing. Brooks Brothers have great gift ideas and sales. Their clothing and accessories are for both men and women. You can receive 8% commission. Sign up at LinkShare.
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/linkshare
MAIDENFORM
Maidenform is a respected manufacturer which has been supplying women's under fashions for 75 years. It has a special commission rate of 20% until the end of 1999. In 2000, the commission will be 5% for sales up to $5,000 in a quarter, 10% for sales above $5,000 and 15% for sales above $25,000. Payments are made after $100 is accrued. Sign up at Be Free.
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/befree
FRANKLIN MINT
Franklin Mint has a huge range of collectibles and gift items. There's a special Christmas range including Christmas ornaments and nativities. The commission rates depend on the volume of sales, beginning at 6% for sales under $2,500 and increasing to 10% for sales over $25,000. Sign up at LinkShare.
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/linkshare
More new listings have been pouring in, far too many to detail here.
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/directory/new-links.html
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3. Are you REALLY getting a lifetime customer?
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By Ken Evoy, author of
"Make Your Site SELL!"
"Personally, I'm attracted to programs that offer long return
features. But I don't count on them to work for indefinite
periods," Jim Connelly says
( http://www.associateprograms.com/articles/388/1/More-dirty-tricks ).
Jim's right - there are so many ways for cookies to be deleted. But the issue is not so much losing the return visitor before she makes her first purchase - after all, most people will buy within a few days to weeks (depending on circumstances such as price of product, type of customer, etc.). If they don't, they are very unlikely to buy at all. My guess would be a loss of under 2% - but again, the more expensive the item, the more important this could be because the "purchase decision" could take much longer to make.
But let's accept that 98% of purchase decisions are made within a few weeks of the first visit. The odds of a cookie being deleted are almost zero in that short a period of time - I know because 98% of our sales are now driven by our own 5 Pillar Program (yes, no typo!)...
But "cookie attrition" (just made that term up!) is a critical issue if you are an affiliate who belongs to (or is considering) a program that has a "lifetime customer" feature (i.e., after a visitor who was referred by you buys from your merchant, that customer is always *YOURS* - you receive a commission for any purchase of any other product from that merchant).
If your program features this, it had better also contain a database-matching algorithm. Without giving away too much about how our proprietary 5 Pillar algorithm works, here's what happens...
If a customer originally bought the Electronic Version of "Make Your Site SELL!" from you, that person is now your lifetime customer. So when that customer orders the Printed Version, you'll get credit for that.
But what about in Q1 2000, when we have two new books slated for release, along with our first productivity software, and a truly major CATEGORY-KILLER server-side solution?
You'd hate to lose those "lifetime customers" - because yes, sooner or later, all cookies die. Hey, who keeps their computers for longer than a few years?
That's where the database-matching algorithm comes in. Let's say that customer who bought MYSS! gets a brand new iMac for Christmas. Bye-bye cookie.
Bye-bye lifetime customer? Nope.
Here she comes now. Let's watch....
She's buying our new software. No cookie so far. She fills in the Order Form (we'll assume that she does not use her "previous customer" username, which gives her a discount - that would be too easy!). Well, besides changing computers, here's what else she would have to change before we'd miss that she belongs to you...
The customer would have to erase her cookie, change her physical and e-mail addresses, use a different credit card, change phones, etc. And she'd have to do it all at once! Each "check point" actually has its own algorithm, so that we aren't fooled by inconsistent data entry.
But the bottom line is this... the odds are 1 in a million that everything gets changed at the same time. When our algorithm detects that someone has already bought from us before, it checks to see who the referring affiliate was. Then it rewrites the cookie *IN YOUR NAME*.
Why rewrite the cookie? Why not - it gives us one more safety check so that you NEVER lose your lifetime customer.
OK, ready? Here comes the shameless plug. When we say that you have a "lifetime customer," that's not marketing...
... it's a fact.
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4. Dirty Tricks Department (4)
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This is the fourth - and last I hope - in a series of articles on dirty tricks people have played on AssociatePrograms.com.
For earlier articles see:
Dirty tricks - Part 1
http://www.associateprograms.com/articles/378/1/No-more-affiliates-says-Net-Detective
Dirty tricks - Part 2
http://www.associateprograms.com/articles/381/1/Greedy-affiliate-merchants
Dirty tricks - Part 3
http://www.associateprograms.com/articles/388/1/More-dirty-tricks
I created a doorway page which ranked extremely well in search engines - for a little while.
I discovered the other day that someone had copied it - totally unchanged - and posted it on a free Hypermart site.
If that tactic was repeated and the pages were registered on search engines, AssociatePrograms.com would be penalized - multiple copies of a page can be regarded as a sort of spam - and my rankings in search engines could suffer.
When I complained, Go2Net promptly deleted the Hypermart page.
Out of curiosity, I asked who owned the site.
Believe it or not, Go2Net hasn't a clue.
To set up a site there, all you have to do is type in a row of gibberish instead of a name. That's perfectly acceptable as far as Go2Net's automatic, unthinking system in concerned.
Not only can any skunk be a publisher, he can also be an anonymous skunk with the help of Hypermart.
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5. Viral marketing hits a new low
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Leander Kaheny has written a useful article, "Viral Marketing Hits New Low", describing how people are throwing together topical web sites and then spamming newsgroups as a way of attracting visitors.
That technique hasn't worked very well, but topical sites which concentrate on one theme and are good enough to get listed in Yahoo DO work well.
Full article:
wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,32696,00.html
All the best,
Allan Gardyne
