Part 2: Answer a Question
A few days ago, we launched into the fear that blank, white screens instill in everyone – copywriters included. I gave you my first hack for quickly creating a powerful email that helps you easily connect with prospects and customers. For today’s “hack” I’m going to reference new marketing “expert”, Marcus Sheridan. Sheridan has owned a fiber-glass pool building company for a long time. But recently, he’s been getting attention for the way he’s been marketing his own business when things got lean. Like many businesses, his pool-building company took a pretty bad hit when the economy crashed. So Marcus had to come up with some creative marketing methods to save his company. Here’s what he had to say about what he did to save his company:“I just started thinking more about the way I use the Internet. Most of the time when I type in a search, I’m looking for an answer to a specific question. The problem in my industry, and a lot of industries, is you don’t get a lot of great search results because most businesses don’t want to give answers; they want to talk about their company. So I realized that if I was willing to answer all these questions that people have about fiberglass pools, we might have a chance to pull this out.”So what does an email look like where you “answer the question”? Here’s a little template you can use to quickly get your message written:
| “Recently, a customer of ours reached out with a specific concern. As I was writing my reply to him, I figured…if he had concerns, maybe there were others who were curious about the same thing. So I’m using this email to answer his question…but for everyone. What he asked me was this: <question goes here>.” |
Think you can finish the email from here? I’ll bet you can. Especially when I share another thought or two with you. First, you don’t have to wait for one of your contacts to legitimately ask the “perfect question.” You’re the expert. You know your prospects better than anyone else. Create a hypothetical situation and ask yourself one of the pressing questions you know your contacts might have. Then write it into an email. Second, as you respond to the “question”, make sure you’re overcoming the objections that typically prevent prospects from buying. You have the floor now and can use your “email response” to break past the barriers that prevent you from making the sale. One of the attention-grabbing devices you can use to write an essay is: pose a question. The same thing works for emails. Answer the question (asked or unasked) and package it up into a quick, but oh-so-effective email, and your relationship with prospects and customers just got a whole lot stronger. Happy Writing!