In my work as a copywriter, I am often asked by clients how they can improve the return they get on their investments in marketing and advertising. I’d like to tell you about the mistakes which small businesses tend to make in their ads so that you can avoid making them yourself.

Layout

Many small business ads look like a shopping list, this is the biggest mistake to avoid.

Company name at the top (where there should be a benefit-rich headline). Dry, egotistical copy in the middle. No clear or compelling offer. Phone number and address at the bottom.
That layout will kill your sales right there, because your prospect doesn’t care about your company name (or a cute headline). He or she only wishes to know: “What’s in it for me?”

Here’s a better layout for selling that works well in almost any situation:

You have to lead in with a compelling, attention getting headline. Keep it simple, just state the biggest benefit of using your service or product.

Include a contact number or perhaps a coupon at the bottom right. This corner is called the “anchor point”.

Company name and address at bottom left (where the prospect will find it once they’re convinced.)

Put headlines under photos or illustrations, so the reader’s eye goes from photo to headline to copy in that logical order. (Illustration layouts also depend on the size and concept of the ad)

It’s a good idea to outline the benefits of your product or service with bullet points. Long copy is great, but it’s a lot harder to write.

What are your ads like? Are they lists or do they have a story to tell followed by a call to action? If you are using the former style, I promise you’ll get more results by changing things up.

Failing to Test and Track Ad Response

Test and fine tune your ads, then track their performance. Even a small change in wording can make a huge difference in sales. This can help you to more effectively spend your ad budget.

How to Track Advertising Response

It’s easy to track your advertising, you can just ask people who call how they heard about your business. If you are publishing many different ads, you can get more complex with your tracking using one or more of these techniques.

Use colour coded coupons in print ads, or track coupons with codes. You can also have callers mention a special offer to track the success of your ads.

Online it’s even easier, there are lots of great tracking software programs that will allow you to compare one page against another or one traffic source against another.

One of my clients a while back tracked their advertising response rates and found that their expensive print ad campaign was bringing in almost no responses, while a nearly free flyering campaign was generating a lot of business. They were able to drop the print ads and save a lot of money while having a more effective advertising and marketing campaign.

What To Test

Test these parts of your ads:

Headlines, Offers, Body Copy, Guarantee and Price

Hint: You’ll get the greatest return by testing headlines first.
When you find something that works, stay with it until you find something better. It really isn’t hard to improve your marketing ROI if you use this approach, yet hardly anyone does it! If YOU decide to take action on this tip, you can save money, leverage your marketing budget, and put some distance between you and your competition.

Just making sure that your ads are working well can dramatically increase your business; you may want to think about taking on a in-house copywriter. This can make a lot of difference in your advertising return on investment.

Not Making The Most of a Powerful Guarantee

Many small business fail to include a strong guarantee in their advertisements. This is a shame, since a powerful guarantee can mean response rates which are at least 50% higher.

A strong guarantee makes customers more willing to buy from you, since the perceived risk is eliminated. If you project confidence in your business, prospective customers will feel it too.

This is how to incorporate guarantees into your ads effectively:

1. Your guarantee should make specific promises about results.

Don’t use boilerplate phrases like “Satisfaction Guaranteed” or even “Money-Back Guaranteed”. While these are probably better than nothing, they don’t have a fraction of the effect of a specific promise like:

“If you’re not thrilled with our product, we’ll pay you to go to the competition”

” Enjoy a minimum 50% increase in website traffic within 60 days or your money back”

“Send $45 to [Your Company Name and Address]. If you’re not satisfied, we’ll send you back $50.”

2. Test Your Guarantee

Being a small business consultant and copywriter, I spend a lot of time helping clients to come up with attention getting guarantees for their advertisements. Many business owners are nervous about making money back guarantees, fearing that they will lose money if too many people take advantage of these guarantees. However, I can tell you that in practice, the amount of additional business which a strong guarantee can bring in dwarfs the outlay you’ll see in refunds. Track the response to your ad and compare it against the returns. If the guarantee is working for your business, continue offering it.

I’ve always found that a strong guarantee generates more than enough additional sales to cover any returns or refund requests.
Also test different aspects of your guarantee (e.g. wording, time period, conditions etc.) The difference in sales generated by a 30 day and 60 day guarantee can be significant.

3. Make your guarantee highly visible

Make your guarantee a headline, you want prospective customers to see this.

What can you offer prospective customers in terms of a guarantee that will make them more interested in doing business with you?