Do The Opening Lines In Your Sales Copy Suck?

AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Writing a great opening line in your sales copy can massively increase your response rate.

Most people know that headlines are important but every word and image that appears in that first screen shot or on that first page of your copy is absolutely vital.

Recently I rewrote a sales page for online split testing software guru Frank Bauer.

The rewrite increased the response by around 100%.

Then we started split testing a few other changes.

When we changed the opening line the response jumped by another 95%.

Never underestimate the power of an opening line.

Here's an opening line from a novel that kind of gets your attention...

"Long ago, shortly after my mother's blood was sluiced from the streets of Changeover and her body was burned upon a funeral pyre, I suffered what the experts called a 'breakdown.' That seems to be a woefully inadequate word to me."

Then in the same gruesome tone here's a great opener by brilliant copywriter Brian Keith Voiles where he talked about his surgery for a brain tumour...

"They Cut Across the Top of My Head From Ear to Ear, Peeled My Face. I thought I Had Died When I Saw Myself In the Mirror.."

When you read an opening line like that it forces you to keep reading.

In sales copy it pays to write the most compelling intriguing opening line you can devise.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Notice as you get more specific with your opening lines and start INSIDE the story they gets more compelling.

Start in the story and be specific. For example

"I'm embarrased to admit when I started online I spammed 10,000 unfortunate people from a list I bought from some dodgy merchant. When they shut down my email account I realized I had a lot to learn about internet marketing."

etc.

My high school English teacher (who is still the best and meanest writing teacher I've ever seen) used to beat us around the head if we dared to state the obvious.

She'd say things like "I don't want to see 'I am writing to you because' in your buisiness letters. It's redundant. It's obvious you're writing to them. They're holding the letter aren't they?"

In the same way great writing is about going beyond the obvious to the story behind it by using specific language.

Don't start by telling me you have a confession to make, start by telling me what that confession is.

"My darkest confession is that deep in the night I dream of covering Britanny Spears in hot treacle. And you won't believe what she says to me as it's dripping down her thighs..."

Actually I don't dream of any such thing but you get the idea.

Start inside the story with your opening line and use specific language wherever you can.

Rewrite your copy to make every word more specific.

For more on this topic check out the post "Secrets To Story Telling That Multiplies Sales at...
http://www.conqueryourniche.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7624

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

A couple more key points.

Some people confuse opening lines with headlines.

The format of copy is usually...

1. Prehead
2. Headline
3. Subhead
4. Image or name of author (optional)
5. Opening line

I think it's important to note that many of the opening lines that were used offline are far less effective online.

If you're sending a letter in the mail you starting with a line like "Dear Friend" makes the letter look a lot like it was written from someone they know (it's imitating a personal letter).

That opening is superfluous online.

It's far more important to get attention.

In a similar way lines like "I've got to get this off my chest before I explode" are not bad but if you start inside the story it becomes far more powerful, eye-grabbing and invokes more curiousity.

For example...

"When I saw this 15 year old kid's software churning out unique web page after unique web page I thought my chest would explode from the excitement."

Online copy is getting harder and harder as attention spans are getting shorter and shorter.

You really have to make every single word and image in that first screen shot of your sales copy stop your propsect and force them to keep reading.

Then you have a chance.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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Mar · Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:54 am Post subject:

I sat down with a cup of coffee in one hand and a plate of delicious, home-made pancakes in the other - and wondered how I was gonna type this reply to you!

Thanks, Andrew. I think you, as well as your English teacher, should be congratulated; I also think your posts above are about to make me change the way I write and (hopefully) have a big impact on my off and online business.

Margaret
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Thank you Margaret you've made my day.

My English teacher was truly brilliant.

I was cruising along in English by the time I finished elementary school I was a significantly better writer than most of my teachers.

Then in high school I wrote an essay for Ms Woods (she was a a feminist when that was not popular).

I got this essay back covered with red marks.

She'd corrected every spelling mistake, punctuation and grammar error and made notes about the weaknesses in the writing.

After I got over the shock I grew to like the challenge of giving her a story she wouldn't destroy with her pen.

(I found out later she was only really tough on the kids who had genuine writing talent).

At 15 I was published in a national magazine (they didn't know I was 15).

That's what a tough teacher can do for you.

Today I smile when I run a spell check on a sales letter with 2,000 words or more and there's not a single error.

I think it's sad that many modern copywriters have really average writing skill.

Good copywriting is made up of 3 main skills:

1. Selling skill
2. Marketing skill
3. Writing skill

Contrary to popular belief it's not about putting your headlines in red fonts or putting a guarantee certificate on your sales page.

The 3 fundamental skills of writing exceptional copy - selling, marketing and writing - will be making you sales long after all those online "tricks" have lost their effectiveness.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Oh and Margaret as nice as those pancakes might taste they're really not good for you.

Smile

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MrSimit · Joined: 20 Jan 2007 Posts: 49 Location: Glasgow

Andrew

What a fantastic post. I have learned more from 5 minutes reading this than I have from hours spent surfing and reading eBooks. Thanks for sharing this, I hope I can put it to good use and improve the copy in my own site.

Sincerely

Andrew Smith
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WillB · Joined: 14 Nov 2006 Posts: 100

Being a Britney fan (at least, before she turned into trailer trash), that
little example made the point very well. I do most of my copywriting
myself, so I will put that "specificity" technique into testing very soon.
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eli · Joined: 12 Jan 2007 Posts: 73 Location: USA

I wish that I had had a Ms. Wood for a teacher. Lacking that, I am glad to read your advice.
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

You should be careful what you wish for Eli.

To be fair most people thought she was a hard-arse teacher who favoured girls.

I didn't care. I asked repeatedly through high school to be put in her English class and chose my other subjects to be sure I was.

When you're ready for it you NEED a hard-arse teacher to beat you into shape.

You know elite athletes travel the world early in their careers to find people who can beat them - that's how they learn.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Here's another great opening line from Terry Pratchett's book "Going Postal"...

"They say the prospect of being hanged in the morning concentrates a man's mind wonderfully..."

This line forces you to keep reading but there's another clever element here that Pratchett uses to get attention.

The tone of the writing is low key conversational tone as if you were reclining in your living room talking to an old friend in a relaxed way...

Then said "Oh by the way the townsfolk are hanging me till I'm dead in the morning" (yawn).

This contradiction between the content in the sentence (a hanging) and the tone stops your mind, makes it back up and say "WHAT THE HELL!!"

If you can get your prospects to say "What the hell!!" when they read the opening line in your sales copy a much higher percentage are likely to keep reading.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

How to avoid the common copywriting mistake of over hyped language and what to do to grab even more attention without it...

Here's another really great opening line from Frank McCourt's "Teacher Man" (if you haven't read Frank McCourt's books you really need to do that - the style is a great lesson in the art of a personal narrative which we use all the time in sales copy)...

The first line reads...

"On the first day of my teaching career I was almost fired for eating the sandwich of a high school boy."

That arouses a bit of curiousity. What the hell is a teacher doing eating a sandwich from one of his students?

But McCourt understands the value of the following line to really grab your reader...

"On the second day I was almost fired for mentioning the possibility of friendship with a sheep."

What the...?!!

You mentioned WHAT?!!!

Also note the understated tone.

A mistake even pro copywriters make is using over hyped language when the content is more than attention grabbing by itself.

By using this understated tone in his writing McCourt is INCREASING the impact.

He's speaking as if this kind of thing happens every day.

Great salesmen use understatment all the time to increase their selling power.

It's disarming and your prospect begins to fill in the blanks.

Let me explain what I mean with an example.

Let's say you were a marketing consultant selling your services to a potential client and you're talking about setting a profit target.

You're telling your prospect a story...

"When we first started working with Jim Jenkins from the TRS Housing Group he set his profit goal for the first 6 months at $500,000 - an increase of about 40%."

"Personally I thought it was a bit low but we ran with that and I was happy that in his first 3 months he passed that goal and 6 months down the track he had an $800,000 profit increase."

If this consultant is smart he knows he can just state the facts low key.

That can have more power because his prospect thinks - "Hell this guy is talking like he gets results like this EVERY DAY!! He didn't even blink an eyelid when he said that!"

Sometimes understatement is powerful in sales and in sales copy.

Remember advertising is just salesmanship in print.

Of course using a low key understated tone in opening lines requires a lot of thought. The key facts and statements MUST grab attention by themselves.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Here's another great opening line from John Grisham's bestseller "The Rainmaker".

"My decision to become a lawyer was irrevocably sealed when I realized my father hated the legal profession."

If you have to introduce yourself in your opening line this is a clever way to do it.

It says something about your character - in this case a contrary nature - and it also raises questions in the reader's mind.

"Why does this guy want to go against his father? What went on between them?"

You can use exactly the same technique in sales copy...

"My decision to create a successful online business was irrevocably sealed when my brother-in-law told me I was an idiot for even thinking it would work."

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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add2it · Posted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 4:25 pm Post subject:

Hi Andrew,

I just stumbled upon your post here... great tips. Smile

Wish I would have met you earlier. With English as my second language I have an even harder time with the written word. Man, I always liked math better. Wink

BTW... thanks for the compliments, but "software guru"? "Computer Geek" would fit better... Cool

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AndrewCavanagh · Joined: 16 Nov 2006 Posts: 128

Well Frank I didn't want to poke fun at you on an open forum.

People might not know we're friends!!

I have to admit if there was a "computer geek rating scale" you would be the "mega super geeky computer geek of the computiest compturized geekness".

But your understanding of html and scripts is astonishing too.

So I guess you're a "software geek" and a "computer geek".

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh
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