Do You Make These Mistakes in Your Print Ads?

If you work in a small company, it's more than likely that the copy for your print ads is written in–house. Most small, entrepreneurial companies simply don't have the budget to hire marketing staff, or to outsource their creative work. The problem is, if no one in your company knows how to write advertising copy, you may be losing more money than you're saving.

Below are the five most common mistakes made in print ads. If you find them in your advertisements, make the corrections before you run the ads again. When you do, you should see a good increase in the response rates.

Mistake # 1: The headline is not getting your audience into the copy.

"The best headlines are the ones that aim at a specific audience
and offer that ‘target market’ something its readers want and want badly."
– John Caples

The headline is the most important part of your advertisement; its job is to grab your prospect's attention and get them into the copy. To do that, the headline must focus on what your prospect wants.

One technique is to write the headline as if nothing else will be read. There are two big benefits to this technique. First, there are just as many people who read the headline only as there are people who read the entire advertisement. Second, it forces you to think about what your prospect wants, instead of trying to write something clever.

According to legendary copywriter, John Caples, stick to one of the tree types of headlines below:

• Self-interest headlines: these contain a personal benefit, and are the most successful.


• News headlines: the second most successful type, these headlines communicate something new, and include words like "New," "Announcing," "Discovered," etc.


• Curiosity Headlines: these are the third-best, and are used to arouse the reader's curiosity.

In his book, Scientific Advertising, Claude Hopkins put it best when he said, "Headlines on ads are like headlines on news items. Nobody reads a whole newspaper. . . We pick out what we wish to read by headlines, and we don't want those headlines misleading."

The bottom line is this, your advertisement's ROI depends on attracting the right readers, and that's the job of the headline.

Mistake # 2: The first paragraph does not follow through with the headline idea.

"A good headline gets your foot in the door . . an unfortunate lead paragraph
can cause you to lose a couple of toes."
– Howard Newton

Next, focus on the first paragraph. It's what will determine if your prospect will continue to read the advertisement. Since the headline is what got the prospect into the ad in the first place, follow through with the same idea.

What's more, keep the paragraph down to a maximum of eleven words — a long first paragraph frightens readers away.

Mistake # 3: Using product features instead of benefits to sell products.

It's easy to get excited about the special, unique features of your product, but consumers buy for emotional reasons. Features are the facts about your products. For example, a "100% money–back guarantee," the "best materials," and "backed by award–winning customer service," are all features. And, they're important because people need them to rationalize their purchase. But, features don't push any emotional buttons.

It's the benefits — the specific advantages that the product offers the prospect — that will get him to buy. If you sell a nutritional supplement that's formulated to give your customers more energy, for example, you do not sell more energy, you sell an active, fulfilling lifestyle.

Mistake # 4: Making it difficult to order.

Many companies assume a web address is sufficient contact information on an ad. Not so. If your prospect has an immediate need, and wants to speak to a person NOW, that extra step of going to the website for a telephone number is not only annoying, it can lose the sale.

Make it easy for your prospects. Give them complete contact information, including a web address — preferably a landing page — fax number, email address, mailing address, and telephone number.

For incoming telephone calls, make sure a person — not voice mail — is available to answer the telephone, and that he can reply to faxes, email, and mail requests. For email, set up an email autoresponder so that an immediate acknowledgment of the request is sent automatically.

Mistake # 5: Using the web address to your home page.

Instead of listing the URL to your home page, use a URL to a landing page. If your prospect lands on your home page, his enthusiasm will cool down. He will browse your site and lose the excitement that got him there in the first place.

A landing page is designed to keep the prospect's interest focused on your ad's sales message. It should repeat the benefits, and have a call–to–action to either close the sale, or collect future contact information.

If you want more responses from your direct response advertisements, review the copy in your print ads to make sure you're not making any of the mistakes listed above. You'll be surprised to see how much of a difference these changes can make.