Fundraising Copywriter George Crankovic

Tag: copywriting

  • What makes people do what they do?

    They’re inscrutable. Insufferable. Illogical. And unpredictable. What makes people do what they do, react the way they do, buy the things they buy, or make the decisions they make?

    It’s maddening. Just ask anybody in marketing or fundraising, and you’ll hear war stories of counterintuitive results and just plain weird reactions on the part of the people we try to persuade.

    Luckily, there’s hope. As psychologists and cognitive scientists delve deeper into human behavior, we’re learning more. And much of this research is on the web — one example is the site by psychologist Susan Weinstein. It’s an ongoing list of “100 things you should know about people,” with each entry revealing a priceless plum about human behavior.

    One such insight is this — anecdotes persuade more than data. Despite everything that common sense might tell you, when it comes to whether people base their decisions on emotion or reason, it’s not even close. Decision-making is almost entirely emotion based. That’s why stories sell. They evoke empathy, which triggers emotional reactions, which motivate people to act. In fact, in most selling situations — and especially in fundraising — rational arguments will discourage response. Emotion sells because emotion is what informs people’s decisions, regardless of how much they may protest otherwise.

    Here’s another example. Groups are swayed by a dominant personality. Whenever people gather in a group, there’s a subtle jockeying for position that takes place until an unspoken org chart emerges. People subconsciously elect someone to be the leader of the group. And often that leadership role is granted to the person who speaks first.

    Think about the groups you’ve participated in — from your kid’s cub scout meetings, to strategy sessions, to serving on a jury. Isn’t it true that there’s always someone who takes the lead and influences others? And often, that someone isn’t the official, designated leader. Think about what that means for focus groups. Just one dominate personality can skew the results, often canceling the validity of the research and wasting thousands of dollars and countless hours of time.

    And yet another example. The more difficult something is to attain, the more people want it. This is all about exclusivity and scarcity. The nightclub that keeps people waiting to get in, the wildly expensive new restaurant, the hazing that college students go through to get into a fraternity, and on and on. Instead of turning people off, exclusivity and scarcity motivate us all the more. Until …

    Sometimes, the nightclub doesn’t seem to be all that exciting once you’re inside, or the fraternity not all that cool. Now here’s the interesting part. When that happens, instead of admitting they were wrong, most people fall back on their original assessment and convince themselves that the group or activity really is worthwhile after all. They reinforce their original decision.

    So, does that mean making products and services appear more exclusive or scarce will entice customers to want them more and cause them to persuade themselves that they’re good even if the actual performance is less than stellar? Trying to cloak a brand in exclusivity it doesn’t merit would probably be a risky strategy if you know the product is poor. But it does seem that people will overlook faults if a brand has cache. Jaguar remains a status brand despite a dismal record of service and reliability. And not so long ago, Harley Davidson motorcycles were almost falling apart on the road because quality had sunk so low, and their customers got the company logo tattooed on their arms.

    The website is www.whatmakesthemclick.net . Well worth a look.

  • When marketing dollars are wasted

    Acme Industries has a created a new product. It’s the result of a big investment in R&D — for them, anyway. It’s been field-tested and focus-grouped. Acme is convinced it has a winner. “It’s so good people don’t even know how much they’re going to want it,” their president has said. Now that they’ve created this new wonder, it’s time to call in marketing and instruct them to tell everyone in the industry about it.

    The obvious response might be full agreement — “Yes, tell everyone!” After all, that’s the role of marketing, right? Mass communication. So Acme’s marketing department — three guys, but hey — starts churning out ads for the trade pubs and press releases for the media. But, wait — that’s probably not the best approach, because …

    The reality is that not everyone in your industry is a prospect for your product or service, nor is everyone who uses the kind of product you sell a prospect for your particular model, no matter how good it is. That’s often tough for companies to accept when they’re not marketing driven. It’s even tougher for the president of the company to accept when he or she has invested blood, sweat, and tears into a project. Fact is, unless the new product has a niche — and increasingly, a very specific niche — it’s not going anywhere.

    Ideally, marketing would work closely with R&D at the very beginning of product development. That doesn’t always happen, of course. But if it did, a new product would more likely occupy a defined space in the market and so have a greater chance for success.

    Another reality is that bringing all potential buyers up to speed about a new product — which is what you’d have to do — is generally a very expensive proposition. The amount of time and money you’d have to spend on educating buyers about the product will far outweigh any potential return on investment from marketing. Marketing gains power — and its cost efficiencies — by exploiting a mass desire in the market not by trying to create one.

    And then there’s the strategic view. Once you’ve already done the educating, you’ve laid the groundwork for your competitors to come right in and start communicating with those prospects — and now they’ll be able to do it at lower cost, thanks to your efforts. You’ve done all the work of clearing out the trees and brush simply to create a playing field for your competitors to use.

    So, then, what’s the right play here? Simple — fish where the fish are.

    Marketing should focus on finding those specific prospects who would benefit from the product’s specific advantages. Headlines, email subject lines, white paper titles, and so on, have to zero in on getting the right prospects to raise their hands and say, “Yes, this is something potentially useful to me.” When you communicate aggressively to those prospects and those prospects only, then you’re on the right track to generating more leads faster, winning more sales faster, and creating an installed base faster.

  • 4 fast, easy tips to tighten up your copy

    A quick read. That’s what we want. Whether it’s for marketing or fundraising — whether it’s an ad, a brochure, direct marketing, or any communication — copy should get to the point and move along briskly.

    Problem is, copywriting should also be conversational in order to be effective, and by definition, writing that’s conversational means more words not fewer, since it involves phrases and expressions used in everyday speech.

    But there’s a way to make copy both tight and conversational. In fact, there are at least four.

    1. Watch out for that. When you write or review copy, be aware of how often you see the word that. Often it’s the written equivalent of like when we talk — not needed. And it slows copy down. For example,
    • “It’s one more way that Acme Advertising ensures your success” can become “It’s one more way Acme Advertising ensures your success.”
    • “Staying number one means that we need to work harder” becomes, “Staying number one means we need to work harder.”
    • The server that stores our applications is on the third floor” becomes “The server storing our applications …”

    Of course, not every that can be eliminated. But you’ll hear the ones that can be when you read the copy.

    2. Be careful of to be. The verb to be is a tricky one, since it takes many forms, such as am, is, are, was, were, be, been, being, and so on. These verb forms show up when we write because we tend to use them when we talk. Most times, copy is better off without them. For example,
    • “The Red Cross is doing life-saving work” can become, “The Red Cross does life-saving work.”
    • “The income we’re generating comes from increased prospecting” can become, “The income we generate comes from increased prospecting.”
    • “The changes in the economy we’ve been seeing …” becomes, “The changes in the economy we see …”

    3. Go easy on the modifiers. Whenever you see an adjective or an adverb, ask yourself whether it’s necessary. Most times it isn’t. We tend to use them liberally when writing in an effort to be emphatic. But modifiers often weaken the impact we try to create. And worse, they slow copy down. For example,
    • “We desperately need this program” isn’t as strong as “We need this program.”
    • “Our lead-generation process is extremely effective…” isn’t as strong as, “Our lead-generation process works.”
    • “Advertising that’s precisely targeted generates rock-solid results in sales” becomes “Targeted advertising generates more sales.”

    4. Chop off the first paragraph or two. When we write, we tend to work up to the main point instead of tackling it straightaway. As a result, the first one or two paragraphs of just about any piece can usually be deleted. Copy will get to the point faster and will seem more direct — both of which are good things.

  • Tell a story to sell

    Because storytelling is so much a part of marketing and fundraising, it’s important to know what goes into a good story … what makes it grab people’s attention and lock it onto the point you’re making for maximum persuasion power.

    Luckily, we have some insightful help in our efforts to persuade through storytelling, and it comes from Mark Rovner, a noted fundraiser who draws on lessons from screenwriting. Rovner gives good, workable advice in a webinar titled The One-Minute Storyteller. You can get the audio here http://www.fundraising123.org/files/NP911_060909_Audio.mp3 and get the pdf here http://www.fundraising123.org/files/NP911_060909_Handout.pdf. It’s worthwhile, but the gist of it is this …

    To craft a good story, the first thing you need is a main character, or protagonist, who has something to gain or lose and who faces and ultimately overcomes the conflicts put in his or her path.

    The second thing you need is a beginning, a middle, and an end. That’s the basic structure. Now, character and structure must come together, and here’s how …

    In the beginning of the story, you introduce the protagonist and include endearing details about him or her. You want the audience to like the protagonist right off. After affinity is established, the protagonist goes through some sort of life-changing event – this again arouses the audience’s sympathy. Which leads us to …

    … the middle. Here you introduce the conflict (with either something or someone) and the obstacles that the protagonist must overcome. By now the audience is cheering for your main character to beat the odds and make it.

    Which leads us to the end. At this point, it should look as though your protagonist may not prevail, but in the final scene he or she overcomes the last obstacle or conflict and emerges victorious. The audience, having grown to like the character and having shared in the journey, now has a sense of satisfaction and closure. Things worked out. All is well with the world.

    If you think about it, that’s the same format that gets played out over and over again in TV shows, movies, novels – just about any kind of entertainment. That’s because it works. And it works particularly well for marketing and fundraising. For our purposes, the story can be anything from the handful of sentences of body copy in an ad to one or more pages in a case history, but even in its most compressed form, your story needs to contain all the elements of storytelling. That’s because you want your audience to go through the process with your main character and to be changed as your character is changed. That’s real persuasion.

  • What should a headline do?

    You’re working. You’re with a group, brainstorming. You’re trying to come up with a concept for an ad. You’re thinking about images and ideas and of course headlines. And inevitably, someone — it could be a designer, the client, or even a creative director — says something like this … “We have to somehow get the whole point across in the headline to catch people who are just leafing through the magazine — because, you know, nobody reads body copy.”

    Is that true? Does the headline have to do all the work of the whole ad? Well, like most things in marketing, the answer is … it depends.

    It depends on the product or service, the state of the market, and the target audience. Say you have a product that’s pretty simple and your audience is fully aware of. In that case, sure, the headline can do all the heavy lifting. In fact, sometimes a headline might be all you need. For example, “Laundry Baskets — 3 for $9.99.” Not a lot else to do there.

    Or even if the product is just slightly more complicated than a laundry basket but your audience is aware of it and its benefits — even then, the headline can do most of the work, like this — “Laugh at the Snow with Goodyear Ultra Ice Winter Tires Thanks to Posi-Lock Traction Tread.” Sure, you could go on in body copy about tread design, rubber compounds, differentiating from competitors, and whatnot, but for the most part — and depending on the audience — the headline says it.

    For the vast majority of cases, though, the purpose of the headline is NOT to convey the entire sales message. Not by a long shot. For most ads, the purpose of the headline is to get your target audience to read the ad. Because if we’re trying to introduce a new product, open up a new market, or reinvigorate a product that’s nearing the end of it’s lifecycle, then our best hope of persuading prospects is by exposing them to a powerful step-by-step sales argument. And you just can’t do that in a headline alone.

    Think of one of the greatest headlines of all time — “Do You Make These Mistakes in English?” This gem was the first step in a blockbuster ad for a correspondence course in grammar. What if someone had imposed the headline-has-to-say-it-all requirement on the writer of that headline, Max Sackheim, one of the true greats of advertising and copywriting? The ad wouldn’t have generated the millions of dollars in business that it did. The key to the success of the headline, of course, is the addition of the unassuming little word “these.” The headline works because — with the help of this one little word — it points the reader’s attention to the body copy, where the ad then takes up the art of persuasion in earnest. Most of the time, that’s the headline’s real job.