The Importance of Emotive Writing

The Importance of Emotive Writing
By Phil and Kate Wiley
Are you getting plenty of hits on your sites but your conversion rates leave something to be desired?
Have you tried changing the page layout, increasing the content or adding more graphics but to no avail?
Perhaps it’s your writing style you need to change. After all, there’s nothing worse than boring sales copy.
The most successful sales letters appeal to their readers’ emotional side. One of the most important things when trying to convert clicks into sales is convincing the reader that they can’t live without the product that you are offering them.
So how do we take our boring sales copy, twist it, craft it and make our readers say “Yes! I have to have that” ?
One of the biggest and most important questions asked by prospective customers is “what’s in it for me?”. If your copy doesn’t convey to the reader that they need this product and here’s why they need it, it won’t be effective.
What will your product or service do for your customer? What will it give them that they didn’t have before? This is where playing on emotions comes into the picture. What do they desire but not possess? Wealth, looks, popularity, success… the list goes on and on.
You need to tell your customers that you will make them these things – they are poor, you will make them rich. If they have wrinkles and are self conscious about it you will take their wrinkles away, etc. You get the idea, I’m sure.
It is very important when writing your emotive sales letters to consider carefully who your target audience is. You need to keep your copy focused on that group. If you don’t your copy will become too broad and it will lose its effectiveness in tugging on the heart-strings. Your copy needs to appeal to their emotional/impulsive side to override thoughts of “yes, I want it, but do I really need it?”.
Writing as you speak is a very effective way of doing this – it’s almost as though you are having a conversation with the person who is reading your copy. Don’t worry about proper grammar etc – do you speak properly all the time? Of course, it is important not to take this idea too far the other way.
It is also very important to write your copy as if you are speaking to the reader (write in first person) – ie, the use of the words you, your etc.
Another way of appealing to a reader’s emotional side is by leaving out facts and figures – focus on what your product will do for them, not the product itself. For example, if I was selling a car and my target audience was young single men aged from 17 to 25, I would tell the reader about how the car’s sleek and sporty yet masculine look will help them get all the girls they ever dreamed of but could never have, and how their mates will be admiring them for years to come. I would tell him about that the car has an impressive list of special features and with the powerful engine and superior handling street drag racers would fear his presence.
Notice that there is no mention of what the special features actually are and that there are no comparisons of say, Kenwood Vs Bose sound systems, or mention of the type of suspension or braking methods.