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1. Find the inherent drama
within your offering.
After all, you plan to make money by selling
a product or a service or both. The reasons people will want
to buy from you should give you a clue as to the inherent
drama in your product or service. Something about your offering
must be inherently interesting or you wouldn't be putting
it up for sale. In Mother Nature breakfast cereal, it is the
high concentration of vitamins and minerals.
2. Translate that inherent
drama into a meaningful benefit.
Always remember that people buy benefits, not
features. People do not buy shampoo; people buy great-looking
or clean or manageable hair. People do not buy cars; people
buy speed, status, style, economy, performance, and power.
Mothers of young kids do not buy cereal; they buy nutrition,
though many buy anything at all they can get their kids to
eat -- anything. So find the major benefit of your offering
and write it down. It should come directly from the inherently
dramatic feature. And even though you have four or five benefits,
stick with one or two‹three at most.
3. State your benefits
as believably as possible.
There is a world of difference between honesty
and believability. You can be 100 percent honest (as you should
be) and people still may not believe you. You must go beyond
honesty, beyond the barrier that advertising has erected by
its tendency toward exaggeration, and state your benefit in
such a way that it will be accepted beyond doubt. The company
producing Mother Nature breakfast cereal might say, "A
bowl of Mother Nature breakfast cereal provides your child
with almost as many vitamins as a multi-vitamin pill."
This statement begins with the inherent drama, turns it into
a benefit, and is worded believably. The word almost lends
believability.
4. Get people's attention.
People do not pay attention to advertising.
They pay attention only to things that interest them. And
sometimes they find those things in advertising. So you've
just got to interest them. And while you're at it, be sure
you interest them in your product or service, not just your
advertising. I'm sure you're familiar with advertising that
you remember for a product you do not remember. Many advertisers
are guilty of creating advertising that's more interesting
than whatever it is they are advertising. But you can prevent
yourself from falling into that trap by memorizing this line:
Forget the ad, is the product or service interesting? The
Mother Nature company might put their point across by showing
a picture of two hands breaking open a multivitamin capsule
from which pour flakes that fall into an appetizing-looking
bowl of cereal.
5. Motivate your audience
to do something.
Tell them to visit the store, as the Mother
Nature company might do. Tell them to make a phone call, fill
in a coupon, write for more information, ask for your product
by name, take a test drive, or come in for a free demonstration.
Don't stop short. To make guerrilla marketing work, you must
tell people exactly what you want them to do.
6. Be sure you are communicating
clearly.
You may know what you're talking about, but
do your readers or listeners? Recognize that people aren't
really thinking about your business and that they'll only
give about half their attention to your ad‹ even when
they are paying attention. Knock yourself out to make sure
you are putting your message across. The Mother Nature company
might show its ad to ten people and ask them what the main
point is. If one person misunderstands, that means 10 percent
of the audience will misunderstand. And if the ad goes out
to 500,000 people, 50,000 will miss the main point. That's
unacceptable. One hundred percent of the audience should get
the main point. The company might accomplish this by stating
in a headline or subhead, "Giving your kids Mother Nature
breakfast cereal is like giving your kids vitamins‹only
tastier." Zero ambiguity is your goal.
7. Measure your finished
advertisement, commercial, letter, or brochure against your
creative strategy.
The strategy is your blueprint. If your ad fails
to fulfill the strategy, it's a lousy ad, no matter how much
you love it. Scrap it and start again. All along, you should
be using your creative strategy to guide you, to give you
hints as to the content of your ad. If you don't, you may
end up being creative in a vacuum. And that's not being creative
at all. If your ad is in line with your strategy, you may
then judge its other elements.
(C)2000 Jay Conrad Levinson
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To find out more about our Guerrilla Marketing
Coaching, Personal Breakthroughs Coaching and Creating
Passive Income Program
call or e-mail us at :
mitch@gmarketingcoach.com
773-209-4255
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