Smart advertising |e-commerce

Archive for December 24th, 2009

Using Guarantees In Your Sales Letters To Increase Sales

Imagine that you’re someone who has just purchased a product or service after reading a wellwritten and persuasive sales letter. You pay the price of the product or service and eagerly await the product’s arrival or to speak with a representative about using the service.

Finally the product arrives or you’re used up your service hours and you have not reaped any of the benefits touted in the flashy sales letter. Even worse the product you purchased was broken or not satisfactory when it arrived and now it’s going to be a hassle to replace it or get a refund. If this were you how would you feel?

Potential customers are often wary about purchasing a product or service based only on a sales letter because there are no implied guarantees. The product can be damaged upon arrival the service can provide little help or the product or service is just not worth the price the customer might pay. There is one trick you can use to reduce these fears on the part of the potential customer. Use a guarantee in your sales letters that allows customers to shed the risk they would normally assume when making such a purchase.

A guarantee can be in several forms. You can guarantee free replacement if a product is defective additional free services if a client is unsatisfied with the service you have provided or even offer to refund the entire purchase price of the product or service if the customer is not completely satisfied. When you offer a guarantee you are creating goodwill and confidence in your product or service. Many potential customers think “Why would they guarantee their product or service if it didn’t work as well as advertised?

When you offer a guarantee in your sales letters make sure the guarantee is riskfree. This means that you should not attach any strings to the guarantee. Some companies require that a product be returned unopened or in its original packaging in order to receive a full refund. If you’ve had the product for a month or two and you’ve already thrown out the packaging this can present a problem. Then you’re stuck with a shoddy product and an emptier wallet. Making your guarantee riskfree means that you don’t require customers to meet any conditions in order to receive the refund replacement or free services.

This is a marketing tactic that can create quite a lot of goodwill from customers. People are more likely to buy from businesses that stand behind their products and services than from businesses that are hard to deal with and inflexible if a product is damaged or a service has not benefited the customer. By offering a riskfree guarantee you are telling your customers that you care about their experience with your company. You are also giving customers an easy way to solve problems rather than making them go through a difficult process. This can even create repeat business from satisfied customers.

Once you’ve mastered the art of using riskfree guarantees in your sales letters you may see an increase in the number of inquiries generated by a particular sales letter or even in the number of sales that result from a direct mail campaign. If you see results it only makes sense to keep this tip in the front of your mind as you develop sales letters in the future.

About the writer:  Direct Mail Strategist Michael Kaselnak can help you get a 6 20 or even a 50 response rate on your next direct response mailing. As creator of the Hoard Client Marketing Sales Lead and Referral Systems he personally brought in over 33 million in new business in just two years in a small Midwestern town. To learn how to put the automatic referral driver to work for you check out this Free 3minute movie: http://www2.hoardclients.com/movie