I often get asked to critique sales letters, and I come across a lot of the same mistakes nearly every single time.  I’ve condensed it down to 13 of the biggest, most glaring mistakes I often see.  Today we’ll start with the first one, and it’s probably the most often made mistake.

1. Poor Headline. Or what's even worse, no headline.  The most important part of sales letters is the headline.  Unless the headline immediately attracts attention and  generates interest, your prospect will stop reading right then and there. This means you have no chance -zero- to fulfill the purpose of the sales letter, which is to make a sale. Your headline should communicate the strongest customer benefit(s) of your product or service.

TIP: Creating a great headline.  This is entirely contrary to what many “experts” say, but it is what most experts do!

Headlines are critically important and yes you can spend hours, days, even weeks if necessary, creating headlines and then testing one headline against another.  You can create at least 15 to 25 and test the strongest ones.  You can write as many as 200 to 250 before choosing two to four to test against each other to find the most profitable. 

Or you can do what most copywriters do when they critic someone’s copy.  They read the copy and pick out a biggest benefit and make it the headline.  Then they look for one or two other big benefits and make them sub-headlines. 

Here’s an Example:

“How To Get a New Roof,
And a FREE 42” Flat Screen TV Just in time for the Big Game”
I Really Don’t Want to Lay Off My Crew this Winter
I only Have 10 TVs – Call Now To Be Sure Your Get Yours!

On Friday I’ll cover 2 more mistakes I often see.  Stay tuned!