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03/12/2006: "Just a Letter --- How Little People Understand What a Copywriter Can Do For Them."

"It's just a letter", my prospective client's wife said to him in disgust. He had told her that I proposed to write a series of lead generating sales letters for his fledging business. I gave him the cost. And as many rather ill-informed people do, the wife reacted with outrage at my fee. After all, it is just a letter.

We copywriters face this ignorance all the time. Some people think they're buying a simple letter or piece of paper or words on a Web site. They fail to realize that's not at all what they're buying.

What people buy when they pay a copywriter is more business. The letter or the words are mere vehicles for the sales that those vehicles produce. It's hard to make people understand. Yet they call on you (the copywriter) because they're not converting with whatever they're using now or they're simply not getting any leads. They need help.

Most people also know they can't write and they certainly can't sell through the written word. There are very few people who know how to do that. The people who do know how are called copywriters.

Yes, my fee was a lot for just a letter. But it was nothing for lots of leads and a considerable amount of new business.

Until more people understand this they will continue to struggle for more business.
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