Award-winning journalist and freelance copywriter, Susanna K. Hutcheson, presents news, thoughts and ideas on the world of business, marketing, copywriting and much more.

Sell to them when they're in Heat.

When you're talking to a prospective client, do you let them tell you, "I'll talk to my wife and call you back"? If you hear that stall and don't do something, you've lost the sale. Why? Simply put, it is an old stall used by people forever.

What you want to do is sell to people when they are in heat. When they want something badly. Don't let them walk or they'll forget about you and your product and your service.


Susanna on 11.30.04 @ 06:33 AM CDT [link]

Protect Entry to Your Notebook and Other PCs.

Protect access to notebook and desktop computers running Microsot Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP.

Dekart Logon allows you to store all your passwords to Windows machines on one removable storage device (USB flash drive or CD disk), a smart card or USB token. It adds the strong authentication and convenience to the standard Windows logon procedure.

With Dekart Logon, you don't have to waste time entering complicated passwords, as all login data is entered automatically once the USB flash drive is connected to the computer. Whenever you temporarily leave the computer, you can lock the computer by simply removing the USB key. The login and password of the user are securely stored on the USB key, which can be protected with the user defined PIN code and (optional) his biometric data. The two- and three-factor authentication offered by Dekart Logon ensures that no third party will get access to your notebook or desktop computer and to your important data, even if the computer is lost, stolen or left unattended.

I use Dekart Logon and just love it. My sensitive data is safe. There is no back door. You can't buy better protection. I keep my program on a jump drive that goes in my USB port of my notebook. When I leave, I simply pull the drive out and my notebook is safe. No one can get to my data.

You need this if you care about security. It's just $39. It's an investment you should make today. You won't regret it.

Powerwriting gives this fine product a 5 out of 5 star rating.

Buy your own powerful copy of Dekart Logon Now.

Susanna on 11.29.04 @ 09:07 AM CDT [link]

Advertisers Using Fewer Words in an Effort to Grab More Business.

The following is from The Wall Street Journal, November 29, 2004.

Advertisers are trying to say more and more with less and less.

Under pressure to reach consumers more quickly and directly, some marketers have reduced their slogans and product names to the most commonplace bits of the English language. Verizon Wireless has been selling a feature known as the "In" network. In ads that ended earlier this year, AT&T Corp. brandished its ampersand. And Citigroup Inc.'s Citibank has a new rewards plan known as "Thank You."

Meanwhile, International Business Machines Corp. has started to highlight the "on" in its already brief tagline "on demand" (which followed another tagline -- "e-business" -- centered on a letter). And Nextel Communications Inc. is running ads linking its name to a four-letter word: "Done."

Marketing observers aren't certain the trend is a good one. "The irony is that if you just used a few more words, you might be able to get your message across a lot clearer," says Martyn Tipping of New York's TippingSprung, a naming and brand consultant. "It's not about the number of letters in the word. It's about the clarity and consistency of the message, and that's what's missing."

I wrote an ad for a national campaign that appeared in, among other publications, The Wall Street Journal. It was for an automobile. The ad contained one word on a full page and sold cars like you wouldn't believe!

The power of words is not in the number of words but in the words themselves.

Consumers Pop Open their Wallets to Buy Online Black Friday
. . . and buy they did . . .

Charge-card data collected by Visa USA indicate that cardholders charged a combined $7.4 billion on their Visa cards at retail stores on Friday and Saturday, a 14.3% increase over the same period last year. Use of debit cards was up sharply, possibly the result of worries about debt: Shoppers spent $3.3 billion using debit cards in the two-day period, a 20.2% rise over last year; consumers' credit-card spending exceeded $3.8 billion for the period, an 8.8% rise. (The remaining $276 million in sales were made on corporate charge cards; the data reflect both increased spending and the effect of more cards in use.)

More people than ever chose to let their fingers do their holiday shopping. Consumers spent $250 million online on Friday, a 41% increase over the $174 million they spent online on the same day a year ago, according to comScore Networks, a Reston, Va., company that tracks Web site activity. For the November-December holiday season, online spending is expected to surpass $15 billion -- marking as much as a 26% increase over last year, comScore says.

What's selling: Digital cameras and DVD players.

And so it goes . . .




Get a big tax deduction.

Powerwriting.com copywriting is tax deductible. Guess what, it's time to get your marketing and advertising written. And get a major tax deduction.

Disclaimer: The above statement is true in all cases we are aware of. Check with your accountant about your own personal tax situation.


Susanna on 11.29.04 @ 06:48 AM CDT [link]

Internet Explorer Losing Market Share Fast.

Long known for its poor security and many flaws, people are finally dumping Microsoft Internet Explorer at a rapid speed.

According to statistics at W3Schools.com, from Jan - June 04, market share of
browsers has shifted as follows:

- 8.2% up to 12.2% for Mozilla
- 71.3% up to 72% for Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) 6.0
Mozilla-based browsers market share has increased from 8.2 percent to 12.2
percent since January. Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) 6.0 presence grew
from 71.3 percent to 72 percent in the same time frame.

CONCLUSION

The Mozilla folks deserve a round of applause for their speedy handling of a potentially serious problem. They have accomplished a tremendous feat. FireFox and Mozilla are great browsers, fun to use, easy to use, solid and safe. I'm glad to say I've been using Mozilla for a long time and now use FireFox.

At the time of this writing, the above figures are changing. Microsoft has lost yet more market share. I notice on my own logs that many more people use Mozilla and FireFox and if things stay at the current pace, IE will be a thing of the past within a year.

Susanna on 11.28.04 @ 06:26 PM CDT [link]

Doctors on the Internet

Have you noticed that many people are beginning to call themselves "doctor" on the Internet? I've noticed many copywriters and other gurus now doing that. I've no idea what sort of doctor they are or profess to be. I do, however, know why they're doing it. I do not applaud this idea as it is so 20th Century and out-of-date.

But during the 70s and 80s lots of books on how to be successful told us that if we could use a title of any sort, it made us sound more credible, more important. So some of these gurus got some sort of doctorate, which is easy to do with the Internet.

The use of the title is of some interest to me. The AP Style Book, the grammar bible to all of us raised in journalism, says, "Use Dr. in first reference as a formal title before the name of an individual who holds a doctor of dental surgery, doctor of medicine, doctor of osteopathy, or doctor of podiatric medicine degree: Dr. Jonas Salk.

The form Dr., or Drs., in a plural construction, applies to all first-reference uses before a name, including direct quotations.

If appropriate in the context, Dr. also may be used on first reference before the names of individuals who hold other types of doctoral degrees. However, because the public frequently identifies Dr. only with physicians, care should be taken to assure that the individual’s specialty is stated in first or second reference. The only exception would be a story in which the context left no doubt that the person was a dentist, psychologist, chemist, historian, etc.

In some instances it also is necessary to specify that an individual identified as Dr. is a physician. One frequent case is a story reporting on joint research by physicians, biologists, etc.

Do not use Dr. before the names of individuals who hold only honorary doctorates.

Do not continue the use of Dr. in subsequent references."

So you see, these folks don't say what sort of doctor they are. They just use the title and leave us to assume whatever we want. And that's just plain wrong. If they insist on using it, they should say what kind of doctor they are . . . if for no other reason than it is proper grammar.

But beyond the grammar problems, I think using a title simply to make oneself sound important or unique or expert is atrocious. It sounds so phoney. I have a friend who holds a Ph.D and teaches in a college. She does not insist nor does she want to be called a doctor. If a person is important or sure of his position, he does not need to use a title for credibility.

As more people use the title, it will mean less. That's how it is you know. The trick to marketing yourself is to do things differently. Hey, it's not cool to be called a doctor anymore. Get over it folks. It's the 21st century. A college dropout is the richest person in America for god's sake.

Susanna on 11.27.04 @ 03:34 AM CDT [link]

It Will be a Hot Season for Online Sales --- Will YOU Get Your Share?

People love to buy online. There are lots of reasons for that. But one is that it's convenient. Another is it saves time and very often it saves money.

Online shopping is easier now that 20 percent of U.S. households have high-speed Internet connections, and many others can shop during lunch breaks at work.

The single biggest online holiday shopping week is expected to start either Dec. 6 or Dec. 13, retail experts predict. Online sales in November and December, excluding travel and eBay, are expected to reach $21.6 billion, a 19 percent jump from a year ago, according to Jupiter Research. The average online shopper will spend $250, about the same as last year, but many more people will shop online this year -- 86.1 million vs. 73.3 million last year, said Jupiter analyst Patti Freeman Evans.

According to ABC News, About one in four Americans say they'll be buying holiday gifts online this year, up only modestly since 1999 — but the amount of money they plan to spend has nearly doubled.

I personally love to shop online. I have my favorite stores and return to them often. I appreciate the convenience of shopping online.

Is your business ready for the online holiday shopper? Perhaps you're not a retailer. But you still have to be prepared for the holiday shopper.

For Online Retailers

Vividence, a leader in Customer Experience Management products and services, offers 10 guidelines to help retailers improve the online customer experience and maximize the potential of their Web sites this holiday season.

Vividence's 10 guidelines for holiday success:

1. Save customer shopping carts for later visits. Customers do return later to purchase items "abandoned" in their carts. Make it easy for them by keeping their cart items for 30 days or more.

2. Offer a promotion or incentive to purchase. Promotions (or deals) differentiate sites from one another. Free shipping is the most common purchase influencer.

3. Show shipping prices early. Customers prefer to choose shipping options and see shipping prices in the shopping cart.

4. Make site registration optional. Customers are more likely to abandon their carts if you require them to register.

5. Consider a charitable donation tie-in. Customers increasingly want to donate to charity. Sites that contribute in some way will engender customer good will.

6. Keep products in stock. Out-of-stock products frustrate customers, especially when they aren't notified until they place items into shopping carts.

7. Provide order tracking. Customers want to reduce uncertainty about delivery time by tracking their orders. This will also reduce calls to customer service.

8. Shorten the checkout process. Customers prefer entry fields on one screen as opposed to multiple screens.

9. Be clear about delivery time. Customers want to know when their items will arrive.

10. Provide paper gift certificates. Gift certificates can influence purchase, and customers tend to prefer paper to e-mail gift certificates.

"As consumer expectations increase and more people plan to do their holiday shopping online, it becomes increasingly important for retailers to understand and improve the online customer experience," said Jeff Greenberg, president and CEO of Vividence. "By using Vividence's customer experience guidelines, online retailers will be better prepared to ready their sites for the holidays and capitalize on every shopper that visits their Web site."

The bottom line is that we online business people are now a major part of the economy. That means we can no longer afford to have sites and sales material that is not on a par of bricks and mortar businesses.

Women Rule
More women are now online. There are some 10 million businesses owned by women in the U.S. There are many women who make major decisions for their companies and their families. Women are a major force.

When I started out online, every call or inquiry I got were from men. Now I get more women than men inquire about my services and, in fact, more women clients at this current time.

The e-commerce gender gap appears to be widening, as more women opened their purse strings than men last quarter: the percentage of purchases made by women reached 62 percent in the fourth quarter with men accounting for just 38 percent of transactions. For all of 2003, online purchasing was split 60 percent women and 40 percent men --- a 5 percent increase from 2002 where the split was 55 percent women, 45 percent men.

78% of women in the US use the internet for product information before making a purchase and 33% research products and services online before buying offline. The study notes that 69% of the women surveyed go online daily.

Women continued to purchase online at a slightly higher rate than men (73 percent vs. 71 percent) for the third consecutive quarter.

Online business-to-business (B2B) spending for female-owned firms hit $18.5 billion -- 46% of the total spending for all small businesses in the US.

88 percent of women rely more and more on the Web for parental guidance and ideas, saying they are always looking for new things they can do with their kids. Eighty-four percent say they enjoy going online with their children -- pointing to trusted family sites as the place to reach kids and parents alike. During the past six months, 86 percent say they made an online purchase while 85 percent said they clicked on an online ad."

Online shopping peaks among higher-income and better-educated Americans. Thirty-nine percent of those in households earning $50,000 or more plan to shop on the Internet for gifts, compared to 15 percent in households earning less than that. Similarly, 35 percent of those who've been to college say they'll buy gifts online; it's just 13 percent among less-educated people.

So with these facts and figures in mind, make sure you and your site and your marketing are up to professional standards. Get a piece of the pie. You won't put on weight --- you'll just add bucks to your bank account.


Susanna on 11.26.04 @ 02:33 PM CDT [link]

Things Change Fast on Internet Time --- Google going? How about IE?

Stats are a great thing. I'm an avid fan of stats. I can tell you almost anything about what goes on in the Powerwriting site. Moreover, I can tell you in real time.

For example, I am seeing a major swing away from Google and back to the good old gold standard, Yahoo! (and yes, the exclamation mark should be there.)

And it's proving to be a good thing because the people coming in from Yahoo are real prospects and not people wanting something totally different as has been my experience with Google. The results in Google are not at all good. For example, under copywriter you will get books on Amazon about copywriting and you will get a piece of software called "Copywriter" but you'll only get one or perhaps two real copywriters on the first page. The second page is not much better.

The Yahoo! results are much more what people want.

So what's my other observation?

Now my other observation. Fewer people are using Internet Explorer and are flying to Mozilla and FoxFire. I've used Mozilla for two years and wouldn't use IE short of an emergency. So I'm glad to see that people are getting smart.

But that means that webmasters are going to have to wise up too and make their sites look and work right in Mozilla. They made the mistake of doing their sites to IE and that's a bad thing. IE no longer rules just as Google no longer rules.

My point? On Internet time you have to be prepared to move on a dime. Time to move gang.

Susanna on 11.25.04 @ 07:46 AM CDT [link]

Baby Boomers Mean Business.

Not too long ago, Madison Avenue ad people disregarded baby boomers --- those folks born between 1946 and 1964. They considered them set in their ways and not open to new products or services. So they concentrated their advertising on the younger set.

Well, that's changing. If you are a smart advertiser, you'll change too.

Spending by 50-plus households will increase by more than $900 billion this decade, according to the Mature Market Group of J. Walter Thompson Worldwide.

One study found older adults appeared in just 3 percent of magazine ads and only 2 percent of TV commercials. Today, more and more, older adults are being depicted in ads as regular people doing regular things.

An AARP study found that older consumers are just as likely as younger adults to experiment with or switch brands.

"Our study smashed a lot of myths about 50-plus consumers," said Stephen Frost, research director for AARP Publications, which publishes the 22.5 million-circulation AARP The Magazine. "Brand loyalty doesn't increase with age."

This year, AARP Publications used those survey findings in an ad campaign designed to get advertisers to rethink the mature market. The eye-catching ads, placed in trade magazines, showed older consumers who had been body-bagged or toe-tagged while still living, breathing and trying to shop.

Lured by the fact that baby boomers have more disposable income than their children, advertisers are devising the best possible strategies for reaching 50-plus consumers.

Just as 20-year-old models are a no-no, so are models who look too old, advertising executives say.

"We're an aging nation, and we have to adjust our strategies," said Jim Ferguson, chairman and chief creative officer of Dallas-based TM Advertising. "But no one wants to see some old guy selling him something."

Ann Fishman, a New Orleans-based consultant who advises companies on how to market to different generations, tells her clients that baby boomers think of themselves as 10 to 15 years younger than they really are.

"Fifty is the new 30," she said.

Boomers also are less likely than previous generations to respect authority, Fishman said.

"The Silent Generation grew up during World War II with figures like Patton, Truman and Ike, so using role models in advertising works well for that age group," she said. "Boomers, on the other hand, rebelled against the establishment when they were young, so they resent expert opinions and are more interested in what their peers have to say."

So with those thoughts in mind and with this new data, you would be smart to count the older folks in. That is if you want some of their money.

Susanna on 11.21.04 @ 06:03 AM CDT [link]

Use the Recency Effect to Your Advantage

Do you think it's hot to be number 1 on Google? Well, it's impressive and it makes you tingle a bit. But does it help conversions? Perhaps to some extent. But most people looking for your service or product will dig a bit deeper to try and find the best deal for them.

That's where the recency effect will benefit you and it will pay to be somewhere in the top thirty but not number one or two.

The recency effect is simply the fact that we will tend to remember the last few things more than those things in the middle.

If you want something to stand out in a person’s mind, use it at the end of a conversation, a written list, etc. Don’t let it get lost in the middle. Repeat the message after a while, still with the key items at the end.

That's why I prefer to be the last person people call when they're looking for a copywriter, not the first. Chances are they won't hire the first person they call unless they're in a wild rush. In that case, I may not be able to help them anyway as I have lots of clients before them.

So, while I don't want you in the "deadly middle", it's a good idea to shoot for being the last person the prospect calls or hears from.



Susanna on 11.16.04 @ 04:40 AM CDT [link]

An Unusual Postcard Marketing Method that Works

I recently did a very effective campaign for a company using postcards. Without going into detail, here's how it worked.

Each day, my client's prospect received a card that simply said, "Here is the 15th reason why you should buy our widget from our company." (The product and company are not named.)

The next day the prospect got a card that said, "Here is the 14th reason . . ." and on it went for fifteen days.

What happened. Well, some people called and said, "Stop sending these cards." My client liked that because it got people to say "no" fast and left only the real prospects. Bottom line? The client got a tremendous response and made a ton of money from this postcard marketing program.

So when you run out of marketing ideas, try this one.


Susanna on 11.14.04 @ 07:47 AM CDT [link]

Test You Ad and Web site Copy with Exciting NEW Software.

Look out! Mama call the kids in --- there's a wild man in the yard. During the last few days some great new software has arrived that will help you track, test and tweak all of your marketing copy. I'm very excited about it and hope you will download your own copy.

You will get $100.00 off if you order now. It's an investment in your business that is well worth the price. If you don't test, you're losing money. So check it out.




Susanna on 11.14.04 @ 07:07 AM CDT [link]

Microsoft Debuts Search Engine

Miicrosoft has finally debuted their long-awaited search engine and they are, of course, taking cheap shots at Google (with Microsoft still at #4).

Meanwhile, Google has 8-billion pages now in its index.

I'm still a fan of Yahoo! but I would very much like to see Google get some real competition and I predict that the day will come when that happens. What goes up must come down or at the very least, level off.


Susanna on 11.14.04 @ 07:01 AM CDT [link]

Are Sales Letters and Direct Mail Still Relevant?

There are those who think that since we are in the digital age, the lowly sales letter is no long useful as an advertising vehicle. I can understand why they think that. Yet it's not true.

In fact, I'm grateful to those folks who have stopped using direct mail. That means more of my client's direct mail gets opened!

Okay. Why do I say direct mail is relevant? Simply put, sales letters are very targeted. Unlike a shotgun, they are a deadly 357 Magnum that cuts right at the center of the target --- assuming you aim right.

Direct mail can accomplish a lot of things. For one thing, it can drive traffic to your store or your Web site. It can cause people to take action, i.e. make a phone call, send a fax, go to your Web site or whatever. Or, if it is a true direct mail order piece, it can get you a fast order.

I am a strictly digital business. I get all of my business online. But some of my colleagues send out direct mail to get business. They also use direct mail as follow-up. And I think that's great. And it's good business.

So if you think direct mail is dead, you're dead wrong. You should use every advertising vehicle you can to get your business. Of course, having said that, I know that a lot depends on the type of business you have. But most businesses can benefit greatly from direct mail.




Susanna on 11.13.04 @ 07:04 AM CDT [link]

Copywriter Doesn't Like Blogs - Duh.

Bob Bly is a good person and a fine copywriter. He also has written numerous books that have helped many people learn to write and become better writers. That said, Bob does not like online blogs. Shame on you Bob.

Bob gives his reasons for disliking blogs in a recent e-mail dispatch and an article.

He pens, "The first is that most blogs I encounter are rambling, streams-of-consciousness musings about a topic of interest to the author, largely bereft of the practical, pithy tips that e-zines, Web sites and white papers offer." Apparently, Bly has only reader the Xangas and LiveJournals of teenage girls. There are many fine, business focused weblogs with valuable and intelligent content for business professionals published today. For a taste, visit Rick Bruner' s Business Blog Consulting which is a compendium of business weblogs.

Bly then writes, "The second problem involves distribution. With an e-zine, once the reader subscribes, he gets it delivered to him electronically every week or month or however often you send it. But with a blog, the reader has to go out and proactively look for it. And since your contributions to your blog may be irregular and unscheduled, he has no way of knowing when something new of interest has been added." Mr. Bly has obviously never heard of RSS or newsreaders which deliver the content of a weblog, post by post, to a person's desktop in real time without all the baggage in most HTML e-zines. Not to mention the need to sift through spam just to get to the email. By the way, didn't the term "e-zine" go out with the 90's?"

Let me tell you something about blogs. Adrants has knocked many copywriters off Google by its many posts about copywriting. Adrants is a popular blog. What that means is that blogs can help you to rank very high on Google. Is this a good thing for Google? I doubt it because the results you get are not what you are really looking for. If I'm looking for a copywriter, I don't want a bunch of blog entries to read through. So shame on Google.

But the fact is that right now as I write this (and it can change in a hearbeat with Google) blogging is a great way to get high rankings in Google. Adrants knocked me out of one of my best keyword positions as it has other copywriters. Do I think that's bad for searchers? Yes. Is it bad for us real copywriters? Yes. But it's working for the bloggers. Is it getting them business? My guess is it might be. Any time you get traffic, you get some business some times.

Frankly, I have found the results on Google to be poor. I use Yahoo! most of the time and have for years. Most of my business comes from Yahoo! and has for years. Business people started out years ago using Yahoo! and have continued to do so. And the results you get in their searches are good.

But back to the original story, blogs are good for getting high indexing in Google if that's what you're setting out to do. Blogs can and I am sure do get some people business.

I have suspected for awhile now that Bob Bly is a bit out of touch with online marketing in comparison to many other copywriters who study it regularly and do it daily. But he is still and always will be one of the greats.

If you blog or want to blog, do it. Blog on. It just may pay off.


Susanna on 11.10.04 @ 09:58 AM CDT [link]

How Long will Google Adsense Make Sense?

Online marketers are always looking for ways to get their message out and many of them use Google Adsense. I know a lot of folks who make money with Adsense so I'm not about to put this vehicle down.

But my point in this space today is expressing my opinion that the drive for privacy will very soon, indeed already is, making Google Adsense less relevant. Why do I say that?

Simply put, a lot of folks are like me. I have a program called Ad Muncher (No, I have no financial interest and am not an affiliate) and it very quickly at my command keeps me from seeing all Google Adsense ads and all ads like them. Frankly, I use it most of the time. I suspect there are other programs that do the same thing and I also assume that people are using them.

So the bottom line is that your site needs to be optimized so you enjoy a high listing in Google and all the other search engines --- especially Yahoo. I'm not at all convinced that Google will always be the big thing it is right now.

Google uses intimidation and scares the hell out of people. That's not a good thing. I know people who get physically ill when they lose their page rank or their Google listing. No one should have that awful affect on people. But I'm getting a bit off the subject.

Adsense is important and it works. But prepare yourself with other forms of marketing. Do not depend strictly on Adsense or, for that matter, on any other one form of marketing. If you do, you'll be badly hurt.

Susanna on 11.06.04 @ 08:59 AM CDT [link]