Use This Persuasion Tactic to Make More Sales
Archives: Daily Issues
Issue #2570
- WEALTHY: Beating rent control (Julie Broad)
- HEALTHY: A refreshing and healthy drink straight from the tropics (Yarixa Ferrao)
- WISE: David Ogilvy on advertising
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- Persuading prospects to buy (Clayton Makepeace)
- What do you do when customers complain? (Bob Bly)
- It’s Fun to Know … about the presidential limo
- Add “aggrandize” to your vocabulary
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Rental Real Estate 101: 4 Ways to Battle the Landlord’s Arch Nemesis
By Julie Broad
Just as The Joker is to Batman and Dr. Evil is to Austin Powers, rent control is the landlord’s enemy. Supporters of rent control claim that without it many people couldn’t afford housing. But what happened to the basics of economics? The law of supply and demand should determine what your rental unit is worth, not the government.
Because of the handcuffs it puts on landlords, rent control creates rundown properties. Utilities, taxes, and insurance keep going up, but landlords of rent-controlled properties are unable to recover those costs through rent increases. This means they have less money for maintenance and improvements.
Have you noticed the lack of new apartments being built in cities where rent controls are in place? Developers choose to build condos instead, because it’s difficult to make money on a newly developed apartment building. And in many cities that have rent controls, apartment buildings get converted into condos so they can be profitable.
The loss of good quality rental units hurts the very subset of the population that rent controls were intended to protect! And it makes life pretty challenging for those of us who are real estate investors.
So what can you do if you’re a landlord in one of the U.S. cities or Canadian provinces with rent controls? Here’s how my husband and I make it work with our investments, which are all in rent-controlled provinces in Canada:
1. Increase your rents every year by the maximum amount allowed. This varies by province/city and usually changes each year.
2. When a tenant leaves, in most cases, you can raise the rent of that unit to the market rate.
3. Make sure the person on the lease is the person living there. I have a friend who lived in a New York City rent-controlled apartment for years. I don’t even think my friend knew the person who was on the lease – it was a friend of a friend! They were paying a paltry sum of money for a great place overlooking Central Park. Had the landlord been paying closer attention, my friend could have been evicted and the landlord could have more than doubled the rent to the market rate.
4. Renovate the unit. In many places, the law will allow for the landlord to give a tenant notice to vacate in order for renovations to be done. And if, for example, you spend $2,000 on renovations, then get $500 more per month in rent, it won’t take long to make back the cost of the renovations and start earning more profit.
[Ed. Note: Renting properties is a great way to make extra cash in any market. For more strategies for making money with rental property, sign up for Internet Money Club member and real estate investor Julie Broad's free monthly newsletter. Get your free report for making money with real estate here.]
“The more informative your advertising, the more persuasive it will be.”
David Ogilvy
A Powerful Persuasion Strategy – and How to Use It to Rocket Your Response
Over the years, I’ve tried to teach lots of folks to write sales copy. Not all of them have gone on to be stellar successes.
One of my most spectacular failures had a PhD in English Lit. Another was a crackerjack newspaper reporter. Still another had penned a best-seller and now wanted to try her hand at copywriting.
All three of these people were great word-jugglers. But as direct-response copywriters, they were hopeless. Not one of them could have written a winning sales letter if you’d held a .44 magnum to his or her highly educated head.
The problem? Though they came to me already armed with impressive writing skills, they had no selling skills. And they just couldn’t seem to acquire the knack of using words to persuade others to take a particular action – to look at their headlines, read their sales messages, and, for god’s sake, to order the doggoned product!
Too little, in my opinion, is written about how to be persuasive. And I mean to remedy that. There are lots of ways to be persuasive – I call them “Suasion Strategies” – and today I’d like to introduce you to one of the most powerful: the Scientific Demonstration.
When your prospects are unfamiliar with the mechanics of how or why your thing works, or why your thing works better than your competition’s thing – and the explanation would be long, technical, and boring – logic alone won’t cut it.
Take the alternative health market, for example…
Consumers of nutritional supplements are savvy about a lot of things. Many can rattle off all the vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and herbs that help lower blood pressure, shrink prostates, ease joint pain, even free you from halitosis, B.O., and the heartbreak of psoriasis. But almost none of your prospects really understand HOW these natural medicines work their magic.
Lots of times, it doesn’t really matter. If you can cite a study in which a Harvard scientist or a Nobel Prize winner says a nutrient does its thing, you’ll probably be okay. But a picture, as they say, is worth a thousand words. And if you can figure out a way to quickly and easily demonstrate how your product does its thing – or, better yet, how it does its thing better than the competition’s product does its thing – the impact can be palpable and the urge to try it irresistible.
Say a certain nutrient is normally water soluble – it needs water to dissolve and to be absorbed in the body. But the cheaper manufacturing process many of your competitors use makes that nutrient impervious to water and, therefore, undissolvable, unabsorbable, and unusable by the body.
Time to go up into the attic and drag out the old chemistry set you played with in fourth grade. Oh – and get the camera, too, so we can snap some pictures for a super-persuasive sidebar.
Yep, it’s time for a scientific experiment…
Take two laboratory flasks (so much more “official looking” than ordinary water glasses). Add water. Open a capsule of your competitor’s product and pour it into the first flask. Pour your product into the second. [SNAP!]
Observe that your product dissolves instantly, making the water cloudy to the eye. [SNAP!]… But the competition’s product is just kind of floating aimlessly on top of the water, like so much flotsam and jetsam. [SNAP!]
Now, just to prove you’re more than fair, take a spoon and stir the heck out of the competitor’s product. Hell… put it in a blender.
Wow! That worthless crap your competitor sells is still floating at the top of the flask. [SNAP!]
Suddenly, your claim that your product is more absorbable and therefore more effective is persuasive beyond doubt. Seeing is believing. Your prospect has been fully convinced.
Can’t do an actual scientific demonstration for your sales letter? No problem. Conduct a theoretical one.
For example, when promoting EDTA to remove plaque from arteries, I had an illustrator prepare a series of “Gray’s Anatomy”-style drawings:
• a baby’s artery – squeaky clean and free of plaque
• a 20-year-old’s artery – already beginning to grow ugly yellow globs of plaque… already beginning to restrict blood flow…
• a 60-year-old’s artery – nearly closed by plaque… only a drip or two of blood getting through to the heart muscle…
• EDTA moving through the artery, dissolving the calcium that bonds plaque to the artery wall, flushing it away and increasing blood flow…
• the 60-year-old’s artery looking more like the 20-year-old’s… and abundant blood coursing through the newly cleared artery
Now Think: What kind of scientific demonstration – real or theoretical – would best persuade prospects that your product can, indeed, deliver its promised benefits and/or is far superior to the competition’s?
Put it in your next sales promotion and watch response soar!
[Ed. Note: If you can persuade and influence others, you can command top dollar as a copywriter from companies eager to beat a path to your doorstep. Or... start your own business and use your skills to move the masses to buy your own products and services. And now, it's easier than ever for you to master the art of persuasion. Learn how to get the secrets of a man responsible for over $2 BILLION in sales right here.
Master copywriter Clayton Makepeace publishes the highly acclaimed e-zine The Total Package to help business owners and copywriters accelerate their sales and profits. Claim your 4 free money-making e-books - bursting with tips, tricks, and tactics that'll skyrocket your response - at MakepeaceTotalPackage.com. ]
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Does It Pay to Complain About Bad Products or Services?
By Bob Bly
I always feel awkward when I have a bad meal in a restaurant and the server asks, “How’s everything?” I get the feeling that the question is no more sincere than the telemarketer who asks “How are you today?” It’s just polite talk. They don’t really want or care about the answer.
I never complain, but on a couple of occasions, we were out to dinner with other couples who did complain.
The first time, when the restaurant manager asked our friend SH “How’s your steak?” and SH said it wasn’t good, the manager argued: “Our steaks are great. How dare you insult my food!”
Another time, when the maitre d’ asked my friend DY if everything was okay, DY replied, “The food was good, but the service was glacial (meaning slow).” Instead of apologizing, the maitre d’ angrily said to all of us, “Please don’t come back here again!”
In both cases, I wondered, “If he didn’t want to hear the real answer, why did he ask in the first place?”
Do YOU regularly ask your customers or clients whether they are satisfied with your products and services? If you do, and they complain, do you really listen? Do you respond politely and helpfully and offer to make things right? Or, like the maitre d’ who told us never to come back, do you become angry and resentful? And is your anger obvious to your customers?
A few suggestions for handling dissatisfied customers:
• Give them a refund – even if they didn’t ask for it, even if the guarantee has expired.
• Apologize. Express regret that their experience wasn’t excellent.
• Ask them what they didn’t like.
• Give them a small free gift as compensation.
[Ed. Note: Tell us how YOU handle customer complaints right here.
To learn more marketing secrets from freelance copywriter and marketing expert Bob Bly, sign up for his free e-zine, the Direct Response Letter. Do so today and get $116 in FREE bonuses.]
Gatorade, Move Aside… Coconut Water Is Taking Over!
I grew up on the island of Puerto Rico, where it is blazing hot almost all year round. My father used to chop down a young coconut from the palm in front of our house and place it in the freezer so it would get very cold. Then he’d make a hole in the coconut and stick a straw in it so we could drink the thirst-quenching coconut water. Little did I know back then that I would rediscover this refreshing beverage in my search for healthy alternatives to high-sugar sports drinks.
I came across coconut water in a health food store in Delray Beach. I was feeling dehydrated, and I wanted something more flavorful than plain water. Coconut water, as I later found out, contains potassium, sodium, magnesium, calcium, and phosphorous – electrolytes that keep your system hydrated and balanced. It’s low in carbohydrates and contains no artificial sweeteners. It helps boost your immune system and eases stomach pains. Plus, it’s a natural cure for a hangover. And these are just a few of its many benefits.Note that I am not a licensed nutritionist.
You should always consult your doctor prior to beginning any nutritional program. But if you are a big Gatorade or PowerAde drinker, or if you just want something tastier than water, you should try coconut water. I drink it almost every day, and so do my clients.Drink about eight ounces of coconut water before, during, or after your workout to reduce muscle protein breakdown and allow for more fat loss. You can also drink it after a night of drinking, if you have a stomachache, if you have diarrhea, or in the morning instead of high-sugar fruit juice.
[Ed. Note: Eating and drinking the "right" things can be the missing link to your weight-loss efforts. For more healthful nutritional recommendations, plus workout techniques, sign up for ETR's natural health newsletter.
Yarixa Ferrao is the certified personal trainer and founder of "Get Fit in 6" who has been whipping some Early to Rise staffers into shape. Coach Yari's e-course newsletter series explains the exercise and nutrition secrets that can help you burn fat. Click here to sign up.]
It’s Fun to Know: The Presidential Limo
Barack Obama, like past U.S. presidents, will travel with airtight security. And that includes the heavily armored presidential limo. The exact details of the latest edition are classified, but here are some of the specs we know:
• A Cadillac body built around a truck frame (Buy American!)
• 5-inch thick armor
• Bulletproof windows
• Chemical weapons protection
• A 10-CD changer (you know, for road trips)
(Source: Wired)
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Word to the Wise: Aggrandize
To “aggrandize” (uh-GRAN-dize) – from the Latin for “large” – is to increase in power, rank, reputation, or wealth.
Example (as used by Robert Greskovic in Ballet 101): “These small worlds periodically featured pageants or fetes to aggrandize local despots as they celebrated such occasions as empire-building marriages or the birth of an heir.”
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker ... build your self-confidence and intellect ... increase your attractiveness to others ... just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR's new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2009
On the rare occasion that a customer complains, after saying I’m sorry to hear that, I ask them to tell me what they are unhappy about. 99% of the time I can set into motion events to remedy the complaint. Very infrequently I end up asking the complainer, “what do you want us to do??” That way they get the solution they want!! It wouldn’t matter if their solution is what I was saying, its their idea. Works for us.
While working for Office Depot in the early 90’s in Dallas, policy required a response similar to one of your 4 suggestions. I can’t think of a time over two years when the customer responded negatively (excepting a drunk who threw up in the aisle!). Often, I got repeat loyal customers that frequently reported my courtesy and professionalism to the store manager. I much preferred responding positively to customer complaints. It ads to the bottom line, in the long run!
A 12 gauge does wonders.
I am a performer and have my own TV show. (You can see a clip on youtube at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYZyekSbGmk
http://youtube.com/watch?v=fhAokoMgSDc
While I agree an owner should be polite and welcome complaint, I am wondering how to deal with complaints that are out and out rude.
“Your show stinks!”
How much money do you make”
Are two of the most common and rudest comments I get.
The show in shown on non-commerical cable and the money to produce the show is coming out of my own pocket. So the people coming up and complaing aren’t really customer. I’m not get a dime from them. I do consider my a business and so any suggestion on handling these people
I do not get many complaints, as all my clients come by word of mouth. But if I do screw up on something, I let the client know up front before he or she finds out for himself. Things can be resolved peacefully that way, and there are no hard feelings.
I insist that each client tell me what their expectations are with regard to my work. “Do whatever you want because you’re the expert” is not acceptable. I do everything possible at the outset to ensure there won’t be a complaint–it minimizes any future hassles.
Kirk–I have dealt with people like that who like to be rude for the sake of being rude. Their comments have nothing to do with you as a person; but they say a lot about who THEY are as people. If they are not offering anything constructive, they don’t need to be listened to.
When I get a comment like that, I have found that a simple, cheerful “thank you!” leaves the person speechless. Any anger on my part just gives him power over me, and that is exactly what he wants. If I don’t respond with anger, he doesn’t know what to think. Hope this helps a bit.