Lessons Learned from an Ebook Launch Part 5

Matthew

If you’ve been a regular reader of this ‘mini series’ you’ll know I held a prelaunch for my ebook in May.

So far, I’ve shared with you four key lessons that I learned during this launch ;

1) commentators are not your customers
2) it’s all about leverage
3) planning your time
4) developing your mailing list

This is the final lesson in the series:

Write a great sales page

Now I’m the first to admit that I don’t have a background in advertising and I’m no copywriter or marketing genius, so you have to recognise what you’re good and what you’re not.

Simply just making a list of all the bells and whistles your product has isn’t going to work. Sure, you might sell a few copies, but you want to sell a lot.

You have 2 options:

1. Hire a professional copywriter

If you don’t know what you’re doing or you want a professional job doing head over to www.Elance.com and register your project there just make sure that you select a copywriter who would be sympathetic to your style and make sure you check out their work before hand! If possible contact their clients and ask about results.

Depending on what you want, this should cost you around $350-450. You may get it cheaper than this if you have a very straightforward project.

2. DIY

When I say DIY, I don’t mean have a go and see what happens. I mean learn about it. A good starting point is The 22 Immutable Laws Of Marketing and learn about marketing for success.

Once you’ve understood the basics then head over to Copyblogger and spend some time hunting around the site.

If you’re looking to title your page or post have a look at Digg.com and look at the most popular articles and what their titles are. What are the common themes of popular posts? Is there anything you can adapt or learn from to use for your own work?

Many people ‘digg’ an article based on title alone, so it works!

For my own sales page I used the following ‘formula’ based on articles I’d read on copyblogger.

1. What have I got for you
2. What it does for you
3. Why you should buy from me
4. What you get
5. What to do next

So, obvious as it sounds describe the problem you’re solving for the reader:

For example, “you know how it is when you’re setting out in business and there’s so many different things to do and you don’t know which way to turn? We’ve developed a step by step guide to show you what to do next so that you achieve your goals quickly, so you’ll make money faster”

You may of heard about features and benefits. Many people get these the wrong way around. For example my Black and Decker drills holes (feature) quickly and makes no mess (benefit)

So, focus on what the product does for your reader.

Tell the reader why they should buy from you. What’s your expertise?

Go back to the product again and describe what they get for the money

Eg 35 page workbook, 10 case studies, 3 interviews with X,Y and Z etc

Finally, tell the reader what to do – ie buy the product now by pressing the button or clicking here.

So, that’s my lessons. What do you think? Anything to add?

Matthew Needham is the principal consultant and director of The Big Red Tomato Company as well as the author of his blog. Matthew is a graduate in Accounting and Finance and a qualified accountant. Having worked for prestigious companies like Rolls Royce, Matthew is more than qualified to talk about quality and business. You can follow him on Twitter.