…but you’re going to create a killer video!

Or…

“A simple letter is beyond you…but a Hollywood blockbuster…no problem!”

OK.  Get the picture.

Look, the above comments (hopefully) don’t apply to you.

But I’m going to go on a mini-rant about something that is annoying me at the moment.

Bear with me because what I have to say may well save you a lot of time and frustration and money too.

There’s a somewhat dangerous (in my view) idea going around in marketing circles…

…that the traditional long copy sales letter is dead…

…and that video is the way of the future.

I guess this idea got going, oh, 2-3 years ago with Michel Fortin’s “The Death Of The Salesletter”.

It’s been picked up by other marketers like John Reese and Armand Morin.

In fact in a recent video promoting a new product, Armand boasted that he hadn’t written a traditional long copy letter for quite a while now.

This was in a video that ran for around 90 minutes…

…and ended with an utterly shameless stacking of bonuses on a slide that looked pretty much like…

…well one of those tables you might see in…a long copy salesletter.

My point here is not to dispute or down play the importance of video.

Done properly, video works and will usually boost sales and conversions.

BUT, video works not simply because it’s video…

…but because it’s an effective medium to communicate an effective sales message!

It’s the sales message that is key.

It’s the same with long copy letters.  They don’t work simply because there is 20-30 pages of text…

…but because they communicate a sales message effectively.

Now, you might be thinking, how do you create a great, effective, video?

Well, turns out that the process, the “formula” if you like, is pretty much the same as the traditional long copy letter.

Take a look at some of these video sales letters.

You’ll see the familiar elements of getting attention, building interest and desire, presenting proof and asking for action.

What I’m saying here is that many of the advocates of video either ignore or gloss over the importance of knowing how to craft a compelling sales message.

Bluntly, if you can’t write a sales letter, you’ve got no chance of crafting an effective video script.

In fact, it’s probably harder to write a video script.

Another thing.

Is video always the best medium?

Probably not…depends on your market and the audience.

Even in a market like internet marketing, video on it’s own can have limitations.

Take the recent launch by Eben Pagan of his “Guru Blueprint” program.

Let me say, I have nothing but the highest admiration for Eben.  The man’s a genius marketer and I watch closely what he does.

However, in the middle of the 90 minute video that formed the “video sales letter” for the product, I had to wonder when the hell this thing was going to end.

It was good content, but did it really merit 90 minutes?

Had to smile when the day after the video came out, super affiliate Jeff Johnson came out with an email that confirmed my thoughts when he said…

“Eben Pagan’s Guru Blueprint sales video is too damn long.”

One of the advantages of the traditional sales letter is that you can skim read it and quickly zero in on the key information.

You can’t do that with a video, which is why some experts recommend supporting the video with…

…a sales letter!

As I said before, I’m not “anti-video”.

I regularly write scripts for clients and I’m a big advocate of using them.

I’ve learnt how to script killer videos from the experts…

…and I watch closely how video is used.

You may have noted my occasional series on this blog about “Marketing And Movie Trailers”.

But the medium is NOT the message.

Beware the “Shiny Object”.

There is no substitute for understanding the marketing fundamentals, crafting a killer sales message…

…and then delivering that message via the most appropriate medium, whether that’s video, audio or text.

Some useful copywriting points to note in a video that’s been causing something of a stir with comments like “Has Alabama’s Dale Peterson created the best political ad ever?”

Here’s the video…

Here are a couple of the points that struck me…

1. Note the use of the “arresting idea” about the size of the commissioner’s budget.  Who would have thought? Great attention grabber.

2. Use of the “us” versus the undefined “them” idea.

3. For his audience (remember, the guy is running for the Republican nomination) the guy is connecting very well with the “conversation” that’s already going on in their minds.

Plus, of course, great imagery throughout with the classic American icon of the cowboy…

…and the very clever introduction of the rifle at the end.

This video does a lot in just over a minute, at the end you know clearly who this guy is and what he stands for.  Well worth looking at the structure of this video.

Be interesting to see how Dale does in the primary and then the election if he gets that far..

Over at Clayton Makepeace’s blog, there is a special guest post from marketing maven Rich Schefren.

It’s all about TV pitchman Billy Mays and the marketing lessons to be learned from his work.

In a nutshell…

“…Billy knew how to do something that very few marketers realize is even possible. He knew how to create and stir up demand for a product in less than two minutes.”

“That’s right, in less than 120 seconds he was bale to introduce you to a product, get you to want it badly enough, and then get you to pick up the phone and crack open your wallet to order it. And once again – all in the span of two minutes.”

Now, for marketers and copywriters, this is going to be an increasingly important skill.

Rich wrote a special report a while back called the “Attention Age Doctrine” which covered marketing in an attention-deficit society. So it’s no great surprise that he was interested in the work of Billy Mays.

(In fact, when Billy died Rich was considering creating a product with him on how best to sell through video.)

The article is more like a special report. I’ve printed it out and it runs to 20 pages, so be warned!

However, this is something well worth your time…

…and attention!

Here’s…

“Billy Mays Marketing Magic”.

Here’s something a little different from the usual marketing video clips that we’ve been looking at.

It’s from one of my favourite authors, Steven Pressfield.

His best known book is probably “Gates Of Fire”, a retelling of the epic battle between the Greeks (mainly Spartans) and the Persians at Thermopylae in 480 B.C.

Steven’s latest book is “Killing Rommel” a novel set against the back drop of the war in North Africa in 1942-43.

Now, if you like historical drama I think you’ll love this book.  I got it a few weeks ago and couldn’t put it down.  Wonderful book with a surprising twist at the end.  Can’t rate it too highly.

But that’s not the main point of this post.

I was listening to a fascinating interview with Steven and I was quite amazed when he spoke about the difficulty these days of getting a review in the press for a new novel.

Apparently, the press in the US has cut back on reviews and even for a successful author like Pressfield, it’s getting more difficult to get the word out about new books.

Interesting.

Anyway, undeterred he went and set up a website to promote “Killing Rommel” that includes a video in 3 versions (30 seconds, 3 minutes and a 10 minute “mini-documentary”).

The different versions are interesting to compare to see how the producers adapt the message to fit the time available.

Interesting approach and we could well see a lot more of this sort of thing with marketing books.  We’ve already seen “virtual book tours” and it makes sense that authors will make more use of the internet to market and promote their work.

I’ve included the 3 minute version below.  On my “A-I-R” structure, I think it rates pretty well but have look and please share your opinion in the comments.

Oh and you may have noticed I’ve switched over to the DISQUS comment system.  You don’t need to have an account, you can comment as a “Guest”. Please do!

…from Billy Mays.

After yesterday’s post, I couldn’t resist putting up one of Billy’s “Mighty Putty” infomercials.

Love the part with the truck! Who wouldn’t want some of this stuff!

My only slight quibble with this is that the offer is a little ordinary…great value for sure, but ordinary.

Sad…shocked really…to hear the news of the death of Billy Mays on June 28.

I confess that living in Australia and not watching a great deal of TV, I was not familiar with Billy and his ads until recently.

When I started to look more closely at marketing with video, the name Billy Mays came up as a master of the modern infomercial…

…especially the shorter variety that last only a couple of minutes.

And that makes his work perfect for us to get some pointers we can use in our own marketing videos.

Digressing slightly, infomercials are viewed with some disdain in the mainstream marketing world.

But that’s a big mistake because the good pitch man knows how to sell.

And for we direct response marketers, at the end of the day that’s our objective…

…to make the sale.

I’ve mentioned before the excellent video “Gadgetmania” from the Discovery Channel (hat tip to marketing guru Stephen Pierce once again for introducing me to the video).

It’s a wonderful exploration of the art of the pitch and the infomercial (featuring classics such as Ronco, Ginsu Knives and…the Thighmaster!) and well worth checking out.

Back to Billy Mays.

There is a lot to learn from his infomercials.  I’ve been checking out a number of them and they all do a great job of grabbing attention, developing interest (with usually some astonishing and entertaining demonstrations of the product) and then making a great offer…

…but wait, there’s more!

Yup, he’s a master at piling on the value to an already great offer to make it virtually irresistible.

I considered a number of videos to include here for you to take a look at.  I love the “Might Putty” ad…

…but in the end I chose this one because of the offer, which I think is an excellent example.

I salute a modern marketing giant and I’m sure the Great Pitch Man In The Sky will smile when he hears…

“Hi, Billy Mays here!”

Went to see the  “Terminator Salvation” movie the other day…

…so I’ll take the opportunity to make a few comments about the movie and also continue the series of taking a look at the trailer to see if we can get some tips for marketing videos.

What I’m going to do when looking at trailers in future is use the framework of a truncated “A-I-D-A” formula…

We know what the last A is (Action, of course)…

…so we’ll see how well a trailer stacks up in terms of grabbing Attention, creating Interest and stimulating Desire to go and see the movie.

The movie itself, first.

There’s a problem with movies like this where, basically, you know what’s going to happen.  We know the “good guys” are going to win…

…because basically the earlier movies told us that!

Now, in the Terminator series there is an element of uncertainty because of the time travel and potential alternate reality elements.

However, it’s a little flimsy so the writers have the problem of how to create drama and tension in the movie.

They do this by introducing a mysterious character, Marcus Wright, who we guess is a cyborg of some kind…

…but we’re not sure whose side he’s on.

By doing this, there is an element of uncertainty.  We haven’t heard of this character in the previous movies and the John Connor character echoes that uncertainty when he states that “this isn’t what my mother warned me about”.

For story buffs, the Marcus Wright character is the classic “Stranger comes to town” theme and, for me, it’s the best element of the movie.  Sam Worthington (playing the Wright character) steals the show, in my humble opinion.

As for the rest of the movie, it’s not bad.

It’s fast paced with plenty of action…but it doesn’t quite hang together to me.

Having said that, worth seeing if you’re a Terminator fan.

Now, as to the trailer.

Certainly grabs the attention with the obligatory “big bang” action scenes.

It then starts to develop interest by introducing the Marcus Wright character and the new element.

It then almost completely blows the whole thing by seemingly giving away the mystery…

…before retrieving the interest at the end and leaving you wondering.

To put some structure on these trailer reviews, I’m going to use a scale of 1-10, with 3 marks possible for each element of Attention, Interest and Desire…

…with 1 discretionary mark that I’ll award based on my overall impressions.

My marks are…

Attention – 2 (fairly orthodox but good enough)

Interest – 2 (good story development, almost loses it but a good recovery that sparks interest)

Desire – 2 (does a good enough job to want you to know more but really doesn’t have to work too hard given that there’s a ready audience for the movie from the existing legions of fans)

Extra Mark – 0 (the trailer’s OK but not outstanding, in my view)

TOTAL – 6/10

OK, here’s the trailer so you can judge for yourself.  Note that for some reason, the “official” trailers didn’t provide an “embed” at Youtube, so I’ve had to make do with this review video…