WRITING THE AD: WHERE TO START
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C. What do your competitors offer, and should you match that or make your offer even more attractive? What are the likely consequences to them—and you—of an “offer war”? D. What are the immediate costs of these options, what are their break-even points, and what are their payoffs if they succeed? The chances are that you’ll have to make an educated guess at some of the answers to these questions. Do it, but keep your guesses on the conservative side. If there are to be surprises, let them be happy ones.
SUMMARY • • •
Load up with benefits to hit your target. Plan your offer for your customers’ wants, not yours. When you can’t afford the offer, can you afford to offer less?
WRITING THE AD: WHERE TO START Every ad is made up of four elements: 1. The headline, commonly called “the head.” 2. Body copy, which is everything except the headline and the identifying signature, or “logo.” 3. The offer, which is part of the body copy but has to be thought out separately. 4. The logo, or signature, which identifies you and is generally the same as or very similar to your letterhead. My personal way of working is to begin with the offer, go to the body copy, and do the headline last. The offer forces me to understand exactly what I am trying to sell and what the buyer gets in return. Chicken at 49¢ a pound, when the competitors are charging 55¢, requires no explanation; but an HMO or the 27th new restaurant to open this month needs a different kind of enticement. After a rough (preliminary) draft of the offer, I do the body copy. My best headlines have generally grown out of a seed planted in the body, which I suddenly realize would make the perfect head. Of course, once the headline is in place, the entire ad may have to be fine-tuned to fit it, but that won’t matter, as long as you work within the ARM framework, which I will tell you about next.
Where You Should Start Where you start really makes no difference. Many writers begin with the headline or body copy instead of the offer and work from there. But no matter where you start, the headline is of such crucial importance that we’ll treat it in detail first.