By Roberta Rosenberg on Jun 14, 2008 | In Book Publishing | 7 Comments
photo credit: mmatins
In the April issue of Steve Harrison’s Book Marketing Update, there’s an article based on author John Kremer’s (1001 Ways to Market Your Book) thoughts on book titling. With so many of us involved in self-publishing POD and ebooks, I thought I’d synopsize the recommendations.
- Make your title memorable, since 80% of books are sold by word-of-mouth.
- Short titles are best, most successful titles are around 5 words. Add a subtitle to expand and/or illuminate the information about your book.
- Numbers in titles can be very effective for non-fiction, just as they are when writing headline copy.
- Include keywords for non-fiction titles. You want to put the main search terms for your subject in your title or subtitle, but don’t use terms that are too generic.
- Try inventing or coining a word for your title, but strive for conceptual clarity rather than showing off how clever you are. (I coined ‘macromize” for a promotion I did for a book about um, Wordstar macros years ago. I still like it.
- Try to think brandable - the Chicken Soup, Idiots and Dummies series represent genius-level book branding at its finest.
- Don’t try to do too much with your title. Think brand, then add the specific audience you’re going after.
Lastly, try the Title Scorer at Lulu.com … it’s free! Created by stat techs based on 50 years of research on the commonalities of best-seller book titles, it’s a nifty way to get some useful feedback on titles-in-progress. (Originally developed for novelists, us less arty, more non-fiction types can still have fun.)
Of course, there are popular exceptions to just about every one of these tips, but knowing the rules before you creatively break ‘em could be a smart move, no matter how you title the result.
By Roberta Rosenberg on Jun 11, 2008 | In DM Copy Tips & Tools | 6 Comments
photo credit: ©aius
One of the hardest jobs I have as a direct marketing copywriter/consultant is to get my clients to test variables in their promotions. Test headlines, offers, lists, color, etc. With smaller clients I urge them to test single variables where the difference to their response/bottom line will be the biggest. Larger clients can afford the luxury of sophisticated multi-variate approaches to their campaigns.
So here’s my segue to today’s interesting article from Target Marketing. Brian Kurtz, leading marketing genius at the power publishing house, Boardroom, Inc., shares his thoughts on testing here. Good stuff and I’m sharing it with you!
Got a testing story to share? By all means, let’s hear about it.
By Roberta Rosenberg on Jun 9, 2008 | In DM Copy Tips & Tools | 7 Comments
photo credit: Bobbie
Ahh, a fresh piece of paper … a completely blank screen … your fingers poised for action …
And nothing. You don’t have a decent shred of an idea to work with. Problem is you can’t afford to wait for the muse to strike because you’re on a deadline that can’t be moved or pushed back. Before you go into panic mode, grab whatever it is you grab as an idea folder and slide this little beauty right out.
In today’s issue of The Golden Thread newsletter from the good folks at AWAI comes this handy tip sheet of 52 ways to kick start your own brilliant headline. Read then, love them, learn from them and make ‘em your own!
1. How To (ACCOMPLISHMENT) By (DOING SOMETHING UNEXPECTED)
2. How To (ACCOMPLISHMENT) In (TIME FRAME)
3. How To Turn (PROBLEM) Into (BENEFIT)
4. How To Get (GOAL) From (SOMETHING COMMON)
5. How To Improve Your …
6. How To Start …
7. How To Have …
8. How To Make (SOMEONE/SOMETHING) Do (SOMETHING GREAT)
9. (PROBLEM) – How To Fix It
10. How To Get Free (PRODUCT/PROGRAM)
11. How You Can (ACTION) In The Next (TIME FRAME)
12. How An Uninformed (PERSON/ACTION) Made A Fortune In (BUSINESS TYPE)
13. How An Unexpected (EVENT) Changed My (SITUATION)
14. How I (ACCOMPLISHMENT) In (TIME FRAME)
15. How I (ACCOMPLISHMENT) By (SOMETHING UNEXPECTED)
16. How I Improved My (PROBLEM)
17. (#) Ways To (PROMISE)
18. (#) Ways To Avoid (PROBLEM)
19. (#) Steps To …
20. (#) Ways To …
21. (#) Ways To Beat (PROBLEM)
22. Get Rid Of Your (PROBLEM) Forever!
23. Buy No (PRODUCT TYPE) Till You’ve Seen (PRODUCT NAME OR DESCRIPTION)
24. Read This And (PROMISE/THREAT)
25. Dare To Be …(PROMISE) !
26. Read This Or (THREAT)!
27. What Makes … ?
28. Do You Make These Mistakes In … ?
29. Want To Be (BETTER CONDITION)?
30. (PROBLEMS) – Which Do You Want To Overcome?
31. (PERSONALIZED GREETING), Here Are (#) (PRODUCTS) Of Interest To You. Which (#) Do You Want Free?
32. Are You Ever (PROBLEM)?
33. Tired/Fed Up With (PROBLEM)?
34. Should You (SOMETHING YOUR PROSPECT IS THINKING ABOUT DOING)?
35. Are You … ?
36. Are You Ashamed Of (PROBLEM)?
37. Secrets Of (SOME KIND OF EXPERT)
38. What Never Ever To (COMMON CHORE/ACTION)
39. The Truth About …
40. What You Should Know About …
41. The One Sensible Way To …
42. What Every (PERSON) Should Know
43. The Secret Of …
44. Why …
45. What It Takes To …
46. What Everybody Ought To Know … About This (BUSINESS TYPE)
47. Little Known Ways To (BENEFIT)
48. The Wrong Way And The Right Way To (DO SOMETHING DIRECTLY RELATED TO YOUR BUSINESS)
49. The Secret Of (ACCOMPLISHMENT)
50. When Experts (FAILURE/PROBLEM) – This Is What They Do
51. The Secret Of … – Yours If You Qualify
52. Your (SOMETHING IMPORTANT TO YOU) Is In Imminent Danger
You find this and lots, lots more in this new AWAI resource. A Copywriting Goldmine Eight Years in the Making and tell them the Maven sent you!
And if you have one to add, add your comment below!
By Roberta Rosenberg on May 30, 2008 | In DM Copy Tips & Tools, Web Copy Tips & Tools | 7 Comments
photo credit: Qinn
I love rules-of-thumb, especially when they’ve been tested and are not simply an extension of someone’s anecdotal experience or bias. I also love direct response techniques and tools. Not to discount talent and creativity - that’s a given - but I just love having “stuff” to fiddle with.
So here’s another I’ve just come across and I’m sharing it with you.
Want the optimal character length for your email subject lines? Think 50, go for 80!
That’s what the testing reveals in the article, Email Analytics Reveal Sweet Spots In Subject-Line Length, published in this week’s Online Media Daily.
Drawn from a keynote address by Dela Quist, CEO of Alchemy Worx, here’s the lowdown:
- 50 character subject lines work best with a simple, powerful offer
- 80 character subject lines work best to entice, entreat, and tempt
- 60-70 character lines, for reasons that are unclear, just don’t get the open rates of the 50/80 lines
Quist theorizes that the longer subject lines give the mailer a better of presenting different concepts that may appeal to a larger number of different consumers thus boosting open rates.
So in the example - Find out Secrets to Spice up your Barbecue this weekend and all Summer Long and enter to win a New Weber Grill - you have something for the bbq fans as well as those who may be in the market for a new grill.
Surely, this goes against the conventional wisdom. I’m also wondering about the 17-character line length that our Blackberries afford us while perusing our emails on the go. Looking at the example above we get “Find out Secrets to …”
Will the email recipient be disappointed or enthralled to learn the secrets are about better grilling on the barbee? Dunno. Worth testing? You bet.
By Roberta Rosenberg on May 26, 2008 | In Occasional Rantings, Running Your Biz, Uncategorized | 6 Comments
photo credit: katielips
In my daily post from the Judaism forum at Beliefnet.com came this interesting set of soul exercises. Having written a fair number of emails in my day — and who wouldn’t want a soul workout — this particular one seemed intriguing so I’m sharing.
Read an E-mail from God
Basically Rabbi Brian (Rabbi Brian? What kind of name is Rabbi Brian? ) posits that you imagine you open your in-box and find an e-mail with the subject line: An e-mail from God. (or G-d for us Hebraic types.)
Now making the giant leap that this email wouldn’t have been sent directly to your SPAM box … AND … depending on the identity of the email’s sender, what do you imagine the message would offer?
- Praise?
- Condemnation?
- An answer to a question that you’ve been asking?
- Advice?
- A forwarded joke? (would it be a dirty joke or uplifting?)
- What?
And once the woo-woo Twilight Zone music in your head stopped, how would you reply, if at all? (Or would you simply ask God for HIS (for argument’s sake) Twitter name so you could answer in short, 140-max character tweets?)
After a few hours of cleaning the garage today, I’d be hoping MY email from G-d would answer my prayer and tell me that I’m next in line to win the Mega Millions - just a few million because there’s no need to be greedy. My reply - a simple, elegant - THANK YOU, LORD and recite the Shema and a Shehechiyanu.
Barring that, I’d take the joke and hope that it’s funny. That way, I could send back a ROFL and a big 
So, how about you?
