Psychological Copywriting: Why People Buy
Do you fully understand psychological copywriting? Do you know why people buy?
For example, did you know a part of the brain, the hypothalamus drives emotions and hidden desires, and another part of the brain, the neocortexlogic governs reasoning and intellect?
How do I know that? Because I read it in a medical journal. Yes, I sometimes read medical journals, when I'm in my doctor's waiting room. I take marketing seriously. I read everything. If you take marketing seriously, you should get into the same habit.
Anyway, I digress. The point is, having this knowledge will help you understand why people behave in a certain way and the very nature of consumers preferences and buying patterns.
When I started my career as a salesman many years ago, one of the very first techniques I learned to overcome price objections was something called "Reduce to the Ridiculous."
Are you familiar with that term?
Following is a perfect example of what I'm talking about:
A life insurance agent sits across the dining room table from a couple. The couple is middle class with two children ages 6 and 10. After conferring with the couple for nearly an hour, the agent has designed a plan to protect the family in the event of death of either the mother or father or both. The agent slides the proposal across the table to the parents. The parents glance
at the proposal and see that the plan will cost them $50.00 a month. The couple hesitates and then glance at each other.
The sharp agent observes the hesitation. He anticipates an objection and calmly reaches into his pants pocket and pulls out 4 quarters, 5 dimes, 3 nickels and 2 pennies. He then puts the change on the table and says "The children's future will be protected in the event that a tragedy takes the life of one of you or both, for a little over a dollar a day or a cup of coffee." He then shuts up. Why? Because in sales, the next one who speaks loses. The couple smiles and asks "Where do we sign?"
This technique is called "Reduce to the Ridiculous" and is a very effective way to overcome the "monthly payment objection." The salesman reduced the payment to the ridiculous and the couple bought. The couple in this example was faced with a dilemma. $50.00 a month is a lot of money. That's $600.00 a year. But when the payment was reduced to a ridiculous $1.67 a day, the couple thought "Wait a minute, just $1.67 a day? We can do that! Where do we sign?"
The couple didn't didn't take the time to "logically" analyze the total cost of the insurance on the extended payment plan and the difference that it would make to their bottom line and whether or not they could could actually afford it.
Instead, their decision was purely "emotional." They were worried about their two children being taken care in the event of their death. So they logically "justified" $1.67 a day was affordable to them.
To this day, I use this technique whenever I write a salesletter. In fact, I'm currently using a version of it on my website now to promote my mentoring program, because it works.
In closing, this is just one example of psychological selling: why people buy. There are many others. I will be presenting additional examples in future articles.
Last edited by Dale King; 03-01-2007 at 06:52 PM.
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