So much so that everyone is still using them. Have you taken a look at your email lately? Have you noticed all those emails from the top “experts” announcing this new product and that recommendation? Guess what… those are solo ads.

Maybe not like you’re used to seeing… the hypey, “do this now” type of ad. Nonetheless, they are solo ads. And they still work.

A client of mine and I were talking the other day about his advertising campaign that we recently worked on and how amazed he is about the performance of the solo ads. “I have to admit, I really didn’t want to waste the money on this type of advertising. But, when the results came in… well, can you write a few more?”

Solo ads are here to stay and I truly believe that there isn’t anything available yet to replace them.

“Why are your ads so effective?”

That’s what someone asked me the yesterday. Luckily, I’ve already been thinking about it and could immediately tell them my personal ad writing tips for successful solo ads.

Be Conversational With Your Solo Ad

I love the new direction that solo ads are taking. Actually, I’ve been writing ads this way for quite awhile now and it seems that it is really beginning to take off. Remember the question at the beginning of this article about the emails you receive from the top “experts”? They don’t really seem like ads, do they?

I mean, we know they are, but it just isn’t your regular “hyped up, buy this amazing product now” type of ad. It’s more… well, conversational. It feels like the person sending the email (ad) to you is talking to you.

Powerful isn’t it? I have never, and I say this with all honesty, bought anything from a short solo ad that “forced” me to visit a site. But, I do feel compelled to visit sites from ads where I feel like they really care that I visit this site.

And I know it’s an ad!

Personal, conversational, relational. Write your ad like you’re actually sitting across from the person or talking on the phone.

Target Your Ad To Fit Your Reader

So many times I see ads for products that I am not even remotely interested in (and I’m interested in a lot of things). I ask myself, why am I receiving this ad? Yes, I might subscribe to the ezine, but why would this person be advertising this product through this mailing list? It’s a huge waste of money.

The most important principle of advertising is targeting your audience for the best possible results. So, it would only be logical to do the same thing with the actual ad itself.

Write the ad to fit your reader, not your product.

So many ads are written to tell about the product, what it can do, and how many special features it has that makes it worth the hundreds of dollars they’re asking for it.

The thing I’ve been doing recently is placing a tremendous emphasis on narrowly focusing the ad to fit the reader. What do people in this niche need? What are they feeling right now? What will help them the most?

For example: Let’s say you are selling an ebook about t-ball practice drills. In writing the ad I would focus on one particular audience… new coaches. I wouldn’t even begin to try to satisfy all people. Just one narrow focus.

The ad would then take on a life of it’s own. Instead of limiting your creativity, the sky is the limit. You could write from the emotion of a new, bewildered father who is stepping in to coach because no one would. Or, set up the ad like a personal letter from one “new” coach to another describing a great resource that really helped.

Focus your ad to fit the reader.

Solo Ads Work Best In The Third Person

This ties into the previous “secret”.

I have found that the solo ads that work best are not the ones that are written for your own product. What I mean by this is when you write an ad for your own product, you shouldn’t write the ad like you own the product. Write it in the third person point of view. As a recommendation.

The last couple of years I have been extensively testing this theory. I have an ebook that I wrote on how to write solo ads that I wrote several ads for. Actually about thirty. Like I said… testing.

Anyway, I tested out a lot of theories and writing styles and the consistently high click thrus and conversion rates came from the ads that were written in the third person. The ads that were like I was recommending my own ebook, instead of saying “buy my ebook”, outperformed the other ads… most of the time by 50-75%.

If you’re struggling with your current ads start using my personal secrets to write some new ones or rewrite your current ones.

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1. Solo Ads – 9 Common Mistakes Advertisers Make
2. Solo Ads: 9 Tips for Writing Better Subject Lines
3. Solo Ads: Agony, Ecstasy, or Nothing?

Tip # 1 – Always remember the truth I just mentioned: the most important part of an email marketing message is the subject line. That piece of text is decisive. If all it says is something like “Delete this junk!”, then the rest is in vain. Your work and your money are wasted. Unfortunately so many advertisers think that buying a solo ad slot in an opt-in mailing list guarantees some kind of readership for their advertisement or otherwise it means that the publisher is some sort of scammer. That’s completely wrong! In order to get a good result, the first thing your ad needs (out of many others) is a good subject line.

Tip # 2 – Write an attention grabbing subject line. Common pieces of text like “It’s Ken here” (as if the reader knows who Ken is – she/he doesn’t!) don’t work. People don’t read all the emails they receive, but only the emails they have some of sort of interest in or the emails that arouse their curiosity.

Tip # 3 – Don’t grab the reader’s attention in a wrong way. Swearing, for example, for sure grabs the reader’s attention, but it makes her or him delete your ad instead of reading it.

“What kind of tip is this? No one will swear anyway.”

Well, claiming something even the advertiser doesn’t believe is common and is actually like swearing. Insulting reader’s intelligence is the no-no method I’m actually advising you to avoid.

Tip # 4 – Keep the subject line short. In some email clients, long subject lines are not readable without opening the email. Since many emails are opened only if the subject line is interesting, in case the subject line is not fully readable, you know what happens, right? How short should it be? If you make it very short (30-35 characters) it will be good for almost all email clients, but you may not be able to write an interesting subject line using so few characters. My recommendation is maximum 60 characters.

Tip # 5 – Write the subject line so that you can have the keywords very close to its beginning. If the subject line is not fully readable without opening the email and the keyword is at the end of the line … you know the outcome.

Tip # 6 – Ask the publisher not to personalize the subject line. Reader’s first name will “eat” characters from the visible part of the subject line. The longer the first name, the shorter the visible subject line. On the other hand, spammers already use first names too, and as a consequence more and more people are no longer naive. Their first name in the subject line doesn’t make them automatically open the email anymore.

Tip # 7 – Refrain from claiming big earnings. Within seconds the reader may say … “I don’t believe her/him”. It doesn’t matter if she or he is wrong. The result is that your advert is deleted.

Tip # 8 – Write more subject lines and test them in order to see which one works better. It’s hard to write the best headline from the very beginning. Be your first critic and then ask your friends what subject line they like.

Tip # 9 – Test the sujbect line (together with the whole ad copy) in order to be sure that it doesn’t trigger the spam filters. If these filters block your ad or send it to readers’ spam folders, all your work is ruined. Don’t let this work on publisher’s shoulders. Most of them don’t have a clue on how to deal with spam filters even if some of them are very good publishers. Don’t take this risk!

To Your Success!
Adrian Jock

P.S. For more such interesting ezine advertising tips, you can subscribe free to Ezine Advertising Info newsletter.

P.P.S. Recommended reading: Ultimate Guide to Solo Ads

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2. Solo Ads: Agony, Ecstasy, or Nothing?
3. Three Writing Tactics To Improve Your Solo Ad Response Rate

Cut out the fluff

People are pressed for time. They don’t want to read a long email. In solo ads, people tend to go on and on and on. Making it incredibly difficult to the reader to stay focused on it because they have other things on their mind.

A lot of the ads floating around these days are full of what I call fluff. Non-essential information that doesn’t need to be there. You have to think first what an ad is supposed to do.

Deliver traffic with a desire to know more.

The reader doesn’t have to know everything from your ad. Leave a little bit for them to discover on their own. Get to the point of your and and let the sales copy, or landing page copy do the rest.

In some recent experiments with some willing clients, I have been testing out long vs. short ads. The shorter ads are receiving much more response than the long ads. Simply for the fact that they deliver a lot of emotion very quickly.

Write like you mean it

Some solo ads just make me sad.

I can tell that the person on the other side of the email could care less about anything else but to get me to buy something so they make money. Sure, that’s the ultimate goal but don’t be so blatant about it.

When writing a solo ad your very heart must be in it. You must be thinking about one person at a time. Not the thousands you want to reach. Create your ad so that when people read it they know that you are very involved with the product, opportunity, ebook, or whatever.

In an ad that was for a very saturated opportunity I tried this technique out. I wrote it in a voice that could be interpreted no other way but heartfelt. I wanted to get into the heart of the person reading it. I didn’t want their mind, I was after their heart.

People have been buried under so many ads that they are immune to the ones that are lifeless. These ads don’t even get a cursory look over. Delete.

What they are looking for, searching for, is someone to bring them something that is full of life, and excitement. Write your ad with that in it. Mean what you write and write what you mean.

Be link happy

If there is one place that you don’t want to be too conservative with you links it’s in a solo ad. Put them in every three to four lines. Just make sure they apply to what’s above them.

Don’t just stick them in there for the sake of it. Lead the reader into wanting to click on the link.

Remember, what is the sole purpose of a solo ad. It’s not to sell anything. But, to prime the reader into wanting more information. Trying to sell them in the ad takes too much time, too much fluff and too much hype.

By putting in your links every three to four lines you’re building up the anticipation of the reader. Each time you build into the link they are more apt to click on it.

Put a little more life into your ads with these three writing techniques and watch your response rates climb.

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2. Three Solo Ads Secrets That REALLY Work
3. 10 More Secrets and Tips for Writing Better Solo Ads