It's no secret that I love writing bullets.
Here is why…
Some people argue over what part of the sales copy is most important. The headline? The opening paragraph filled with persuasion and promise?
Sure, they are essential. Sales copy must, as Joseph Sugarman says, "greases the chute" to pull the reader's eyes down the page.
Without a strong headline and excellent copy, no one would stick around to get to the bullets.
But the bullets…OMG, I love them.
No part of a sales page ever gets me to whip out my wallet faster than bullets dripping with curiosity.
Bullets are responsible for boosting sales to the stratosphere.
So, the question I promised to answer was, how did I win the Copy Chief bullet the podcast competition?
Gather round the fire buckaroo, and I will tell you.
The short answer is I wrote 50 bullets and then pulled out the best 10 to submit.
While 50 bullets might sound like a lot, I would say it was at least 50 too few. 100 would have been better.
Now you might be saying, "not so fast. That's great you can write 50 bullets for a podcast but HOW did you come up with the bullets in the first place?"
Good question.
The answer isn't so easy. We have to go back to when I was a brand spanking new copywriter. You see, the best copywriters tell you to find examples of copy from the greats and hand copy them over and over.
Did you I do that?
Yes, I did. Hold on, and I will tell you why that matters.
I didn't only write sales letters by hand. I found more instruction from the late great Gary Halbert on bullet writing.
Go get five hundred 3x5 index cards. Go to a big newsstand and get dozens of magazines. (If you're strapped for money, you can do this in a library for free.) Only get those magazines with lots of teaser copy ("bullets") on the covers. Cosmopolitan is just about tops when it comes to this. Write one bullet on each index card. Try to pick out only really "Hot Bullets." Keep at it until you have 500 cards with 500 bullets…
Instead of using magazines, I copied bullets from the greats like Dan Kennedy, Parris Lampropoulos, John Carlton, and Gary Bencivenga.
I wrote all the control busting bullets I could find on index cards like Gary said.
At least once a month, I read through all those index cards as well.
Now flash forward to the Copy Chief bullet the podcast competition…
I had two pieces of information to complete the project. The recording of the podcast and the transcript.
The first thing I did was listen to the recording for fun. I didn't try to create bullets in my head or pause and take notes.
Next, I printed out the transcript. When something hit me as important I highlighted the section.
How did I know what to highlight?
It was a gut feeling that was a mix of market awareness and from hand-copying all those old sales letters.
That's something that comes with time and exposure to a lot of copy.
Something else happened as I highlighted. More often than not, I would have a rough idea for a bullet right on the spot! I noted each idea as I scrolled down the page.
I took the most persuasive ideas and put them in a word document. I narrowed it down to 10 concepts that I thought would be most interesting to the listeners of the podcast.
Then I let my "subconscious computer" go to work using the imprint of 100s of notecards trapped in my brain. I wrote 5 bullets for each of the concepts (though if it was for a client, it would have been at least twice that many).
Then I used my secret weapon…a friend.
I gave the bullets to my friend and asked her to rank the bullets from most exciting to least.
I submitted and won.
Easy as that LOL…
Let me summarize for those who don't want to read a wall of text.
- Learn how some of the best in the industry write and structure bullets.
- Listen to the material once without any expectations.
- Review the content and note anything that would be valuable to your market.
- As ideas pop in your head, take notes.
- Write way more bullets than you need. The more, the better.
- Get as many people as you can to tell you which bullets excite them the most.
Now go grab your index cards and get started.
BONUS TIP: Go check out my bullets here and listen to the podcast. Then you can see how I created each bullet.
Do you want to get some of the best training and personal copy critiques from A-List copywriters? Check out Copy Chief. (This is an afillite link. It won't cost you any extra to use it. I am a member of Copy Chief and it is the best copy community around)
If you are looking for someone to fill your sales pages with bullets so intriguing customers can't help but hit the buy button, then let's chat!
You can get on my calendar HERE.