We’re back with our Old Masters Series, and this is the last part of a four-part series -- What Your Prospects Most Want To Know. I would add, what is it that they want to know right away, and whether or not you tell them might decide whether or not they keep on reading?

The answer is still:

What will your product, or service, do for me?

But this time, we’re going to take it from a different angle. Up to now, we’ve talked about what your product can help them do, gain, and save.

But this time, it’s what your product will help the prospect be. This is different and may in many ways go deeper than before, because this is about identity.

So here’s what we’re going to do today. We’ll go over seven things Schwab found prospects want to know if your product can help them be.

I’ll show you how and why. We’ll cover some examples you are probably familiar with in general, like product categories, or in specific, like promotions you’ve probably heard of.

Again, let me remind you that Vic Schwab spent 44 years working in advertising and kept a lot of notes. Everything here is based on testing and very scrupulous observation, with an eye towards what stimulates inquiries and what generates sales. From the eye of a master.

That’s because Ad Age magazine called Schwab “the greatest mail-order copywriter of all time.” In 1941, he wrote a series of five articles for Printers Ink magazine and titled the series “How to Write a Good Advertisement.”

In 1961, he expanded that series into the book, “How to Write a Good Ad.” The book is so important that my mentoring clients and I spend almost half a year going through this book in a special way I’ve developed. It’s as good in its own way as Gene Schwartz’s “Breakthrough Advertising.” In short, I’d saw Schwab’s book is a gold mine for copywriters.

Also, a quick reminder: Everything in this and the other three podcasts in this series come from page 47… the first half of the page. That might seem like a lot of podcast based on very little information, but remember, he spent 44 years testing and tracking ads and reviewing other top-performing ads. So it’s condensed practical wisdom.

The book and the link:

How to Write a Good Advertisement, by Victor Schwab

https://www.amazon.com/How-Write-Good-Advertisement-Copywriting-ebook/dp/B01AXJ7SES/

Download.