Even if your ad budget is small you should still plan and measure results of you advertising. This process is key to your ultimate success.

You see, there are two types of advertising. The first is broadcast marketing. This category includes TV and radio commercials. While broadcast ads can be effective they are very expensive and almost impossible to measure.

And you can’t manage what you can’t measure.

Which brings us to direct marketing. These ads are sent directly to your prospects. Sales letters, coupons, and order ready websites are some examples of this type of ad. But truth is, any ad that you can accurately measure results for falls into category of direct marketing.

Sales letters are hard to write. And writing a good one takes a lot of time, research and effort. But…a good letter will make you money.

The best place to start is with research. You want to know everything you can about product or products you’re selling. At this point you’re interested in specific information.

The details are vital. You want to understand and be able to clearly and thoroughly describe every aspect of program you’re writing for.

Print your notes on a few sheets of paper so you have them when you’re ready to begin writing.

Next you want to do some research on your target market. Again specifics are important.

Start by defining characteristics of typical prospect who would benefit most from your product. Be as thorough as possible.

What problem will your product solve for your client? Get inside their head. See whole loan process from their point of view. Constantly ask “why would they want to do this”?

Make another few pages of notes.

Your first set of notes are features. They’re what your product does. The second set of notes are benefits. They’re reason prospect will decide to buy or not.