I want to share with you a cold, hard fact about the copywriting business: most sales copy fails.

Sad, but it's a fact.

And that raises a question: Why?  What's going wrong? Well, there are a lot of reasons. Sometimes the copy is hard to read, sometimes it doesn't clearly describe the benefits, and sometimes it just plain boring.

But those aren't the MOST important cause of copywriting failure.  The most important cause is lack of credibility.

Remember, everything you tell your readers has to be believable and plausible. Having better features is not enough. Having free delivery is not enough. Having a great price is not enough.

It does not matter if you give your product away for free - you still have to convince your readers that you are legit.

Don't believe me? Imagine you found an ad offering a laptop computer at a 95% discount. It's your dream computer, with a huge screen, tons of memory, everything you would want. Imagine that the normal price is $2,000, and you found an amazing deal where it cost just $100. Would you buy it?

No, you wouldn't. But why not? 

Because it smells like a scam, that's why.  No amount of facts could convince you that this is a real deal.

So there you go. Everything needs to be sold. People are wary of scams, and you need to give them a reason to trust you.  In marketing, trust is worth more than money. If you lose money, you can always earn it back. But if you lose a customer's trust, you will never get it back. It's gone forever.

Here's what trust means when it comes to sales letters.

Prospects have to trust that you are going to deliver on your promise. And they must trust that they will get their money back if you don't deliver.

It sounds so simple, but  building that level of trust is one of the most difficult tasks you will face as you build your online business. Where does trust come from?

It comes from the words you use, of course. But what most professional copywriters don't like to admit is that trust is built by more than that. Trust comes from the overall level of professionalism in your marketing materials.  Trust comes from the price you are charging, and the value customers get for the price. People want a bargain, but they expect to pay for quality. So charging a price that is too low will not attract customers - it will actually make your prospects suspicious.

And tossing in a few special bonuses into the offer will also help to build that level of trust.

And of course, trust comes from you. Your copy needs to convey a sense of who you are. You need to come across as a person they can beleive in. Competent, informative, helpful. Someone who is like them. That is why using the right tone and the right vocabulary is critical for winning over your prospects.

And finally (and most powerfully), trust comes from your REPUTATION.  You could have a crappy sales letter, but if people are talking about your wonderful product, helpful information and recommending you to others, then the sales will come.