1. What is the problem?
2. Why has it not been solved?
3. What are the possibilities?
4. What is different now?
5. What should you do now?
When you are answering these 5 questions, just do it as-a-matter-of-factly. Do not try to be creative. You can get creative later.
1. What is the problem?
Firstly, identify the main problem your target audience faces, in other words, the main problem that your product or service solves. It would help for you to know your audience well in the first place. What are the 3Ps of your audience? Pain ... Problem ... Predicament ...
Do your part. Investigate and Diagnose their Problem first.
It would be a grave mistake to just shove a solution down your audience's throat before getting your audience to acknowledge that there is such a problem in the first place.They need to know and perceive you as understanding their pain, problem and predicament. So, it is important that you know your audience and what they are facing before embarking on your copywriting.
Write down your target audience's problem in a few sentences. Do not be longwinded about this so that you will have a better focus.
2. Why has it not been solved?
Write down the reason(s) why the problem still continues, persists or lingers. What are the factors preventing a solution? A few factual sentences would do.
3. What are the possibilities?
This is known as possibility thinking. Write down whatever is possible as a solution to your audience's problem. Paint a picture of the way things would be when your audeince's problem has been solved. As usual, a few sentences would do.
4. What is different now?
How will things become for your audience with the solution(s) you have come up with? This is where you introduce yourself and explain how your product or service can help them, and show what is so different about your product or service that will eliminate their problem. This is where your Unique Selling Point/Proposition (USP) comes in. Again, just a few sentences would suffice. Do not rant and rattle on. Write the substance, not the details.
5. What should you do now?
State clearly and explicitly what you want your audience to do. This is your call to action. Simply tell them to respond in some specific way such as opt-in, request a call-back and buy the product or service.
When you are done answering the 5 questions, you will have in your hands the blueprint of your web copy! That would be the meat while the rest is just gravy. With this, you can make sales. This blueprint, consisting of the answers to those 5 simple questions, can be used to create any type of marketing materials... even your elevator speech.
Cheers!
