Tap into Their Imagination

Learning Objective

To develop compelling sales copy to help your customers visualize the positive transformation they’ll experience once they purchase your offer. 

Help Your Buyers Imagine Their Results

Think about why someone is buying or using your product. Now, think about what your product does for them. If those two aren’t matching up, then you’re not meeting their expectations or wishes.

Your copy should help customers see how they can get from where they are now to where they want to be through buying your offer and experiencing the benefits it promises.

Remember that a benefit isn’t the product or service you sell, it’s the value a customer receives. Vague statements like “best quality” or “best service” don’t have impact. The benefits need to be specific and relevant.

In many places your sales copy will be quite short. In this case, you only have a few words to demonstrate how life will be with your product or service. Use emotions and feelings to increase the impact. Adding images that depict the "after" picture can sometimes achieve more than a paragraph of words.

When you’re writing a long sales page, then you’ll have time to describe in detail the transformation and connect them to the emotional benefits they’ll receive. 

Use The Before After Bridge (BAB)

When you think about weight loss products or beauty products, it’s easy to demonstrate the transformative results because you can show "before" and "after" photos.

Luckily, there’s a copywriting formula that can do this for you in words. It’s called the Before After Bridge.

It works for all types of copy, short or long, and can be achieved in a few sentences. It works because it paints the picture for your customer of what outcomes will occur when they purchase your product or service.

Before:

This is the situation causing your customers’ challenge. Help them connect to it by tapping into the existing negative situations and the associated negative emotions. For example:

You’re a working mom so busy in your business that you don’t have enough time to play with your kids. You feel guilty, like you’re a "bad mother", and sad you’re missing out on their childhood.

Review the language you identified earlier that customers are using and the challenges and pain points you noted. Use that same language in your "before" description.

After:

This is the situation your customers want. Help them imagine what life would be like in that "different world" by using a positive, descriptive narrative.

Your business is successful and can run without you so you can take time off when you want to spend it with your family. You’ll enjoy all those precious childhood moments and build memories that will last forever. You’ll feel fulfilled as a mother, knowing you’re doing the best you can for your kids.

You paint a picture of the realization of their dream, which is the opposite of their current negative feelings. Use the words and phrases you gathered in your earlier research that speak to your customers’ goals.

Bridge: 

The bridge is the link your audience is missing to get them from "before" to "after". Connect the two sections by introducing your product/service.

The bridge demonstrates how your product or service solves their problem and leads to the outcomes they’ve dreamed of, and which will be theirs after they’ve purchased.

Here’s an example of Before After Bridge copy:

Before:

You work all hours in your business because you don’t have enough to pay the bills. You’re exhausted, disappointed, and fed up because you can’t make it happen. You missed yet another family birthday because you had to work late.

After:

How would it feel if you could work fewer hours and have more money coming in? Can you imagine yourself lighting the candles on your child’s next birthday cake without worrying about the work you still have to do? Wouldn’t you like to be at all your special family moments? 

Bridge:

Take the financial strain away and enjoy all time off you want, by signing up for The Financial Freedom Program. You’ll learn how to tap into your existing assets to build a passive income strategy and enjoy knowing your finances are taken care of.

How to Build The BAB

Here are some ideas for drafting the BAB:

Action Steps

Revisit the core message you drafted earlier. Recap on the 3 benefits you offer that deliver this core message.

Take your chosen piece of copy and paint a picture of the transformation you’re promising by describing:

• The Before
• The After
• The Bridge citing your key benefit(s).