Talk about a hot and sexy USP (Unique Selling Proposition): Reebok says their new EasyTone walking shoe will firm up your butt and sculpt your legs so well, “your boobs will be jealous.”

That’s according to one of their ads. I haven’t seen that particular ad, but I read about it in the NY Times, so it might be true.

I did see one TV ad claiming the new sneakers tone leg and buttock muscles better than regular walking shoes. Is it just marketing BS, or could it be true? A lot of people seem to think (or at least hope) so. Sales are smoking hot, just like your legs will be.

Reebok says the EasyTone is their biggest hit in five years. And no wonder. They were designed by a real rocket scientist, former NASA engineer Bill McInnis, now Reebok’s head of advanced innovation.

But what about the controversial claim? Can the shoes live up to the boast? According to the Times,

“The claim is backed by a single study involving just five women, walking on a treadmill for only 500 steps. Some wore the EasyTone or another Reebok walking shoe, some were barefoot. Sensors indicated that the EasyTone worked glutes 28% more than regular walking shoes. Hamstring and calf muscles worked 11% harder.” (Edited slightly for length, clarity and emphasis.)

Wait — who cares if your leg and butt muscles work a little bit harder? All we want to know is, do boobs really get jealous?

The biggest challenge for any business website is finding a way to immediately engage the visitor’s interest.

Ask yourself, what do they want? What are they really looking for? How can you make it clear that you have what they want? (Or that they want what you have?)

Knowing what a prospective customer is thinking when they first arrive at your website makes it a lot easier to hook ’em with your copy. Luckily, it’s not too hard to figure out. In fact, I’ll show you exactly what’s going through the typical visitor’s mind. Let me borrow my crystal ball from this turbaned fellow and we’ll walk through the process together.

Peering into the brainpan: What website visitors are thinking

How do most first-time visitors find your site? If you guessed Google, Yahoo, or one or the other search engines, you’re right. Chances are, they typed in one or two keywords to describe what they were looking for, then clicked the SEARCH button.

Almost instantly a search results page popped up, containing a long list of links to websites. Most of them, they’ve never heard of.

Which one will they click?

This, too, is pretty predictable. Statistics show that 80 to 90% of them will click one of the first four listings – which is why it’s pretty important to optimize your website for search engines.

OK, they’ve clicked a link and, miracle of miracles, they land on your website! How cool!

Then what? Well, put yourself in their place. What goes through your mind when you land on a website you’ve never seen before? There are three things you immediately want to know:

1. Am I in the right place? Is this where I meant to go? Or did I click the wrong thing?
2. Does this site have what I’m looking for? This is a biggie. If you don’t show them instantly, they’ll hit that BACK button and be gone faster than you can say, “Huh? Where’d everybody go?”
3. How do I feel here? Am I comfortable? Or is it creepy or sleazy? Can I trust these people — or are they just trying to rush me into buying something? Do they even know what they’re talking about?

Oh, by the way. You only have a few seconds to get all that across.

Why the big rush?

The dazzling speed of computers and the Internet has conditioned us all to be very, very impatient. Admit it. If you don’t find what you’re looking for instantly, you look elsewhere. Right? If a link doesn’t open fast enough, you click somewhere else.

We all do it. And so does your website visitor. If she doesn’t see the answers she’s looking for instantly – I mean within the first 3-5 seconds – you have very little chance of keeping her around.

How in the world can you possibly communicate all that in just a few seconds? I’ll show you how, in the next installment of today’s exciting adventure.

Next: How to write copy that gets to the point — without getting obnoxious.

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photo credit: KrätzschePhotography

Do you anguish over creating a Marketing Plan for your small business, or the business you hope to start one day? Ivana Taylor at The DIY Marketers has compiled a Quick & Easy Marketing Plan. This is the kind of high-altitude view that helps you stay on-course while you’re doing the actual marketing work.

When she says quick and easy, she isn’t kidding. To get rolling, just answer seven simple questions (which you should already know the answers to) and you’re on your way:

1. Describe your ideal customer and what’s important to him/her.
2. What do you want your marketing plan to accomplish?
3. What competitive advantage do you have that will make it easy for them to choose you?
4. What will you offer your customer that will make them choose you?
5. How will you build a relationship with your customers?
6. How will you measure success?
7. What resources will you need to help you get there?

We’re all visual people to one extent or another, so one of Ivana’s best tips is finding a photo that most closely represents your Ideal Customer. Then create a collage, magazine cover or vision board around them, showing the things that are most important to them. Keep it in front of you and refer to it frequently while creating your marketing materials. Make sure what you’re writing has real meaning and value for your IC.

Read the complete article for additional inspiration.

Hate marketing-speak? So does Bob Hoffman, the Ad Contrarian. Anyone who commits marketing or advertising for a living ought to read his blog.

Bob’s a successful and savvy advertising executive who owns his own agency in San Francisco. He’s also a delightfully grumpy old fart who loves to snicker at the Emperor’s missing bloomers, as well as the foolishness of the people watching the parade.

Like me, Bob gags at what passes for B2B copy these days, especially the “cutting edge, state of the art, scalable” baloney favored by technology companies big and small:

“One way we can tell that the marketing and advertising industries are in dire straits is by listening to the language. From the HP website:

“… (HP’s) collaborative approach is tailored to a customer’s ecosystem to create adaptive infrastructures that use leading software products and architectures and leverage HP’s own expertise in the creation of adaptive infrastructures.”

“Spend time at a conference, read a trade publication, listen to a presentation and it soon becomes obvious that speaking plainly and clearly has become anathema to most marketing practitioners.”

As a copywriter and former technical writer, I confess I have been forced to write that kind of crap on any number of occasions. But in my defense, the clients flatly rejected my initial drafts — the ones written in plain American English, easily understood even by CEOs. The kind of everyday shirtsleeve English you and I speak to each other.

Can you imagine meeting someone new, asking what they do, and have them say, “Oh, we create adaptive infrastructures…”? Of course not. Nobody really talks like that. Not even the guys who wrote it.

I have a theory. See if you agree. I think vague, jargon-filled copy are like those giant boulders in old TV westerns. They’re really big, they slow down your enemies … and they’re really great to hide behind.

PS: After a month-long, self-imposed hiatus from blogging, Bob’s and his blog are back together. To be honest, I think he was considering a divorce, but settled on a trial separation instead. Since he’s pretty skeptical about the business value of social media, we’ll see how long he lasts. Enjoy his curmudgeonality while you can, kids.

photo credit: colinedwards99

It’s understandable for business owners and marketers to dread nasty feedback from unhappy customers. It’s even worse when they vent their spleens online, posting negative reviews on the company’s own or resellers’ websites, in independent customer forums, Amazon reviews, etc.

Some companies even go so far as to try and squelch or remove them if they can. Which isn’t exactly the spirit of openness and honesty the interwebs are famous for.

But surprise! Negative reviews are not necessarily the kiss of death. As CNN/Money (via Consumerist) reported, sales can still increase. One company discovered that sales on a particular sweater increased 23%, even though its ratings were less than stellar  (e.g., three stars out of five).

“People are really researching their purchases,” said AlpacaDirect.com co-founder Jim Hobart. ‘We knew our customers liked our products, and we wanted them to tell one another.’

Here’s my take on negative reviews:

• All reviews, even mediocre ones, tend to reduce the “fear of the unknown” factor which can stop sales in their tracks.
• Something that might be a dealbreaker for one customer might not matter that much to another.
• The seller appears stronger, more confident, even fearless, by allowing both negative and positive reviews.
• And of course, negative reviews can be a form of market research. They can help you decide where you need to improve.

And be honest. Haven’t you ever read a negative review of a product or service you’re perfectly happy with? Haven’t you sometimes wondered, ‘What is this guy’s problem?’ A review that’s dripping with hatred and bile sometimes says more about the reviewer than the product.

photo credit: B Rosen