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January 2003
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How to Make the Perfect Ad
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By Drew Eric Whitman
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Making big money is easy, especially in the pizza business.
All you do is get the bank to loan you money… find a location… build
a shop… find a source of supply for flour, cheese, meats… and start
counting your money. Right? Of course not. Then why are so many pizza
owners doing exactly this? Why do they kill themselves to get the
PHYSICAL aspects of their business in order, but do little or nothing
to differentiate themselves from the dozens of local competitors?
Heck… they spend years thinking about going into business for
themselves. Sweat profusely hoping their business loan is approved.
Slave for months supervising the construction of the shop (or doing
much of it themselves). Rack their brains over a good business name.
Pour through mountains of paperwork to make the business legal. Seek
out the best sources of supply. And get all excited to finally be in
business for themselves. Yet their promotions typically consist of no
more than a few crummy ads in local rags.
This article is about a technique that’s so deceptively simple, yet
so powerful that if you apply it faithfully, you’ll leave your
competition choking on clouds of high-gluten flour. I call it the
power of “Extreme Specificity,” and your competitors will curse you
for it. It's simple, and here's what you do: From this day on, start
being extremely specific every time you describe your pizza. Here’s
what I mean.
Last week, I did a test. I grabbed my telephone and the Yellow Pages.
I called about 25 local pizza shops at random, at a non-busy time of
day.
I Said: “Hello… I’m coming in with 10 friends this Saturday. I want
to come to YOUR place, but one of the guys wants to go to another
pizza shop instead. Help me convince the group… WHAT MAKES YOUR PIZZA
BETTER?” (Yes… I really did make those calls. The answers were both
fascinating and depressing.)
CALL #1
RESPONSE: (ANNOYED) “What makes our pizza better? Uhhh… I
don’t know. That’s for YOU to decide!”
ANALYSIS: Pathetic. Here’s a guy who was given the opportunity by a
money-in-hand customer to distinguish his restaurant from his
competition. In 30 seconds, he could have won up to 10 new customers
(for years, if not for life). But hell… it’s not for him to tell you
what makes his pizza better. You decide on your own! Sigh.
CALL #2
RESPONSE: “We use better ingredients.”
ANALYSIS: That was his entire answer! Again, pathetic. Why? Because
his reply tells me nothing. His lack of specificity gives me no
information. It’s the very least he could say and still directly
answer the question. It creates no positive images in my mind… gives
me no reason to desire HIS pizza. What about those ingredients? WHY
are they better? Another chance to stand out from the crowd… blown.
CALL #3
RESPONSE: (THICK ACCENT) “Look buddy, you can go wherever you
want.”
ANALYSIS: Wow… what a revelation! What a salesman. Presented with the
opportunity to build his business, this “businessman” chooses to give
me no reason to give him my money. I won’t.
Before we go further… are you surprised by any of this? What would
you have said if I called YOU? Seriously! Forget the fact that you’ve
never gotten a call like this before. Forget that it’s “not
realistic.” That’s a cop out! This crazy call is simply a tool to
prove my point that most pizza retailers (and most businesspeople in
all industries) simply do not know how to stand out from the crowd.
They do not know what to say in their advertising to make people WANT
to buy their products. They may know how to make a pizza, but they
don’t know how to SELL it in order to attract new business.
So… how would YOU have responded? The answer to this question reveals
whether or not you’re capitalizing on the #1 way to steal business
from your competitors. I challenge you to jot down your answer before
continuing with this article.
Let’s continue with a call I made to restaurant/pizza shop I’ve been
to about a hundred times. I know the owner (and his business) pretty
well, but he didn’t know it was me on the phone.
CALL #4
RESPONSE: “Why is it better? Hold on.” [MUFFLED: “Hey Joe:
This guy wants to know why our pizza is better.” [JOE ANSWERS] “Hello…
yes… our pizza is better because of quality. Our sauce is from Italy
and so is our flour.”
ANALYSIS: Not great… but better. My friend Joe doesn’t just say
“quality,” or “ingredients,” but he also specifies WHICH ingredients.
He goes further to imply that they’re better because they’re true
ITALIAN ingredients. To the average consumer, this sure sounds better
than flour and cheese made in Camden, New Jersey, doesn’t it?
Could he have done better? Sure! How about telling me what makes the
cheese better… that’s it’s not just cow milk mozzarella, but also
incredibly flavorful (and hard-to-find) buffalo milk mozzarella… and
according to true Italian style tradition, the cheese is never
shredded, but put on in chunks. The flour? Only hard, northern spring
wheat because of its excellent rising qualities, crisp exterior and
chewy interior crust.
Now, good old Joe doesn’t have to stop there! His sauce… ahhhh… now
THIS is a thing of beauty. Joe never uses pre-prepared sauce… no sir.
He crushes his own tomatoes. (And not any old tomatoes, either. He
insists on “Genuine San Marzano” tomatoes from Italy!) Olive oil? Only
extra-virgin Olivieri, of course. The dough is hand stretched. His
masterpiece pies are baked in a coal-burning oven imported directly
from Italy, which imparts an amazing flavor… unmatched by the
competition’s plain old gas ovens. Meats and vegetables? Heck, they’re
hand-sliced right there in the store. And his new dining room! It was
just completely renovated floor- -to-ceiling…doubled in size…far more
comfortable…and now features gorgeous Italian tile and fabulous
artwork. Not only that, but his family has been handcrafting pizza for
four generations. You experience the 80 years of mastery that goes
into every pie with every crispy bite.
But does any of this really matter in our
“charge-the-consumer-more-and-give him-less” world? Of course it does.
Heck… you’re a consumer, aren’t you? Wouldn’t it matter to YOU?
Don’t you see? All this stuff differentiates Joe from the dozens of
competitors around him. Problem is... he doesn’t advertise ANY of
this! What a terrible shame! Why? Most likely – as it is with most
other businesspeople – they never even thought about it. They simply
don’t have what I call, a “Madison Avenue Mind.”
So… back to my original question: What are YOU doing better that you
are not telling potential customers about? Want another example? Okay…
Not long ago, I went to a little 50's-style fast food place called
“Nifty Fifties” in Philadelphia. This place does an incredible job of
differentiating itself from the competition. (And they’re packed to
the gills with customers. Their dinner and lunch lines bust through
their doors onto the sidewalk.) How do they do it?
First, by making sure that YOU know that they never use frozen beef.
That they never use frozen fries. Never use frozen onion rings. That
their hamburger beef is ground fresh daily. That you can look through
a window and see the man dipping the big, juicy onion slices into
their homemade batter and then into their wonderful, herb-seasoned
breading. They tell you what kind of oil they fry in. They tell you
why it's to YOUR advantage to eat there rather than King Burger down
the block. They don't just leave it up to you and hope you discover
these things. They're proactive. THEY TELL YOU. (Read that last
sentence again.)
I just said an amazing thing up there. Did you get it? I said that
they tell you ... in extreme specifics. “Oh come on, Drew. People
don't need to know all that ... they just want a pizza! They just want
good food.” Don't be so sure about that.
We’re talking about advertising here. Not just opening your doors and
hoping a hungry crowd approaches. Listen: one of the most powerful
things you can do in any sales situation is to educate your potential
buyer to the benefits of what you're selling. Once educated, and
assuming your product is at least as good as the competition, they
will better appreciate what you're offering.
I can simply tell you that I sell a 6-cassette tape album that
teaches you how to write powerful advertising. Or, I can tell you that
I spent well over a year writing the script. Next, I spent two to
three days a week for months cooped up in the recording studio. It
took about three months to do the initial recording to get it right. I
then spent almost a month creating music and sound effects so you'd
not only learn, but also be entertained. I spent over $11,000 and
worked my tail off! (I would go on and on.)
Now... of course you don't need to know all that! But now that you
do... let me ask you: don't you naturally appreciate the product more?
Don't you now have a better understanding of the value? Don't you now
have a better picture in your head about these tapes? Of course. And
now that you value them more -- if you ever considered a product such
as this one -- you'd also be more likely to buy.
HOT TIP: When you use visual language you automatically “install”
pictures in peoples' heads. The more specific your words, the clearer
the pictures. If a hamburger joint can do it for their fast food ...
and I can do it for my cassette tapes ... why the heck can't YOU do it
for YOUR pizza business? You certainly can.
Think--what interesting story can you tell people about your product
or service? How can you educate them? (HOT TIP: Be sure your pizza is
of excellent quality or you may educate your potential buyer AWAY from
you!)
How do the national chains fare in my telephone test? Not much
better. First, Papa Johns:
CALL #5
RESPONSE: “Well, we hand-stretch our dough and our sauce is
made from tomatoes that were packaged only hours ago.”
ANALYSIS: That’s it. Believability aside, the young man could give
only two reasons why their pizza is good enough to propel their
company to own almost 3,000 stores in 49 states and nine international
markets. Hmmmm.
Now, Pizza Hut guy took a different tact. Instead of
telling me why his pizza is better, he chose to simply tell me about
their selection:
CALL #6
RESPONSE: “Why should you eat here? Selection. We have thick
crust, thin crust, original crust, Big New Yorkers and a family
friendly dining room. Pizza Hut is America’s favorite pizza.”
ANALYSIS: Okay… he didn’t answer my question, but he did do SOMETHING
to differentiate his business from the other guys. He differentiates
himself on the basis of SELECTION. Nothing wrong with that. It’s much
more than most do. It wasn’t a GREAT response, but he gave me reasons
to eat there.
CALL #7
RESPONSE: “Look… if you come here, great. I’ll say THANK YOU.
But if you don’t, you don’t.”
ANALYSIS: Must I analyze this one?
Okay… let’s now look at the case of two nice, little Italian
restaurants. In their ads…
RESTAURANT #1 tells you they have wonderful home cooking. They list
things that most Italian restaurants list in their ads. Chicken
parmesan... spaghetti... manicotti, etc. Plus, a coupon. B-O-R-I-N-G!
Gee guys... the idea in advertising is to STAND OUT!
Now let's look at RESTAURANT #2. Ahhhh. They too list what they serve
and give a coupon, but they say more. MUCH MORE. They differentiate
themselves in the marketplace by saying things that people want to
know:
“We make our bread fresh every day, golden and crusty. Our pasta is
made from scratch. We use only fresh herbs in all our recipes. Only
pure, cold-pressed 100 percent virgin olive oil is served. Spring
water fills your glass... mellow Italian music fills the air... and
softly glowing candles light your table.”
Wow! Can you feel the difference? Yes! It's actually a feeling. You
get a better feeling for restaurant #2. They tell you more. They are
not just trying to SELL you. No. They are actually wooing you, aren't
they? Their words put pictures in your head.
Listen up: EVEN IF EVERY OTHER ITALIAN RESTAURANT IN THE CITY DOES
THE SAME EXACT THING ... NO ONE ELSE SAYS IT! And the one who does,
wins.
So ask yourself... “What can I say about my pizza that may be obvious
to me, but my market knows little about? How can I educate them about
in such a way that the very description will make them salivate? Can I
tell them about the processes used... the time, money and effort
expended? How can I point out the major benefits of my product--like
the Nifty Fifties fast food joint--and make people begin to question
the quality of my competition?”
So start yakkin'! Tell, tell, tell. And don't worry about how long
your ad copy is. There's an old maxim in advertising that says, “It
can't be too long, only too uninteresting.” And another says, “The
more you tell, the more you sell.”
If people are in the market for pizza, you won't believe how much
they'll read. If they are not, they won't make it past your headline.
Load 'em up with relevant information. Offer an excellent product. The
educated consumer will then be your best friend... and customer!
Drew Eric Whitman is the author of, “How to Create Power-Packed Ads,
Brochures & Sales Letters that Make Money NOW!” and co-author of, “The
$50,000 Business Makeover Marathon”. Visit him on the web at:
www.AdSurgeon.com
PMQ
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