Michael Masterson - The Architecture of Persuasion: How to Write Well-Constructed Sales Letters

T here are relatively few master copywriters. And there are even fewer great copywriting teachers. Michael Masterson is that rarest of birds, a master copywriter who is also a master copywriting teacher.

He has made himself, his partners, his clients, and most important for you many of his students and readers wealthy. While he is adept in many areas of business, his greatest strength the key area that is the foundation for so much of his success is his mastery of a deceptively simple skill: the ability to write persuasive sales letters.

Sales letters written by Michael Masterson or under his direction have mailed in the millions, and have generated millions of dollars in sales for him and his clients. In this book, The Architecture of Persuasion , he teaches you his simple five-step formula for writing sales letters that have beaten countless controls, launched over a dozen multimillion-dollar businesses, and generated sales and profits most direct marketers only dream about.

I said that writing persuasive sales letters is a deceptively simple skill. After all, almost everyone can write a letter. But few people can write sales letters that follow Michael Mastersons time-tested architecture of persuasion. Now you will be one of them.

But you wont acquire the skill merely by reading this book. You will acquire it by putting Michaels techniques to work and practicing them, writing letter after letter according to the Masterson formula.

Writing sales letters is like playing the piano. Easy to do poorly; extremely difficult to do well. Most marketers are good at writing mediocre sales letters. Michael Masterson can make you great at writing letters that compel your prospective customers to order your products and send you their checks.

Youve surely heard the old saying Those who can, do; those who cant, teach. It is our good fortune that Michael Masterson does both, and does them better than just about anyone on the planet.

Robert W. Bly, author, The Copywriters Handbook (Henry Holt)

O f all the many forms of direct-response marketing copy none is more fundamental than the simple sales letter.

Sales letters have been around for as long as man has been writing letters. You could argue that the poems of Sappho, written more than two thousand years ago, were letters selling love.

Mark Twain made a part-time living writing sales copy. So did F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ogden Nash. Direct-response sales letters have been around for at least two hundred years since mail was carried on horseback. The only other direct-response vehicle that can claim such a pedigree is the catalog.

These days, many fledgling copywriters write exclusively for websites and blogs. They may have some familiarity with older formats, such as magalogs, bookalogs, and reportalogs, but most have never written an actual sales letter. Thats a shame. And a problem.

For nothing will teach you the art and science of good copywriting faster and better than writing sales letters.

On the face of it, writing a sales letter is a simple matter.

• You begin with a teaser copy printed on the outside of the envelope.
• Then you write a headline for the top of the letter.
• Then you write the letter itself, selling the product.
• And finally, you close the letter by asking for the sale.

What could be easier than that?

Yet most copywriters coming into the market dont have the skill to do it. And this lack of skill shows through in the abysmal quality of writing that is ubiquitous on the Internet today.

Because of the Internets rapid growth, thousands and thousands of copywriters have flooded into the market recently. Most of them have no experience or education in the field. Some take the occasional home-study course that covers the basics but offers neither feedback nor the opportunity to practice. Others take lessons from self-dubbed experts who have never competed in (let alone made a name for themselves in) the real world of direct mail which is dominated by sales letters.

Some of these ersatz copywriters will eke out a living writing ersatz copy for marginal websites and e-zines. A few will break through by hard work and continuous self-education. Most will find copywriting to be a difficult and unrewarding profession and will move on to other careers.