Guarantees are the topic! (Images courtesy of Shutterstock via my CyberLink PowerDirector royalty-free usage agreement).
You’ve got a great product. Prove it by offering an explicit, bold guarantee. This powerful guarantee will instantly build trust in a prospect. Prospects will realize the risk of your product not working out has flipped. It flipped from them to you! You’d only do this if you knew your product delivered the goods. It hardly takes any time to create your powerful guarantee.
“If you really have a good product or service, don’t balk at your guarantee.” – John Carlton, copywriting legend
It was a hot summer’s day. I entered the sales office. Over 20 other new Cutco workers greeted me. We all looked awkward in our suits. It was the first suit I wore since I could remember. The tight, itchy collar was strangling me. My clip-on tie must’ve looked goofy.
The air-conditioner wasn’t working. Combined that heat with my anxiety, and I was getting soaked.
“Woo-hoo!” says a guy in a suit who bursts into the room. He then does 5 straight flips across the floor.
“Who’s pumped?!? I’m pumped!” He’s our sales team leader. He’s a former gymnast at San Jose State. He is the Energizer Bunny in human form.
Now I remember two big reasons I ended up in that room. Gymnast Guy’s zeal and energy over the phone infected me. He took it to another level in person.
It was the Summer of 1993. I just finished my freshman year at UCLA. I was looking to make some money over the summer. One ad in the Jobs section of the San Jose Mercury News stood out. I can’t remember much. There was an exciting salary. Working for the greatest cutlery company in the world sounded great.
I called the number on the ad. The energetic ex-gymnast was the guy who answered the call. I was a shy kid. I only had two previous jobs. I was a newspaper delivery boy. My freshman year, I was a UCLA-dorm dining-hall worker. This boisterous Cutco guy got me excited. Getting me to buy and wear a suit was a miracle at the time.
What else got me to show up for that first day in that hot office? It was something powerful. It overcame my introvert-fueled terror of being a salesman. It was Cutco’s legendary “Forever Guarantee.” This guarantee lasts forever. No receipt needed. No questions asked. Satisfaction guaranteed – forever.
“Since 1949, Cutco owners have enjoyed a Forever Guarantee that insures the Cutco they use in their home will be as good tomorrow as the first time they used it. We want every Cutco owner to be satisfied forever, and when the product is passed along, we will continue to back that pledge.” – Cutco website
“They MUST be the greatest cutlery in the world if they offer this type of guarantee,” I thought.
Even I could easily sell a product this good!
I’ve seen the power of guarantees from a lifetime of shopping. Expert copywriters teach the power of guarantees. See for yourself by searching “copywriting and guarantees.”
Now you’re ready to offer a guarantee! But what should go in it? Work backward from what your audience most desires. How does your product deliver that wish?
“Save one day every week. Guaranteed.” – ClickUp
Here’s a fearless, confident guarantee from ClickUp. ClickUp offers a SaaS Productivity Tool by the same name. (SaaS means “Software as a Service.”)
They add some more info after this headline:
“We analyzed the time saved by over 4,000 teams after switching to ClickUp to manage their projects. That’s 52 days back every year!”
ClickUp then gives you two choices.
- A shiny button saying, “Get More Time”.
- Some faint text prodding the pain of missing out, “No, I want to waste 1 day per week”.
They guarantee this with the free version of ClickUp. If you don’t save a day, you can just walk away without spending a penny.
This bold guarantee drew me in. I eventually became a happy customer who upgraded to a paying plan.
ClickUp knew the desire behind productivity tools is to save time. Their guarantee hits right on this. Their benefits deliver on time-saving.
Create your guarantees in the same way. The guarantee should be so good it’ll amaze your prospects. It’ll gain their trust.
Plus, you should already know your benefits and their desires. That means no extra time spent on marketing. The guarantee just gets plugged into your existing content and ads.
Need help with this part? First, ask your customers and prospects what their desires are. Ask them what benefits they’d most like in your product. Look at your competitor’s guarantees. Have your guarantee outshine the competition.
Here are 3 actions to get your daring guarantee done:
- Action 1: Answer these questions: What does your customer desire? How do you get them there?
- Action 2: Create a bold guarantee based on this desire. You have a great product, so be confident in it.
- Action 3: Frame the Guarantee in a simple “if, then” format. For example: “If you use our help desk tool, you’ll receive 50% fewer help desk calls.” The headline can be “Cut Your Help Desk Calls in Half with HelpMeWare! Guaranteed.”
“A guarantee is an essential part of good sales copy designed to eliminate risk in the prospect’s mind. A good guarantee is very believable & covers all of the bases so people don’t feel like there’s some kind of loophole that can screw them over.” – Swiped.co
By offering a bold guarantee, your customer will trust you and your product. Only something that good could promise that type of guarantee. They risk nothing except missing out on the desire you are helping fulfill!
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About Charles Polanski: I help people prosper through online marketing. Click this link to unlock a world of possibilities with online marketing.
