Bad marketing (and poor copy) leads to lackluster launches, low sales, confused readers, and in some sad cases a totally failed business. 💔

On the other hand, a solid marketing strategy and the high-performance copy that follows often get a bad rap for being manipulative and shady.

If you're a business owner who cares about ethical relationship-oriented marketing, how do you know who to listen to and what strategies to use?

Is copy that works bad? Are all marketing strategies manipulative?

Let's dig in. 🧐

There are thousands of opinions on the interwebs, and as someone who has been in this arena for nearly a decade, here’s my take:

1. Your Readers Have Free Will to Assess Your Offerings and Sign Up (or Not).

In fact, your reader has a ton of practice at this. 35x a day someone is positioning an offer in front of her and inviting her to take action. At this point, she’s literally pro at declining offerings.

2. The Hard Deadline Is Not a Problem As Long as It’s Honest

Coupons expire. Food expires. The enrollment window for a semester at your local community college expires.

Having hard deadlines keeps things moving on schedule for both business owners and customers. As busy people, we need to know what we need to accomplish and by when.

Putting a countdown timer on a page should be done with thought and consideration. What do I want my reader to know when she sees this? Is this deadline solid and honest?

If the deadline is solid and honest, letting your reader know when the offering expires can be helpful. It helps her get organized and decide if she’s signing up now, or if she’s going to defer until your next enrollment/promo.

A hard deadline veers into being unethical when it's not real.

If enrollment doesn't close in 10 days, don't say that it does.
If applications don't close in 10 days, don't say they do.
If the coupon is not actually going to expire, don't say it will.

Recap: Make sure the time sensitivity that your timer or hard deadline reflects is honest and accurate, and you’re good.

3. Speaking to Your Reader’s Pain and Challenge

Is it unethical to establish empathy with a person? Is it unethical to say “Hey, I know what you’re going through?”

No ma’am, no it’s not.

Honestly, not establishing empathy by speaking to your reader’s pain/challenge is more of a problem, because you may end up signing students or clients who are not the best fit.

Now, there is a difference between establishing empathy in your copy and doing the whole “twist the knife” thing.

Years ago I was in a sales funnel for an offering where the copy was consistently saying (in other words) “You’re not a good enough educator if you don’t study with ME inside THIS program.”

I was educated (in that area) and it was really off-putting to be on the receiving end of someone trashing my education just so they could position their program as required education in the industry.

Don’t: put people down.

Do: Be sensitive, respectful, and honest in your copy.

Still to this day, I don’t know if that marketing angle was the business owner’s idea or if it was the copywriter she hired. Either way, the business lost my trust and attention.

4. Using Industry Buzzwords like “Collapse Time” and “Quantum Leap”

Oh no, I swear I just said “collapse time” during my recent podcast interview with Christine at @thepaidcopywriter.

I mean, “collapse time” is just a phrase used to explain moving your client from point A to point B faster than if she was trying to get there on her own.

If you’re able to do that for your customers or clients, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with stating that upfront.

If you go to a mechanic because your radiator is leaking he’s going to help you collapse the time it takes to get that fixed and get back on the road, right?

Wouldn’t it take you longer to DIY it? And might you miss some important steps that a pro wouldn't miss?

If and when you use phrases like this, it’s 100% important to partner them with a strong reminder that in order to get results your customer will have to do the work consistently.

I guess the debate comes down to this: Are there really any shortcuts in your industry?

I think there are. And most people know they can pay for them.

There is always work involved that only your reader/customer can tackle, so take the opportunity to state that where needed.

This will help you make connections with the types of readers and clients who take responsibility for themselves, clients who are not afraid to do the work, and clients who take the necessary steps before them.

5. Using Social Proof

Maybe I live under a rock but I didn’t think there was anything wrong with showing your potential customers that other people are engaging with and buying your products/services.

We all look at reviews before we buy, right? How many reviews? How many stars? Who is buying and what do they think?

If I see two pizza places and one of them is packed with customers while the other is a ghost town, where am I going to go?

I don’t like crowds so maaaaaybe I’d go to the ghost-town-pizza-place.

But it’s more likely that I’d see all those customers at the busy pizza place as people with opinions, and I’d think, “Hey, that pizza must be worth the crowd and the wait.”

Obviously, honesty is again crucial. Only share what’s real, what’s honest.

Do: Let other people know what people are saying about your products and services.

Don’t: breach any confidentiality agreements or doctor-up your client’s testimonials to the point at which they’re unrecognizable.

If you believe in your products and services, my opinion is that it’s not manipulative to let other people know that people are buying them.

Another note on testimonials: I always edit for cohesion/readability and what I like to do is run the edited version by my client or customer for final approval.

This gives me peace of mind knowing that even after editing their words, the client verified that the testimonial was accurate and sharable.

6. Justifying the Price

People buy with emotion and then back their buying decisions with logic.

As the copywriter, it’s my job to provide both emotional reasoning and logic for a reader.

“Hey for the price of a coffee and a scone, you can join me each month for [insert offering name] to [insert result].”

See how that works?

The art of justifying the price could be as simple as referencing the coffee and the scone or it might be that you break down the components of your offering and showcase the price of each on its own before showcasing the price you’re charging.

Regardless of how you provide that logical justification for the reader’s buying decision, I think again, this is ethical so long as it’s honest and accurate.

Service providers, program facilitators, and course creators: It's simple: be honest, be transparent, set your marketing plan, and stick to it.

And — remember to constantly cultivate a genuine desire to help your readers and potential customers.

What do you think?

Big Love,