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HOW TO WRITE GUARANTEES THAT DISSOLVE FEAR AND UNLEASH A RIVER OF SALES

Let’s review. What have you already done? If you’ve worked your way through this book carefully, you already understand your buyers, what motivates them, what are their fears, frustrations and anxieties. Not only that...

You’ve done all this amazing persuasion work and yet... it’s still not enough. Why?

Fear.

We need to remove fear, so that people are free to buy. Before we do that, we have to understand where this fear comes from.

In any transaction, there is risk on both sides. If you’re a product creator and you’ve sold any products at all before, any training, coaching or consulting, you already know there’s risk on your part. You could end up with a “dud” client. “Dud” clients include those who don’t pay what they owe, or those who are energy or time vampires, or perhaps they’re even just weird and creepy.

There are so many different ways that people can take from you, even if they are a customer.

Further, there’s the risk that some people will buy from you and then rip you off... download your materials and ask for a refund, which they intended to do from the beginning. In the credit card world they call it “friendly fraud.” I’m not sure what’s friendly about it.

There’s a definite risk involved for you, when you accept anyone as a client.

There is, of course, also risk for the buyer. Their risk is that they might not get what they paid for. Put yourself in the buyer’s position. What are you afraid of when you purchase a program, product or service? You’re afraid you won’t get what you paid for. You’re afraid it won’t be the way it was represented.

You’re afraid it might work for other people but it won’t work for you. The buyer’s safest default position is to not believe you without proof. It’s in their best interest is to begin the relationship not believing you.

DON’T DESPAIR – THEY’RE SECRETLY ON YOUR SIDE

I know the picture I’ve painted so far seems rather pessimistic. But inside all this fear, there’s actually very good news. There’s a secret you need to know about your prospects. Here’s the secret... when they visit your sales page, or your website... when they come to your seminar, your retreat, etc... they secretly want you to be right.

They secretly want to buy from you.

They secretly hope you have the solution.

The challenge is, they also know it’s in their best interest to not believe any of that upfront. That’s why you need proof, but even “mere proof” is not enough.

You must convey the idea that you are shouldering most of the risk. If you can transfer the risk from the buyer to yourself, that removes the barrier, it removes the fear and they’re free to do what they most want to do — buy your product.

Armed with this knowledge, you can sell from confidence. You have so much confidence in what you’re offering that you are willing to bet on it. You’re going to put your money on the line. You’re going to “put your money where your mouth is.”

HOW DO YOU CONVEY THIS MESSAGE?

1. First, you have to be this message. You have to really feel this way.

In the case of the Copywriting Academy Program (WriteCopyThatSells.com), I believe in my heart that it’s one of the best, if not the best, copywriting training programs for entrepreneurs in existence. I’m willing to bet on it and I offered the program with a 30-day guarantee that you could get your money back if it doesn’t work for you. I take a lot of risk in that because what I’m betting on is that you’ll get the power of the idea so deeply in your bones, in your DNA that you’ll actually do the work to put this to work so you can see if it works for you or not.

The program/product that I’m offering in this training is one that requires work on your part, it’s not just a pill that you take that works magic on your physiological body. It’s not just something that you stick into your gas tank that gives you more gas mileage. It’s not something that you can read and learn and automatically benefit from it, you have to work at it. I have to be willing to bet on you, and you need to come from the same place when you’re thinking about your product or service.

2. Second, you offer proof and credibility.

We’ve talked about how you do that, how you present proof in the form of testimonials and credibility in the form of other accomplishments or the form of people that you worked for or with, things that you’ve accomplished. Of course, you need to offer a money back guarantee.

If you’re taking payment via credit cards, you’re required to offer a money back guarantee. It’s part of your contract with the credit card merchant provider. If customers aren’t satisfied with your service or product, you must refund their money. If the merchant provider thinks too many people have asked for a refund, they will revoke your credit card merchant account.

So you really have to be willing to bet on it and you have to go further than offering just a money back guarantee. You need to offer that, because you’re required to, but you also need to go beyond it. You have to deal with all the risks that the buyer is taking. You have to convince them, to show them, to demonstrate to them that you are the one taking the risk.

Now, let me assure you that the thing they’re most afraid of isn’t necessarily losing their money. Of course, nobody wants to lose money, but there are things that buyers hate more than losing money. I’ll tell you what some of those things are.

If they think they’ll have to go through a lot of bureaucratic red tape to get their money back, sometimes they just let it go. Some unethical companies count on that as part of their business strategy. I implore you not to be that kind of company, because that’s just dirty. Make it easy and hassle-free for people to get their money back, and make that message clear to them. You may find this hard to believe, but buyers often hate the hassle more than they fear losing their money.

Most of us have enough stress in our lives already; we certainly don’t want to take on more. We don’t want to deal with pushy salespeople. We don’t want to deal with rude customer service reps. We don’t want to worry about the purchase we’re making. We don’t want our spouse to think we made a stupid buying decision. If you give your customers any hint that dealing with you will ever be stressful, they may avoid doing business with you at all.

This happens often with weight loss programs. People see the before and after pictures and they think they’re going to look like that. They get the program, they talk about it to everyone they know and become evangelists for the program. Have you ever known anyone who acted this way? Then, maybe they lost weight at first and a few weeks later they put all the weight back on ... and they feel foolish.

Maybe you know someone who’s had that experience, or maybe you’ve had that experience yourself. The specter of looking foolish looms in the background of your prospect’s mind.

Prospects also don’t like to feel foolish. None of us likes to feel we have been duped or taken advantage of. Buyers hate this more than losing money.

YOUR GUARANTEE MUST DISPEL FEAR

Your guarantee (or risk-reversal) has to not only guarantee their money back, but it must dispel fear.

You must overcome the prospect’s fear by showing them that you are the one taking the risk.

I have a very specific method for doing just that. I call it “Ray’s Way” of writing a 10-part guarantee that will multiply your sales.

This is the next level, beyond “mere money back guarantees.” A money back guarantee is good, but it’s language that’s been used so often that it almost becomes wallpaper. We expect it, it’s going to be there, but it feels meaningless.

We want to know that there is one (a money-back guarantee), but I think half the time we don’t believe the company will actually give us our money back. Or we believe it will be too much stress and hassle for us to bother with it..., or we’ll look so foolish and stupid we don’t even want to talk to anybody about it. The plain old “money back guarantee” has become a lot less effective than it once was.

You must use the language, “money back guarantee” in your sales copy, but it’s not enough. You have to go beyond it. If you use my way of writing a 10-part guarantee, it’ll increase your sales. It’ll decrease your refunds, because people will be more deeply committed to their decision than they would be otherwise.

It also increases the lifetime average value of a customer, because if they’re satisfied with one purchase, then they’ll likely make another purchase, and another. Every time they make additional purchases, they become more valuable over the lifetime of their relationship with you.

Does that sound like good stuff you’d like to have happen? Let’s get going. Here’s how to construct a 10-part guarantee that is powerful beyond belief.

1. Start with the words “100% unconditional money back guarantee”

Wait a minute, Ray! You just told me that doesn’t work. No, I said it’s not enough. You definitely need to have it because for some people this is the only code they will accept on your sales page that means they’re protected. If they don’t see these “code words” they won’t accept that you are safe.

2. Sell your benefits and transformation in the guarantee itself

Don’t worry I’m going to explain how to do this, I won’t just give you the abstract description of, do all this and good luck. I’ll show you how to do it because we’re going to write a guarantee.

3. Integrate your USP (unique selling proposition) into the language of the guarantee itself

Have you ever heard anybody teach this? I’m sure you’ve heard people talk about making a guarantee and making sure it’s unconditional and that there’s no hassle. Maybe you even put your signature at the bottom so they feel you’re personally guaranteeing it. But, have you ever heard anybody teach that in the guarantee itself you need to sell your benefits and transformation? That in the guarantee itself you need to integrate your USP? You might have, but it’s unlikely because most people, even copywriters or direct response marketers, aren’t aware they should be doing this.

A few are, but this is rarely used, and even more rarely understood. So if you’ll internalize this and start practicing it, this alone is worth about one thousand times your investment in this book.

4. Personalize the guarantee

This means more than just putting something that looks like your signature at the bottom of the guarantee. Convey the idea that this isn’t just an impersonal company guarantee, but that it’s your personal promise. It’s your own integrity you’re putting on the line.

5. Give the longest guarantee possible

If you can give longer than 30 days, then do it. Your credit card processor may not like it, and you may have to negotiate with them on this, but my testing has proven to my satisfaction that in almost every case, the longer the guarantee the lower the refund rate.

6. Demonstrate that returns are easy and hassle-free

Don’t just describe it, but show it. Prove it.

7. Assure them that this is a no-strings attached, unconditional guarantee

Sometimes it’s appropriate to offer a conditional guarantee. There are instances in which that’s a good thing to do, depending on the investment the customer makes in your program and your cost of delivering the service or training. Most of the time, though, in almost all cases, you should offer a no-strings attached, unconditional guarantee.

8. Emphasize the speed of refunds

People may believe that you’re going to honor their refund request. They may believe it will be a relatively hassle-free process, but even if they have those things settled in their mind, they probably still suspect it’ll take them weeks to get the check.

9. Amaze them with what I call the “I’ll-take-the-risk twist.”

This one takes some backbone, but if you have the stamina to do it, this will ramp up your sales like crazy. In this instance, you might offer to send them double their money back. Or to send them their money back, and let them keep the product... or some other outrageous promise that makes it clear that you have absolute faith in the quality of your product.

10. Give your guarantee a name

It can’t be “the guarantee,” it has to have a special name. An evocative, descriptive, differentiating name. One that makes it stand out from other, “inferior” guarantees. Something like, “Our Super-Strong, Good as Gold Fort Knox Guarantee”... or “The World-Famous Double Your Money Back, No Questions Asked, No Weasel Guarantee.”

…

That’s “Ray’s Way” of constructing a 10- part guarantee that has power, and that will boost the sales of your product or service. If I were you, my next question would be, how do I do all that?

That’s a great question. In the following pages, you get to watch me transform a weak, lily-livered guarantee into an iron-clad deal maker.

THE AMAZING TRANSFORMATION OF A WEAK GUARANTEE INTO THE INCREDIBLE HULK OF RISK REVERSAL

Let’s start with this... a sad little guarantee, a weakling, one who’s always bullied on the playground, always getting sand kicked in his face and never making a sale because he’s not much of a guarantee.

This is a guarantee for an imaginary dentist. We’ll call him Dr. Ben Parker. Maybe he has a cosmetic dentistry makeover service that makes your smile look better, and here’s his guarantee.

You might say, “Well, that’s not so bad.”

You’re right, it’s not so bad. It’s at least average, maybe even better than average, but it’s not going to inspire the kind of confidence we need to get buyers to believe that we’re taking on all the risk. It is a sad, sad little guarantee.

Let’s go to work on this using the same product, but changing the guarantee. It means having some backbone, some belief in what you offer. I’m going to pretend that Dr. Ben Parker is my client and he’s told me, “Ray, whatever you have to do to make my guarantee work, to get more people to come to my clinic, and get this makeover, do it. I’ll back up the guarantee you create, because I believe in my product. I believe in it so much I’m willing to bet on it.”

I smile. “Dr. Parker,” I say, “Let’s do this thing.”

TOTAL GUARANTEE MAKEOVER

First, let’s rewrite the guarantee to sell the benefits. Thus:

Of course, I don’t think there is a cosmetic dentistry makeover that can be done in one visit, but just for the purposes of example I’m going a bit overboard. You can adopt this to whatever your actual situation is, and maybe I’m wrong and there is a dentist that will do this in one visit. One painless visit I’m not sure about, but if you’re that dentist... contact me.

The next step is to integrate your USP.

What is your unique selling proposition? Let’s pretend that Dr. Ben Parker’s USP, the thing that makes him stand out, is he’s known as “Painless Parker, the world’s gentlest dentist.”

Back in the 1800s, there actually was a dentist known as Painless Parker, and he was quite the marketer. He was well-known and not always revered, because he was seen by his colleagues as a snake-oil salesman. That doesn’t change the fact that he was known as Painless Parker and his patients loved him. I don’t know how he managed to do that. Maybe he gave them opiates, filled them up with liquor, or hypnotized them... but somehow he managed to live up to his “painless” reputation. He had a very successful business as a result.

Let’s pretend that our modern day Dr. Parker has more acceptable means of making his dentistry painless. Maybe he uses neuro feedback techniques, hypnotic induction or even some light anesthetics or a combination of these things, but somehow he manages to make his dentistry painless and gentle, and that’s his USP. The copy then reads...

Our next step would be to personalize the guarantee with Dr. Ben Parker’s signature, and add language like, “I take your smile very seriously and you have my personal promise...” I would actually use Dr. Parker’s real signature if this was a real client.

Then we want to give the longest possible guarantee. In this case I’ll have Dr. Parker guarantee his work for life. Your credit card merchant account may not allow you to give a lifetime guarantee or they may not let you give more than a 90-day guarantee and in some cases you can’t give more than 30 days, so you may need to take an alternative form of payment in order to offer longer guarantees.

I can tell you that even though it feels riskier, I have much experience with offering longer guarantees. I have one client in particular, has a standard one year guarantee on his products. People can buy them and benefit from them, and return them up to a year later for a full, no questions asked refund. His refund rate is quite low. I think it’s because the one-year guarantee alleviates a lot of fear and pressure from people’s minds. Maybe these customers are thinking, “Well, if they’re behind it for a full year it must be good.”

Will some people take advantage of this because they need Christmas shopping money next year? Yes, a few will, and that’s just the cost of doing business. In the long run, I think you’ll make more sales and ultimately you’ll make more profit by offering the longest guarantee possible.

The next step is to show that returns are easy and aren’t going to be a problem.

You need to go into some detail about this and you can see below in my finished rewrite, I’ve added more copy, making it obvious how you might ask for a refund of Dr. Parker’s services. We have a phone number for them to call. Also on the page with the guarantee is a mailing address and an email, all the different ways people can contact Dr. Parker’s office to get their refund.

The next step is to make sure that you emphasize there are no strings attached.

You do that in the copy as I’ve done at the bottom and I use very fancy, sophisticated language. I say there are absolutely no strings attached, no forms to fill out, nothing to prove, etc. Look at this copy in context below as we finish adding the different pieces to the guarantee.

The next step is where we talk about the speed of the refund.

We want them to know they won’t have to wait forever, so it’s very simple. At the bottom you can see I’ve written, “and you won’t have to wait, we will issue your refund check on the spot.”

Then we amaze them.

How, you might ask, can you be more amazing than offering the refund on the spot?

By saying that Dr. Parker is so confident in his work, he’s so sure you’ll be overwhelmed with gratitude that he will give you double your money back. This is clearly daring and you need to believe in your product very strongly before being able to offer this, but there are many companies who offer a double your money back guarantee and, in some cases, triple your money back.

They do it because they know they can deliver what they promise. Now, if you can deliver what you promise and you’re willing to do this to back it up, this will make your guarantee almost irresistible.

The final step is to name the guarantee, but I’m not sharing the name with you until we do the final comparison. I came up with a pretty good name for it.

Let’s start by looking again at the sad little guarantee from the beginning.

Okay, not bad but not great. Let’s look at the Ray’s Way version and see if it’s any different.

That, my friends, is a guarantee.