Copywriting Formulas: Craft Compelling Business Message

Copywriting formulas are pre-established structures or guidelines writers use to craft effective marketing copy. These formulas apply to various copywriting needs, from email subject lines and headline formulas to landing pages and sales pitches.

So why do you need a copywriting formula? Good copywriting is crucial whether you're writing ad copy, crafting a blog post or sales page, sending out an email blast, updating your website, or creating social media posts. Copywriting formulas ensure that your messaging remains on point and can help you overcome writer's block by providing you with a clear roadmap for ideas.

It can also help you create content faster. Whether it's a brief ad copy or a long-form sales page, having tried and tested copywriting formulas to follow streamlines the entire writing process, ensuring faster content turnaround times that allow you to write consistently.

The main goal of copywriting formulas is to help you write copy that maximizes engagement and conversions. Formulas work and have been honed through years of experience and proven to engage readers and drive the most desirable outcome.

Copywriting formulas can yield your business:

• Higher conversion rates: By following proven copywriting formulas that capture attention, build interest, and incite action, businesses can enjoy higher conversion rates, turning potential customers into loyal customers.
• Clarity: Copywriting formulas help businesses articulate their value propositions in clear, succinct manners, ensuring the target audience understands the message without ambiguity.
• Enhanced brand trust: Copywriting formulas provide consistency in messaging. This consistency reinforces brand reliability. When customers receive consistent, clear messages, it builds trust, fostering stronger relationships between the brand and its audience.

Popular copywriting formulas

Certain copywriting formulas are the most popular because they're easy to remember and consistently deliver results. These formulas have been refined through years of practice and offer a structured approach to crafting compelling copy on everything from long-form sales pages and sales letters to blog posts. You can even use them to create your own headline formula for landing pages and ads.

By adhering to these copywriting formulas, businesses can construct messages that capture attention and guide readers through a logical process, culminating in the desired outcome. Below, we explore some of the most popular copywriting formulas:

AIDA formula

The ADIA — Attention, Interest, Desire, Action — formula presents a linear flow of thought designed to capture and sustain the reader's attention through the sales process.

• Attention: This is where you capture the reader's attention. It could be with a striking headline or compelling image. The goal is to make them stop and take notice.
• Interest: Once you have their attention, you must maintain that reader's interest. This could involve sharing a surprising fact, an emotional story, or detailing how your product stands out in the market.
• Desire: Here, you appeal to the reader's emotions, building a desire for your product or service. By illustrating the benefits and painting a picture of how it'll improve some aspect of their life, you make them want it.
• Action: The action step often comes in the form of a call-to-action that prompts the reader to take a specific action, whether it's making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter, or contacting your business.

PAS formula

The PAS — Problem, Agitation, Solution — copywriting formula revolves around identifying a pain point or problem and amplifying its significance before offering a solution.

• Problem: Start by clearly identifying and articulating the problem the target audience is facing to create a sense of relatability and demonstrate understanding.
• Agitation: Dive deeper into the problem, emphasizing its implications, repercussions, or the emotional distress it might be causing. This heightens the sense of urgency and reinforces the need for a solution.
• Solution: The PAS copywriting formula ends with the solution. Introduce your product or service as the ideal solution, detailing how it addresses and resolves the target audience's issues.

FAB formula

The FAB — Features, Advantages, Benefits — formula emphasizes the product's features while connecting them to tangible advantages and benefits to ensure the reader comprehends its full value.

• Features: Begin by listing or describing the features of the product or service that make it unique or stand out.
• Advantages: This step involves detailing what the features mean in practical terms and why they matter.
• Benefits: The last step in the FAB formula is outlining how the advantages translate into direct benefits for the target audience. This allows you to highlight the positive impact or value addition the product or service will bring to the user's life or business.

BAB formula

The BAB — Before, After, Bridge — copywriting formula paints a vivid contrast between the current state and potential future state with your product or service as the bridge between the two. You tap into the human desire for change and improvement by highlighting the transformation.

• Before: Start by depicting the current situation or problem. This is the "pain point" or challenge your target audience faces. It's a snapshot of their life or business without your product or service. The aim is to make them recognize and relate to this scenario, building a sense of empathy and understanding.
• After: Next, paint a picture of what life could look like once the problem is solved. This is a vision of a brighter, more desirable state of affairs. It should be compelling enough to make your audience yearn for this change and view it as a tangible possibility.
• Bridge: This is the pivotal point where you introduce your product or service as the means to transition from the "before" state to the "after" state. Essentially, you're presenting your offering as the bridge that facilitates this transformation. Detail how your solution works and why it's the ideal choice to usher in the desired change.

PPPP (Promise-Picture-Proof-Push) Formula

The PPPP — Promise, Picture, Proof, Push — copywriting formula moves the audience from understanding the value of an offering to taking concrete action. Its progression is methodical, ensuring that each step builds on the previous one, leading the audience down a persuasive pathway.

• Promise: Begin by making a promise to your audience. This is a bold statement or declaration about what your product or service can deliver. Whether it's a solution to a problem, a unique feature, or a specific benefit, this promise sets the tone and creates an expectation.
• Picture: After setting the promise, paint a vivid picture of the result of the experience. Use evocative language and storytelling techniques to help your audience visualize the benefits.
• Proof: This is where you back up your claims. Offering proof adds credibility to your promises and pictures. This can come in the form of testimonials, case studies, statistical data, expert endorsements, or any evidence that validates your claims. It's essential to ensure that the audience believes what you're selling is genuine and can indeed deliver on its promises.
• Push: Finally, with the groundwork laid, you push your audience towards taking a specific action. This can be a call to action like "Buy Now," "Sign Up," or "Contact Us." This final 'push' is meant to convert the interest you've built up into tangible results.

Crafting a compelling message is a strategic necessity because it allows you to capture your audience's attention in a world where they're constantly bombarded with other messages. A powerful business message on sales pages resonates, engages, and compels. However, creating impactful messages requires you to understand your audience, align with business objectives, and ensure clarity in communication.

Identify your target audience

Before you begin writing a blog post, landing page, social media post, or sales page, it's crucial to understand your target audience. Understanding who you're speaking to is the foundation of any compelling business message. Crafting customer personas can help.

Developing these personas allows you to create detailed profiles of your ideal customers. By considering demographics, psychographics, behaviors, and notifications, you can craft a semi-fictional representation of your target audience, ensuring that your message speaks directly to them.

You should also clearly understand your target audience's pain points. To truly resonate with your audience, you need to understand their challenges and concerns and address them directly in your messaging to demonstrate empathy, understanding, and a genuine desire to provide a solution.

Tailor sales copy to your business goals

Your messaging should align with your broader business goals. If your goal is to raise awareness and engagement, your sales copy should be designed to captivate and resonate, sparking curiosity and encouraging interaction.

Meanwhile, when the objective is conversions or sales, you should write persuasive copy, emphasizing the unique value proposition, benefits, and clear advantages of choosing your product or service.

Write clear and concise copy

Whether it's for social media posts, a free ebook, or a sales letter, your copy should be clear and concise. Clarity is a necessity of effective communication, ensuring that your audience understands your message and is motivated to act upon it. Avoid industry-specific jargon or overly technical language that might alienate or confuse your audience. Instead, opt for plain language that's universally understood.

You should also use the active voice to make your marketing copy more direct, dynamic, and clear.

A compelling business message can capture attention and inspire action, but for long-term success, you must build and sustain credibility and trust. Without these pillars, even the best messages can fall flat.

One way to build credibility is through social proof. When potential customers see that others are endorsing your product or service, they're more likely to trust you. Testimonials and case studies can significantly enhance your brand's credibility by giving customers a preview of what they can expect.

Improve your brand messaging with Mailchimp. Our suite of marketing tools can help your business effectively build trust and establish credibility while measuring the effectiveness of your copy. From analyzing robust analytics that help you understand your audience to creating a customizable landing page that showcases your social proof, Mailchimp can help you amplify your messaging strategy.