Welcome! Introduction Best Accounts to Choose Common Mistakes Gathering Info Securing Artwork Determining Ad Size Attention Grabber Benefit Headline Copy Other Elements Producing the Ad The fastest way to increase sales! Participate in this award-winning, newspaper-specific ad sales course on-site or in a Webinar.  • Get past upfront stalls and objections without any pushing  • Make the account believe he really needs you  • Get better information from your prosepct  • Develop quick ad strategies that work the very first time  • Eliminate size, frequency, content, cost and most other objections before they ever arise  • Get dramatic responses for all kinds of advertisers  • Never have to push an advertiser to run again click here

Because readers typically read from top to bottom, the top of the ad is prime real estate. Don't waste it with the business' logo, for example, despite many advertisers insistence that, if nothing else, they at least want to people to see and remember their name.

After all, their name is meaningless to everyone but those people who already love them or hate them–both groups are not the best to target.

Since the business you're making up the spec ad for most likely wants to attract the attention of people in the market for their product (including those who don't know them), a picture of the product or service has proven to be the strongest attention-getter. The name of the product or service (not the name of the business) is nearly equally effective if it can't be described graphically.

Whether it's a graphic, words, or both, it should be instantly recognizable as the product the advertiser is selling and big enough that nobody glancing at the ad can miss it. This means it may need to be a quarter to a third of the ad.

Take a look at the ad below. See how it doesn't attract people looking to go out for a seafood dinner? You'll find in many cases that the business' logo just doesn't properly communicate what the advertiser sells, resulting in dramatically fewer target customers seeing your ad.

Now take a look at the partially redesigned ad below. If the restaurant wanted to attract anyone out there in the market to buy a seafood dinner (current and new customers alike), this ad would attract all of them, both with the graphic of the two lobsters as well as the words "Twin Lobster Dinner." There's not question what the ad is selling, which is the first step to getting a response.

Similar to the way you learned to layout a live ad earlier, draw a box on a layout sheet (or a plain piece of paper if you don't have a layout sheet) the size of the ad you want, and indicate where you want your graphic to go, attaching the artwork to a separate sheet and keying it up. If you don't have any artwork, ask the artists to find you some, but as I mentioned earlier, it's best to get your own artwork.

Next: The benefit headline