Done correctly, the classified advert can be the best advertising you will ever place. However, not every one uses them to their fullest potential.

Wherever they are used, classified ads are created to fulfil two key functions:

1.    To generate interest
2.    To drive traffic to you or your website

It can be daunting writing small ad copy; after all there’s not much space and you want to get as much across as you can but always remember the golden rule; never try to sell anything from your small ad or links.

The 4 essential components of writing a profitable classified ad are summed up in the acronym A-I-D-A, which stands for Attention-Interest-Desire-Action this is an elementary advertising principle employed by all professional copywriters and described in the following:

Attention: Goal number one is to generate attention, to stand out amongst all the other ads and get noticed by anyone scanning the ads and attention is created by your headline. The headline should put the brakes on your reader so they will stop and read your ad copy, which makes it the most important element of your ad.

Interest: Once you have gained their attention, you must get them interested. If your ad is good enough and your headline is good enough, it could well get their interest too and it needs to do this by building upon the initial impact.

Desire: The next step is creating the desire in your reader to find out more about your offering. This means driving them to your website or to contact you in some way for more information; in other words step closer to you.

Action: This where you get you prospect to make that connection either by clicking through your link or contacting you. This is your call for action, the reason why they would want to visit you – now!

Remember! You don’t need your prospects to buy from your small ad – you merely want them to ask for more information by clicking through your link or sending you an email.

Some of our favourite examples might be:

Headings: “4 Things You Must Know Before Writing Your Classified Ad” or perhaps “How To Write Really Great Classified Ads”

If you wanted to write a classified advert these would get your attention and probably get you interested too.

Action: Click Here To Learn How It’s So Easy. Clearly asking them to click here or visit this website are possible action I want them to take and the action of clicking through or visiting will reinforce the interest and desire elements of your ad.

Once they have taken action, you are free to make your full sales pitch but you do need to wait until the right time otherwise your prospects won’t play.

If you want to discuss having this service working for you and putting your products and services ahead of the competition, email us.