I've had an account here for 3 years and hardly visited, so I thought I'd add a few useful posts in case I need help myself.
Best 'trick' I ever learned is a very simple one. Get your prospect (potential customer, or 'prospect-ive' customer) to agree with you.
Seems simple and basic but if I remember the stats correctly, you need 3x 'yes' before you can try for the sale.
Or something like that. But I don't take the numbers too seriously.
So, the other 'trick' is, to answer the question that is on your customer's mind.
Again, seems simple.
But what that achieves is #1 to make it appear like you have an insight into the customer's mind, although, if a guy walks into a shoe store and picks up a pair of brown suede loafers and you go and say to him
'are you looking for a pair of comfortable shoes?'...
'do you prefer the color brown?'
'do you prefer suede?'
Or something. You potentially have 3x 'yes' and can move on to 'we have these on offer for the next few days, would you like to try them on?' etc.
I'm not writing sales scripts here, I'm just making a point.
It all seems pretty simple, and basic, but when YOU are the guy, and YOU're in a shoe store, and YOU pick up a pair of brown suede shoes, it is very possible YOU ARE thinking about buying a pair, you do actually like loafers (possibly because they are comfortable) and you do like this brown and you do like suede, so when this sales guy comes over and asks you all that and you're nodding your head to it all, you tend to go along with the idea of trying a pair on too.
Same type of thing works on a web site. Although you don't have the visual cue of someone picking up a pair of shoes, you DO have the very obvious fact that you have EG: a health website and someone has visited it, so they are probably interested in health.
This would make a poor strapline BUT the words 'are you interested in health related issues' at the top of your pages would, in principle alone, get you your first 'yes'.
It's awkward as hell, so it would also cause people to think you were communicatively retarded, but I'm simply making the point.
The additional benefit you have, of being a website owner, is that you write the articles.
So, if you write an article about, I dunno... the abc diet... or whatever... that is great for weight loss, youthfulness, regular poops and is cheap as chips...
Then you start your article with something along the lines of --
are you looking for a diet that will help you lose your weight but not cost the earth?
= 2x yes
Do you sometimes suffer from abdominal pain from poor eating habits?
= 1 or 2x yes
etc
Essentially, by asking the questions you KNOW are on the mind of who ever lands on your page, you are getting agreement from your reader and that is what keeps them reading.
Moving on towards the 'sale' is simply a matter of filling out the solutions to those answers, as they relate to whatever product or service you are currently pitching.
If you adopt this mindset to sales, you won't go far wrong.
Yes, there is more to it -- keeping your audience reading to the end isn't all about what's on their mind or being 'charming' it's as much about following the necessary train of thought that persuades them you have more answers.
But this is enough to answer your initial question here.
I hope something in this post helps!
