Monica Badiu, Email Copywriter & Copy Coach

If you’re reading this, you probably need to write a sales page for your business. It’s not easy and it can be hard to come up with the right words. I’m here to help you do that without feeling salesy or pushy.

Sales copy is an often overlooked, but necessary part of any business.

People think that they need to be master copywriters to produce content that converts.

Or that the only way they could sell through copy is if they aggressive and salesy. When you’re thinking about it, it makes you feel dirty, doesn’t it?

While you do need some good copy to catch the interest of your customers, getting your audience to buy from you instead of someone else is not about writing the world’s best headline – and it is definitely not about being a sleazy salesperson.

It’s all in your head

In all my years as a marketing consultant I don’t think I’ve ever met a business owner who wasn’t afraid of sounding salesy in their content, emails etc. I’d say it’s actually the biggest objection I hear when it comes to tactics that would get them more clients and revenue.

I hear this from coaches, agency owners, consultants, online course creators, artists, retailers, designers, makers etc. When it comes to selling, so many business owners have so much head trash that they get stuck for years and years doing the same things, and seeing very little growth.

As soon as they get to the point in the strategy that implies running sales calls, reaching out for referrals, running an email promotion, they get nervous, shy, struggle with imposter syndrome and would rather give their right arm than have to do it.

Emotion beats logic

You must have heard this before. The thoughts you have create emotion, which seem so real to your brain that they beat logic. It’s one of the reasons I’ve added mindset and NLP coaching into my business consulting practice – to help entrepreneurs reframe that negative emotion so they can clear their head trash and think of their business and growth tactics with a clear, logical mind.

The secret is in reframing what you think is salesy and what your role is as a business owner.

Because, here’s the thing your marketing is about you helping ONLY the people that you can help. It’s not about convincing anyone who wouldn’t benefit from what you have to offer. And it is definitely not about using gross sales techniques or any false benefits to sell your stuff.

Your role as a business owner is to help your people take action towards achieving their goal. It could be moving away from a pain they have in life (losing weight) or towards pleasure (fit body).

Your marketing is guiding them towards their goal. You’re not forcing them to do anything. You are however educating and doing your best to give enough information, benefits and examples of how your product or service is an option that could help them achieve their goal. It might not be for them, and that’s fine.

But it is your responsibility to give them a nudge forward so they can achieve their goal. That is your primary responsibility as a business owner. If you serve your people, money will come. If you go at it just to make money and disregard what you audience needs, you are going to be disappointed very fast. People nowadays know when they are being sold to, and they definitely appreciate a brand that caters to them, rather than sells at them.

Sales copy is not like any other type of copy.

The sole purpose of sales copy is to get your people to take action and hit the purchase button. It might make you feel very uncomfortable writing it IF you are not aware of what your customers actually want. In fact, it’s going to be almost impossible to write something that gets them to say yes, if you don’t know who they are, what are their pain points, and what is the language they use to talk about their frustrations, desires etc.

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The secret weapon of good sales copy is the customer avatar.
— Monica Badiu

There’s an insightful article right here about this. I suggest you don’t even attempt to write a sales page without having this. It helps you create better sales content because you’re not writing for yourself anymore—you’re speaking directly to your ideal audience with their needs as top priority.

Make it about the benefits – not about the features

The easiest way to write good sales copy is by using the benefits-driven approach. This technique helps you highlight how your product or service solves a problem for your customers.

When writing this think about how what you are offering is going to help them achieve a transformation or experience a benefit. Because in all honesty, nobody cares that your online course has 100 video lessons, or that your book has 1000 pages, or that your mugs are made from kaolin clay and fired at temperatures as high as 2,600 degrees Fahrenheit.

Why should that matter to your client? Spell it out. Here are two examples:

This online course has more that 100 video lessons which were designed to take any guesswork out of your learning experience. If you have a question, we have an answer. Plus, we’re taking all the overwhelm out of the picture, and guiding you through all the important milestones so you don’t have to waste any time figuring this out by yourself.

This amazing mug is made from kaolin clay and fired at temperatures as high as 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit so you can get fine, thin porcelain without rough edges that make you feel like you’re drinking coffee out of a $1 ordinary mug. You are sure to impress any guest with this delicate bright white piece of porcelain that feels as soft as silk in your hands.

Here are a few examples of benefits and features:

Example of benefits - driven copy

Example of benefits – driven copy

Example of features only copy

Example of features only copy

The easier way to explain writing benefits-driven copy is to employ the FAB formula, which starts with features, mentions advantages and then spells out the benefits to the client.

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Feature + Benefit + Meaning

Benefits are usually used in bullet points or short sentences that try to summarize the most important reasons your people should take whatever action you want. You can use them in a product description (Amazon really stresses out the importance of these on their product pages), you can use them right under the headline of your product or service so you can draw curiosity.

The formula I like to use is based on something I learned in “Copywriting Secrets: How Everyone Can Use The Power Of Words To Get More Clicks, Sales and Profits . . . No Matter What You Sell Or Who You Sell It To!” a book written by Jim Edwards, who has developed Funnel Scripts. Here’s the formula:

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It———————— so you can —————————————
— Jeff Edwards, Copywriting Secrets

Keep it simple

When writing anything try to keep your copy simple and conversational. Use short sentences and imagine you’re trying to explain what you do to a child. Unless your audience is academia, scientists or some other profession that requires the use of technical terms, do not try to sound smart.

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The average American reads at the 7th- to 8th-grade level.
— — The Literacy Project
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Half of U.S. adults can’t read a book written at the 8th-grade level.
— — Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

This does not mean you are talking down to your customer or that you’re making the assumption that your customers are dumb. Quite the opposite.

There’s something called the Flesch – Kincaid test which is used by the US military to evaluate the readability of their manuals. The test evaluate reading ease based on a ranking scale of 0-100. The higher your score, the better. Low scores indicate text that is complicated to understand.

You can actually use this test to see where your website or sales copy scores. The rule of thumb for businesses is that your copy should be understood by students in seventh grade.

For example, The Huffington Post’s website has an average grade level of about 7, meaning that it should be easily understood by 12 to 13 year olds.

Medical information for the public should be written at no higher than an eighth-grade reading level, according to the American Medical Association, National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Instead of saying “it represents” say “it is”

— Keep it simple

Write to solve a problem (The PAS framework)

The hard truth is that people don’t care about you. They just don’t, especially when you are asking them to give you the money they have worked hard for it. Especially when they have so many options to use their disposable income.

So what is a business owner to do? Talk about their pain points. Talk about the problem. Even if you’re just starting out, even if you haven’t had your first client yet. Talk about the problem. Make it about them, not you.

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Problem + Agitate + Solution
— Copywriting Framework

One of the easiest and most powerful copywriting frameworks I use when writing sales copy is the PAS. It stands for Problem, Agitate, Solution and it is a great to help your reader relate to what you’re talking about.

This can be used to write a paragraph, an entire email or even a good chunk of a sales page.

You will start with identifying the problem. It can be written as “Does this sound familiar?” and have a list of pain points that your audience have expressed either on forums, or in surveys. Or it can be a plain paragraph that just states the plain truth.

Let’s use as example business owners who want to sell more, but they can’t because they just don’t know who their customer avatar is.

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Problem: A lot of companies don’t have a clear idea of who their ideal customer is. This leads to a lot of wasted effort, because they’re trying to sell something that nobody wants.
— Example of step 1 of the PAS framework

Agitating the problem gets the reader to react emotionally. It makes them feel how frustrating the problem actually is.

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Agitate: The best way to get clarity on your target audience is by creating a customer avatar. It’s like the old saying goes “If you build it, they will come.” Your product won’t be successful unless you know exactly what kind of person needs it in order for them to buy it.
— Example of step 2 of the PAS framework

Finally, it’s time to present the solution. Explain it as simple and as straightforward as you can. This closes the loop and creates a natural connection to your offer WITHOUT sounding salesy, aggressive or pushy.

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Solution: Creating an avatar can help you get more customers and make more money! You’ll spend less time and money on marketing efforts if you know exactly who your audience is before you start spending any resources at all. Our team has created hundreds of avatars for our clients’ products and services over the years, so we’ve gotten pretty good at helping people identify their perfect customer!
— Example of step 3 of the PAS framework

Here you go, a couple steps on how exactly to write sales copy that’s not pushy, but still gets the point across. If you hate writing sales copy and marketing your business in general, but you know there’s value in what you have to offer, reach out. It’s what I help my clients with.

If you want to learn more about writing sales copy…

Watch this podcast episode from the “Art of Selling Online Courses”.

Here’s what you can expect to learn from this podcast episode about sales copy that converts:

  • How to write a successful copy for your website

  • What is a customer avatar and why you need it

  • What are some of the sales page copy parts that you should always have

  • How to write emails to make your audience willing to buy your product

  • How to get inspired for writing a copy of your own sales page

  • How to make the whole copywriting process an easy, straightforward task

About the Author

Monica Badiu is a passionate email copywriter and conversion strategist with over 13 years of experience in marketing. With a love for crafting emails that genuinely connect, she’s spent more than 25,000 hours honing her skills in customer-centric copywriting specifically for course creators. In 2023, her tailored strategies helped course creators around the world generate over $3 million in revenue, making her a trusted partner to some of the biggest names in the industry.

But for Monica, it’s about more than just writing emails; it’s about building relationships. She believes in creating value-driven content that doesn’t feel pushy or spammy but rather speaks to audiences on a real, human level. Alongside her work, she mentors and champions ethical marketing, helping course creators not only reach their revenue goals but also grow loyal, lasting connections with their communities.

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