Throughout my research, I’m always surprised when I stumble onto websites that are professionally designed and seem to offer great products and services, but lack or fail in certain important elements.

Elements that, with just a few short changes, can help multiply the results almost instantaneously.

Generally, I have found that there are seven common mistakes. I call them the “Seven Deadly Sins.” Is your website committing any one of these?

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Many copywriters often talk about targeting a niche… getting to know them so you talk their language and describe your solution for them as though you were one of them.

I’d like to take a contrarian view.

I think it’s silly to worry about targeting a “niche.”

I propose that all people are the same at their core and if you are actually working a true market… targeting is as silly as pretending that some people don’t eat or sleep or have sex or breathe.

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The 10 Commandments of Power Positioning: Magical Marketing Strategies for Creating an Endless Stream of New, Repeat, and Referral Business is Michel Fortin’s ebook that brings together the art of positioning with the science of direct response.

This version is the 3rd edition with over 140,000 copies distributed to date! This is includes third party distribution since people are invited to freely pass the ebook around. In fact, the estimate is in excess of 140,000 copies in all. (It’s probably closer to 300,000 copies if not more.)

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I often get made fun of for this, but one of my favorite movies of all time is “Signs,” directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Why do I like it so much?

Probably because it shares many characteristics with Alfred Hitchcock films. (Hitchcock is my favorite director of all time.) But it’s also a bit funny, a bit scary, a bit emotional, and very suspenseful. The premise is an alien invasion, but the plot is really about a minister regaining his faith.

Talk about something for everyone!

That brings up a good question. How do you advertise a film that has something for everyone? Do you try to appeal to everyone? Or do you choose the most profitable segment of the market?

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The most important part of your copy is not your headline, not your offer and certainly not your benefits. The most important part is your customer.

In the last few weeks, I’ve been critiquing some pretty good copy. Very well-written and compelling. But if the conversion rate is low (hence, the reason why I was hired to conduct a critique consultation), it’s because these salesletters do not target the right audience for the offer, or the author and the copy fail to connect with their readers.

Researching your customer in depth is vital to the success of your copy. It’s not only an important component of targeting and qualifying the best prospect for your offer, but also an effective way to discover new ideas, different angles, captivating storylines, unsought benefits, and appropriate length and language of your copy that will convert more.

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I was recently interviewed by a print magazine about how I started my business. In it, I offered several tips and ideas on how to carve a niche in the marketplace that I personally applied.

And I realized that some of these tips were particularly powerful. So I wanted to reprint some of my answers here for you.

If you know my personal story, you know how niche marketing played an important role in my career.

Long story short, I feared rejection immensely, which led to a reclusive childhood. I wanted to overcome my fears and decided to dive into the world of sales in order to fight them. Years passed and many failures ensued until I finally became the top producing salesperson in Canada for a Fortune 500 company.

How did I accomplish that?

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In the competitive marketplace of the new millennium, the demand for specialized products or services will increase. If your site sells everything or to everyone, chances are that your audience will not perceive any greater value in shopping from you than anyone else.

The more generic you become, the greater your competition will be, since you’ve placed your offering in the same ring as the Wal-Marts, Targets and eBays of the world.

In other words, cast a wider net, and the likelihood that more competitors who are trying to go after the same “fish” will occupy the same marketspace.

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