Practical information‖ 3 steps you must know to create fear-based copywriting

Fear marketing is no stranger to everyone, so why is it so effective?

Advertising expert Eric Whitman tells us: Fear creates stress. This kind of pressure will take people out of their relaxed state of mind, causing them to feel nervous and focus on your copy.

What we often see:

Drink Jiaduobao if you are afraid of getting angry

The discount is only for one day, don’t miss it again

You The system may crash, please check for viruses in time

There is also the famous "I am afraid of people who read", which I have mentioned in my previous article.

The pain caused by getting angry will make you pay more attention to your personal health and take action; missing this discount will make you feel a financial loss, so you start buying; the virus will also cause computer paralysis. It makes you suffer losses, which prompts you to quickly kill the virus; not reading will bring us the pressure of being abandoned by the people around us, thus making changes.

Fear generally takes advantage of people's fear of suffering losses. At this time, you must take action to reduce or save this loss. For example, on Double Eleven carnival night, the discount time is set to attract people's attention. If you don't buy on that day, it means you may lose double the money. Therefore, the vigorous Double Eleven is also a kind of fear marketing.

Generally speaking, people are more concerned about their own economic interests, health problems, their own lives, children, etc. Therefore, fear-based copywriting must also start from these topics to be effective. For example, this copywriting starts from the topic of children:

Since fear is so effective, how to create fear-based copywriting? I will share these three steps that I have summarized with you.

Fear-based copywriting generally stretches the distance and looks further than the consumer, focusing on showing them the consequences of not using the product or continuing a certain behavior. This is also the most common technique used by most fear-based copywriters.

For example, this copy that won the Cannes Graphic Award in 2003:

Cancer cures smoking addiction

There is only one row of text, but it seems to be a quiet sentence, But it gives people shocking power. The popular understanding is: Just keep smoking! Wait a few years and you will be cured of your smoking addiction after you have cancer. This is a typical case of presenting consequences to arouse fear in the audience.

Another example is Cai Kangyong’s kind text message to the cruel society:

Learning to swim and learning English are things that will not have any impact if you don’t learn them now. These consequences will be a few years later. will appear. What the copywriter needs to do is to put this consequence in front of them now, so as to give users a sense of urgency and prompt them to act now.

We always have a sense of luck about what will happen in the future, or are temporarily paralyzed. Most people do not have a strong sense of crisis and will not actively seek changes, especially for products that take a long time to see results after purchasing now, but the copywriting must allow users to take action immediately. At this time, we need to present what happened many years later in front of users to strengthen their sense of crisis.

Now we have understood that fear-based copywriting must first present the consequences to consumers, but in order to deepen the user's impression and prompt them to act as soon as possible, we also need to add some exaggeration to the copywriting to present some extreme effects. .

Such as this public service announcement:

If you are tired of this world, keep doing this! Short-lived ghosts, usually don't wear seat belts!

This copy first presents the consequences of not using seat belts, but this consequence is quite extreme. Its subtext is to tell you: if you don't wear a seat belt, you will lose your life.

But this is actually just one of many situations. If you don’t wear a seat belt, a car accident may or may not occur; if a car accident occurs, it may just be a bruise or a dislocation. Yes, losing your life is only a small possibility. But if the copy is changed to "If you don't wear a seat belt, your arm will be dislocated!", it will definitely not be as effective as the copy above. Extremely exaggerated situations are more likely to attract attention.

A public service announcement about child seats with the same effect:

I believe many readers have seen this video. In the video, there was only an egg and a little girl sitting in a child safety seat. The little girl was having fun playing with the egg throughout the whole process, but due to a sudden brake, the egg broke and the little girl was unharmed.

I have to say that the technique of this advertisement is very clever and does not show bloody scenes. Using an egg as an analogy to the life of a little girl, the implication is that if the little girl is not sitting in a safety seat, she is likely to have the same fate as the egg. This advertisement also plays on parents' fears and presents an extreme consequence: If you don't use a safety seat, you may lose your child.

Compared to tepid persuasion, adding a little exaggeration will put pressure on your readers to take action immediately.

Through the previous two steps, we have successfully aroused the readers' fear, which is equivalent to you have dug a hole. At this time, you have to give specific suggestions to solve this fear. Fill this hole. This is the best time for your product to appear.

For example, a classic advertisement in "Money-attracting Advertising":

It is obvious that the first half of the copy is arousing consumers' fear, making you feel that your bed can be so dirty. , and this series of descriptions will make us unbearable. The next paragraph immediately gives the corresponding solution: buy bloxem's anti-mite bed cover. Complete and effective.

But one thing to note here is: the suggestions given in the copy must be appropriate and beneficial, and can exactly solve the fear you evoke. Don’t scare consumers for fear’s sake.

Authors Plaka and Aronson proposed in the book "The Age of Propaganda" that fear is most effective only when the following four points are met:

1. Scary enough

2. Can provide specific suggestions to overcome threats

3. Make consumers believe that the suggestions provided can reduce threats

4. It is convenient for consumers to implement the suggestions< /p>

We must be careful to convince consumers that the advice we give accurately reduces the threat posed by fear. Otherwise, you'll just succeed in scaring consumers away, which is not beneficial to either party. And blindly taking advantage of consumers' fear will also cause more negative effects.

For example:

This copy is indeed taking advantage of parents’ fear, but it always feels a bit strange. What’s wrong with it? The fear evoked in the copywriting is too great, and it cannot be solved by coming to xxx education. Such a statement will only arouse the disgust of consumers, who think you are flashy. It might be better if the copywriting of this training class was changed to this:

Eric Whitman also has a similar point of view: If you arouse too much fear in people's hearts, the result will be counterproductive. Scaring people into taking action.

If you open a karate school and provide self-defense training to people. You need to list not only shocking crime figures, but also don't show too bloody scenes, which will only scare your consumers away. Make them believe that the methods you teach can easily defeat attackers.

Convincing customers that your suggestions and products are feasible can indeed eliminate their fears. Otherwise don't try it easily.