No one's dying to hear from you

So don't go strutting through cyberspace and customer's mailboxes like a peacock with no sense of purpose or direction.

After all, you're asking for someone's time. Many parents will give up their children before they'll sacrifice their time—that's why there's day care centers, latch-key kids, and sociopathic, homicidal, high-school gun-slingers (don't get me started on the lack of quality family time).

Waste your target market's time often enough, and your emails and direct mail will be deleted and discarded before they're opened—same goes for your website.

I don't know how many times I've arrived at a website and wasn't sure I was in the right place—'cause I couldn't immediately see what they do, what service they provide or what products they sell—and I didn’t have the time to find out.

If you could sell time—you'd make a fortune. In the meantime, whatever you're selling will cost time—at the outset.

So don't beat about the bush. Don’t build a warm and fuzzy nest in which to lay an egg—present the bird, already cooked and ready to be eaten.

Then, if you think it will help grease the slide, you can talk about the weather, where you went to college, the boil on your uncle's butt—or whatever you think will float your market's boat.

Learn from my mistake

If this article was a sales letter, I'll bet you a tennis bag and ten tennis racquets that I couldn't give away a Brinks truck filled with 24 karat gold bricks for $1—if that's what I was offering.

Why, because who in their right mind cares about, much less has time to consider, my tennis ranking, my tennis obsession or how I walk my dog. They'd stop reading after two or three sentences—they'd never get to the part where I offer to fill their living room with 10 tons of gold bricks for a measly buck!

But it's not a sales letter... and yet, it's still won't be read by many people—especially those not interested in tennis—because I took too long to make my point.

Sheesh! What a waste of my time!

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