To start learning how to write good classified ads to use for email marketing or online ad sites, find ten classified ads from ten different ads, like in ezine or newsletter type publications - ads that you think are pretty good. Cut & Paste each of these ads into a word program or notepad.

Analyze each of these ads: 

How has the writer attracted your attention - what about the ads keeps your interest - are you stimulated to want to know more about the product being advertised - and finally, what action must you take? Are all of these points covered in the ad? How strongly are you "turned on" by each of these ads?

Rate these ads on a scale of one to ten, with ten being the best according to the formula I've given you. Now, just for practice, without clipping the ads, do the same thing with ten different ads from a Sears or Penney's catalog. In fact, every ad you see from now on, quickly analyze it and rate it somewhere on your scale. If you'll practice this exercise on a regular basis, you'll soon be able to quickly recognize the "Power Points" of any ad you see, and know within your own mind whether an ad is good, bad or otherwise, and what makes it so.

Practice for an hour each day, write the ads you've rated 8, 9 and 10 exactly as they've been written. This will give you the "feel" of the fundamentals and style necessary in writing classified ads.

Your next project will be to pick out what you consider to be the ten "worst" ads you can find in both classifieds sections, online and offline.

Clip/copy/paste these out and paste them into your word program and onto a sheet of paper so you can work on them.

Read these ads over a couple of times, and then beside each of them, write a short comment stating why you think it's bad: Lost in the crowd, doesn't attract attention - doesn't hold the reader's interest - nothing special to make the reader want to own the product - no demand for action.

You probably already know what's coming next, and that's right. Start re-writing these ads to include the missing elements.

Each day for the next month, practice writing the ten best ads for an hour, just the way they were originally written. Pick out ten of the worst ads, analyze those ads, and then practice re-writing those until they measure up to doing the job they were intended to do.

Once you're satisfied that the ads you've re-written are perfect, go back into each ad and cross out the words that can be eliminated without detracting from the ad. Classified ads are almost always "finalized" in the style of a email ad or product catalog.

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