*ILLUMINATION QUESTIONS *

Can one question boost sales?

The answer is yes. 

The question? 

“Is your oil at the proper level?”

Texaco paid legendary copywriter Elmer Wheeler $5,000 in the 1930s for those seven words.  

The result? The following week Texaco found themselves under 250,000 more hoods. 

Wheeler was a master at making people scratch their head and think, “Hmm, I’m not sure. Better look into this.”

Why am I talking about this?

Asking a question makes prospects scratch their heads, compels them to find out more about what you are offering. 

I call these illumination questions. You’re shining a light on a potential problem or opportuntiy without leading people to a desired answer.

Here are some examples:

"How can you tell when it’s time to retire?"

"How do you know your sponge won’t scratch your car?"

"Are you getting the lowest mortgage interest rate?"

"How are you accessing working capital without taking on debt or pledging assets?"

“Are you overpaying for SaaS subscriptions?”

“We know that Safari delete 3rd-party cookies every 7 days so you can't send cart or browse abandonment emails to half of your returning visitors. How have you been dealing with that?”

"In 2023, 353 million victims were exposed across 3,200 data breaches. Have your passwords and accounts been breached on the Dark Web?"