How to Use Desire and Demand Triggers in Your Copy to Attract More Ideal Customers and Generate More Revenue

Robert Gillespie
2 min readJun 7, 2022

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Picture the front cover of ‘Men’s Health’ magazine.

Right there in the middle is always a picture of a good looking, well-toned guy. And if you don’t believe me, just Google ‘Men’s Health’ and look at the images tab. Surrounding him are multiple pieces of short, snappy copy.

These two elements; ‘The Toned Guy’ and the ‘Snappy Copy’ make up what’s called:

  • Desire Triggers; and…
  • Demand Triggers

And when you understand how these work together, you’ll immediately write better copy, attract more paid customers and increase your revenue.

There’s a big misconception when writing copy

The misconception is that you only need to come up with ONE hook and ONE big promise to create enough attention and desire to sell your digital products.

That’s total B.S.

Understand this. One customer will buy the exact same product for one reason and another customer will buy it for something completely different.

But it’s your job to promote those different features and benefits — and that’s where Desire and Demand Triggers come in.

How Men’s Health magazine uses Desire and Demand Triggers to sell more copies:

Desire Trigger

The visual of the buff looking guy on the front cover of the magazine is the ‘Desire Trigger’.

The job of the visual is to grab your attention and say “Buy this magazine and you can look just like this”. It’s appealing to your desire.

And it’s a large image just to make sure you don’t miss it amongst hundreds of other magazines sitting on the shelves.

But this visual alone doesn’t work unless you can make it realistic for the audience — which is where ‘Demand Triggers’ come in.

Demand Triggers

Demand Triggers are ‘what you will get’ to help you reach your desire (toned body in this example).

Here are 3 pieces of copy (Demand Triggers) used from the front cover of a randomly selected Men’s Health magazine.:

  • Gym-Free Abs, 7 Day Power Plan
  • Double Your Endurance: Go Longer, Go Harder
  • The 5 Superpowers of Everyday Strength

They’re all very different messages. And they will appeal to different people.

But ultimately, they will all help you to get stronger and fitter — and maybe, just maybe, look more like the guy on the front cover.

In closing then, it’s your job to uncover as many Demand Triggers as possible and use them in your messaging to see what your audience responds to.

That’s how you will attract more customers and increase your revenue.

Read this post and more on my Typeshare Social Blog

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Robert Gillespie

I write about Digital Entrepreneurship, Marketing and @Notionhq | Currently Vice President of Marketing @JPMorgan Chase | UK Entrepreneur of The Year final