For me it's variety, variety, variety. Even though most everyone uses templates to some extent, change up the text on the page, the ad text, the metas if you use them, the order of the recips, etc. It just doesn't take that long. Google hates duplicate content, and I'm very reluctant to list sites that are too templated. Other than that I'm not too concerned with the way the site looks (as long as it doesn't make me want to jab pencils in my eyes
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Sales text is your deal. Hard, soft, I don't care. And I don't think anyone's going to be able to tell you what works best as it's different for everyone, depending on your niche, your sponsor, your traffic sources, etc. Experiment, keep good notes, and you'll get a feel for what works.