I took an Uber today and in my best Gene Schwartz moment, I decided to chat with the driver.
We talked for a few minutes about casual topics. Suddenly, he shifted to his interest in theology and his deep Catholic faith.
He spoke enthusiastically for a minute. And then, sensing my lack of religious conviction, he launched into a persuasive argument. These were the key points:
1. Perhaps you think God doesn’t care about you?
2. Of course he does. Why else would he make you in his own image?
3. You’ve got reason… You’ve got memory… You’ve got free will. These are all aspects of God. He gave them to you because he cares.
4. You should look into this more… it will give you the meaning you haven’t been able to find so far in life.
Here’s why I bring this up:
A few days ago, I watched an excerpt from the Agora copy camp (or whatever it was called). This is a video training recorded at Agora Financial offices where they locked a bunch of newbie copywriters in a dungeon, and over the course of a week or two, taught them the Agora way of writing copy.
The excerpt I watched showed Joe Schriefer, the copy chief at Agora, explaining how to structure your sales letters.
The first step is to brainstorm a giant list of objections…
Then pick out the most important ones, and put them in a logical order — the order in which they will appear to your reader.
The next step is to convert each objection into a sexy subhead.
And the final step, the actual writing, is to expand each subheadlined section in a 4-part structure, which my Uber driver adopted instinctively:
1. Objection
2. Claim
3. Proof
4. Benefit
If you write sales copy, you should look into this structure. It will give you the kind of writing speed and persuasive power you haven’t been able to develop with more heathen copywriting methods. Why else would Joe Schriefer share it with you?