“If you talk less, you’ll sell more, and that is a rule you can take to the bank.”
— David Sandler
What, you’re still reading?
Even though I’ve paid off the subject line?
Insatiable. All right…
I can tell you I’m re-reading David Sandler’s mysteriously titled book, You Can’t Teach A Kid To Ride A Bike At A Seminar.
In case you don’t know Sandler, the man was a sales trainer, and his book is about his sales system.
Sandler was influential enough in the world of actual sales — the world of cold calling, going to prospect’s offices, sitting across the table.
But his ideas are much better known in the world of online marketing because negotiation coach Jim Camp, who influenced a million and one Internet marketers, apparently got most of his negotiation system, often verbatim, by being a Sandler franchisee.
Aaanyways…
Sandler says to talk less. To draw out your prospects to talk. To listen, and to get them to sell themselves.
It’s good advice. I tried it. It worked like magic, back when I used to get on calls with prospective copywriting clients.
It’s great advice for sales copy too.
Back when I was writing sales copy — thousands of words every week of advertorials, and VSLs, and sales emails — I made it a policy to “write as little as possible.”
That didn’t mean to have a VSL of 150 words or a half-page advertorial.
Instead it meant “getting the market to write your marketing for you,” as Travis Sago likes to say. To mirror and feed back things that people in the market already said themselves, in their own words, instead of coming up with my own arguments and language.
So that’s a tip for you. Talk and write less. You’ll sell more.
Here’s another tip. The above tip is great advice if all you’re looking to do is to sell, today.
But if you’re writing a daily email newsletter, particularly one for yourself and your business, then there’s a second purpose to your emails.
This second purpose is more wooly. Much less measurable than sales. It also happens in the vague future, rather than the clear present.
I’m talking about getting people to open your emails again tomorrow, and to give you an honest hearing. About gradually, getting people to see you as an authority, a leader, a trusted guide in all kinds of questions in their life.
Sales today are necessary and nice. But really, all the profits in email are in this long game, in the ongoing relationship, in the back end.
And that’s a rule you can take to the bank.
And now, on to my offer. If you don’t buy it today, I’ll promote it again tomorrow, and maybe I’ll convince you then.
Or maybe I’ll convince you today?
My offer is my Daily Email Habit service. It’s a new prompt/puzzle each day, delivered to your inbox, to help you write your own daily email.
The dual goals for Daily Email Habit are 1) making you sales today and 2) establishing your influence and authority, so you have an asset in your email list that only grows in value tomorrow, and the day after.
If you’d like to get started with those dual goals, and now: