“If I would’ve known their real job-placement rate — not to mention how hard it was to actually learn at the school — I never would have signed up.”
— Jonathan Stickrod, one of the students involved in arbitration with Lambda School
Almost exactly a year ago, I proposed something I later called AIDA School. A new way of teaching people copywriting… for free… modeled on Lambda School.
As you might know, Lambda School is a startup. It provides an education to folks, like the young Stickrod above. And it then places them into paying jobs as programmers and designers.
And Lambda School does it all for free. Well, at least upfront.
Because Lambda School gives you the free education. Then it finds you the job. And once you have the job, it takes a cut of your salary, for a few years, up to $30k in total.
Interesting. At least I thought so.
Only, it doesn’t seem to be working. I read about it today in a Business Insider article.
The article makes it sounds like Austen Allred, the CEO and co-founder of Lambda School, is a conman. Cutting back on instructors to make money… defending a crappy, inadequate curriculum… lying about the percentage of students Lambda School places in paying jobs.
But knowing what I know, I doubt Allred is a conman. I think he’s probably just a dolt.
I’m not saying that from any kind of smarter-than-thou place. After all, I also thought the Lambda School model smelled interesting.
But with a bit more sniffing… it now reeks to me of a flawed setup. Regardless of how good or bad the management or the education might be. Because check it:
From direct marketing, we know two fundamental appeals sell.
The first is FREE.
The second is done-for-you.
These appeals tap into some monkey brain, lizard brain, whatever. Not a brain that’s likely to be successful in the 21st-century economy.
And yet, these appeals still stick around inside of us, in spite of being unhelpful. That just shows how powerful they are. Which is why direct marketers use these two appeals so much.
The thing is, direct marketers know not to put those two appeals together.
Not just because it’s unnecessary. But because when you combine FREE and done-for-you, who exactly are you selecting as a market?
I’ll leave that question hanging. And I’ll just say that, seen from the powerful lens of direct response psychology… it’s clear to me that Lambda School, and by extension, my AIDA school, are doomed to failure. Allred, I’ll meet you at the bar for a drink.
Maybe you find all this depressing. So let me give you the good news.
Direct response fundamentals like FREE and done-for-you still continue to work.
You can use them, starting today, to make money for yourself. Just don’t combine them in one offer. Because you’ll attract the wrong kind of business.
Buuut…
What if you don’t want to just cautiously avoid bad business? What if you want to actively attract the best business?
In that case, you might want to go beyond direct response fundamentals… and to my Influential Emails training.
Influential Emails is not about abolishing direct response law. Rather, it’s about fulfilling it with new ideas that transform how you make sales and how your market sees you.
I won’t give you the full pitch here. All I’ll say is that Influential Emails is neither free… nor done-for-you. If that doesn’t trigger your lizard brain too badly, then take a look here for more information: