An open letter to my non-native copywriting brethren

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For my upcoming business of copy guide, Copy Zone, I interviewed three working copywriters about their experiences getting client work.

Only afterwards, I realized a curious and unintended thing had happened:

All three of these copywriters are non-native English speakers. To be fair, one of them is writing copy in his own language (Spanish). But the other two are working and writing in English, and successfully so.

I bring this up because a few days ago, I got a comment and a question from a new reader:

I love your writing and how you take your readers (us) on the journey with you.

I mean, is it even possible for me (a non-native copywriter) to write close to your writing style and finesse?

I don’t know about my writing style and finesse. If there is something fine and stylish about my writing, I think it’s mainly the result of work.

But on the broader question of whether it’s possible for a non-native speaker copywriter to succeed… well, the case studies I will include in Copy Zone definitely show that yes, it is possible.

On the other hand, most people never do anything, and never achieve anything.

One of my favorite “fun” writers is William Goldman, who wrote the screenplays for movies like The Princess Bride and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Goldman also wrote books, including one about Hollywood called Adventures in the Screen Trade.

And in that book, Goldman said that, in Hollywood, nobody knows anything.

​​In spite of huge money being on the line… in spite of a bunch of smart and ambitious people working day and night to identify or create the next hit… nobody in Hollywood has any clue of what will end up being successful or why.

My belief is that it’s not just Hollywood where nobody knows anything.

The world is a complex and mysterious place. The only way to find out the answer to many questions is to run the cellular automaton a few million steps and see what ends up happening.

And if you want an example of how weird and unpredictable life can be, then take me.

I am technically a non-native English speaker, though I consider English to be my first language. ​​Meaning, I didn’t grow up speaking English for the first decade or so of my life… but today English is the language I know best, because I’ve done most of my reading, writing, and arithmeticking in English.

I’m not giving myself as an example of somebody who succeeded in copywriting despite a non-native level of English skill.

All I want to point out is that, at birth, and for some years after, nobody could have predicted I would end up speaking English as my first language. And even fewer bodies could have predicted that, one day, I will make my living writing sales copy.

So can you make it as a non-native copywriter?

​​You certainly can. ​​I imagine you knew that already.

But will you make it?

​​Well, here’s something else you probably knew already. That’s a question that only you, and a bit of time, can really answer.

Last point:

If you want to know when my Copy Zone guide is out, or if you want occasional free advice on the business side of copywriting, then grab a spot on my daily email newsletter.

How not to get stupider and maybe even get smarter

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Last Thursday, I tried to access the RT website. As you might know, RT used to stand for Russia Today.

RT is the Kremlin’s answer to CNN — a source of generic news, more or less fact-based, which are nonetheless filtered and shaped to push a certain viewpoint and agenda.

I tried to access the RT website because I had gotten sucked into reading news about the Ukraine war. But all the news sources I was reading were American or European journalists and analysts, and their data sources were ultimately either the Pentagon or Ukrainian government announcements.

​​So I wanted to see what the Russians have to say.

It turned out I cannot.

​​The RT site is blocked throughout the EU. When I type in the URL, I get some kind of security exception which none of my browsers can get around without special evasive maneuvers.

I remembered hearing something about this early when the war started. And sure enough, I soon found a video of Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, saying that Russian media outlets RT and Sputnik are now banned across Europe because they spread lies and threaten to “sow division in our union.”

Like I said, there’s no doubt RT is manipulative, biased, and has its own agenda. But so are all of our other sources of news, including the ones that get state funding either in the EU or the US.

And when a politician like von der Leyen says she is restricting access to information because she doesn’t want division among the people she rules… well, this reminds me of something I truly believe:

A change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points. That’s a statement by Alan Kay, who is something of a genius inventor, technology prophet, and expert on learning and education.

The inverse also holds:

A consistent and uniform perspective, designed to minimize division, leads to a loss of IQ. Maybe not 80 points, but 15 or 20 for sure.

Perhaps you don’t agree with, not in the current situation, not when there’s a black-and-white crisis like the current war in Ukraine.

But perhaps you’re like me, and you intuitively believe in the value of broader viewpoints and longer-term thinking.

If you do, I’d like to suggest you take on other position even when it seems repulsive. Even when you firmly believe it to be propaganda, manipulation, or even straight-up lies.

At worst, it will turn out to be a topic for a new email to your list. At best, it might mean a transformative change in perspective, worth an extra 80 IQ points.

For more possibly perspective-shifting ideas:

You might like to know I write a daily email newsletter, mostly about persuasion, influence, and copywriting. You can try it out here, until the European Commission blocks me from spreading divisive ideas.

Outrage with stupidity to milk info out of cagey or indifferent adversaries

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Two years ago, just as the whole world was shutting down due to the first wave of corona, the president of the UFC, Dana White, got trolled into revealing a highly guarded secret.

A bit of background:

The UFC hosts mixed martial arts fights, and in April 2020 they were supposed to host the biggest and most anticipated fight in their history, between Khabib Nurmagomedov and Tony Ferguson.

These two fighters were both on 12-fight win streaks in the UFC, and they were scheduled to fight four times already. Each time, the fight was cancelled at the last minute for some reason.

This time around, as sports organizations around the world cancelled events because of corona, Dana White refused to give in. “We’re going ahead with the fight!”

The only problem was they couldn’t figure out where to host it. It was originally supposed to be in Brooklyn, but that was out. In fact, any other location in the US also became untenable.

“The fight is still on, guys!” White would repeat whenever asked, though he wouldn’t give any more details.

So as the fight date neared, speculation kept increasing. Fans were alternating between getting resigned to the inevitable fifth cancellation… and hyped when some new possible location for the fight surfaced.

Meanwhile, even Tony and Khabib, the fighters who were supposed to be fighting, didn’t know for sure if the fight was still on.

So that’s the background. Would the fight happen? Would it get cancelled a fifth time?

The answer finally came when somebody created a fake Twitter account, mimicking a well-known MMA journalist, and tweeted:

“#BREAKING: Dana White and Vladimir Putin have reached an agreement on travel arrangements for UFC Lightweight Champion Khabib Nurmagomedov to come to the United States. He will fight Tony Ferguson. It’s happening folks. #UFC249 will go on as scheduled April 18.”

To which Dana White, big goof that he is, immediately blasted out a Tweet saying that it ain’t so, that Khabib is not fighting, and then to prove it, he finally revealed the whole card that was scheduled for this corona-infested bout.

Which brings us to an eternal truth, something called Cunningham’s law:

“The best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question; it’s to post the wrong answer.”

The sad fact is that in business, in love, and on online forums, there are many times when people are unwilling to answer your questions. Maybe the person you’re talking to is indifferent, or cagey, or hurt, or they just don’t like the implied power dynamics that come with you asking and them answering.

So if you ever find yourself in this situation, swallow your pride, and publicly make a dumb, completely wrong assumption about the right answer. If Cunningham is right, and I suspect he’s at least a little bit right, then your outraged adversary will jump in and say, “No! You’re so wrong! Let me tell you how it really is…”

But I think this Cunningham and his law go even farther. If you just swap out “right answer” and you swap in “response,” you get a good recipe for how to get yourself publicity and an audience online.

Of course, unless you want to be just a troll, you’ll have to figure out a reasonable argument to justify a seemingly “wrong” opinion that you use to attract attention. But it can be done, and guys like Matt Stone (aka Buck Flogging) and Ben Settle prove it. Outrage and reason are a powerful combination. Aloe vera on its own is pretty bland and slimy, but it sure feels good once you burn your hand on the stove.

And if you want less outrage, not more:

You might like my daily email un-newsletter. I avoid outrage, even though I know it’s good for business. Instead, I try to make my ideas appealing in other ways. In case you’re curious, you can give it a try here.

Mood is a thing for cattle and loveplay, not selling

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Last night was the first time I’ve ever walked out of a movie theater.

I nervously edged forward in my seat… I clutched my jacket and my backpack… I waited for the end of the scene… and then I gritted my teeth and pushed through the long row of legs and their groaning owners and the boxes of popcorn these leg-owners were holding.

Once I had tripped and stumbled over all these people, I made my way through the darkened theater, out the emergency exit, and out into a world of light and air and freedom.

I asked myself later what had happened to me. After all, I’ve suffered through worse movies than this, the 2021 version of Dune. Why did I decide to bolt this time?

Maybe it was the fact it was my first time in a movie theater in over two years.

Maybe it was the movie itself. After all, compare the same line from the mysterious 1984 version, which I like a lot, to this present, lifeless version:

“Not in the mood? Mood’s a thing for cattle and loveplay, not fighting!”
— Dune (1984)

“Mood? What’s mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises, no matter the mood!”
— Dune (2021)

So yeah, there were those reasons. But I realized what the biggest reason was simply:

I had gone to see this movie by myself.

I’m in transit between two cities. I had some free time, and a few people had recommended this new Dune. So I decided to go to the movies, even though I had no one to go with.

It turned out to be a rare blessing.

I didn’t have to bribe, convince, or beg anyone to agree with me. I didn’t have to look over to my movie partner, look imploringly at the exit, and then look back, trying to see if the person next to me understood that now’s time to get up and get the hell out, and avoid wasting two more hours of perfectly good life.

In my experience, that’s often not the case. Not when it comes to movie going. And not when it comes to life in general.

I recently wrote about the many hooks that keep people stuck in the status quo. Even when the status quo is dull, sepia-toned, and threatens to drag on endlessly, like this new version of Dune.

Well, other people are the most powerful of these hooks, both directly and indirectly.

That’s an unavoidable fact of life. And it’s something you will have to deal with in your marketing.

So my point for you is this:

Many marketing gurus will try to sell you new tricks to help you agitate the spleen out of your prospect. The idea being, once you get somebody in the right mood, he will finally take action.

A dangerous mistake, I say.

In the words of Jonah Berger, instead of asking what would encourage change, ask why things haven’t changed already.

And if you are trying to get your prospect to take real-world action… or make a transformation in his life… or just make a really big purchase, which might end up helping him… then think about other people in his life. And somewhere in your marketing, equip your prospect to deal with these other people.

​​Give your prospect a buying system, not a mood. After all, there’s a world of light and air and freedom at stake.

Now, in a moment, I’ll give you a chance to transform your life, by signing up to my email newsletter and getting a steady stream of valuable persuasion and marketing ideas.

But you might think how your spouse, kids, or wife might react if they see you reading yet another newsletter on your phone, when you should be paying attention to them.

When they try to make you feel guilty about it, tell yourself, and them if you like, that it’s a temporary sacrifice, so you can build a better life for all of you.

But that’s all assuming you sign up to my newsletter. It’s not for everyone. But maybe it is for you. If you want to find out, here’s where to go.

Tell, don’t show

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Among copywriters, the most famous movie of all time is Lethal Weapon. That’s because Gene Schwartz, the author of Breakthrough Advertising, which is something like a bible in the field, once said that every copywriter should watch Lethal Weapon at least two or three times, preferably back to back.

Gene was recommending Lethal Weapon because of its BANG-talk-BOOM-talk-JOKE-BANG-BOOM-talk structure.

But Lethal Weapon is an influence gift that keeps on giving. For example:

In one early scene, we see Martin Riggs, a cop played by Mel Gibson, in the middle of a Christmas tree lot. Riggs is being used as a human shield by a cornered drug dealer, who is pointing a gun at Riggs’s head.

Riggs starts yelling to the gathering cops, who all have their guns out. “Shoot him! Shoot the bastard!”

The drug dealer is getting flustered. He begs Riggs to shut up.

​​Riggs keeps yelling. And in a flash, he turns around, grabs the gun from the drug dealer, headbutts him, and ends the standoff.

​​Next scene:

W​e see the same Martin Riggs, in his ramshackle trailer by the beach, late at night. He’s drinking and looking at a framed wedding photo of himself and his wife.

Riggs takes his gun and puts it inside his mouth. He tries to pull the trigger, but he can’t. He starts crying. “Oh, I miss you,” Riggs says to the picture.

Are you getting an idea of what kind of character Martin Riggs might be?

I hope so.

But in case not, there’s one more scene I want to tell you about. In fact, it’s the very next scene in the movie:

The police office psychologist is walking with the police captain through the police station. “May I remind you,” she says to the captain, “that his wife of 11 years was recently killed in a car accident? He’s on the edge, sir. I’m telling you he may be psychotic. You’re making a mistake by keeping him in the field. The man is suicidal.”

So now let me point out the obvious:

Probably the most famous bit of writing advice is to show and not tell.

And it’s good advice.

It’s almost as good as the advice to both show and tell, which is what’s happening in those Lethal Weapon scenes.

Because with buddy cop comedies, sales copy, and with influential writing as well, we are really not looking for people to draw their own conclusions.

Sure, it’s great if they conclude what we want them to, on their own. And that’s why we show them stuff.

But you don’t want to leave it there. You don’t want to give people any wiggle room. So that’s why you tell them your point as well as show it.

What? You say you knew that already? Or you say it’s so obvious that it doesn’t need to be pointed out?

Fine. So let me tell you something else, which might be genuinely new:

You can tell people stuff. Including stuff that’s not supported by the emotional visualization you just showed them.

Because an emotion is like syrup. It can be poured over anything… and once it’s poured onto the pancakes, it’s likely to spread all over the plate, to the sausages also.

That’s a super valuable idea, if you only grasp it.

​​In fact, all my emails are chock full of such super valuable ideas. If you want me to show you as well as tell you that, sign up for my newsletter here.

Niche secrets and side business reports

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A little-know fact about my online life:

​​Between 2016 and 2018, I became a low-level celebrity and semi-expert in the aromatherapy and essential oils niche.

I had connections with top experts in the aromatherapy field. I had an email list that’s about twice the size of my current copywriting list. I was regularly and successfully selling info products about aromatherapy — an ebook and occasional webinars.

I started this side career as a marketing experiment and learning opportunity.

In fact, the name of my aromatherapy website, Unusual Health, was a tell. The health part was obvious — I was writing about alternative health topics. The unusual part — well that was standard copywriting lingo, like one weird trick.

I bring this up because last week, I got an email from a reader named Nick.

Nick wrote in response to my “Back to the Boardroom era” email. That’s where I said there might once again be an opportunity to simply package up good, credible information and sell it. And Nick wanted to know:

“If you were going to offer a product of information that was of high quality on any given topic where would you gather your information? What would your research process look like? Where would you avoid looking for information?”

I won’t burden you with an exact recipe. But I will tell you the general idea:

Think “library” instead of “smartphone”.

I’ not saying you have to actually go down to your local library. I’m also not saying you have to become a PhD candidate in whatever niche topic you want to sell info products in.

But ​​I do believe that as soon as people come in contact with your product, they can smell immediately if there’s something new there. And the easiest way to give people something new… is to genuinely do what nobody else is doing or willing to do.

In the case of my aromatherapy website and info products, that meant digging into sources of data that were a layer or two deeper than what everybody else in the space was doing.

I’m talking books, textbooks, science papers beyond the abstract. Much of this stuff was publicly available online. But it wasn’t anywhere to be found on essential oils blogs or Facebook groups or YouTube channels.

Of course, you still have to package the earnest but dry info you dig up in a sexy way, using your copywriting and marketing skills.

For example, the lead magnet on my site was The Little Black Book of Essential Oil Scams. I got that straight from Boardroom, and their Big Black Book of Secrets.

Anyways, by the end of 2018, I decided to shutter my essential oil influencer career. I had too much copywriting work and other projects that were more lucrative.

But one day, I might get back to selling aromatherapy, because I found the topic interesting.

And that’s the final thing I want to share with you:

You might be stressing about which niche to pick for a side project, business, or even as a copywriter who wants to specialize.

And no doubt, it’s hard to succeed long-term writing and researching and promoting a topic that you absolutely hate.

But in my experience, the more you know about any topic, the more interesting it becomes. A bit of interest is enough to start.

So if you have a bit of interest in dog training or black-and-white photography, now might be time to start writing the “5-Minute Bad Dog Cures!” or “Black & White Power: Secrets and Strategies for Better B&W Photography.”

Or, if your interest is marketing or copywriting, well, you can write your own stuff. Or for inspiration, you can read what I write in my daily email newsletter. You can sign up for it here.

The mystery deepens: Scientists shocked, Robert Collier not so much

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Somewhere outside of time, in an alternate dimension made up purely of destiny, growth, and power, the eternal essence of Robert Collier is shrugging its shoulders and saying, “Didn’t I tell you so?”

A few days ago, I read a fascinating article on the pop science site Quanta Magazine.

It was a summary of recent physics research that’s threatening to break down how we’ve thought about science for, oh, the past 500 years or so.

The situation in a nut is that particle physicists are find value in a radical idea, anti-reductionism.

The standard view of science, the one we’ve had for those 500 years, is reductionist. The trees explain the forest. If you want to know more about the forest, learn more about each tree. And if you want to learn more about each tree, learn about its cells. And so on, down and down.

Well, once you get all the way down, where these physicists are looking… it turns out influence might go the other way too.

In other words, you can’t tell the whole story by looking at the trees. The forest as a whole contributes some fundamental part of the picture, and explains the trees also. At least that’s the latest theory.

So what does this mean?

Does it mean that mystery merchant, Robert Collier, was right when he wrote the Secret of the Ages? Will anything your mind imagines trickle down to the subatomic level? Will your intent change the very fabric of the universe?

I have no idea. I imagine the physicists would say absolutely no, and that it’s a huge and unwarranted leap.

It’s all a deep mystery, if you ask me.

But you didn’t ask me. In fact, you might be reminding me impatiently that this is a newsletter about marketing.

So let me map this to the matter of influence in writing.

I have long tried to look at successful copy — and influential writing more generally — and break down why it works. After all, it’s got to be all there on the page.

By looking closer and closer, at each sentence and even each word, I’ve found out the answers to many influence and persuasion mysteries, some of which I’ve shared with you in this newsletter.

And yet, it’s never the whole story. Like Dan Kennedy once said about Gary Halbert’s copy, there is some magic in there. Even somebody as deliberate and trained as Dan himself can’t see where the magic lies… but it’s there, because of how customers responded.

“You’re really killing me here, John,” I hear you say. “What exactly is your point? Can you just tell me what to do and let me be on my way?”

Well, I’m telling you to spend time looking at the small scale of copy. The arguments, words, and structure.

But there’s something else that makes up the total effect of what you write. Something on a much bigger scale. The overall feel, intent, or — shudder — even vibration of what you are writing.

You might be looking for practical advice. The best I can do is leave you with these words of another mystery merchant, Matt Furey:

Truth is, everything you write – whether a simple note to a friend or an advertisement for your business or a chapter going into a book – carries a vibration of some sort, and the stronger your personal vibration while writing the greater the likelihood that those who are somewhat sensitive will feel it.

If you’re in a bad mood when you write, don’t be surprised if the reader doesn’t like what you wrote. Conversely, if you’re in an incredibly positive and vibrant state, the reader may feel such a strong current coming from your words that you lift him from the doldrums of depression into an exalted state of mind.

Then again, if you’re somewhere near neutral when you write, don’t be alarmed if no one bothers to read anything you put out. Make no mistake about it, if you want your writing to get read, it better have some ZAP.”

Last point:

For more anti-reductionist writing and influence advice, you might like to join the destiny and power movement, also known as my email newsletter. You can sign up for it here.

How to effectively divide and rule

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Legend says that in the early days of Rome, the city was made up of two races — the Romans and the Sabines.

The Sabines felt like second-class citizens, and hated the Romans.

The Romans didn’t trust the Sabines and worked hard to keep the Sabines down.

Tension threatened to tear the young city apart.

So the leading men of Rome — Romans and Sabines both — elected a new king in the hope of getting out of this crisis.

The new king’s name was Numa. He was a Sabine by birth. And he fixed the problem.

Numa eliminated Roman-Sabine strife. He united the two races into manageable citizens of Rome. He set the ground for what was the become the great Roman empire.

The question is how?

How do you take two groups that hate each other, and unite them into a cohesive, ruleable whole?

Well, here’s one thing Numa did:

He created new guilds based on occupation.

There was a guild for the musicians, one for goldsmiths, another for shoemakers. Each guild had special privileges, rituals, even their own unique patron god. And crucially, each guild cut across racial lines – each included both Romans and Sabines.

It worked.

This illustrates an idea from Eric Hoffer’s book True Believer. Writing about the idea of “divide to rule,” Hoffer had this to say:

“An effective division is one that fosters a multiplicity of compact bodies — racial, religious, or economic — vying with and suspicious of each other.”

Maybe you’re not sure exactly what this means. So let me give you another, more modern example.

Have you heard of Josh Wardle, the guy who made the viral game Wordle? Which, by the way, was so much fun to play until the failing New York Times ruined it?

Well, before making Wordle, Wardle worked at Reddit. And one project he had there was called Orangered vs Periwinkle.

As you might know, Reddit is a bunch of separate and sometimes antagonistic communities.

But on April Fool’s in 2013, every Reddit user was automatically assigned to one of two made-up teams. Team Orangered or team Periwinkle.

The outcome was a ton of engagement and activity on the site. New bonds being formed across subreddits. In Wardle’s words:

“Uniting people through difference is easy. Essentially what we did is we just put people on separate teams. And it turns out people are really really good at creating stuff when they say, ‘I’m part of this group, I’m not part of that group.'”

Wardle has a vision of using this “divide to unite” trick to stir creativity and create greater unity on a big scale.

But I’m not recommending anything like that to you. This email is not my call for the greater brotherhood of man, or for an ever-expanding union through the clever use of new divisions.

That’s because I believe that size is evil, or at least inhuman. After all, the Roman empire, like all other empires that came after it, crushed and destroyed to serve its own ends of growth. And Reddit is kind of a sewer on most days.

So I have no clear takeaway for you today. I just wanted to point out this curious technique of dividing to unite.

You will have to decide how you want to use it. Whether to unite people, hopefully in a good cause… or to be aware of it, so you can resit being co-opted into a new divisive group, because you don’t want to contribute to anybody else’s inhuman ends.

Not convinced?
​​
Well, maybe you want to read more about my idea that size is evil. If so, take a look here:

https://bejakovic.com/the-most-dangerous-idea-in-america/

7 minutes to productivity

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Let me tell you how I prepared to write this email:

I set a timer on my phone for seven minutes.

Then I sat down at the kitchen table, put my head in my hands, and started to press my thumb against my teeth. ​​I stared out the window… I stared at the sad house plant across from me… I tapped my fingers on the chair. I played the Bee Gees “You Win Again” in my head, and I realized I don’t remember the lyrics. I gradually got more and more antsy, tapping my foot on the floor, looking out the window and trying to peek into the neighbor’s house.

Finally, just as I was ready to jump out of my skin, the timer rang, and my seven minutes were up. ​​I got to work right away.

And that’s the idea I want to share with you.

I once read an article by marketer Sean D’Souza. Sean was talking about how he organizes his work day. He separates his tasks in different blocks. And in between each block, he takes a special kind of break:

He gets down on the floor, puts two books under his head, and just lies there.

I tried Sean’s system exactly, including the two books. But each time, within a minute, the same thoughts raced through my head:

​​​”What the hell am I doing? Why am I lying here? I’m not tired. If I want a break from work, fine. But let me go read a magazine for a minute or check my email or at least wash the dishes.”

That was a mistake. Because whenever I did go do something, well, that would often stretch out into 10, 15, 30 minutes. And at the end of my “productive” break, I’d have to force myself back into work.

I realized only later the essence of Sean’s system.

It’s to do nothing.

​​Even seven minutes of doing nothing drives me slightly insane. I find I’m eager and thrilled to get to work.

​​Plus the fact that I haven’t done anything — well, except playing the Bee Gees in my head — this usually allows all kinds of surprising ideas to bubble up. Ideas which would have been suppressed had I gotten external stimulation, even if that meant washing the dishes.

Perhaps this won’t be useful to you.

After all, perhaps you’re not like me. Perhaps you have a deep and broad capacity for work because of ingrained self-discipline. Or perhaps you genuinely look forward to the work you do.

I find I actually enjoy the work I do. Even so, I always feel resistance to getting started, and getting re-started after a break. In my experience, expectation is nothing like experience.

That’s why taking short do-nothing breaks has worked great for me. I get my work done sooner. I do better work, because I get more use of that time of day where I’m good for anything. Plus I find it very easy to convince myself to start doing nothing, and I find it even easier to stop.

So that’s my productivity idea for you. Try out my do-nothing breaks. Or think up your own tricks to work harder, with more focus and intensity.

Because working harder is the difference between huge success and failure.

​​If you have nothing else going for you, can go far simply by working harder. The good news is, like Gene Schwartz said once, working harder doesn’t mean working longer. In fact, it can even mean working shorter. Or doing nothing at all.

Are you still here?

This email is done. In record time. But if you’d like to read more essays I write about marketing, copywriting, and personal change, sign up here for my newsletter.

Should getting more client work really be this easy?

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The first advertorial I ever wrote, back in 2016, started off by telling the story of Arcan Cetin, a man who walked into a department store in Washington state, took out a shotgun, and shot four people, killing three of them. ​​

​​When Cetin finished his killing spree, he put the shotgun on the cosmetics counter and walked out of the store.

This advertorial promoted some kind of service to help people get a concealed weapon license. (In my research, I found out that the no. 1 reason people wanted a concealed weapon license was the fear of mass shootings.) The headline I used, a swipe of a classic Gene Schwartz headline, read:

“Should obtaining a concealed carry permit really be this easy?”

This advertorial must have done ok because the client hired me to write some more copy for him after that.

​​From what I could understand, he had a bunch of offers in the gun and gun training space, and he was running a ton of traffic to them.

I think I did a good job with those followup projects too, but really I never found out. ​​After I delivered those projects, the client didn’t ask me to write any more stuff. ​​When I tried following up with him a few months later — “Hey how’s it going? Do you need any more help with copy?” — I never heard back.

So here’s my tip for you today, in case you’re a copywriter who works with clients:

The early time in a client relationship is often the best time to really find out what a business does, to ask lots of questions, and to set yourself up so you maximize the LTV you can get with this client.

After all, when I first got hired by this guns-and-ammo guy, I got on a call with him, like I do with every other client. He was accommodating and open, and answered any questions I asked.

But here’s the thing. I only asked questions that were relevant to this one project.

Had I thought to find out a lot more about his business or businesses, beyond just the project I was hired for, I would have been in a much better place later, when I wanted him to hire me for more stuff.

The bigger point is this:

In my experience, many business owners think of hiring a copywriter as a one-time, unavoidable expense. Not in terms of money. But in terms of their attention and time.

Once that one time is over, business owners often want to put you out of mind, and get on to next things. You can slip off their radar easily. And if you follow up later by naively saying, “Hey, how’s it going, do you need help with anything?” — well, that just creates more work for them, not less.

So the next time you start work with a new client, become genuinely interested in their business, way beyond what is relevant to your own project.

Then squirrel away that knowledge, and use it later.

​​It might be the most unfairly easy way to get more client work down the line — without ever having to hunt for new clients.

And now, you might like to know I am preparing a guide all about the business side of succeeding as a copywriter. It’s called Copy Zone. If you’d like to find out more about it when it comes out, sign up for my email newsletter.