Reddit vs. Hacker News: How to get better customers, clients, readers, and business partners

by

Paul Graham is a computer programmer, writer, and early-stage tech investor.

His startup fund, Y Combinator, helped start a bunch of famous companies, like Airbnb, Dropbox, DoorDash, Instacart, Zapier, and Reddit.

The total valuation of all Y Combinator companies is now over $400 billion. Y Combinator owns 7% of that, or roughly $30 billion.

Really, the only reason I know this is because I’ve been a regular reader of Hacker News for the past 14+ years.

Hacker News is a news board. Graham started it in 2006 as a way of sharing interesting ideas and getting connected to tech talent. Today, Hacker News gets over five million readers each month.

I’ve been thinking about creating something similar, just with a different focus. So I was curious to read Graham’s 2009 article, What I Learned From Hacker News, about the early experience of creating and running HN.

This bit stood out to me:

But what happened to Reddit won’t inevitably happen to HN. There are several local maxima. There can be places that are free for alls and places that are more thoughtful, just as there are in the real world; and people will behave differently depending on which they’re in, just as they do in the real world.

I’ve observed this in the wild. I’ve seen people cross-posting on Reddit and Hacker News who actually took the trouble to write two versions, a flame for Reddit and a more subdued version for HN.

Maybe this only stood out to me because something I’ve thought and written about before.

Your content, marketing, and offers select a certain type of audience. That much is obvious.

What is less obvious is that your content and marketing and offers also change people. Because none of us is only one type of person all the time.

So if you want an audience that’s smarter, that’s more respectful, that’s more thoughtful and less scatterbrained, then make it clear that’s what you expect. And lead by example.

This can be transformative in your everyday dealings with clients, customers, readers, and prospects. And who knows. It might even become the foundation on which you build a future online community.

If you found this interesting, you might like my email newsletter. You can sign up for it here.

The limits of persuasion and propaganda

by

“We tend today to exaggerate the effectiveness of persuasion as a means of inculcating opinion and shaping behavior.”

Today I was planning to write a standard email about marketing and persuasion. But I checked the news this morning, and I saw that Russia invaded Ukraine by land, air, and sea.

It’s the biggest attack in Europe by one state against another since World War II.

I’m close to people who have families living in Ukraine, and for them this has real consequences.

So a warning: Today’s email is a persuasion downer.

Because I mostly write about persuasion tricks and manipulation strategies.

There have been plenty of those in the past few weeks from the EU and US both, in anticipation of the Russian invasion. But as a US diplomat put it:

“One of the shortcomings is the deterrence package that we’ve developed is kind of asymmetrical in that it’s mostly economic and we’re facing a military threat.”

Another way to put it is the quote I have up top, which is from Eric Hoffer’s True Believer.

​​Hoffer thinks that the fabulous power often ascribed to words has “no greater foundation in fact than the falls of Jericho ascribed to the blast of Joshua’s trumpets.”

So if not words, then what?
​​
Well, here’s a last Hoffer quote to wrap this emergency email up. It might be worth keeping in mind as we enter a new age of political black swans:

“The truth seems to be that propaganda on its own cannot force its way into unwilling minds; neither can it inculcate something wholly new; nor can it keep people persuaded once they have ceased to believe. So acknowledged a master of propaganda as Dr. Goebbels admits in an unguarded moment that ‘A sharp sword must always stand behind propaganda if it is to be really effective.'”

A watermelon-headed politician walks into a flat-earther’s house…

by

I’d like to tell you a story but first I have to give you a bit of background. Our story has two characters:

First, there’s Pericles, a famous statesman in ancient Athens.

Pericles led the Athenians at the start of their war against the Spartans. He was also well-known for having a watermelon-sized head. That’s why statues most often show him wearing a helmet.

Second, we have Anaxagoras, a philosopher who came from Asia and settled in Athens.

Anaxagoras brought with him the spirit of scientific inquiry, which wasn’t common in Athens before. He also happened to be a flat-earther.

Now, on to the story:

When Pericles the Athenian was a young man, he studied philosophy with Anaxagoras.

Later, Pericles became a powerful man. When he needed to make important political decisions, he still consulted his wise old teacher.

But as Pericles sailed the seas, leading the Greeks in battle, Anaxagoras grew older and poorer. There aren’t many drachmas to be made in explaining rainbows or what the moon is made of.

In time, Anaxagoras became so poor he could no longer afford even a bit of cheese and wine. So one day, he did the only philosophical thing:

He covered his head with a robe, and determined to starve himself to death.

When Pericles heard about this, he rushed to Anaxagoras’s house.

He started begging his old teacher to live. He lamented his own hopeless future if he should lose so valuable an advisor.

There was a moment of awkward silence.

Then Anaxagoras yanked the robe off his head, looked at Pericles, and said, “Pericles, those who want to use a lamp supply it with oil.”

So that’s the story.

I don’t know about you, but when I first read it, it made me laugh.

And because I like to kill a good joke, I asked myself why I found this story funny.

Was it the idea of an old man starving himself to death?

Not really funny.

Was it the lamp analogy at the end?

Not so funny either.

I realized it was the robe.

​​Anaxagoras put it on his head and then pulled it off. It made him seem like a petulant child. It was such a contrast to the image of a sage and self-possessed philosopher.

So there you go:

Seemingly irrelevant details give all the color to a story. They can create suspense. Enjoyment. Or, of course, humor.

But perhaps I didn’t kill enough jokes for you today.

If so, then subscribe to my email newsletter, so I can kill another joke for you tomorrow.

And then, then take a listen to the 2 minute and 45 second clip below. It’s a recording of a young Woody Allen, delivering a standup routine in the 1960s.

Then listen to it again. And notice all the detail — seemingly irrelevant, but really, just what makes the skit funny. it might be something you can use in your own writing.

​​Here’s the video:

Skunk email with a great and valuable reward

by

This email won’t be easy or pleasant to get through.

​​In fact it will take work and it might make you feel queasy along the way. But if you can manage it to the end, the rewards will be great.

Let me start by telling you I’m re-reading Claude Hopkins’s My Life in Advertising. And one story I missed before is this bit from Hopkins’s childhood:

One of the products which father advertised was Vinegar Bitters. I afterward learned its history.

A vinegar-maker spoiled a batch through some queer fermentation. Thus he produced a product weird in its offensiveness.

The people of those days believed that medicine must be horrible to be effective.

We had oils and ointments “for man or beast” which would make either wild. We used “snake oil” and “skunk oil,” presumably because of their names.

Unless the cure was worse than the disease, no one would respect it.

Today we assume that every offer must be fast, easy, and cheap.

But human nature changes like glass flows — so slowly that we will never see it happen.

And a part of the human brain still believes, like it did in Hopkins’s day, that the cure must be worse than the disease. At least along some dimension.

So if your offer is fast and easy, make sure it’s not cheap.

Or if your offer really is all of fast, easy, and cheap… then at least throw a skunk or a snake into it somewhere.

In other words, turn your prospect into a hero. Tell him a story:

He’s somebody who’s willing to do what’s offensive to others… somebody who can swallow what would turn most men or beasts wild. ​​No, it won’t be easy or pleasant. But if he can manage it to the end, the rewards will be great.

Last thing:

Maybe you’d like to know I have an email newsletter. It’s cheap and easy, but it’s very slow. You can sign up for it here.

The blood-drive bobblehead bonus

by

A friend of mine once gave blood because the Red Cross was giving away bobbleheads.

If you’re not American, you might not know what a bobblehead is—

A little figurine, plastic or ceramic, with an oversized head on a spring. Tap the head and it starts bobbling around, hence — bobblehead.

My friend normally never gives blood. And his experience giving blood this time was particularly slow, painful, and scary.

In the rush and push of the big blood drive, the nurses forgot about him. He looked on in panic for what seemed like a long winter, convinced that air bubbles were coming up into his veins.

And yet, he did it, for the bobblehead, because he’s a big baseball fan.

My friend staggered out afterwards, clutching his bobblehead of Brooks Robinson, the legendary third baseman for the Baltimore Orioles.

“Please take me home,” he said weakly.

So I gave him a ride back to his place, where he spent the next three days sleeping and recovering, with the Brooks Robinson bobblehead next to his pillow.

My point being, you can sell a lot of unsellable stuff by giving away a free gift.

​​But you probably knew that already.

So let me zoom in a little and point out that you can sell a lot of unsellable stuff by giving away a completely unrelated free gift.

Most bonuses in the DM world tend to be relevant to the main offer:

“Order a ThighMaster NOW and get FREE a ButtMaster plus a copy of Suzanne Somers Toning System™ workout video!”

But a free bonus doesn’t have to be related to your core offer. And in fact, it might work better if it isn’t.

The blood-drive bobblehead is just one example.

I also remember hearing Dan Kennedy give a couple of other examples.

The magazine Advertising Age, which sold subscriptions with a bonus mug. No relevant bonus could outpull the mug.

And Omaha Steaks, which sold steaks, from Omaha. Their best-performing free bonus was a calculator.

Why?

​​Who knows. Just know this:

If your current offer is as much fun as giving blood… then your free bonus doesn’t have to be a kidney removal.

And now, please sign up for my email newsletter. If you do, I’ll send you a free bonus, a picture of the cover of Breakthrough Advertising, with Gene Schwartz’s name blocked out and your name pasted in.

“If you got an area of excellence… then rich can be arranged”

by

The Color of Money is green and it’s also the title of an 1986 Martin Scorsese film about pool hustlers. The movie contains a valuable truth about business, so let me quickly spell it out.

The Color of Money has two main characters:

An old pool shark, named Fast Eddie Felson, played by Paul Newman, and…

A young pool shark, named Vincent Lauria, played by a 24-year-old Tom Cruise.

In the beginning of the movie, Fast Eddie tries to recruit Vincent and so he says:

“If you got an area of excellence… if you’re the best at something, anything… then rich can be arranged.”

Vincent knows he’s the best at pool. He likes the idea of being rich. So he agrees to team up with Eddie.

It’s only later, once the two are already on the road, driving around in Eddie’s big white Cadillac and cleaning out dirty poolhalls around the Midwest, that Eddie tells Vincent the whole truth and nothing but the truth:

“Pool excellence is not about excellent pool. It’s about becoming something.”

Becoming what exactly?

Well, a businessman. In pool, it means being a flake… tanking on occasion… hustling the other guy and sometimes even the audience.

Maybe your business is not pool. And maybe you really dislike the idea of tanking on purpose or hustling anybody.

Fine.

So just take this as a reminder that excellence in whatever you do is about working on your business as well as in it.

And also:

If your business happens to be freelance copywriting, then take this as a reminder that my copy Zone Offer is now in the oven and is baking at 475°F.

I want to make sure the final result — all about the business of copywriting, as opposed to the craft — is fully baked before I put it on the table. More info on that soon — sign up here if you want to get notified.

Marketers are from Mars, prospects are from—?

by

John Gray catches a lot of flak for his 1992 best-seller, Men are from Mars, Women are from Wenus.

But I’ve personally gotten a lot of use out of this short idea from Gray’s book:

“The most frequently expressed complaint women have about men is that men don’t listen. Either a man completely ignores her when she speaks to him, or he listens for a few beats, assesses what is bothering her, and then proudly puts on his Mr. Fix-It cap and offers her a solution to make her feel better. He is confused when she doesn’t appreciate this gesture of love. No matter how many times she tells him that he’s not listening, he doesn’t get it and keeps doing the same thing. She wants empathy, but he thinks she wants solutions.”

The thing is, it’s not just men who prematurely jump to solutions. And it’s not just women who will ignore offered solutions, even when they are perfectly good.

We are all like this, much of the time.

When we are frustrated, most of us hate having suggestions tossed at us. “Don’t you think I’ve thought of that? It would never work in my case! Why don’t you just listen for a second?”

I know I’ve reacted like this, at least internally, while keeping up a stoic front. And I’ve seen plenty of other guys — some of them manly, practical-minded men – nervously shrugging off good solutions to their ongoing problems.

The question to me is why? Why do women and men both choose not solve problems for which there are good solutions?

I’ve spent a bit of time thinking about this.

My conclusion is this isn’t a trivial human quirk, or like Gray says, just a hysterical cry for a bit of empathy.

Instead, my feeling is it goes back to fundamental human needs, like those I talked about yesterday.

Specifically, the need for uniqueness… and the need for meaning.

​​It might not seem very rational from the outside, but it makes perfect sense from the inside:

People will hold on to their problems just so they can keep feeling unique. “I might not have much… but I’ve got trouble like nobody’s ever seen.”

Or they will cling to pain and failure, even when there’s an easy way out. Because if there really is an easy way out, then what was the purpose of all that suffering they’ve experienced in the past?

In other words:

You might be selling your prospect a shiny new chrome pipe. And your prospect might desperately need it — the old pipe is rusted out and the basement is filling up with water. But what you don’t realize is that installing that new pipe might undermine the very foundations of your prospect’s house.

So that’s the problem that you face.

It’s tricky.

And it’s definitely unique.

But don’t worry. I won’t irritate you with any pigheaded suggestions for how you can solve this problem. At least I won’t do it here.

I’ll save that for an upcoming paid product. Maybe I will call it Marketers Are From Mars, Prospects Are From— but where exactly? I still have to work that part out. In case you want to get notified when this mansplaining guide comes out, sign up for my email newsletter.

Hating and loving in love and copy

by

A few years ago, I was walking along the street when I saw a queer sight:

An elderly couple was walking towards me, together but not together.

The woman was walking on the sidewalk.

​​Walking parallel to her, but about 10 feet away and in the actual road where the cars go, was her husband.

“That’s a strange way to walk with somebody,” I thought.

As they passed, I heard the woman speaking to the man, without facing him:

“That’s good. The further you are, the better. I don’t want to see you or hear you.”

Like I said, these people were elderly. I guess in their 60s or 70s. They’ve probably been married for a few decades, or maybe a half century.

How fitting, I thought. It really sums up the human condition.

The woman can’t stand her stupid husband. And yet they are together. If anything happened to him, she would probably be lost.

I had a suspicion about this kind of thing for a while.

It didn’t become clear in my head until I heard a Tony Robbins talk on the matter.

All human beings have a few fundamental needs, says Tony. And all our problems surface because half of our needs directly contradict the other half.

Turns out we are all rather complex bundles of different desires.

And though we say we want one thing, the exact opposite urge is also lurking somewhere, not far below the surface.

So when you write your copy, keep this in mind.

Promise people excitement and novelty… as well as certainty and control.

Offer to make them unique and outstanding… as well as beloved and part of a community.

People want magic. They will go through their whole lives wanting to believe it’s true. All you have to do is to tell them it is in fact so.

The BYAF compliance method

by

“Can I move? I’m better when I move.”

There’s a sexy scene in the 1969 classic Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid:

Butch and Sundance are American outlaws who have run away to Bolivia. They’re trying to get work at a Bolivian silver mine.

The boss at the mine wants to see if either Butch or Sundance can shoot a gun. What a joke. Sundance is the fastest and deadliest gun in the West.

So the boss throws a rock 30 feet away. “Hit that,” he says.

Sundance straightens his arm… takes aim… fires and misses.
​
The boss spits on the ground. He turns around and starts to walk away.

“Can I move?” Sundance asks.

“Move?” the boss says. “What the hell you mean move?”

In a split second, Sundance squats down, pulls out his gun, shoots the rock and then shoots it again while it’s midair, splitting it in two.

In other words:​​

It’s not common sense… but sometimes you get better results if you give people some space to move.

A while back, I read an academic paper about something called the BYAF compliance method.

​​BYAF = but you are free.

​​You make a request, and you tell people they are free to say no. It’s supposed to double the number of yeses you get.

It also goes against all copywriting dogma.

​​Copywriters will tell you that you should close off all doors… conclusively answer all objections… and PUSH PUSH PUSH for the sale.

So who’s right?

The BYAF crowd has 42 scientific studies on its side.

​​The “slam all the doors shut” copywriters have hundreds of millions or billions of dollars worth of sales behind them.

You might think the conclusion is clear. But I think it really depends on who you’re dealing with.

For example, Jim Camp was a negotiation expert who worked with Fortune 500 execs while they negotiated multi-billion-dollar deals.

One of the big tenets of his negotiation system was allowing people to say no.

​​It didn’t mean ending the negotiation… in fact, no was just the beginning.

Because Camp said that in the kinds of negotiations he was involved in, “slamming all the doors shut” so your prospect feels caged in and only has the option you want him to take… well, that was a recipe for an abrupt end to the negotiation, without ever being welcome back for round two.

Does this apply in copywriting?

I definitely think so.

Sure, there are markets where people need you to be a German Shepherd, barking at them so they make their way into the fold in an orderly fashion.

​​But there are other markets, equally as profitable or more so, where it’s better to allow people to move before you ask them to shoot.

And now, if you’d like to sign up for my newsletter:

Click here and fill out the form that appears. But of course, you’re are free to do whatever you choose.

Copy Stalker guidance to the A-list Room

by

The camera starts at the face of a sleeping man. It then pans over his forehead, across his bald head, to the stream next to which the man is lying.

The camera keeps panning over the water. It pauses for a second on a clod of dirt that sticks out of the stream.

The camera moves on to more flowing water and in the water, it focuses on some trash:

A large metal syringe… a box with coins in it… a Russian Orthodox icon… gears from a clock, covered with moss… a long black spring… a page of a calendar… a gun… ceramic tiles, covered with floating layers of dirt and algae.

The camera completes its trip and ends up where it started, on the sleeping man’s hand, halfway in the flowing water. A black dog, which has been sitting and guarding the man, stands up. The man opens his eyes.

That’s part of a long, dialogue-free scene from the movie Stalker.

The stalker in the title of the movie is a guide.

For a bit of money, he will take you inside the Zone — a mysterious and magical place, with its own strange and even deadly rules.

But why go inside the Zone?

Well, somewhere inside the Zone there is The Room. And if you can survive the Zone and make it inside the Room, it is said you will be granted your innermost wish.

Stalker is one of my favorite movies. I’ve seen it a grand total of two times. But I’m not here to recommend you see it even once.

Statistically speaking, odds are great you would hate it.

Stalker is dark, depressing, and slow. It’s a scifi movie without costumes, without cool sets, without special effects — unless you count the black dog. There’s no action and little dialogue, and what dialogue there is is philosophical rather than sexy.

So what’s up? If I’m not recommending Stalker to you, then why talk about it? For two reasons:

Reason one is that the Zone in Stalker is why I’m calling my new offer Copy Zone.

Copy Zone will be my travel guide to the magical, mysterious, and sometimes dangerous world of freelance copywritering.

I’ve been walking in and out of the Copy Zone for a few years. I know it well and I’ve already led a few people inside.

​​If you like, then my guide will show you the rules and signposts to go inside Copy Zone safely — and even to reach the fabled A-List Room, if that’s really what your innermost heart desires.

The other reason I’m telling you about Stalker is that yesterday, I promised to talk about pop culture that your audience isn’t familiar with.

And if you’re still reading, you can take a look at what I did in this email, and how I turned a 1979 Soviet sci-fi film into marketing.

I’ll leave you with two quotes. One is from Andrei Tarkovsky, the director of Stalker. When he was told that Stalker is too slow for human consumption, Tarkovsky replied:

“The film needs to be slower and duller at the start so that the viewers who walked into the wrong theatre have time to leave before the main action starts.”

The other quote is maybe more practical. It comes from comedian Andrew Schulz. Schulz has this simple rule about talking about topics that his audience can’t relate to:

“Who cares if they relate to it? Make them relate to it.”

Last thing:

If you’d like to be notified when my Copy Zone guide becomes available, sign up here for my email newsletter.