What gung-ho action takers don’t tell you

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This past weekend, a pro MMA fighter named Jeremy Stephens did something dumb.

During the ceremonial pre-fight staredown, Stephens pushed the other fighter, Drakkar Klose, hard. In fact, Stephens pushed Klose so hard that Klose got whiplash. So the fight was canceled, Klose got the win by default, and Stephens lost a paycheck.

It’s not the first time Stephens did something dumb for publicity.

A few years ago, during a big press conference that featured a bunch of MMA fighters and starred Conor McGregor, Stephens was seated all the way in the back.

At one point, a journalist asked Conor, who was sitting front and center, “Who do you think would give you the toughest fight from everybody here on stage?”

Conor paused for a second to think of an appropriately cocky answer. And in that moment, Stephens saw his opportunity — and he seized it.

“Right here,” Stephens said, pointing to himself and speaking in the third person. “The hardest hitting 145-pounder in the world. This guy knocks people out.”

The whole room went silent for a second.

And then Conor looked over both of his shoulders. And he chuckled. “Who the fuck is that guy?”

My point is this:

A lot of people say you’ve got to take your shot.

They tell you stories of how they saw their opening… went for it… and how it worked out brilliantly.

Well, it didn’t work out for Jeremy Stephens. He will always be best-known as the guy who got pwned by Conor at a press conference.

So my point is that, rather than jumping at your opportunity, make sure you’re ready. Because you only get one chance at a first impression.

And if you’re clenching your fists right now because you think I’m such a downer:

I’m not saying you should be super cautious, inert, or frightened of ever making a mistake.

But as for the question whether success comes down to careful preparation… or to bold action… the answer is always yes.

As for me:

I’ve been preparing for this moment for a long time. I think I’m ready.

So I’d like to invite you to join my email newsletter. It’s mostly about marketing and copywriting. Sometimes about MMA fighters, and what we can learn from them about life. If you’re curious and you want to give my newsletter a try, you can sign up here.

How to get your worst customers or clients foaming with rage at you and impotent to do anything about it

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I was walking home down a dark street just now. It was empty and quiet and I was lost in thought when — screaming and scratching — a cat scrambled out of a dumpster right next to me and bolted away.

I won’t lie. The bitch startled me. I might have missed a step and my heart definitely missed two beats.

I cursed out the cat and collected myself. I turned around to make sure nobody saw me in my unmanly state. And I picked up my path home, still a little alarmed.

“But what about the cat?” I thought. “I bet I gave her a good scare, too. Must be why she bolted like that! But she deserved it.” And a sly smile spread across my face.

You might think I’m a miserable person to gloat over possibly scaring a cat. Perhaps you’re right. But I’m reporting the more shameful parts of my life to bring you an idea. A copywriting idea. A copywriting idea which I think might be powerful.

It goes like this:

1. Think of your prospect

2. Think of other people who are around your prospect, and who are causing your prospect fear, harm, humiliation, despair, etc.

3. Write your headline: Here’s how to cause fear, harm, humiliation, despair, etc. to those other people

You may this is deranged. Again, perhaps you’re right. But aren’t you at least curious to see this idea in action? If so, here are three successful examples:

1. Gary Halbert. Selling his own newsletter. His prospect? Anybody who’s trying to sell something… and is finding it frustrating or even humiliating. Gary’s headline:

How to make people line up and beg you to take their money!

2. A top Clickbank offer right now, called His Secret Obsession. It’s targeted at women. Who want to win a man’s “love, attention, and total devotion for LIFE.” But not just any man! There’s a very specific guy these women have in mind, because (my guess)… they are OBSESSED.

3. John Carlton. Like Gary, John also poked into dark places of the soul. It might be horrible… but it works. Even to sell golf instructional videos:

How Does An Out-Of-Shape 55-Year-Old Golfer, Crippled By Arthritis And 71 Lbs. Overweight, Still Consistently Humiliate PGA Pros In Head-To-Head Matches By Hitting Every Tee Shot Further And Straighter Down The Fairway?

“The answer will shock and delight you!” writes John.

​​I bet. After all, just imagine. You’re not as disadvantaged as this overweight, crippled golfer… and Tom, Dick, and Horace down at the country club definitely aren’t PGA pros… so the humiliation will be immense! But they deserve it.

By the way, if you’re curious about the “How to” promise in my headline today… you can find these special client management strategies inside my daily email newsletter. Here’s where to sign up.

The “2-sentence persuasion secret” that A-list copywriters know and you don’t

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I’ve got a “2-sentence persuasion” secret I’d like to tell you, which I extracted straight from the head of John Carlton, and which will help you write killer sales copy, for more sales in less time.

Interested?

If you say yes, then I say… I’m not surprised. Hear me out.

I took my own advice from a few days ago. And I looked at the top three guys in the “copywriting course” space. I wanted to see how they sell their stuff.

And by the top three, I mean Stefan Georgi with his RMBC course… Ben Settle with his Copy Slacker course… and Derek Johanson with his Copy Hour course.

(If your blood pressure just shot up because you believe these three are NOT the top guys in the “copywriting course” market… fine. You’re probably right. I just feel that, for people who might be potential customers for my bullets course — name still TBD — the above three are my top competitors.)

Anyways:

I looked at their sales pages. And I told my brain to search for commonalities. Here’s what it came back with:

1. Mechanism. All three sales letters prominently feature a mechanism — it’s actually the name of all three courses.

2. Authority. Beyond mechanism, all three rely on authority to wow you. Stefan’s page is all about his own authority and the massive sales he’s made… while Ben and Derek defer to A-list copywriters for their implied or direct endorsement of the mechanism.

3. The promise. Both Stefan and Ben basically say, “More sales in less time.” Derek’s promise is more vague — killer sales copy, and ultimate success. Perhaps he’s just targeting a slightly different audience than Ben and Stefan.

So my point for you is:

This kind of research is something you too can do… and it might prove valuable in helping you define your promise and your positioning.

Or it might not.

I’m not sure if I will really go with “2-sentence persuasion” and all that other stuff when promoting my bullets course. Because even though Ben, Stefan, and Derek are all successful in selling their courses… I bet the copy is not a major part of why those courses sell.

Instead, I think it’s about the relationships those guys have with their lists… their reputation in the market… their word-of-mouth endorsements.

That’s why you can’t really trust most online copy. Sure, it can give you good ideas. But it’s worth testing anything you find, and making sure it actually works for you.

By the way, if you are interested in killer copy and more sales and less time, and you’re curious about my 2-sentence persuasion approach… then sign up for my newsletter. That’s where I will send out announcements once this offer becomes available.

Anatomy of a laugh that didn’t happen

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“I can handle this. Handle is my middle name. Actually, handle is the middle of my first name. [Insert canned laughter]”
– Chandler Bing, Friends

You probably know from Cialdini’s Influence about the power of social proof. That’s why shows like Friends insert canned laughter. We laugh more when we hear other people laughing, even if we know it’s fake.

But:

It turns out to be more tricky than that.

Some scientists in Australia tested this out. They wanted to see if WHO is laughing matters. And the answer is yes.

I won’t burden you with the details of the experiment. In a nutshell, the study subjects (university students) had to listen to audio recordings of a standup comic, with canned laughter and without. But there was a twist:

One group of students was told that the canned laughter was other students from the same university.

A second group of students was told that the canned laughter was sympathizers of Australia’s far-right One Nation party, which apparently would like to build a wall with Mexico, and have Mexico pay for it.

And the results?

When the canned laughter was present, group one laughed four times more than without the canned laughter. Makes sense. Other people like them found the material funny. So Cialdini was right, and so was Friends.

But no such thing happened in group two. The students didn’t laugh any more with the canned laughter than they did without it. How could they? Obviously the comic isn’t very good if those horrible xenophobes find him so funny.

I’m telling you about this because it applies to direct marketing as well.

Just like the producers of corny sitcoms, marketers know about the power of social proof. That’s why we stick tons of testimonials into our sales letters.

And testimonials are good. But:

Testimonials are much better if they come from people like the prospect. (At least that’s what Dan Kennedy says, but he should know.) You want to find testimonials that have the same gender… same race… same age… same ideas about building the wall… as your prospect does.

And what if you don’t have any testimonials like that?

Well, then you can just sweep your arm over your offer and say something like,

“I write a daily email newsletter. Many successful marketers and copywriters find it very valuable. Click here to subscribe.”

The most “dangerous” idea in America?

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“I worry that I should be doing something bigger with my life.”

I have this friend. Many years ago, he came to America on a work-and-travel visa. He stayed and he built a little business. Through this little business, he made the 4-hour-workweek a reality in his life.

Ever since, he’s been making good money each month by sending a few emails and making a few phone calls. The rest of the time, he travels the world, has fun, and chases women.

“But I worry I might be wasting my time,” he told me when we spoke. “Maybe I should be working to save the children or make the world a better place.”

My answer to him was that there’s value in thinking small, and that leading a life of modest impact is a virtue. And vice versa. I believe that thinking big is flat-out dangerous.

Maybe you find that thinking perverse or even repugnant. So let me give you a few examples to back up my case:

1. The Soviet Union. From everything I’ve read, the people who laid the groundwork for Bolshevism were the best and brightest and most humane of their generation. They thought they were building a better world. And yet the result was a monstrous machine that took decades to dismantle.

2. Google. Just today I read how the Federal Court in Australia ruled that Google has been willingly misleading consumers. Google continued to track consumers’ locations, even after they had turned location tracking off.

Of course, Google didn’t start out being a power-hungry, inhuman monolith. Not long ago, it was just two PhD students, whose motto was “Do no evil.” They were looking to improve access to information, and make the world a better place — on a big scale.

But maybe you don’t care anything about Bolsheviks or Google’s surveillance. Maybe you just want your own big business that makes big money. So let me tell you why smaller might still be a safer bet.

It’s something I heard Pete Coyne say a few weeks ago.

As you might know, Pete started out as copywriter at Agora. He then became a publisher there, which means he ran an entire division. He built up this division from scratch to over $100m.

In short, Pete is a smart guy, and somebody who knows more about building big businesses than most of us ever will.

And yet Pete said the following:

“A lot of people chase scale. They want to scale their business. And I feel there’s a lot of gross number porn out there. 7 figures… 100 million… 500 million. That’s not really a great thing a lot of times. Usually, your headaches explode with your revenue… your exposure to lawsuits and regulations goes up.”

Instead, Pete said there is a magic number for yearly revenue. Once you get to it, you’re better off spinning up a new business than trying to grow what you’ve got.

Not only will this save you headaches and lawsuits, says Pete, but you might actually net more money in the end.

And this  is not only thing I heard Pete share.

He also talked about three “monetization events.” He calls these “gray labeling,” “demographic jumping,” and “USP flipping.”

​​Each of them is a quick, low-risk way to create revenue bumps in your business. And none of them requires doing anything very different from what you’re already doing. Just make sure you don’t shoot past the magic number.

Maybe you’re getting tired of the teasing. So let me get to the point:

I heard Pete say all these things in this month’s Steal Our Winners.

Once each month, I push you to check out Steal Our Winners. Because in my opinion, it’s the best value out there if you are interested in direct marketing or have a business that uses direct marketing.

In a nutshell:

Each month, Rich Schefren interviews a bunch of high-profile marketers like Pete Coyne. Rich gets these marketers to spill valuable ideas and information. There’s no fluff or self-promotion. Just valuable ideas, most of which you can apply immediately.

And it’s all available for an unthinkable monthly price. Plus you can even get a low-risk trial month, for a $1 entry fee.

So in case you’re curious, you can find the $1 Steal Our Winners offer at the link below. And if you act fast, you can probably still get the Pete Coyne segment. Here’s the link:

https://bejakovic.com/sow

#1 secret of wealth creation for marketers and copywriters

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Today, for the first time ever, I took a closer look at Parris Lampropoulos’s Copy Vault sales page.

Parris, who is an A-list copywriter, offered the Copy Vault training back in 2018. And back in 2018, when I decided I wanted in, I raced past the sales letter and went straight to the order page. Rabbit brain.

So today, while working on a project, I finally took a closer look. And right away, I saw something odd. The headline reads:

For the First and Last Time Ever,
Parris Lampropoulos Opens the Vault and Reveals His Top Wealth-Creation Secrets
for Copywriters and Marketers

Hmm. That sounded strangely familiar.

The bit calling out copywriters and marketers… the promised secrets of wealth-creation… and that “first and last time” thing…

Had I seen all of those somewhere before? Oh yeah. Of course:

Available on DVDs for the First and Only Time…
“Gary Bencivenga’s
7 Master Secrets
of Wealth Creation
for Marketers and Copywriters”

That’s the headline that Gary Bencivenga, an even more famous A-list copywriter, wrote for the sales letter for his farewell seminar, back in 2006.

Coincidence?

Hardly. Rather, it’s the #1 wealth-creation secret for any marketers or copywriters who are willing to listen. Here’s why.

I recently heard marketer Caleb O’Dowd talk about how he does research. Caleb said two things.

First, when you enter a market, you should look at your top 3-5 competitors. (Or I guess one is enough, if your competitor happens to be Gary Bencivenga.)

Caleb said there are reasons why those people are at the top. So reverse engineer their successful sales letters… figure out those reasons… and you too will know exactly what to say to prospects to get a response.

Very obvious, right?

Right. But still something that was eye-opening to me. Because while I’ve spent hundreds of hours of research on copywriting projects… very little of that time went to analyzing copy from the competition.

Silly me. That’s something I will change starting now.

And what about the second tip Caleb had about research?

Well, that’s in the video below.

​​The video is from the Q&A after-party of the recent Clayton Makepeace tribute. It features a bunch of A-list copywriters, including Gary Bencivenga and Parris Lampropoulos, answering questions.

​​I personally think it’s worth watching for Caleb’s answer alone. But perhaps you’re wondering if you really need another Obvious Adams tip on research.

In that case, let me repeat something I wrote a few weeks ago, also in connection to Caleb:

“Caleb said deep research is the kind of thing very few marketers are willing to engage in. But those who do inevitably wind up at the top of their market. They don’t just succeed, they have breakthroughs, and they make millions.”

By the way, Caleb isn’t the only one to put such a premium on research and understanding your audience.

Gary says the game is won or lost in research. He calls deep research the “launchpad of copywriting breakthroughs.”

And Parris says the #1 secret in copywriting — more than any technique or book — is to understand your audience.

In case that’s sufficient motivation for you to find out Caleb’s other research tip…

Well, let me interrupt for a second. And say that, if you are a copywriter or a marketer, and you’re after wealth-creation secrets, you might want to sign up to my email newsletter.

And now, if I’ve convinced you about the value of research, and you want to see what Caleb’s second tip is, here’s the video:

Do as top copywriters and marketers do… not as they say

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A lot of people wrote to me over the past 24 hours. Many guessed the right answer to the riddle I posed yesterday.

I won’t reveal what that right answer was. After all, I have to withhold something as a reward for people who are signed up to my email newsletter.

But I will tell you this:

Among the people who did NOT guess right, there were lots of good ideas.

Curiosity… emotions… a big idea… a starving crowd… believability.

And you know what?

Makes sense. Because the copywriters I mentioned yesterday talked about the critical importance of each of those things.

Maybe you’re wondering what my point is. So let me set it up with something that may or may not surprise you.

In the interview where I got the Gary Halbert quote I cited yesterday, I heard Gary talk about the bullets he wrote for his Killer Orgasms book. Like a proud father, Gary said there are two really, really important things about those bullets:

1. None of them are hypey

2. They are based on truth

Well, I’ve looked at those bullets. They are most certainly full of hype.

I’ve also looked at the book Gary was selling. And it sure looks like it was slapped together after the bullets were already written. The payoff seems to be an afterthought. And sometimes there is none.

My point is that you can’t always go by what people say.

I got this bug into my head via marketer and copywriter Glenn Osborn. Glenn’s MO is to look at what successful promoters do, and learn from that.

So that’s what I’ll do tomorrow.

I’ll tell you about the #1 wealth-creation secret for marketers and copywriters — as I’ve heard it discussed, AND as I’ve seen it done. In fact, as I’ve seen it done by one of the famous A-listers I talked about yesterday.

And I’ll tell you this: This #1 secret is not the answer to my riddle yesterday… or any of those other things that people guessed.

If you’d like to sign up to my newsletter, so you can read tomorrow’s email, and so you can join in any future riddles I send out, click here and follow the rabbit hole to the end.

A copy riddle with a swipe file prize

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Here’s a copy riddle for you:

Gary Halbert called it the only reason that people buy from an ad, for the most part…

While Ben Settle said that copywriting is all about this one thing.

Parris Lampropoulos credits his success to it. And drilling this one thing is how he spends 80% of his time with his copy cubs.

David Deutsch said it’s the “key to the kingdom”…

And John Carlton believes it makes the difference between a sale made and a sale lost.

So my riddle for you is, what is this one thing?

I gave this riddle to people on my email newsletter. And the people who got it right got a prize.

The prize was a link to the best publicly available swipe file I have ever found. And no, it’s not swiped.co.

In my opinion, the swipe file I have in mind is about 100x better, based on the quality and quantity of ads you can find inside… many of which are only available today as bonuses to expensive copywriting and marketing courses.

Sometimes, I run little contests and challenges like this, as a way to keep my newsletter fun and profitable. If you’d like to try out my newsletter, both to see whether you like the content, and so you can participate in the next little riddle challenge, then click here and fill out the form.

A $30,000 copywriting course?

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Today I’ve got a business idea for you, if you’ve got an entrepreneurial mindset:

A few months ago, I speculated on a fanciful idea. What if copywriting education were free upfront, and the only income came from the money that students make thanks to the education?

Back then, I thought it was pretty impossible. It seemed to me that copywriting education can only go to one of two poles: AWAI or Agora.

AWAI is Mark Ford’s direct response business about copywriting. It works like any other direct response business — a never-ending stream of new offers. There’s always another secret to learn.

At the other extreme, there’s Agora. Not Agora the client-facing direct response business. That works just the same as AWAI.

Instead, I’m talking about Agora the copywriter training machine. That’s where Mark Ford (again) and the rest of the Agora folks bring in promising and ambitious people… teach them how to write copy… and then set them to work, capturing most of their productivity.

In other words, it seemed to me that you can either be an employee and get a great education for free (Agora)… or you can be a freelancer (or freelancer wannabe), and pay thousands or tens of thousands of dollars for your education, delivered in drips and drops of offers and upsells (AWAI).

So that brings us to today.

Because I learned something today that I didn’t know a few months ago, when I first wrote about this. What I didn’t know is that there is a business called Lambda School, which teaches you how to be a computer programmer.

So far, so meh.

The interesting thing is how Lambda School charges its students. It doesn’t charge an upfront tuition (like a regular undegrad education)… and it also doesn’t put you to work, paying you a wage and capturing your productivity (like a PhD, or work at a company).

Instead, Lambda School offers an income share agreement. I’d heard of these before, but only in the context of a traditional university. But things seem to be changing.

So here’s how Lambda School and its income share agreement work:

First, you apply to Lambda School. If you’re accepted, you sign the income share agreement, and you take the course. 6 months later, once you are a hireable programmer, you go out into the world and get a job. And then, you start paying a share of your income to Lambda School, for a total of 24 months, not to exceed $30k.

So there’s my business idea for you.

It works just like Lambda School, except it’s called AIDA School. And it teaches you copywriting and marketing. In a bit more detail:

You ask people to fill out an application to get into AIDA School. You test for basic writing skills… level of dedication… availability to commit to the course. The applicants who pass a certain threshold get in.

​​And then, you really give ’em a great education. You even help them get freelancing clients. And then you reap what you sowed, in the form of a share of their income, not to exceed $30k.

$30k per person. More than you’re likely to make selling ebooks and teasing secrets. And if you do an honest job on the teaching side, more of a positive impact also. Just remember to mention me in the first commencement speech.

And remember also to sign up for my email newsletter — if you want more business, marketing, or copywriting ideas than you would ever believe.

Will work for hundreds of thousands of dollars

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There’s a video on YouTube that shows Dan Kennedy’s cave. It’s where Dan does his writing, and where he receives clients for consults.

Dan’s cave is underground. That said, it’s as bright and cheery as an underground cave can be. The walls are packed with rare Disney memorabilia, exotic money, and clocks. And then there’s a sign that reads:

“Will work for hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

This connected in my mind to something Jay Abraham said.

(By the way, I’ve spent a lot of time listening to Jay Abraham, including the video I re-watched today. I can imagine he’s said this same thing in many places, but it never registered in my head until just now. It’s another example of why it’s worth going back to stuff you’ve already read or listened to.)

Anyways, Jay was saying how you don’t want to just give stuff away for free. First off, you want to make people understand how valuable your free gift is. Second, you want to set expectations. Jay gave some off-the-cuff copy to show what he means:

We’ve spent five years and 50,000 hours studying this. We’ve come to conclusions that, to our knowledge, no one else has. We’ve spent a year and a half refining it. We’ve now put it into a form where you can grasp it and you can act on it. It will instantly impact your performance. It’s the result of looking at billions of dollars of successful transactions.

It would mean a lot to us to share this with you. We would like to gift it to you without charge and buy it for you. But there is an expectation, and it’s a very respectful one:

If we do that, we’d like if you, first of all, take the time to seriously read it and reflect on it and then take action. And we’re hoping it will help you appreciate what we do so that there will be an inclination to want to do business with us later.

It’s this last bit that finally clicked for me. Jay is basically saying, free stuff ain’t free. And you should let people aware of this. Don’t be pushy. Don’t be needy. But do state the fact.

Speaking of which:

I’ve written almost 900 of these blog posts, each of which is first sent out as an email to my newsletter subscribers. By my estimate, they are the result of ~9,000 hours of cumulative work and experience.

This includes tens of thousands of dollars in copywriting coaching… dozens of courses and even more books on the topics of copywriting and marketing… and the experience of 6 years of working on client projects, with many 7-figure and several 8-figure direct response businesses.

I’m saying this because it means a lot to me to share these posts with you. I hope you get value and entertainment out of them. I also hope they will, as Jay says, give you an inclination to do do business with me later.

Speaking of which:

If you want to do business with me, the first step is to get my free (well, debatable) email newsletter. Click here if you’d like to sign up.