Business Ideas

Even numbers are for the dead

by

Last week I was visiting my home town of Zagreb, Croatia. It was my mom’s birthday. I went into a flower shop to buy her some flowers.

I pointed at some sunset-pink roses. “Six of those,” I said to the flower shop girl.

She shrugged as if to apologize. “We really only sell them in odd numbers. So five… or seven…”

I stared hard at her for a moment. “Fine,” I said. “Then give me seven.”

While she was tying the roses up I was pacing the flower shop and inspecting the orchids and potted eucalyptus plants. My irritation was growing.

“And can you tell me please,” I finally blurted out, “why exactly you only sell them in odd numbers?”

The flower shop girl looked at me patiently, the way she might with a child. “Because even numbers are for the dead. Odd numbers are for living people.”

I was taken aback. But I’ve double-checked since. The girl is right.

At least in this part of the world — Croatia, Serbia, and possibly a dozen other tiny countries with a shared cultural history — you buy an even number of flowers when you go to a wake or a funeral. You buy an odd number for weddings, graduations, birthdays, etc.

Why? Why not the other way around?

Who knows. Perhaps some practical reason. Perhaps symbolic. Or perhaps entirely arbitrary, set by some highly OCD person once upon a time who managed to enforce his will on the rest of us.

One thing’s for sure:

People love these kinds of rules. They live by them. It gives structure and coherence and even meaning to an otherwise chaotic existence.

People love these rules so much they will seek them out if they are missing.

My friend Sam sent me an article last week about Brandon Sanderson, one of the best-selling fantasy authors in the world.

Sanderson sold $55 million worth of books last year. But unlike with J.K. Rowling or George R.R. Martin, practically nobody, outside Sanderson’s sizeable audience, knows who he is.

The reason, as the article will tell you, is that Sanderson is not a very good writer.

​​So why the devoted following of millions of people?

One reason, according to Sanderson’s fans, is his characters. And then, from the article:

“The second answer to Why Sanderson? is his worlds. This is probably what he’s best known for. Worldbuilding, as it’s called. Sanderson dreams up far-off lands—sometimes cities, sometimes whole planets, with rules and systems and politics—and then he populates them with characters whose fates are also the worlds’.”

So there you go:

People are shopping for worlds to inhabit.

They might enjoy yours, and even pay to be inside.

In order for that to happen, one thing you will need is a strong and elaborate set of rules.

For example:

One of the rules of my world, as you might know, is that deadlines are deadly.

You don’t want to miss them.

Because I don’t extend them and I don’t make exceptions to them.

My deadlines also come exactly at 8:31pm CET.

Such as my deadline tomorrow, Tuesday, at 8:31pm CET, to get my MVE course before the price goes up threefold, from $100 to $297. That’s less than 24 hours from now. In case you don’t want to be struck down by the law:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Mysterious copy chief gets me moving

by

Back in May, I wrote about the mysterious Mercure. That’s the pseudonym of a guy with a big following on copywriting Twitter.

Mercure ​​only reveals publicly that he is the copy chief of $10M company. He offers coaching to copywriters without them knowing his real name or even seeing his face.

(I happen to know Mercure’s real identity because I met him in real life. But I ain’t telling.)

Two weeks ago, for reasons of his own, Mercure bought himself a ticket to the Most Valuable Email show. He wrote me a few days later to report an “aha!” moment:

===

Whew, what can I say! It’s a rollercoaster! I loved it!

It resonates with my way of writing, and puts some words and ideas on otherwise unconscious processes.

It wasn’t easy to follow at times, and it did require my full attention, but that’s due to the (circular) nature of the idea. Your fluid writing actually made things easier to get. And your choice of examples make everything clear in the end.

Truth be told, it did get me a “Aha!” moment, concerning my current sales letter, product, offer, and future newsletter. I’m now curious to see how it can be applied to others niches, even though you did say it may or may not work. I think it can, as it appears close to some of the “techniques” I’ve been using in the supplement niche.

All in all, I believe Copywriters fascinated by the architecture of persuasion will appreciate it a lot and find it indeed most valuable.

I think it deserves a second and third read to grab onto the smaller details, that’s what I’ll do in the coming days.

So thank you very much for this! I’ll be focusing on implementing the many lessons now. 🙂

===

It always warms the old heart-cockles to get an endorsement like that. But Mercure wrote me something else that wasn’t as cockle-warming:

“I think you should absolutely raise your prices. 100 for MVE is a steal (I believe it.)”

Mercure told me he raised his prices for the group coaching he offers. Twice. Result:

* Less demand for his coaching
* Less work to do
* More money coming in

So while I wasn’t too happy to hear this message — I fight like a dying man against making any kind of change — I decided it was time to finally listen.

Like I announced yesterday, I will increase the price of Most Valuable Email from $100 to $297.

The price will change in two days’ time, on Tuesday at 8:31pm CET.

If you’d like to get Most Valuable Email, or rather steal it, before the price changes:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Who else wants to get kicked off my list?

by

Yesterday, I sent out an email about how I recently created a joke payment plan for my Most Valuable Email course, and how I’ll soon increase the price of MVE from $100 to $297. The subject line read,

“They laughed when I created a payment plan, but when I jacked up the price…”

In case you’re entirely new to copywriting, that was a play on “They laughed when I sat down at the piano but when I started to play,” which is one of the most famous headlines of all time, written by John Caples in 1926.

A healthy number of people bought MVE from yesterday’s email. Some also wrote in to reply and say they thought the email was witty. And then one guy wrote in to say:

===

297 plus 3 payments of 1 dollar?

BTW, the subject line is a bit lame, don’t you think?

===

I raised my eyebrows a bit, paused for a moment. I then scrolled down to the bottom of the email, and clicked unsubscribe on behalf of this reader.

I don’t know whether his reply was a missed attempt at humor. I don’t know whether it was a genuine attempt at trolling me. I do know it was a distraction.

And it would have stayed just a distraction — but I would hate to allow myself to be just distracted. That’s why I decided to write an email out of it, and get some use out of this ex-subscriber, rather than simply allowing him to interrupt my morning.

Moving on:
​​
As you might recognize, my subject line today, “Who else wants to get kicked off my list,” is a play on another classic John Caples headline, “Who else wants a screen star figure?”

I’m not actually inviting trollish responses with that subject line. I like almost all of my readers, and I like having a pleasant rapport with my audience. That’s why the “lame subject line” guy is only the fourth person I’ve proactively unsubscribed from my list in 5 years of daily emailing.

But I do draw a line somewhere. I expect my readers to treat me well, because I treat them well.

Which brings me back to Most Valuable Email.

I have been selling MVE for a year for $100.

Over the past year, I’ve had many people tell me that’s a steal, and that I should raise my price.

And just in the past couple weeks, I’ve had a number of people I admire tell me the same. I will tell you about one such mysterious person in my next email.

Eventually, the message got through.

So I am raising my price for MVE, like I said, from $100 to $297.

I am also giving you fair notice about this change. You can still get MVE for $100 until Tuesday, August 22 (yes August, not July), at 8:31pm CET.

But why wait and risk missing out? You can laugh at deadline worries — if you follow this simple link:
​
https://bejakovic.com/mve/

They laughed when I created a payment plan, but when I jacked up the price…

by

This past Tuesday, I created a new, mildly troll-like “financed payment structure” for my Most Valuable Email course. Just $97 today… plus three easy $1 payments each 30 days.

I did make some sales with that new payment structure. But what I did not expect is the sheer amount of laughter, chortling, and knee slapping this aroused.

I got a lot of LOLOL, funny, this is hilarious af 😂😂😂 replies. One particularly amused reader wrote in to say:

===

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I’ve been laughing at this checkout page for longer than I’ve laughed at ANY standup comedian’s joke.

‘just thought about it again and had to laugh (again) before typing this sentence.

It’s the most absurd thing I’ve seen in ages!

I FUCKING LOVE IT!

Gotta take the ‘sting’ out of those one hundred bucks!

===

I’ve since removed that financed payment structure — as I said, it was destined to disappear without ceremony or notice. MVE is back to its usual one hundred bucks price. But soon, it will be time for a new payment structure, with much more sting:

I’ll be raising the price of Most Valuable Email from $100 to $297, effective next Tuesday, July 22, at 8:31pm CET.

I’m deadly serious about this price increase.

I realize that doing so on the heels of a trollish “financed payment structure” might not get me taken the most seriously.

But this is not a stunt, and not something will reverse like I did with that $97 + 3x$1 setup.

This is a genuine price increase. If you’re curious, I will have my explanation and reasoning for it over the next few days. Or in case you’d like to get MVE before the price triples, and you don’t want to risk missing the deadline as so often happens:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

One big proof element

by

I read a story this morning about Tim Meeks, the inventor of the harpejji.

The harpejji is a new instrument, one of only a few new instruments invented in 21st century to actually take off. It’s a combination of a piano and an electric guitar. It sells for $6,399 a piece, and Meeks sold more than $1 million worth of them last year.

That’s where we are today. Here’s how we got to where we are:

Meeks invented the harpejji in 2007. He made videos of himself playing the thing. He showed it off at music festivals. He had a few other harpejji enthusiasts play it and hype it up for him.

Sales. Were. Meager.

And then one day, Meeks was at a trade show in Anaheim, CA. Somebody tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hey, can you teach me how to play this thing?”

Meeks stared for a moment and then snapped out of his trance. “Sure,” he said. “Sure! Of course! I’d love to!”

It was Stevie Wonder who was asking.

Stevie Wonder loved the harpejji. He bought one immediately. He has since performed a bunch with it in public.

And here we are today. Point being:

One big proof element can be worth 100 small or middle-sized proof elements.

In fact, entire sales promotions, and even entire businesses, have been built on the back of one big proof element.

So if you’re smart, you will work to get yourself such a big proof element, or maybe even to bake it in to your offer when you create it.

But on to business. I have my Most Valuable Email course to sell. And odds are, you haven’t bought it yet, because only about 5.1% of my list has bought to date.

I’ve shared lots of proof elements for MVE so far:

My own results, tangible successes, and intangible benefits resulting from applying the MVE trick…

The reason why of the thing, which I hint at publicly and explain in detail inside the course…

The testimonials and endorsements and even money-making case studies from many satisfied customers.

The fact is though, none of this qualifies as the One Big Proof Element.

So let me tell you that feared negotiating coach Jim Camp used the Most Valuable Email trick on the very first page of his legendary book Start With No.

This book has formed and influenced other influential people, like email marketer Sen Settle… business coach Travis Sago… and FBI negotiator Chris Voss.

Did all these influential folks find Start With No influential because of the ideas inside?

Yes, but — the presentation was also immensely important. In fact, in the case of somebody like Camp, the presentation and the ideas were really an indistinguishable blend.

If you’re a Jim Camp fan, it will be obvious to you how Camp is using the MVE trick in Start With No once you know what this trick is.

And whether or not are a Camp fan, if you would like to have similar influence on your readers, particularly the influential ones among them, then Most Valuable Email might be your ticket. Here’s where to buy it:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Announcing new financed payment structure for Most Valuable Email

by

This past May I went to the one and only copywriting conference I have ever attended. Trevor “Toe Cracker” Crook, who organized the conference, got up on stage on day two to give his presentation, all about creating outrageous offers.

Trevor had something like 9 points to cover. And then he got into the 10th, which was a pitch for his paid offer, something called Silent Sales Formula.

The structure of Trevor’s offer went like this:

* Access to Trevor’s Own The Casino training (a $5,970 value)
* 3-7 Zoom calls with Trevor for the rest of 2023 ($5,000 value)
* All for an affordable $497 today, and then “9 financed payments of $497 every 30 days”

Trevor made it clear this was not a subscription offer, and you could not hope to cancel after the first month, or really at any other month.

I remember talking to some of the marketers and copywriters after the fact. We were all confused by that payment structure. It seemed to put a kind of anti-demonstration on Trevor’s otherwise excellent presentation about great offers.

It turns out I and the people I had been talking to were probably wrong, and Trevor was probably right.

I say “probably,” going by the other successful marketers I have seen since, offering exactly the same pricing structure:

I saw Sean Anthony do it recently for his High-Ticket Email Conversion Workshop ($590 today + 4 more payments of $590). I saw Justin Goff do it last week for the 7-Figure Email course he was promoting ($97 today + three future payments of $297).

You might think this is just a payment plan.

But for all these folks, there was no option to pay in bulk, and there was not really any talk of the total price. It seems the main reason for this pricing structure is a kind of reverse price anchoring. What you pay today is quite affordable, and the rest… well, the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.

As you might know, I am all about taking effective marketing strategies and putting them into practice.

And so I would like to announce I am stealing this idea from Trevor and Sean and Justin.

I have changed the payment structure for my Most Valuable Email course.

Before, the course was much more expensive than it is today — though still grossly underpriced for the value it delivers.

But I’ve changed all that with my new financed payment structure for MVE.

Now, you can get started with Most Valuable Email for just $97 today + 3 financed payments of $1, each 30 days.

You might not believe me. You might think I’m a joker. You might think I’m trivializing an otherwise valuable marketing idea. So check for yourself.

In order to do that, you will have to click through to the page below… scroll past all the big claims I make about MVE (build your authority, grow your email list, create exciting new offers out of thin air)… skirt the towering wall of testimonials… turn right at my guarantee that puts John Carlton and Gary Halbert to shame… and then click on the “Yes I want to learn the Most Valuable Email trick” button.

You will then see my new financed payment structure in action.

I don’t make any promises about how long I will keep this generous payment option up, but right now it’s there. Check for yourself:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

I’ve been a bestselling author for years and I didn’t even know it

by

A few days ago, I went on Amazon in search of ideas for “pocket change” offers. That’s after I went through a training that Ning Li put on last week about the same.

I don’t think I’m giving away a huge spoiler for Ning’s course by revealing that a part of his research process is going on Amazon and seeing what else is selling in his niche.

So there I was on Amazon, looking at best-selling books.

As I’ve hinted a few times, this year I’ve started a new newsletter in the health space. I was doing research for possible “pocket change” offers I could create to grow that newsletter.

I was stabbing around various categories and following random hunches. I scrolled down in one highly specific but popular category to about rank 40…

… and then I guffawed, snorted, and chuckled.

I saw a familiar book among the bestsellers:

One o’ mine own.

I wrote this particular book about 9 years ago. I hadn’t really seen it or thought about it since. It was part of about a dozen alternative-health how-to books that I wrote at that time under various pseudonyms.

All these books are still up on Amazon, and some continue to rack up reviews and sales. This particular book is the best of the bunch, and is doing well enough to make me a best-selling author in a fairly competitive category, without any effort, without any promotion, and without even being aware of the fact.

But let’s get biblical:

The only book I currently have on Amazon under my own name is the 10 Commandments of A-List Copywriters.

It’s currently only #96 among best-selling Kindle books in the “direct marketing” category.

But there was a brief period last December when my 10 Commandments book was ranked higher among Amazon bestsellers than Gary Halbert’s Boron Letters and Dan Kennedy’s Magnetic Marketing.

Maybe, with your help, I can get my book back up in the rankings, to the top of the charts where it belongs. Plus, it’s only 5 bucks. If you’d like to take a look:

https://bejakovic.com/10commandments

How to become a millionaire on Five-grand-err

by

I read something mindblogging via Codie Sanchez’s newsletter:

A freelance designer by the name of Brett Williams is making $120,000 per month. Not per year. Per month. All from client work.

How?

Williams has a unique business model. He charges all his clients a flat fee, $5k per client per month. Clients can quit or pause their “design-as-a-subscription” at any time. They can only make one request at a time, but as soon that is fulfilled — usually within 30 minutes to 48 hours — they can make another.

It might sound impossible that this could work. But Williams has ~20 clients at any time. He seems to be alive. He doesn’t seem to be working superhuman hours.

Again, how?

My guess is he works with good clients, does good work, and delivers it in a reasonable timeframe.

Clients are happy with what they get, and happy with what they don’t get — no full-time payroll burden, no hassle of finding a new freelancer, no opportunity cost of reaching a new agreement with a known freelancer, each time they have some niggling design request to make.

Do you think you might do something similar?

Of course not. It’s outlandish. But just pretend.

Think of a Fiverr-able skill you have. And instead of offering it for $5 on Fiverr, imagine offering it for $5k on your own site.

If you have Williams’s kind of luck, you will be able to make a cool million in under a year. If you’re less lucky, it might take you two or even three years to get there.

But still, what else you got right now? If that’s not so hot, might as well start moving towards that million-dollar service business today.

In related news, the deadline for my 9 Deadly Email Sins training is nearing. The training happens next Monday, August 7, the deadline is the day before, Sunday the 6th.

I’ve given away a lot of valuable info over the past few days, in the form of hundreds of copies of my new Simple Money Emails course.

Simple Money Emails shows you how to write effective sales emails.

9 Deadly Email Sins shows you… how to avoid writing ineffective no-sales emails.

I realize that might sound like a promise nobody wants. The only thing I can say in my defense is that I have been paid to critique 100+ emails over past year. Including by people who have had all the email marketing and copywriting education in the world… including pro copywriters… including people whose entire businesses run on email.

​​And yet I find these people, who should know better, repeatedly commit these sins, and repeatedly pay for it, in the form of lower sales, bored readers, and shrinking engagement.

You might wonder how this 9 Deadly Email Sins offer is possibly related to the Brett Williams thing I told you above.

I can think of two ways:

You can use Simple Money Emails + 9 Deadly Email Sins to actually learn how to write effective sales emails, and avoid the mistakes that plague others. There’s plenty of demand for that at Fiverr, and might be legit demand for it on Five-grand-err. I’ve personally been paid much more than five grand per month by some clients, just to write effective daily emails for them.

Or if you have no interest in selling email copywriting services, but you have another skill that clients might want, then you can use daily emails to sell that. The only real difference I imagine between Fiverr and Five-grand-err is the Five-grand-err clients are likely to need a bit more trust and softening up, and daily email is the perfect format for that.

But you make the choice. If you decide that effective daily emails are something that’s worth knowing, and knowing well, then here’s where you can sign up for my training next Monday:

https://bejakovic.com/sme-classified-ty/

A splash of ‘expensive’ and ‘exclusive’

by

Yesterday, I was exchanging emails with a low-profile email marketer who is quietly doing some big things.

He only has three clients. But two of those three clients are 8-figure businesses, and the third is a 9-figure business. Since he gets performance bonuses and equity for his work, I imagine he does very well.

Yeah yeah, good for him. But what about me?

Even though the above email marketer does very well, he decided not to spend $100 on my upcoming 9 Deadly Email Sins training, set to happen next Monday. He wrote me to explain:

“Personally, the training didn’t seem that interesting (I felt I would never pay for a ‘mistakes to avoid’ training, not sure why).”

It’s a fair point. The “9 Deadly Email Sins” angle was something that popped up in my head a few weeks back. I used it once in an email as a kind of placeholder, and then I just stuck with it just to git ‘er done.

The fact is, a good number of people on my list have already signed up for this 9 Deadly Email Sins training. But those are people who generally trust me and figure I make all my offers worthwhile.

But a different positioning might have attracted more people. Specifically, it might have attracted more people who joined my list via the classified ad I ran last weekend, people who don’t know me well yet.

For example, rather than talking about deadly email sins, I could have said something about private lessons… only given out in expensive and exclusive coaching to successful clients… which is how the content of the training came about.

​​I floated that idea to that email marketer above. He wrote back right away to say:

“See? That’s more attractive to me already. ‘Costly email mistakes’ that you’ve only revealed during your ‘expensive and exclusive coaching to successful clients’. Sounds like something I’d personally consider. Maybe that’s the issue I had. The ‘9 deadly email sins’ angle seems too broad and I’m not sure whether its contents will be valuable for me specifically. A splash of ‘expensive’ and ‘exclusive’, and I’m considering it!”

So there you go:

If you want people to at least consider your offer rather that dismissing it on first sight, give it a splash of expensive and exclusive. You’re likely to sell more, at least to rich and successful customers.

But there’s actually a bigger, rarer, more valuable point I want to make about this whole story.

I will reserve that for Monday’s training, which is unfortunately named 9 Deadly Email Sins. When I say, “9 Deadly Email Sins,” you hear, “expensive and exclusive.” Because that really is how this training came to be.

The deadline is slowly but surely nearing. If you want to sign up in time:

https://bejakovic.com/sme-classified-ty/

3 great reasons to sign up to Josh Spector’s newsletter before Sunday

by

Today I’d like to invite you to sign up to Josh Spector’s newsletter For The Interested.

​​Signing up is free, and I can think of no fewer than three great reasons to do so:

First, Josh writes both a weekly newsletter on Sundays (long, similar to what many others are doing) and a short daily newsletter in a different format on all the other days.

What Josh is doing with daily emails is innovative and it works. So much so I already wrote an email about it just a couple weeks ago. It might be something you want to keep an eye on and model yourself.

Second, if you ever find yourself crying “Value! More value!!!” and you want marketers to bombard you with non-stop, practical, how-to info and inspiration, without any teasing, guru-like grandstanding, or endless personal stories, then Josh is your man.

His newsletter is all value, zero charismatic manipulation, all day long.

Third, I will be running a classified ad in Josh’s newsletter this Sunday.

This ad will have a special offer to get my new Simple Money Emails course. I will sell this course after the promo in Josh’s newsletter ends, but if you are on Josh’s list by Sunday, and you take me up on the offer inside the ad before the deadline, you will get Simple Money Emails for free.

So are you… interested?

​​If you are (maybe you can sense where this is going) then here is Josh’s For The Interested:

https://bejakovic.com/fti