Business Ideas

The end of info products

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THE FOLLOWING EMAIL IS CONTROVERSIAL AND MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME AUDIENCES

READER DISCRETION IS ADVISED

You might be familiar with Max Sackheim’s famous ad, “Do you make these mistakes in English?”

The ad ran for decades, unchanged, and kept bringing in profitable business better than any contender.

Thousands of pages of analysis have been written about the 7-word headline of this ad and the copy that followed.

But what about the actual product this ad was ultimately selling? What about the means by which a prospect could hope to correct his or her mistakes in English? What were prospects actually exchanging their money for?

Sackheim’s copy only teases you about the product, and calls it a “remarkable invention” and a “100% self-correcting device.”

As far as I know, nobody today actually has this remarkable invention stashed away in their garage. Whatever it was, it’s clear it was sold as some kind of tool, a device, and not just information.

This is a well-known direct marketing truth that’s been around since Sackheim’s days and before, back into the age of patent medicines.

A real, tangible, external mechanism — a fat-loss potion, a dog seatbelt, a “100% self-correcting device” — sells much easier than just good info — how to lose weight, how to be a less negligent dog owner, how to speak gooder English.

Smart modern-day info marketers have gotten hep to this fact. That’s why people like Russell Brunson and Ben Settle and Sam Ovens have put their reputation and audience to work behind tools like ClickFunnels and Berserker Mail and Skool.

The thing is, creating a tool, whether physical or software, has traditionally been an expensive, complicated, and risky business.

Take a look at Groove Funnels, another tool created a few years ago by another experienced info marketer, Mike Filsaime. Groove Funnels is a bloated, buggy, frankly unusable product. I say that as somebody who invested into a lifelong subscription in Groove Funnels.

I have a couple degrees in computer science. I also have about a decade’s worth amateur and pro software development experience. But after I quit my IT job 10+ years ago, I never once considered putting this experience to use in order to develop any kind of tool I could sell.

Until now.

Because things are changing. Today even a monkey, working alone, can create and deploy a valuable app simply by querying ChatGPT persistently enough. And there are plenty of shovels available for such would-be gold miners, tools to build tools, which will do much of the in-between work for you. Just say what you will to happen, and it will be done.

Decades ago, master direct marketer Gary Halbert said that the best best product of all is… information!

But I bet if Gary were alive today, he’d be hard at work (or maybe easy at work) creating some kind of high-margin tool to sell, in the broadest sense of the word — a thing to do some or all of the work for an audience with a problem. A few reasons why:

* Again, tools are easy to sell. They fit with innate human psychology of how we want to solve problems.

* Tools can make for natural continuity income if you license them out instead of sell them outright.

* Tools can create their own moat over time. There can be lock-in or switching cost if your users build on top of your tool.

* And now, thanks to the most remarkable invention of AI, it’s possible to create tools quickly, cheaply, and with great margins.

All that’s to say, best product of all… information? I don’t think so. Not any more. Best start adapting now.

Speaking of which, I got an offer for you:

Would you say that there are any tech issues that are keeping you from starting your own email list?

If there are, write in and let me know about them.

In turn, I’ll have something for you that you might like.

Swan song for famous forecaster

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Today’s top headline in the New York Post:

“Renowned election guru Nate Silver reveals latest forecast for presidential election”

That’s news to me because I remember Nate Silver as a famously failed forecaster.

Silver confidently predicted the 2016 election for H. Clinton. After Trump won that election, Nate Silver waffled and said the data was right but his own weakness got in the way. The implied promise was, “I’ll be right next time.” People around the Internet shrugged and said, “That’s good enough.”

I think there are lotsa lessons to be learned from the ongoing career of famed forecaster Nate Silver. I will draw just one for you today, one I read in Lawrence Bernstein’s newsletter a few days ago:

“Rule #1 of Financial Copywriting 101: It’s better to be wrong than wishy-washy.”

This applies to any copy, not just financial.

So I’d like to make a confident prediction of my own. We won’t be hearing from Nate Silver again, at least not in front page stories for big publications like the New York Post, and not around major future contests like the 2028 presidential election.

Because Silver seems to have lost his nerve, possibly after the last Trump election he had to call. While people dearly want him to make confident predictions, he’s hedging his bets now. From the NY Post article (emphasis mine):

“Renowned election guru Nate Silver called the race for the White House a “PURE TOSS-UP” Sunday as he gave ex-President Donald Trump a SLIGHT EDGE over Vice President Kamala Harris in his latest forecast.”

Who’s got any use for wishy-washy forecasts like “pure toss-up?” My prediction is that the media will find a new Zoltar, one who is willing to confidently say what will happen and cheerfully be wrong.

Another prediction:

Tom Grundy’s Subtraction Method training will happen this Wednesday at 8pm CET/2pm EST/11am PST.

Tom will talk about how to think less pedantically, how to be okay without clinging to the latest mental-model-of-the-month, and how to do better in life as a result — emotionally and maybe even practically.

Tom’s training is free for you because you are a subscriber of my newsletter.

If you’d like to sign up for it before the polls close:

https://bejakovic.com/subtraction

Behind the scenes of my affiliate deal-making

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Over the past few weeks I’ve been approached to promote three affiliate offers, and uncomfortable thought it was, I turned all three down.

All three of these offers were solid. They had good info at a fair price. There’s no doubt each of them can be very valuable to the right person.

Also, all three offer owners who approached me I already had previous relationships with. I had already done some projects with them, or at least we had exchanged some non-business emails and had some sort of rapport going.

Finally, all three offer owners were paying out generous affiliate commissions. In theory, I could make some good money here.

And yet, like I said, I turned down the opportunity to promote any of the three offers.

The reason was simply I personally couldn’t get excited about them. I took a look at these offers and my personal reaction was “Hm, I see.”

I imagined writing emails to promote these offers. How? I’d have to do some jumping jacks before, in order to simulate a bit of life in my copy.

I also imagined taking myself out of the equation altogether. I imagined saying, “Hey this isn’t for me, but don’t let me get in your way, maybe it’s for you.”

That still didn’t sit right. After all, with that approach, where do I stop? Do I end up promoting $3.45 pork chops on sale at Target, because somebody somewhere might want them?

I’ve made the point many times before that I don’t look at this newsletter as a business first. I look at it as my own personal playground, an opportunity to experiment and practice, a reflection of my own interests and tastes.

I can’t blame you if you shrug off everything I’ve said above as just my perverse attitude, something that I do because I apparently don’t care enough about money to reach out and grasp it when it’s offered to me.

Still, I remembered something while thinking about this rather unpleasant issue.

Ben Settle, who I think treats his email newsletter as much more of a business than I treat mine, shared almost the same attitude in an email a couple years ago. In fact it’s possible I got my attitude from Ben.

Ben wrote that the best affiliate offer to sell, at least for him, is one that’s personally fun. And when an offer is not personally fun for him… well, here’s Ben’s report on one such campaign:

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No matter how much time I spent writing those emails, no matter how much time I spent strategizing the campaign, and no matter how much time I spent interviewing the creator of the product (and I did) it did not matter, and the sales were lackluster at best.

The reason?

Not because the offer was bad.

It was extremely valuable, especially for the price.

No, one main reason why was because it was not fun.

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I’m telling you this because over the next few days, until Tuesday to be specific, I’m promoting Tom Grundy’s Subtraction Method.

In fact, I’m promoting it as an affiliate, even though it’s a free training.

There was was the option to simply promote the paid workshops that Tom will be running in the coming weeks, on the back of the (free) Subtraction Method training.

But Tom and I both agreed that the best and happiest way to promote this was simply offer the free training first, one where Tom would reveal all the concepts underlying the Subtraction Method.

It’s Tom’s job to sell the group implementation workshops, following the free training, just to those who want help working through those concepts with Tom’s guidance.

Point being, the real reason I’m telling you to go sign up to Tom’s Subtraction Method is that I’m personally interested and even excited by what Tom has to teach. The promise of an affiliate payout alone wouldn’t do it.

But maybe you don’t even know what I mean by the Subtraction Method. If so, here are the details from my Al Pacino-themed email yesterday:

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Tom’s story is that he quit his high-powered London banking job in order to seek enlightenment. Enlightenment found, Tom ended up going back to the bank.

Curious, right?

The first time around at the bank was miserable, says Tom. The second time around has been enjoyable, stress-free, and even fulfilling.

What made the difference is what Tom calls the Subtraction Method.

The Subtraction Method is not about the kind of minimalism that involves living in a hut in the backwoods of Montana, shooting and skinning rabbits, and melting snow for drinking water.

Rather, it’s about a different kind of minimalism, one that has to do with ideas and attitudes.

The end result can be that you achieve all the external success you think you want now, and you do it on such terms that you’re not eaten out from inside like Michael Corleone or Al Pacino.

Or the end result can be you don’t achieve the external success you think you want now, and you find out that that’s perfectly fine, because what you thought you wanted is not what you actually want.

Here is where I start waving my hands and waffling and mumbling a little too much. Because the Subtraction Method is not my area of expertise. Rather it’s Tom’s area of expertise.

That’s why I’d like to invite you to sign up to his training. The training is free. It’s happening next Wednesday, Nov 6, at 8pm CET/2pm EST/11am PST. I’ll be there. If you’d like to be there as well, you can register to get in at the link below:

https://bejakovic.com/subtraction

A critical look at Daniel Throssell, part III

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In the unlikely case that my newsletter is the only direct marketer-y list you subscribe to, let me tell you some news:

Last week, there was an affiliate contest.

That means that a bunch of marketers all fought to promote the same affiliate offer, all at the same time. Beyond bragging rights, I assume there were also generous prizes for the best-performing affiliates, above and beyond the usual affiliate commissions.

I did not participate in this contest, and I didn’t even pay very close attention.

But I do know that among the people who did participate, there was a selection of A-list copywriters and top-flight industry gurus, with decades or maybe centuries of experience among them, and with big communities and hefty email lists at their disposal.

And yet:

The person who won this contest was a young guy, who apparently lives in the slums of a second-tier city in Australia… who nobody knew of before he started to build his legend online some five years ago… and who only has a modest-sized email list of his own.

That young guy is a certain Daniel Throssell.

I’m on Daniel’s list, and so I can share with you what Daniel wrote about the final results of this affiliate contest:

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As of the final cart close, I think I had something like 60% of the TOTAL sales (thus meeting my usual goal of ‘more than everyone else put together’) … and somewhere between 8-10x the sales of the second-place affiliate.

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How did Daniel do it?

I’ve already written a couple emails in past years with my thoughts on Daniel’s successful strategies (hence the “part III” in today’s subject line).

As for this most recent success of Daniel’s, my guess is it has to do with all three elements of the old 40/40/20 formula.

40% of your results comes down to your list…

… 40% down to your offer…

… and the remaining 20% down to the least important part, your copy. But it’s that least important part, the copy, that I want to talk about today.

In fact, I just wanna talk about one aspect of copy, a very mechanical aspect. Because even without paying close attention to this affiliate contest, one thing was notable to me:

Daniel sent 28 emails to his list to promote this affiliate offer.

He sent at least one email each day, as he does every day of the year, and many more emails as the deadline neared.

I’m not on the lists of all the other people who participated in this contest.

But from what I can see, most of the big names who did participate do not write daily emails to their lists outside of this promo. Some of them, including some who said they really really wanted to win the contest, chose not to send daily emails even during the actual promo.

To my Elmer Fudd mind, the conclusion is simple:

Email more, and you’ll make more sales, even if you don’t change a d-d-d-damned thing else.

But that’s not all.

Because if you email more, it’s gonna have a positive effect on that next 40% of your success, meaning your offers.

I defy anybody in the world to argue honestly that Daniel’s high-priced courses — which he gave away as free bonuses for this affiliate promo — would have the perceived value they have if Daniel didn’t send daily emails to build up desire for them… to justify the premium prices they sell for… to highlight all the other people who have bought these courses and praised them.

Anybody can say their course costs a thousand dollars. But that does nothing, unless people believe it, and unless they want it.

As for that other final 40%, your list:

I imagine that most everyone on Daniel’s list is also on at least one other list of someone who participated in this contest.

And yet, the odds are two-to-one (or actually better) that if such a person bought this affiliate offer, they bought it via Daniel.

In part, that comes back to the offer. But in part, it’s about the fact that daily emailing trains and transforms the people on your list.

The people on your email list are not simply “buyers” or “not buyers” — like it’s some God-given caste system you have no control over.

Relentless email followup, done well, takes disinterested or skeptical people and turns them into followers, converts, and partners. Not just anybody’s followers, converts, and partners — yours. That’s a moat that protects your business, even if some other business owner can somehow get the names and email addresses of everyone on your list.

So yeah.

Copy is the least important part of your success.

But in a way, it’s also the most important, via its effect on the perceived value of your offers, and via the transformation it creates in the people on your list. And I think Daniel’s results prove that.

All that’s to say… I don’t know? Email more? Maybe daily?

Yesterday, I announced a new service I’ll be launching over the next 30 days that gives you a new daily email prompt each day. The goal here is to make sending daily emails faster by an hour or two a week, and easier to start with and stick with for the long term.

I can tell you that my email today was based on one such prompt, one that I set myself a few days ago. Yes, I eat my own dog food.

I will be offering first access to this service to a small number of people on my list, based on who I think will be most likely to get value from it.

But my offer from last night still stands:

If you feel daily email prompts are something that could be useful to you, then hit reply and tell me what you like about this idea (do tell me why, because simply replying and saying “yes!” won’t do it). If you do that, I will add you to the priority list, so you have a chance to test this service out sooner rather than later.

My new 30-day startup

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Last week, my friend Sam — we studied computer nerdery together in college — forwarded me an interview with a note that said, “Pretty inspiring.”

I listened — 3 and 1/2 hours.

The guy being interviewed was a certain Pieter Levels. Levels is a software developer who creates websites and tech tools and puts them out into the world. Some take off, others don’t. At one point, Levels launched 12 startups in 12 months.

I realized while listening that I had actually come across some of these websites before. There’s Hoodmaps, which shows you a map of your city with crowdsourced tags for each neighborhood, down to the street level. There’s Photo AI, which I guess was one of the first services to allow you to put in your broke selfies and get out rich-looking professional headshots.

Levels has this philosophy of “build cool shit.” As far as the money goes:

Hoodmaps, virally popular though it is, makes no money.

On the other hand, Remote OK, another of Levels’s websites, was making $140k/month back in 2020 (it’s now scaled back to just $10k/month).

But since Levels keeps spinning up new projects, and since most of them run independent of him after the initial sprint of work, the income starts to stack very nicely.

I’m telling you this because there’s a general insecurity that plagues my mind and maybe yours, and that is, “Will it fly? Is this the right project to embark on? Will I end up wasting my time and only get frustration and disappointment as a reward?”

One option for dealing with this insecurity is to wait for a lightning bolt from heaven to strike you and leave you with the certainty of a life mission, one that you will pursue at all cost.

Another option could be something like Levels is doing. To commit to a process. Say, a new “startup” every month, one that you make so tight and well-defined and bare-bones that it can be launched in 30 days or fewer.

At the end of your month, if you reel in your line and find nothing there, then next month, you put a new piece of bait on your hook and cast it out into the world again.

On the other hand, maybe you catch a live and possibly magical goldfish. You then gotta figure out what to do with it — throw it back, club it to death and eat it, or maybe put it inside your aquarium at home and nurture it and watch it grow.

I’ve decided to do this myself.

I will tell you my first “startup.” It’s based on something I learned from Ben Settle, in an appendix to his Email Players Skhema. That’s where Ben gives a sample 30-day email schedule, with a different prompt — “personal story,” “challenge assumptions” — for each day.

I took that idea and I’ve been using it on and off for years. At the start of the month, I spend an hour or so to plan out what kind of email to send each day, over the coming 30 days.

Even when I’m “on” with this daily prompt habit, I don’t always stick to the prompt I’ve set out for myself. Some days I have a specific thing in mind for my daily email, or something specific to promote, and that is good enough.

But in general, I’ve noticed that when I’m “off” this daily prompt habit, when I entirely improvise each day’s email, day after day, my emails take longer to write… end up trying to do too much… and are simply less effective.

On the other hand, when I follow a prompt I’ve set for myself ahead of time, it forces me to actually be more creative. Plus I get my emails done faster, and the result (based on both feedback and sales I’ve had) seems to be better than emails that are improvised from the ground up.

I can tell you this email you’re reading now was based on a prompt I set out for myself ahead of time. As they say in the software development world, I am eating my own dog food.

Over the next 30 days, I will be creating a subscription that gives you a new daily email prompt each day. The ultimate goal here is to shave shave off writing time if you’re already sending emails regularly, and to make it more likely that you send consistently if you don’t do so yet, so you keep building up the relationship with the people on your list, and so you have a real shot at making sales.

I will be offering first access to this to a small number of people on my list, based on who I think will be most likely to get value from it.

But I will make you a deal right now:

If you feel daily email prompts are something that could be useful to you, then hit reply and tell me what you like about this idea. In turn, I will add you to the priority list, so you have a chance to test this service out sooner rather than later.

Solid as a rock

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I was on the Barcelona metro yesterday, bouncing along, keeping my eye out for potential assailants, and listening to a podcast — James Schramko interviewing Ryan Lee.

In case those names don’t mean much to you, both guys are highly successful, highly influential Internet marketers.

Both James and Ryan have been at it for decades.

Both have made many millions for themselves, and probably hundreds of millions for their various coaching clients.

For example, Ryan has coached multimillionaire fitness marketers like Mike Geary (PaleoHacks, Truth About Abs) and Jeff Cavaliere (Athlean-X, 14M subscribers on YouTube).

James on the other hand has coached multimillionaire info marketers like Ryan Levesque (ASK Method) and Kevin Rogers (Copy Chief).

Point being, both Jeff and Ryan are the real deal when it comes to knowledge of Internet marketing and to getting actual results.

At the end of the interview, just as I was nearing my stop, James summed up the takeaways of their call, with Ryan jumping in:

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JAMES:

1. Find a way to get recurring income

2. Keep it as simple as possible

3. YouTube is a strong front-end driver and potentially a good income earner

4. Email is still solid as a rock

RYAN: No matter what you do, whatever social platform you pick…

JAMES: … build an email list.

RYAN: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram — get ’em on your list, because at the end of the day, you control it.

JAMES: That’s the simple advice that people ignore.

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I’m telling you all this because there are still people who say they don’t have time to email.

Maybe that’s you too.

I’m sure you’re busy, and you have lots of stuff to do. Work, family, dog, cat.

I can completely understand.

I just wanted to share the point of view of James and Ryan above, because they are both very experienced… because they both make very nice money by working something like 10-15 hours a week… and because they are not in the business of selling email marketing or email copywriting.

And yet, both agree that there are only a few needed ingredients for long-term success… and that email is one non-negotiable part of that. (By the way, they both practice what they preach, and write emails, as Ryan says, dailyish.)

If you want to follow their simple advice, and you also want to see how to write dailyish emails faster, in as little as 15-20 minutes a day, without being particularly creative or inspired, then take a look here:

https://bejakovic.com/sme

60% of my book is meh, says reader

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I got a hot/cold review for my book on Amazon a few weeks ago. The headline of the review says, “great.” The number of stars is five. And yet, the actual review reads:

“Love this, recommend this. Could use an update and some more work, 60% is meh. But the other 40% might make about $20k in the next week. So that’s a good ROI on 45 minutes of reading.”

That’s quite an emotional rollercoaster for 37 words.

When I first read it, I was left confused, exhilarated, offended. “Love this… 60% is meh… good ROI.”

I can tell you two things:

1. If you want people to feel something about you, notice you, react to you, then giving them the hot/cold treatment is much more effective than giving them either the hot treatment or the cold treatment by itself. And if you want proof of that, then take this email as proof.

2. Even though the dude above says 60% of my book is meh, I am on the whole well-pleased to have his review up on my page. Not because he gave me 5 stars or because he says he loves the book, but because it sounds like he might be somebody who takes action.

And ultimately, people who take action are the kinds of people you wanna associate with, at least if you are involved in something that might be called business.

If you need some ideas to take action on, here’s my book.

40% of it is apparently worthwhile and has money-making potential, that is, if you have 45 minutes and $5 to spare. Link:

​https://bejakovic.com/new10commandments

Czech Russell Brunson’s uncreative success

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A couple days ago, I asked readers what subscription or continuity offers they be payin’ for. I got a number of responses to that email, featuring some familiar offers, and some that are entirely new to me.

For example, a long-time reader from Czechia wrote to tell me about a mastermind he signed up for last month, centered around a “Czech copycat of Russell Brunson.”

“Copycat!” I hear someone saying. “That’s rrreprehensible!”

And yet, this Czech Russell Brunson is clearly seeing success. This made me think back to the real Russell Brunson’s mentor, Dan Kennedy. Dan likes to share the following quote, attributed to McDonald’s CEO Ray “Killer” Kroc:

“Creativity is over-rated. Most business success comes from doing boring, diligent work. From developing a system that produces consistent results and sticking to it.”

Developing, I might add, or swiping…

Anyways, my long-time reader from Czechia finished his message about Czech Russell Brunson by saying:

“I am interested in seeing if you are cooking some continuity of your own, maybe not a postcard this time around 😂“

That’s very on point. I am cooking up — or more like shopping for ingredients for – my own continuity offer.

I want to make this new continuity offer, well, continuous.

Instead of having 10 people sign up and stay signed up for two months each, I’d rather have one person sign up and stay signed up for 20 months.

Also, I want to cook up this new continuity offer sooner rather than later, simply because I am impatient.

Enter my 3rd Conversion training, which I announced in a bit of a hurry yesterday, without much fanfare, buildup, or teasing.

The promise for this 3rd Conversion training is that I will show you how to make your paid info products — whether courses, memberships, or paid newsletters — more likely to be consumable and enjoyable, with the goal of turning one-time buyers into long-term repeat customers.

(Hence, 3rd Conversion.)

I can tell you honestly, I am putting on this training as much for myself as for you.

I’m thinking about all the ways people have gotten me to stick around and consume their products… as well as techniques I’ve used to achieve the same, wittingly and unwittingly, in my own info products like Most Valuable Email and Copy Riddles.

After some pondering, I managed to group all these techniques into three broad categories. Using the analogy of a restaurant, these categories map broadly to 1. Kitchen 2. Table Service 3. Ambiance.

In each category, I have several specific techniques in mind, each backed with a few case studies.

Frankly, I might not be able to cover all this in the 3rd Conversion call on Thursday, not without violating my own rules of consumption. I’d rather make the call more enjoyable and useful than to comprehensive and nausea-inducing.

But I can promise you that, if I don’t decide to cover all the techniques I have in mind on the call itself, I’ll get them to you afterwards, most likely in some written format.

And in case you’re wondering:

Some of the techniques I have in mind would no doubt be familiar to you if you could see them now. Others, on the other hand, are almost sure to be new.

Frankly, even one or two of these techniques, whether you know them or not already, would instantly make your existing products more consumable and enjoyable for buyers.

That means that, if you were to implement just one or two of these techniques right after the call on Thursday, you could reasonably have a few extra sales by existing buyers by the end of the week. That’s likely to be worth hundreds or thousands of dollars right away, and probably, much more down the line.

And yet, I’m pricing this 3rd Conversion training at $100.

I’m offering it at this firesale price is because my primary goal is just to pull all this information together, and to do it now.

My secondary goal is to get feedback live from people once I share these techniques on the call. Maybe that will be you as well.

Last I can tell you that, if I ever make this training available again, it won’t be as a recording of this workshop… but as a proper course for $500 or more.

The 3rd Conversion call will happen this Thursday at 8pm CET/2pm EST/11am PST. There will be a recording which I will send out after the call, though if you can make it live, you and I both are sure to benefit more from it.

If you’d like to sign up for 3rd Conversion now, here’s where to go:

https://bejakovic.com/3rd-conversion

The old peanut butter & jelly

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A week ago, a dude wrote me with a proposition:

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Proposition for you: let me in on your Simple Money Emails course and I’ll interview you on my channel, promote your stuff in the description of the video, and anything else.

I heard you in an interview, good stuff, authentic…most other marketers in interviews put me to shleep.

Anyhow, if you’re interested, great. If not, no probs mate.

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… and below that, the dude included a link to his YouTube channel.

Now here’s a fact:

Last month, I got paid good money to come and talk about email marketing inside a small and closed-door coaching community. This involved preparing a bit of a presentation, and critiquing some copy, and a level of transparency regarding how-to that I don’t promise in podcast interviews.

But even when I’m not getting paid to come and speak in front of a group, I don’t pay for the same privilege.

The way I look at it, a podcast or other kind of interview is already a kind of barter:

The host has the audience/platform… I bring the interesting content for that audience.

It’s like peanut butter & jelly. Each has limited dietary uses on its own… but put them together, and you’ve got a culinary marvel you can live on for the rest of your life.

The point I’m trying to make is not that you should be a hard-nosed “Never pay!” negotiator. There are plenty of good occasions to pay for self-promotion. (Last year I paid Daniel Throssell $1k to run 50 words of copy in his newsletter, offering his audience a bunch of valuable stuff for free.)

My point is simply that if you have or can provide good content, there are people who have an audience and who could use good content.

And vicey versy. If you have a platform and distribution, there are people who would love to come and sell for you, present for you, make their good offers available for you.

The old peanut butter & jelly.

And speaking of:

If you run a private community… mastermind… coaching group… podcast… YouTube channel… small-town newspaper… community bulletin board at the local dog park… and you need someone to talk interesting, and to talk email marketing, then reach out to me. Maybe we can barter in a way that makes us both better off.

My piratin’ days

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ARRR, I be quite old, much like a giant tortoise. And to prove it, I can tell you I was there when the Internet was first becoming a thing.

Quite naturally, I was also there when a friend in high school first told me you could get music, for free, on the Internet.

For reference, this was back when the only way to listen to the music you wanted, when you wanted, was to hand over the modern equivalent of about $30 for a CD.

“No!” I told my friend in disbelief when he told me about this piracy stuff.

“Yes!” he said. “Any kind of music you want. You just type the name of the song into AltaVista, and you look for mp3 files.”

So I tried it. I remember that the first song I searched for and pirated was The Beach Boys’ I Get Around. It took about three days to download.

Now here’s the head trip:

A short while later, I actually ended up handing over the modern equivalent of about $30 for a CD, The Beach Boys’ Greatest Hits, Volume 1.

I did this even though I had already pirated several Beach Boys hits off the Internet… and even though I could probably get the other ones too, with just a bit of searching.

Now let me make it clear:

1. This email is not an invitation to pirate and salve your conscience by saying you will somehow pay for it later, when you have more money. Piracy, romantic though it may sound, is well known to lead to scurvy and hangings, among other unpleasant consequences. It’s a miracle I survived my piratin’ days and lived to tell the tale.

2. This email is also not an invitation to give away your catchy songs for free, in the hope that people will eventually pay for the album. In fact, my point is kind of the opposite of that.

My point is that format is positioning.

I don’t remember exactly what made me pay for the Beach Boys CD.

I probably rationalized it to myself. I could listen to the music on my stereo instead of the crappy computer speakers… there were songs I might not find online, and they took so long to download… I could take the music with me and play it in the car or at a friend’s house.

There was probably a bit of all that. But really, I imagine my decision was mostly irrational.

The album had a colorful, attractive cover. I had the modern equivalent of $30 burning a hole in my pocket. Plus, I had been well trained over the years to buy CDs, and this was in fact a CD for sale. So I bought, and I was even happy about it.

Here’s my takeaway for you:

If you have free content, you can legitimately repackage it and sell it for good money, even to the people who have gotten much of that stuff for free in another format.

And if you’re selling stuff but not making as much money as you like, then the same lesson applies. Change the format, and you can double, triple, decuple, or even vinguple the prices you charge. People will buy, and even be happy about it.

Because format is positioning.

And if you want my help putting this lesson into practice, well, then read on. Today is the last day I will be making the offer below, because tomorrow we weigh anchor and set sail:

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I’ve set aside time over the next month to help two business owners to quickly churn up new offers using their catalogue of existing products. The ultimate goal here is to:

* Create something new and exciting for your audience, without creating entirely new products

* Develop a new asset for yourself — a new offer you can reissue in the future with little tweaks or maybe without any tweaks

* Bring in new buyers who might then buy other stuff from you, or get deeper into your world

* Do a bit of work and make back a good deal of money as a result

If you want a specific example:

Last week, I sent three emails over two days in what I called my Shangri-La MVE event. Those three emails ended up selling 22 copies of a $297 course that I had already promoted hundreds of times over the past couple years. $6.5k or so when all the money comes in, and all it took in terms of work was a couple of hours of repackaging content I already had.

I’ve run other such promo events, ranging anywhere from 1-14 days. Some were complete duds, and brought in less money than this Shangri-La event. But others brought in more, well into the 5-figures.

Your specific numbers?

It will depend on how big your list is, the relationship you have with the people on there, and of course your offers.

But with my second pair of eagle eyes scanning over all your assets… and my experience running not only my own “reissue events” but also coaching a couple dozen copywriters who worked on these kinds of promos for clients… you will be more likely to come out of this with a result you can be happy with.

Like I said, I’m talking to a few business owners about this already.

If you’re interested in this offer in principle, hit reply and let me know a bit about your list (size, how often you write, etc.) and your back catalogue of previous hits.

I will be promoting this offer until this Thursday. I want to talk to everyone who’s interested and find the two people I think I am best qualified to help… and then we’ll kick things off.