Business Ideas

I got paid $10k to listen to a dude talk for 20 minutes

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Last night, before I went to bed, an intriguing email landed in my inbox. The subject line read:

“I got paid $500k to write a 12-minute VSL”

The email came from copywriter Stefan Georgi. If you’re not on Stefan’s list or haven’t read the email yet, the gist is this:

* Stefan talked to a business owner about doing a VSL
* Stefan quoted $120k + a share of revenues
* The deal never happened
* Stefan kept following up, but got no response
* Months later, Stefan bumped into the business owner at a conference
* The business owner agreed to hire Stefan for a new project, a short 12-minute VSL
* Stefan ended up getting $500k in total, $250k up front, and another $250k as a “we’re so happy” bonus

Pretty crazy, right?

​​$500k for a 12-minute VSL?

​​Probably a thousand words total? $500 per word?

But there is a catch.

This business is a crypto project. And Stefan got paid in the tokens of that project.

These tokens might really be worth $500k one day. Or they might be worth more. Or they might turn out to be worse than monopoly money — not even the value of valueless paper.

If it sounds like I’m harping on the obvious like a jilted lover, that’s because this is a highly sensitive personal issue.

Back in 2017, a friend and I started a crypto news website.

2017 was the year of ICOs — crypto projects raising funds by selling their own tokens. Some projects were legit. Many were scams.

I had the idea to interview the founders of various ICO projects on camera. This would give investors a more realistic feel for who is a shyster and who is genuinely genuine.

The first founders I interviewed were from a project called CanYa, a kind of crypto Upwork.

I got on Zoom and listened to the founders of CanYa talk enthusiastically about their business for 20 minutes.

Once the call ended, the CanYa CEO said he wants to say thanks for the publicity (our YouTube channel had 4 subscribers). So he sent over $2k worth of CanYa coins.

“Pretty nice,” I thought, “though it might turn out to be monopoly money.”

But then, it happened. A few days later, CanYa started trading on a public exchange. And CanYa coins jumped from $1 to $5.

Suddenly, my 20 minutes of listening to some dude talk was worth $10k!

This was a hell of a business. “So long copywriting,” I said to myself. “Hello listening to people enthuse about their project at an effective hourly rate of $30,000 hour!”

Well.

​As you can see, I’m still in the copywriting and marketing world.

I no longer have that ICO news website with my friend.

And my former $10k treasure of CanYa coins, which I continue to sit on like a greedy dragon on his hoard, is today worth $22.02.

I’ve personally lost almost all my interest in crypto. I think that today, as in 2017, there are a few legit projects. As for the rest, it’s a bunch of hype and scams.

But you know, none of this is the point of why I told you about Stefan’s experience above.

The point is up there, hidden among those bullet points.

Maybe you can spot it. And if not, then read my email tomorrow. That’s where I will tell you the valuable point I have in mind, because today’s email is getting long.

To get that email when it comes out, you can sign up for my newsletter. The newsletter is free, though contributions of worthless crypto tokens are always welcome. Click here to sign up.

The fallout of my “rape” subject line

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3 days ago, I sent out an email with the subject line, “Don’t rape your audience.”

That hook came from a quote from screenwriter William Goldman (Princess Bride, Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid), who compared gradually seducing your audience (movie screenplays) to raping them (TV writing).

Like I said at the start of that email, rape is a shocking metaphor. In today’s society, it’s borderline impermissible.

So sure enough, when I checked my unsubscribe count for this email, it showed I disappointed, offended, or perhaps triggered a lot of people. ​​My unsubscribes proved it. I had 7 unsubscribes total, which might not sound like a lot, but is 5.8x my norm for the past 90 days.

I did the hard work of checking who all those unsubscribes were.

Some were new — they signed up only a few weeks ago for my “Analysis of Daniel Throssell” presentation.

Others had been on my list for a while.

Either way, none of them had ever bought anything from me… replied to any of my emails… played along with any of the engagement bait I regularly put out… or even opened and read my emails very often.

So there’s that, the hard and toxic fallout.

On the other hand, I also had a dozen thoughtful replies to my email, both about the subject line and the idea in the body. Almost all these replies came from successful marketers and copywriters. For example, copywriter Robert Smith, who runs his own CRO agency, wrote in to say:

Yo.

Yesterday I was on a zoom call with the team.

It was about our marketing emails.

I shared my screen and opened my email app to talk about a thing.

Instead of talking about our email stuff, we spent the next 10 minutes admiring your subject line.

It’s tier-1.

At first, I had a thought like:
“In a non-DR market this would get super-high Opens, but just as many Spam complaints.”

Addendum to original thought after opening:
“…Only if the body doesn’t deliver.”

3rd addendum after reading body:
“And… It delivered.”

Kick ass! And super inspiring to see. Really got me thinking: “my subject lines suck!”

Robert pretty much spelled out everything I wanted to say about this crisis.

Shocking subject lines, and shocking topics in general, will polarize your audience.

But if you can somehow back up your shocking stuff in a congruent way, you will only scrub away the barnacles clinging to the gleaming white hull of your magnificent ship.

At the same time, you will engage and bond more deeply with successful, thoughtful people, the kinds of people you want to associate yourself with, whether as customers, clients, or just readers.

You might say I am not telling you anything new here.

And you’re right. Ben Settle and Dan Kennedy before him have both been preaching this kind of repulsion marketing for years.

But fundamentals like this work. And so they are worth repeating from time to time. Until maybe the right time, when it all clicks for you and you decide to try it out for yourself.

Anyways, if you have a business, and you’re worried your subject lines suck, then you might want to hire me to help with that.

Because as of now, I’m offering consulting. And one of the things I’m highly qualified to consult on is email marketing and copywriting. And not just the shocking and repelling kind. And not just to my own email list.

If case you are interested, fill out the form below, and I’ll be in touch:

https://bejakovic.com/consulting

Spanish A-list copywriter makes me an indecent proposal

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Last year in September, I kicked off the third run of Copy Riddles, my program for learning copywriting by practicing bullets.

As part of that September run, I had a little each week for the best bullet. Anybody who wanted to could send me their bullets. The winner got a prize, usually a book on marketing and copywriting.

(The contest has since been shuttered, since I spun off a complete coaching program to go with Copy Riddles.)

Anyways, the very first week and the very first contest, out of something like fifty submissions, the winner was Rafa Casas, a Spanish-speaking and Spanish-writing copywriter.

Rafa’s first bullet won because it was so simple and promised such a clear and desirable benefit.

But Rafa kept submitting bullets for later bullet contests (no dice, you can only win once). Still, he had such clever and persuasive ideas that I was sure he will be a big success soon.

And it seems to be happening.

Rafa is now writing copy for a number of clients in Spain.

He’s also offering his own email copywriting coaching to a few clients, based on his experiences writing two daily email newsletters.

And from what I understand, he recently won some kind of fancy award in Spain, recognizing his wizard-like copywriting skills.

Put all this together, and I think it qualifies Rafa as an A-lister in the Spanish copywriting world.

And if you wonder whether Rafa really has the hard results to back up being called an A-lister… then I’ll tell you that copywriting stardom is more about endorsements, legend, and mental shortcuts than it is about results.

That’s something to ponder if you yourself have aspirations to become an A-list copywriter.

But back to the indecent proposal I promised you in my subject line. A few days ago, Rafa sent me the following email:

It turns out that this afternoon while I was waiting for my daughter to do her yoga class, I read, as I always do every Thursday afternoon with a coffee, the book I always read while I´m waiting for her: The 10 Commandments of A-list Copywriters, and I have come up with a business with which we will not become millionaires (not for now) but it will not cost us money either.

What do you think if I translate your book into Spanish and we try to sell it to the Spanish-speaking world as well?

Of course I wouldn’t charge you anything for doing it, well not in money at least. The idea is that while I translate it and we try to sell it, I can learn from you the strategy that we implement to sell it, for example.

Immediately upon reading Rafa’s message, I drifted off into a pleasant fantasy. I saw myself being interviewed on CNN, with all the different translations of my book on a shelf behind me.

“So Bejako,” the CNN anchorwoman asked me, “what can you tell us, as an internationally read copywriting expert whose books have been translated into multiple languages, about the recent news of monkey pox? Is this something to worry about? Is washing our hands with soap enough? And are there influence and persuasion principles we can learn from this?”

My dream balloon popped. I fell back to reality.

I realized was that Rafa’s proposal was indecent. But only in the original sense of that word, meaning not suitable or fitting.

Because while I would love to have a Spanish-language version of my book, it’s probably not worth Rafa’s time to translate it. Either for the money we could make together, or for the learning experience of how I might promote that book.

My feeling on these Kindle books is that they are valuable for credibility and as lead magnets.

They siphon people from Amazon into your world. They sit there, more or less passively, and do their work. In my experience, most of their value comes without any added promotion, outside of some very basic Amazon ads and occasional mentions in this newsletter.

Maybe you think that’s a cavalier attitude about promotion for somebody who calls himself a marketer.

Perhaps. But perhaps it’s about the best use of your time.

So in case I haven’t piled on the value in this email sufficiently, I will give you one last practical tidbit. It comes from James Altucher.

James is an interesting and quirky Internet personality. He has written and published 20 books, both fiction and non-fiction. And he’s doing something right, because he has amassed a huge audience… sold truckloads of books… and even had a WSJ bestseller with a book he self-published.

Here’s the book-marketing tidbit. James asks:

What’s the best way to promote your first book?

Simple.

Write your second book.

That’s what I’m planning to do to promote my 10 Commandments book. Along with, of course, occasional mentions in this email newsletter.

So if you don’t have a copy of the 10 Commandments of A-list Copywriters… and you want to find out why a star in the Spanish copywriting sky like Rafa might want to read this book every Thursday afternoon… then take a look below:

https://bejakovic.com/10commandments​​

How to create positioning that your more established competition will eat itself alive for

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Around 10:20pm, a tiny dot appeared in the skies above Le Bourget Aerodrome in Paris, France.

A crowd of thousands of people, happy and slightly drunk, waiting at the airport, started to cheer and push forward. Men took off their hats and waved them in the air. Women, a little more dignified, kept their hats on.

The dot grew larger. It was now visibly a gray and white monoplane.

At 10:22pm on May 21 1927, exactly 95 years ago, the plane landed. The drunk and happy crowd ran out onto the tarmac and immediately surrounded it on all sides.

Out of the plane, a slim, worn-looking young man staggered out and raised his hand in greeting. After 55 hours of non-stop flying, across more than 3,600 miles, he had finally done it.

An incredible feat. Celebrated around the globe.

Worthy of being remembered even a century later.

Charles Lindbergh, the Lone Eagle, had become the third man to fly nonstop across the Atlantic.

Yes, third.

What? That’s not how you know the story? You know Lindbergh as the 25-year old flier who gained instant worldwide fame by becoming the first man to fly nonstop across the Atlantic?

I’m here to tell you it wasn’t so. In June 1919, two British fliers, John Alcock and Arthur Brown, made the first nonstop transatlantic flight. They flew from Newfoundland to Ireland.

Sure, Lindbergh’s flight from New York to Paris was longer, almost double the length. And he was flying solo.

But on the other hand, Alcock and Brown did it eight years earlier, with much wonkier technology — planes were developing fast in those days. So perhaps their feat was braver and more impressive than Lindbergh’s.

It’s kind of a puzzle, isn’t it?

Why did Charles Lindbergh become an instantaneous celebrity by flying across the Atlantic? And why has nobody ever told you, until I told you today, that two other guys flew across the Atlantic almost a decade earlier?

I’ll give you one good reason:

Spectacle.

Lindbergh was flying to win a much talked-about prize of $25,000, worth over $415,000 in today’s money, put up by a French-American businessman, and left unclaimed for over 8 years.

Days before the famous transatlantic flight, Lindbergh flew from San Diego to New York, setting a record for the fastest transcontinental crossing, and building up anticipation and interest.

Also, 1927 was a mostly peaceful and stable year in Europe and the U.S. Newspapers were hungry for a story, and young Lindy was a good-looking kid.

And then, there were all the idle and drunk crowds in New York, the idle and drunk crowds in Paris, the American ambassador to France putting in an appearance, and a collection of the best French aviators at the time, circling the Paris skies in anticipation of Lindbergh’s arrival.

Poor Alcock and Brown didn’t have any of those advantages. And that’s why nobody ever celebrates them today.

So my point is:

If you want people to remember you, get yourself some spectacle.

Think big. Create anticipation. Enlist slightly drunken crowds to stand around and cheer as you do whatever it is that you do.

It can turn you into worldwide celebrity, a daredevil star, someone who is talked about for years or decades or even a century later.

Or if your ambitions are smaller, and mainly focus on making money and having a business, it will give you positioning. The kind of positioning that others in your industry, who were there long before you — working hard, risking it all, for not much acclaim — will eat themselves alive for.

For more positioning ideas and advice, you might like my spectacular email newsletter.

Opportunity doesn’t come in a sales letter

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A couple weeks ago, I sent out an email about my history making a living, for a few months at least, by writing and selling $2.99 books on Kindle. To which a reader wrote in and asked:

Every day, I get inundated with ads about ‘building passive income with kindle ebooks.’

​Is this one of those overblown opportunities that resembles a once pristine reef teeming with life that’s now been trampled into oblivion?

​Curious to hear your thoughts, as you’ve actually been in that space.

My answer is something marketer Rich Schefren likes to say, which is that opportunity doesn’t come in a sales letter.

The implied or overt promise for any make-money thing is to get rich in just 78 days or less, and then retire if you want to, so you can start worrying about how to spend all that free time you’ve suddenly saddled yourself with.

It makes sense to sell this promise to people because that’s what we all respond to. But it’s not something you want to buy yourself.

That’s not to say that Kindle publishing has become a dead and fossilized reef, with only a few pale and hungry blobfish still swimming around and trying to eek out a bit of nourishment from it.

It doesn’t even mean that it’s not worth paying for a course to guide you through the technical work of picking a niche, writing up and formatting your first book, getting the cover done, etc.

That information can easily be worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars to you, if it saves you time that you would have spent to figure out the same stuff.

Or it​ can be worth infinitely more — if it makes the difference between you getting overwhelmed and giving up on a project and sticking with it and ultimately having success with it.

My bigger point is that if you decide to buy a book, course, membership, mastermind, coaching program, whatever, be mindful of what you’re buying… and figure out how to make that thing pay for itself.

​​Apply the ideas you’re getting exposed to. Work harder. Do things you wouldn’t have normally done.

​​It might not be as sexy and colorful as a pristine reef teeming with life… but it’s a guaranteed opportunity to succeed, in just 78 days, or a few months more.

But back to Rich Schefren. I have a offer for you today:

Last year, I regularly promoted Rich’s Steal Our Winners. That’s where Rich interviews a handful of successful marketers each month, and gets them to share a tactic or idea that is working for them right now. You can think of it as a bunch of opportunities, but not in a sales letter.

Steal Our Winners used to be an attractive offer and an easy sale to make — you could try it out for just $1 for the first month.

But then they changed the offer. The $1 trial disappeared, and was replaced by a lifetime-only subscription. So I stopped promoting Steal Our Winners.

But now, the $1 trial is back. So I’m promoting it again, because I still think Steal Our Winners is a valuable source of new marketing ideas.

The only issue is that the layout of the Steal Our Winners site has changed, and for the worse. It’s been redesigned to become more confusing, more YouTube-like, and less monthly newsletter-like. I personally find that annoying, but maybe it won’t be an issue for you, particularly if you didn’t get used to the old site.

In any case, if you are curious to find out more about Steal Our Winners, or even to try it out for $1, here’s the link:

https://bejakovic.com/sow

John Bejakovic writes only for the Letter

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I’ve got a quirky history lesson for you today. But before you run and hide, let me say this lesson is as valuable and as relevant as an NFT investing tip. Here goes:

The first full-page advertisement in the U.S. appeared in The New York Herald, on June 7, 1856. It repeated the same phrase nearly a thousand times, all the way down the page:

“Fanny Fern writes only for the Ledger”

The ad was taken out by the extravagant Robert Bonner, the owner of the Herald’s rival newspaper, The New York Ledger.

​​Bonner had hired a then-popular writer, Fanny Fern, to write a story for his newspaper at an astronomical $100 per column. And now he was advertising the fact, over and over, in a single ad, in his rival’s newspaper.

Result?

The circulation of The Ledger doubled, to nearly 50k.

Bonner didn’t repeat this exact ad in the future, but he kept his eccentric advertising practices to promote his newspaper. Sometimes he repeated a phrase in an ad over and over, sometimes he ran a full-page ad that was almost entirely empty.

His newspaper circulation grew and grew. Bonner died a millionaire, back when a million bucks could buy you a skyscraper or three.

So what’s the point?

Well, I won’t try to massage this little story into a stiff lesson for you. Rather, I’d like give you a meta-point:

A clear example or two, or fifty, are often more valuable than a bunch of rules.

And if you truly are interested in persuasion, influence, copywriting, and the like, then there’s an entire history of real-world experiments out there, just waiting for you to discover and rediscover.

Maybe you can reduce these experiments to theoretical rules. Or maybe, more profitably and usefully, you can just use them for new ideas you can imitate, sometimes verbatim, in your own marketing and influence efforts today.

Speaking of which:

My headline above says, “John Bejakovic writes only for the Letter.”

The Letter. Yes. That’s the name for my daily email newsletter. The John Bejakovic Letter. In case you want to join the growing circulation of this little rag, I still have a few copies available, and you can sign up to get one, on the regular, for free.

How to come up with email topics your list will love to read and not buy from

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I just got home from a beautiful, sunny, morning walk. Not only is it Sunday morning, but where I am right now, it’s Easter, which means the streets are blessedly empty. Just the sun, trees, birds, and occasional whining cat are out and about.

I got home filled with positive impressions and opened my laptop. YouTube asked — resume video?

Suddenly, a weight settled on my shoulders.

​​I have a habit of leaving music playing when I go out of the house. It happened this morning too, until YouTube paused it at some point. Now it was asking if I want to continue.

My finger lingered over the resume button. I could see the next song that would play. It was both appealing and repulsive:

Gerry Rafferty’s Baker Street.

I’m telling you all this as an example of a real problem I’ve noticed in my life.

​​My mind is becoming a closed garden, with songs I have known before and humor and ideas I have known before as the only plants that have a chance to take root.

I’ve listened to Baker Street, by my estimate, some 13 million times in my life. Do I need to listen to it again? No, in fact, it’s become irritating. But do I want to listen to anything else, anything new? Not really.

I don’t have a solution to this problem.

​​Perhaps you have a solution for me.

Or perhaps you don’t. Perhaps just have the same problem, and feel a little excited that at least one other person shares your problem.

Or perhaps not even that. Perhaps you don’t have this problem at all, but you just found it curious to read that somebody could experience such a deep life crisis around the topic of Baker Street.

If any of these is true, then I guess I’ve done my job.

Because when I opened up my laptop, closed down YouTube (sorry Gerry), and got to work, I made a list.

​​It was titled, “10 problems I have in my life right now.”

Making this list wasn’t depressing. In fact was a relief to get it out of my head and on to the page.

#8 was the “closed garden” problem above.

#6 was that I have no email topic for today.

​​Well, at least that problem’s solved for now.

So maybe you can do the same. If you have to come up with ideas, topics, or content, start by making an honest list of problems you have in your life. And then pick one of those problems and write about it.

​​It always does well for me when I send out an email like that.

“You mean you make lots of sales like that?” you ask.

What, have you been reading my “10 problems” list?
​
​​The answer is no, if you really must know. I don’t make sales like that, but that’s because I don’t have enough offers to sell. That’s a real problem in my life. Well, at least until I turn it into a topic for another email. If you want to read that when it comes out, or if you’re interested in copywriting and marketing, sign up to my email newsletter.

Unique, slightly gross positioning through “whale fall”

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A whale is denser than water. When a whale dies and stops breathing, it sinks to the bottom of the ocean. It then forms something called a “whale fall.”

A bunch of shrimps, crabs, and sea cucumbers suddenly appear. Some of these creatures specialize in eating the whale’s soft tissues. Some suck the fat out of whale bones. Others colonize the whale skeleton. In short, a whale fall creates a whole new ecosystem, which can last for many years.

Do you think this could be a way to create a business?

I once read Craigslist was basically an Internet whale that sank to the bottom. When it did, a bunch of creatures crawled out and started feeding off its carcass. So Airbnb scarfed up the vacation rentals. Indeed.com sucked in the job listings. Tinder ate the “casual encounters” section.

Maybe that’s a way for you too to start a business right now. Today’s whales like Facebook and Google are becoming less popular. Many of their services don’t work well. Maybe you can peel one off, and simply do a better job.

Or if you want personal positioning, why not turn your hungry eyes toward a whale influencer?

Guys like Jay Abraham or Frank Kern have been around for a long time. Over the years, they’ve had lots of different angles and ideas. They can’t focus on all of them. So you could pick one that appeals to your appetites, chomp into it, and make it into a steady stream of nourishment.

Maybe this whale fall discussion is getting a little gross. But the basic idea is sound. Few things are new in the world. We mostly take what came before us, and recycle it to new purposes. So go forth and prosper, you ambitious sea cucumber, you.

Are you still here? I don’t have any more whale facts for today. But if you want more marketing and business ideas, click here and subscribe to my daily newsletter.

“Filthy animals”: How to become a star and embarrass your mom

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Colby’s phone was ringing. He looked at it and his head sank to his chest.

It was his mom again. He would have to finally talk to her. And he knew what she would say.

“This is horrible, Colby,” his mom yelled as soon as he answered. “How could you? I just saw it again on ESPN! You called them filthy animals! An entire country, and you called them filthy animals! This is not how we raised you Colby! I should come over there and wash your mouth out with a bar of soap!”

You might know who I’m talking about. Colby “Chaos” Covington, currently the number-1-ranked welterweight in the UFC.

In case that doesn’t mean much to you, let me explain:

Covington is a professional MMA fighter. And he’s good at fighting.

But it turns out fighting is only a part of his job.

So in spite of being good at fighting, Covington was at one point on the edge of getting dropped from his contract with the UFC.

He was just not very exciting to watch or listen to.

So Covington started wearing a MAGA hat and name-dropping Donald Trump at every opportunity…

He started talking up his support and admiration of the police, right as the BLM movement was dominating the news…

And then, he went into his fight against the Brazilian fighter Damian Maia, in Sao Paolo, Brazil.

And right after beating Maia, during the post-fight interview, as the crowd started whistling and booing, Covington yelled into the microphone that Brazil is a dump and that Brazilians are filthy animals.

“What do you want me to do, mom?” he said when she finally gave him a chance to speak. “They really were acting like animals. They were all drunk, and they were throwing things at me and booing.”

So that’s the point I want to share with you today.

Covington says his public persona is really him. He’s not making it up.

He is a Trump supporter. He does admire and support the police and the military. And he thought the Brazilian crowd, before and during and after his Sao Paolo fight, was being incredibly rude.

The difference is, Covington took all those things… and he took them to 100.

It definitely worked for him. He had his UFC contract extended… he started making much more money… and he became one of the biggest names in the sport today.

And it can be the same for you, too.

You don’t have to be a natural to succeed at anything. Including having a personality.

You can even have fun doing it. A/B test different aspects of who you already are… exaggerate them, caricature them… and see what people respond to.

Money, fame, and opportunities will follow.

And in case you’re wondering:

Yes, I am telling this to you as much as to myself. Because this is an exercise I have been slacking off on doing.

So if in the near future you want to see me contradicting myself blatantly… or writing about crystal skulls and Akashic records… or announcing that I have converted to Taoism… well, sign up to my email newsletter. And get ready to witness my transformation.

 

Marketing to frustrated newlyweds and disgusted divorcees

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Last autumn, Reuters published an article about an Iraqi man named Aram Mehdi. Mehdi belongs to the persecuted Kurdish minority in Iraq. And though he grew up Muslim, Mehdi converted from Islam to Zoroastrianism.

He says it’s been a real struggle:

“We cannot even write a comment on a Facebook post as a Zoroastrian. Some people say it’s a taboo to dine with you, ugly animals are better than you. Others say, ‘Just let us know where you are if you dare.'”

Maybe your reaction to this is, “Wow that’s terrible. Poor born-again Iraqi Zoroastrians.”

Or maybe you’re heartless like me. And maybe your reaction was more like, “Seriously guy, you were kind of asking for it. After all, if you are a member of a persecuted minority in a war-torn country… why would you willingly make yourself a member of an even smaller, even more persecuted minority?”

Well, maybe because it’s fundamental human psychology.

Over the past few months, I’ve shared a lot of quotes from Eric Hoffer’s book True Believer. That’s because it’s so full of interesting ideas.

I’m gonna do it again in just a moment. But before you turn me off, I will tell you this idea has real, concrete, maybe even profitable direct marketing implications.

Ok, on to Hoffer and his quote:

“Since all mass movements draw their adherents from the same types of humanity and appeal to the same types of mind, it follows: (a) all mass movements are competitive, and the gain of one in adherents is the loss of all the others; (b) all mass movements are interchangeable. One mass movement readily transforms itself into another. A religious movement may develop into a social revolution or a nationalist movement; a social revolution, into militant nationalism or a religious movement; a nationalist movement into a social revolution or a religious movement.”

The starting point of Hoffer’s book is that people who join holy causes are fundamentally frustrated. And they look to the holy cause as a way of escaping their current, flawed selves, and being reborn in some new, cleansing identity.

For that, the actual holy cause doesn’t matter too much. Many potential ones will do.

For example, if for any reason you cannot be reborn as a freedom fighter (Kurdish minority in Iraq)… well, then there’s always some fringe religious movement that’s open to you (Zoroastrian minority in a dominantly Muslim country). And if that doesn’t work, then maybe you can become an anarchist or a communist or a pacifist.

So that’s the interesting psychology idea — or interesting to me at least. Now here’s the related direct marketing advice.

It’s based on the fact that direct response customers are also fundamentally frustrated. They share many traits with Hoffer’s true believers.

And that’s why if you run a DR business, your best prospects are either the newlyweds or the divorced. Either people who recently bought something from your competition for the first time… or people who recently walked away from your competition in disgust, and who claim they will never buy anything like that ever again.

Because those people are still frustrated. And because their holy cause — the product they are buying and identifying with — doesn’t matter all that much.

What does this mean practically?

Well, in the good old days of direct mail, you could actually buy lists of unsubscribers or new buyers.

But even today, with a bit of thought, I believe can apply this to your business.

For example, you might have your own list of fallen subscribers or customers. This might be your most valuable resource – if you sell it to your competition.

And vice versa. Your best leads might come from a joint venture with your competition. Just have them send you their disgusted ex-customers.

More broadly:

If you’re trying to position yourself in the market, you don’t have to be so unique, likeable, or even much of an expert. Just make it clear you are not that other guy — while still promising the same opportunity for blessed escape that the other guy was selling.

By the way, if you really hate Ben Settle, and his email marketing tips, you might like my daily email newsletter about marketing and copywriting. you can sign up for it here.