Copywriting

Green Valley must fire its warehouse manager

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Last week, supplement company Green Valley, which was founded by A-list copywriter Lee Euler, sent out a panicked email that started with:

Dear John,

We discovered somewhat of a sticky situation last week…

So I’m hoping maybe we can help each other out…

You see, late last week our warehouse manager called to let me know that we have NO room for a large shipment that’s already on its way to our fulfillment facility here in Virginia…

That means I now have to get rid of a few pallets worth of one of our top sellers…

So, I’m knocking 70% off Gluco-Secure—a natural breakthrough shown to…

I don’t know who’s at fault here. But I find the warehouse manager’s “not my circus, not my monkeys” attitude contemptible. ​​Particularly since he allowed a similar situation to happen last September. That’s when Green Valley sent out an email that started:

Dear John,

I never do this.

But I have a small problem and I think maybe we can help each other out.

Yesterday afternoon the Green Valley warehouse manager let me know that they have NO room in the warehouse for a truckload shipment of product that’s scheduled for delivery next week.

Somehow wires got crossed but it turns out we have 4 pallets of our top-selling joint pain formula that we need to clear out FAST to make room quickly for new inventory.

So, I’m doing something I never do…

I’m knocking 70% off a powerful joint-healing discovery…

Somehow wires got crossed?

Twice in under one year?

I don’t know what this warehouse manager is doing all day long. He’s clearly not doing his job. That’s why I say Green Valley must fire him, and must do it now.

But one person they shouldn’t fire is their email copywriter. Because that guy obviously knows about the power of reason why marketing.

Reason why is the most widespread and effective click, whirr mechanism in advertising.

​​Click, whirr, by the way, is the useful but somewhat-dated analogy Robert Cialdini used in his book Influence. You press the tape player button click, and whirr goes the automated behavior tape.

The incredible thing is that, just as with canned laughter and obvious flattery, reason why is effective even when it’s blatantly untrue.

I’m not saying you should lie… but you might choose to stretch the truth, until it turns into a reason why.

Because reason why works on you too. So if you ever need to justify why stretching the truth is ok, you can always say, for your own peace of mind and your customer’s,

“I never do this. But I have a small problem and I think maybe we can help each other out…”

Speaking of sticky situations:

I recently had an influx of new subscribers to my email newsletter. And I’m getting really close to a big round number of subscribers that I’ve always coveted.

So I’m going to do something I never do, in the hopes of quickly filling up those extra few newsletter subscriber spots.

For today only, I’m opening up my email newsletter to anybody to subscribe, for free, right here on this page. This opportunity might not come again for a long time. If you’re the type to grab a great opportunity when you see it, click here to subscribe now.

Superior solution, inferior marketing results?

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Direct marketing is counterintuitive. For me even the basics don’t come easy, so I have to use all kinds of metaphors to trick myself and avoid making stupid mistakes.

Otherwise, I end writing copy that seems perfect to me — but that makes as much of a splash as a feather floating down a well.

So here’s one metaphor that helps me and might help you, too. Let me illustrate it with a scene from this morning:

The apartment I’ve been staying in for the past few days is cold. This morning, I got cold while working there for an hour. Then I went out for a walk.

My body was tense and alert and guarded. Cold.

Outside, the sun was shining. And whenever I walked into a patch of sunlight somewhere, my body relaxed and my scowl changed into something like a smile. Warm.

But then I’d step back into the cold shadow next to a building or a bunch of trees. Each time, my body tensed up again and the scowl came back.

And so on. Over and over. Warm sunlight leading to a moment of openness and hope. Cold shadow again, making me closed and guarded.

My point is:

This is the same thing that’s going on with your prospects right now.

And if your marketing or copy is not getting all the results it’s capable of, it’s because you’re taking the focus off your prospects and their problems.

It’s a mistake that’s easy to make.

You try to get people to believe your message. You try to show them how you’re better and how you’re an expert and how you deliver results. How your solution is superior and solves the problems they have.

But people can’t hear you.

Because they’re shivering in the shadow, looking for a bit of warmth. The problem is you’re shifting the focus off them too soon, and onto some external thing.

People say they want a solution to their problem, but they really don’t. Not for a long, long time.

What they want is to be understood, to be validated, and to get an understanding themselves of why they’re in this mess to begin with.

That’s the warm sunshine that gets people’s body temperature up.

So keep the focus on them.

And only when they get so sweaty and uncomfortable that they can’t take any more hot sunlight… do you provide the cool shadow of a leafy tree and say, “Here, here’s what you need. And can I interest you in an ice-cold lemonade as well?”

Well, can I?

Because if you want more ideas on how to improve your marketing results, I write a daily email newsletter on that topic. You can sign up for it here.

“Self-describing copy”

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Copywriting is the easiest thing in the world to write about, if you do this:

Pick an idea that’s new and interesting to you. And then write an email, or a blog, or a newsletter, not just talking about that idea, but demonstrating it in action.

After all, a demo is the best kind of proof, and it’s also one of the 12 sticky messages.

But why am I not taking my own advice? Why am I telling you about this, instead of showing you? Silly me. Here, take a look:

“Coke and hookers”: Meghan Markle NYT story proves evergreen copywriting truth

This was the subject line I used in an post about the power of intriguing, dramatic headlines to drive readership. And based on open rates, it sure worked.

Here’s a second example. This is how I wrapped up a recent post about using cold reading to get people to buy into your system:

Finally, here’s a prediction:

You pride yourself on being an independent thinker. That’s why you don’t accept others’ statements without satisfactory proof.

Was I right? If yes, and you want to know the system I used to figure that out about you, then simply write me an email, and I’ll share all my secrets with you.

A bunch of people responded to that. They wanted to know what the secret is. Well, it was right there, in the post — but telling doesn’t work nearly as well as showing to make a point.

So this demonstration stuff is really great, both for your reader and for you.

But you know what’s even better?

It’s when you demonstrate a copywriting technique in action, but you don’t actually spell out what that is. You tease it a bit, you get the reader antsy because it’s sitting right there in front of his face, but he’s not 100% he’s got it. For example, take a look at the following:

I want to leave you with a couple of choices. Of course, you are perfectly free to ignore both and to take no action.

This was part of a post I wrote about an under-the-radar persuasion technique I had found myself getting manipulated by.

In the post, I spelled that technique out. Right now, in the interest of good demonstration, I won’t spell it out again here.

It’s not hard to figure out, but there are some subtleties to it. Anyways, I’m sure you’ve already got it. But in case you want to double-check, here’s the link to the post in question:

https://bejakovic.com/influence-2-0

How to get booked solid with paying clients without prospecting any harder or dropping your prices

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Today I have a copywriting tip for you, not a lead-gen tip. But if you are looking for a way to get more client work, then here’s an idea from a recent Ben Settle email:

If you want clients who love and rave about you, be punctual.

It truly separates the men from the boys.

It also will make what I teach in my “Email Client Horde” book that’s on sale today a lot more powerful — potentially ramping up the respect and gratitude clients have for you, wanting to keep you, and not wanting to hire anyone else.

I’ve seen (and experienced) it many times.

I suspect you can, too.

Ben’s email had the subject line, “A secret way of using an ordinary pocket watch to get booked solid with paying clients.”

It’s a standard bullet writing technique. You zoom in on the solution. And then you zoom in some more. So far in, that the reader starts to wonder, “A pocket watch? Why specifically a pocket watch? Gotta find out.”

The best copywriters out there, from Gary Bencivenga to Parris Lampropoulos and David Deutsch, all use this technique regularly. But there’s a problem:

You can’t use it all the time. Your readers get wise, and get burned out. “Oh, it’s the teaspoon trick.” “Not the air conditioner secret again.” “There he goes, trying to get me to read by zooming in on a hairbrush.”

So what can you do?

There’s a second clever thing A-list copywriters do in situations like this. It’s probably obvious because you can find it in the subject line of this very email.

But if it’s not fully obvious, or you want a few examples of how A-list copywriters use this trick to create bullets that seem to be truly impossible, then you can find that in lesson 8 of my bullets course.

​​Which you can’t join just yet… but which will be available soon. If you want to make sure you get in while it is available, sign up for my email newsletter, because that’s where I will first announce it.

Why you’re not getting anything done

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“What do you want me to say?” I snapped.

My mom gave me a call yesterday. “What’s your plan for today?” she asked.

“I’m trying to work,” I said, “but I’m not being very productive.”

That was a mistake. Because it was really an invitation for my mom to ask me the worst possible question:

“Why do you think that is?”

I’ve written before about Tony Robbins. I’ve learned a lot from the guy. Perhaps the most valuable thing was the power of asking the right questions.

It really works.

By asking myself the right questions, I’ve made my way out of seemingly impossible situations, by doing less and by having more fun than I would ever have believed possible.

And vice versa.

By asking the wrong questions, I just agitate and muddle the mess I am already in. It starts to feel hopeless.

“Why do I think I’m not being productive? Let’s see… because I’m lazy? Because I’m frustrated with the project I’m working on? Because I feel the deadline looming… because I worry that I will miss it… and because I’m not strong enough to control my own brain, so this is turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy? What do you want me to say?”

Well. I didn’t say most of that stuff. But I was thinking it, while biting my lip. So I told my mom I would talk to her later, and I got back to staring at my half-complete, frustrating project, head in hands, wondering where it all went wrong.

Because asking WHY primes your brain to focus on failure and shortcomings. And while that might sound smart, it’s actually a bad way to spend your energy, and unlikely to do anything to move you forward. So don’t do it if you’re trying to be productive.

BUT!

Focusing on WHY is a great thing to get your prospect to do. Particularly if you have a new answer to that question.

As I’ve written before, a new answer to “WHY do I always fail” can allow you to “get one up” on jaded, hostile prospects who think they are too smart to fall for your marketing. And if you do it right, you can even become a star in your niche.

I won’t lay out the whole case for you here. That’s because I’ve written about this topic in detail already. You can find it as Commandment VII of my short book, The 10 Commandments of A-list Copywriters. In case you’re interested:

https://bejakovic.com/10commandments

How to get away with making extreme promises more often than you would ever believe

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In a recent email, A-list copywriter David Deutsch included the following P.S.:

P.S. Justin Goff says working with me enabled him to multiply his income 10 times over.

Not saying I’ll do that for you.

But it does show the power of getting the right kind of help improving your copy.

I call this frontloading. Here’s a second example of it, from an email by Ben Settle:

And it contains the exact same methods I used to land high-paying clients who could have easily afforded to hire better and more seasoned writers. But, using my sneaky ways, they not only hired me… they hired only me (often multiple times, plus referring me to their friends), without doing the usual client-copywriter dance around price, without jumping through hoops to sell myself, and without even showing them my portfolio, in most cases.

I used this info during good and bad economic times.

In fact, I got more high paying clients during the bad times (2008-2010) than the good times.

I cannot guarantee you will have the same results.

And the methodology doesn’t work overnight.

But, that’s how it worked out in my case, and this book shows you what I did.

So those are two examples of frontloading. It works like this:

First, you make a powerful, extreme promise. Then you qualify your promise. That way, you create believability… while still leaving the extreme promise ringing in your prospect’s head.

This works well as a way to organize a single sales argument (as in David’s case above). It can also shape your entire message (as in Ben’s email).

I think of it like grabbing a man by the shoulders and shaking him violently. Once his body goes limp and his head starts to swim, then you let him go and even dust off his shoulders and straighten out his rumpled shirt a bit.

In other words, you agitate and agitate your prospect… and then you agitate some more… and then you ask him to be reasonable.

Of course, you can also choose to be more subtle about it. You can only agitate a little bit, and then immediately get more reasonable. This can work well in your subject lines… or even your headlines.

Anyways, in case you want to get on board the most interesting email newsletter in the world, according to several marketers and copywriters who are subscribed to it, here’s where to go.

Great product names for dummies

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Today I spent some time looking up the worst book titles of all time, according to the Internet. Here are a few standouts:

– The Joy Of Uncircumcising
– You Are Worthless
– Reusing Old Graves
– The Missionary Position: Mother Theresa In Theory – And Practice
– How Green Were The Nazis?

Ridiculous, right? But it’s easy to shake your head and point and laugh. Can you do better though?

Can you come up with a great book title that gets people to latch on to a book… pick it up… thumb through it… buy it… and mention it to friends, before they’ve even read it?

It’s a relevant question if you’re a marketer or copywriter. Because book titles are the closest mainstream thing to naming direct response products and offers.

If you like, I’ll tell you what I think. I think there are lots of ways to come up with good titles or offer names. Let me illustrate just one:

– The 4-Hour Workweek
– The 16-Word Sales Letter
– The Lazy Man’s Way To Riches

How good are these titles actually? ​​Well, the first and third are backed up by results.

Neither Tim Ferriss nor Joe Karbo were famous. And yet they managed to get their books to millions of people, largely on the strength of the appeals in those 4- and 5-word titles.

The second title on that list is a book by Evaldo Albuquerque. It’s about a very niche topic — writing long-form sales letters. And even so, it’s got a respectable 260 reviews on Amazon.

A part of that is because Evaldo is as close to a star as you can get in this field. Plus he has the backing of many copywriting and marketing influencers.

But his title certainly helps. And in any case, it’s an illustration of the point I want to make:

* You can write a good name through paradox.

“Paradox” in this case is a shortcut for flat-out impossibility (“The 16-Word Sales Letter”)… contradiction (“The Lazy Man’s Way To Riches”)… or subverting strong expectations (“The 4-Hour Workweek”).

So how do you use this? All I can do is give you an example.

​​Say you’re selling a solution that helps people title their books. So you start with “book title” in the name of your offer. And then you ask yourself:

What’s the opposite of that? What are things that people believe to be “musts” around this topic? What are people expecting?

Well, one thing people might expect is that a good title has to be short. So you could use the name:

“The 99-Word Book Title”

People might also expect that you have to be creative to come up with a good name. So here’s option two:

“The Dullard’s Way To Great Book Titles”

Finally, people might think that coming up with a title name will take brainstorming or a lot of time. So you subvert that:

“The 4-Second Book Title”

But perhaps the results still suck. Fear not. There are lots of formulas you can use.

​​For example, if your topic is tricky, overwhelming, or requires study or intelligence… there’s an easy way to turn that into a title that works. Just put your topic in your name… and then attach “for dummies” at the end. And if you think you need it, add a disclaimer:

“Great Product Names For Dummies: Not just for dummies — but for everyone who is intrigued by paradox!”

Well. Maybe you’re still not sold. Maybe you want more ways to come up with great names for your product or offer. Then here’s an offer of my own:

I write an email newsletter. Product naming is something I might talk about more in the future… or I might not. But if I do, my newsletter is the first place where any such talk will go. If you don’t want to miss that, click here to subscribe.

Gary Halbert’s second best copywriting tip

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On January 7 of this year, carried on the wings of Twitter, Elon Musk became the richest person in the world.

That was good news for the folks at Agora, who could now run the following promo about Jeff Bezos:

“World’s second richest man’s NEW world-changing disruption”

I don’t know about you, but this sounds more intriguing to me than:

“World’s richest man’s NEW world-changing disruption”

And I guess Agora’s readers agree. After all, Agora keeps mailing this second richest thing, even though Bezos is actually back to being the richest person ever, as of February 16.

My point is this:

When it comes to copy, superlatives and extremes are great. But they can become unbelievable, or simply tired. If that’s happening in your market, it can make sense to go to the extreme… and then back off 1%. Just like Gary Halbert did with the following bullet:

* Almost foolproof contraception: It’s over 99% effective but… so new… most people have never even heard about it!

You might wonder what this new form of contraception is. That depends, like Bill Clinton said, on what the meaning of “is” is. But I will tell you this:

The secret Gary is talking about is actually 100% effective. (I found that out by following Gary’s top copywriting tip, which was to study bullets by comparing them to the source text.)

And yet, Gary decided to cut down the effectiveness of his promise. Why?

Because round numbers seem less specific, and therefore less convincing, than jagged numbers.

So if your number is round (like 100% contraceptive effectiveness… or the world’s richest man), then take Gary’s lead. Find creative ways to rough up your promise and make it more believable.

And if you want more second- and third-best copywriting tips:

Click here to sign up for my email newsletter.

Chance encounters with Blackie

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And somewhere in the darkness
The gambler he broke even
But in his final words
I found an ace that I could keep
— Kenny Rogers, The Gambler

This morning, I started writing my bread-and-butter piece of copy. It’s an advertorial of a person on a quest.

In this case, the quest is a mom looking for a way to cope with her 8-year-old’s ADHD without drugs. I’ve also used the same quest structure to sell tens of thousands of shoe insoles, silicone kitchen sponges, even fake diamonds.

The quest has 3 acts.

Act 1 is the hero coming face-to-face with the horror of the problem… and then getting sucked deeper and deeper into promised solutions that don’t work or even make things worse. Despair sets in.

Act 2 starts with a chance encounter. And that’s what I want to tell you about today.

In my advertorials, this chance encounter is usually a friend or acquaintance the hero hasn’t met in a long while. The friend casually mentions the key missing ingredient for the hero’s quest.

At first, the hero is skeptical. But the friend isn’t pushy, plus there’s a good reason why the solution could work. So the hero goes home to do more research and— EUREKA!!

If this sounds familiar, it’s because something like it is present in more than 99% of all make money, rags-to-riches, “I was living in a trailer but look at me now” sales letters. The hero in those stories wouldn’t be the success he is today were it not for the trick he learned from a Yoda-like guru who lives on top of a mountain or in a gated retirement community in Florida.

In fact, according to Dan Kennedy, this same trope goes back to at least the middle of the last century. It’s called a “Blackie story.”

Old Blackie was this horse track regular until the day he died. He had a secret for bettin’ on the ponies… and then on his death bed, he revealed the secret to the writer of the sales letter.

What do you think? Corny? Overplayed? Transparent?

Think what you like. The fact is these Blackie stories work.

Because chance encounters in stories are like spike proteins on the surface of corona virus. They jam themselves into your soft defenses so the payload can worm its way in.

And if Blackie dies to boot, like The Gambler in the Kenny Rogers song, it’s even more powerful. Because the secret is now lost… unless you buy the product on sale.

This all reminds me of a run-in I once had with an old door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman. He showed me a neat little trick to get your foot in the door, every time, without fail. It works brilliantly online too.

Unfortunately the poor bastard died just a few weeks later. Rest in peace, Jerome.

If you’re curious to learn Jerome’s “foot in the door” copywriting trick… it’s one of the things I share inside my email newsletter. It’s free to subscribe. You might find it entertaining, and you can always unsubscribe if you don’t like it. Here’s where to sign up.

Dan Ferrari’s shocking advice to copywriters who hope to write a winning ad

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A couple days ago, I revisited two “control” sales letters by copywriter Dan Ferrari. Dan wrote these sales letters while he was a star in-house copywriter at The Motley Fool. The headlines for the two sales letters read:

HEADLINE 1: What Every American Wishes They Knew Before Filing For Social Security

HEADLINE 2: Warren Buffet’s Shocking Advice to Americans Who Hope to Retire in the Next 5-7 Years

Now maybe I hear you saying:

“That’s it? Those are the winning headlines that a ‘star A-list copywriter’ writes? Pff. I could write that back when I was in 3rd grade!”

And I’m sure you could. And you could probably also write it now, as long as you remembered just two simple but powerful things.

(I’m telling you these two things because I myself often forget them. Whenever I forget them, sales plummet and promotions fail. Whenever I remember them, sales stay healthy and clients come back for more.)

So thing one is that your #1 asset as a copywriter is to know your audience well, and know exactly what they worry about and want. Maybe you’ve heard that before. That’s because it’s true.

Thing two is to realize that… as valuable as fancy copywriting tricks can be in some situations… good copywriting is most often simple. Simple and clear. As Dan himself said once:

“In many places, clarity trumps everything else. It trumps misdirection. It trumps trying to create readership because clarity will create readership.”

And now, here’s a shockingly simple offer:

I write an email newsletter about marketing and copywriting, both from my own experience and from stuff I’ve learned from people like Dan Ferrari. In case this is something you could benefit from, you can try out the newsletter by signing up here.