Copywriting

How to get readers to drool like fifth-grade schoolgirls with Bieberfever

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I follow tennis closely, and I spend a lot of time reading the latest news and gossip on the r/tennis subreddit.

Every time a grand slam starts up (like the Australian Open right now), one particular redditor pipes up.

His handle is -Rainman500.

And he always writes the same kind of fictional joke post (AKA “shitpost”). They always feature a cast of current tennis stars, with lots of cryptic references to recent tennis news, and they always end the same way: Rafael Nadal gets demolished/decimated/decapitated.

Now here’s why I bring this up.

Whenever Rainman does one of these posts, it shoots up to the top of this active subreddit, with hundreds of upvotes and dozens or hundreds of comments.

This happens in spite of the fact that the posts aren’t very funny. Or particularly valuable in any other way.

In fact, one other redditor complained that the community drools over Rainman like fifth-grade schoolgirls with Bieberfever.

So what gives?

Why is Rainman so popular?

And is there a lesson here to help you inspire Bieberfever in your audience?

There might just be.

And if you look at how I described Rainman’s posts, you’ll probably guess what I have in mind.

In case you don’t get it right away, here’s another example to help you out.

It’s from my current best friend, Joe Sugarman, who made hundreds of millions of dollars selling BluBlocker sunglasses.

Joe did pretty well before BluBlockers, too.

For example, he once sold some kind of physical spell checker with an ad in the Wall Street Journal (this was back in the 1980’s I believe).

There was a clever gimmick in this ad:


Joe purposefully misspelled some words in the copy. And when you put in your order, you could also add in a list of misspelled words you found. For each misspelled word you found correctly, you got 2 bucks off the spell checker.

The promotion was successful. The spell checkers sold well.

But more impressive was that Joe kept getting calls and letters from people who didn’t even want the stupid spell checker. They just wanted to make sure they had gotten all the misspelled words from the ad. Some of them had even spent hours poring over the ad over and over.

By now, I think it should be obvious why Rainman generates Bieberfever.

And like I said, this is something you can easily apply to your copy as well. If you want to see how, you’ll want to get a copy (free, if you sign up now) of my upcoming book on email marketing in the health space. And if you want, you can even use this book to confirm that you’ve identified Rainman’s secret correctly. Here’s the link to sign up for a free copy:

https://bejakovic.com/profitable-health-emails/

 

5 marketing lessons from the most boring writer who ever lived

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I advise you not to read this post.

It’s long, and it deals with a very boring topic. And that’s the poet Kenneth Goldsmith.

Goldsmith practices something called “uncreative writing.”

For example, he’s written a book called “Day.” This is a typed-out edition of the New York Times from September 1, 2000. “Day” is 836 pages long, and it took Goldsmith a year to type.

Goldsmith then wrote “Weather,” a transcript of a year’s worth of weather reports from a New York City local radio station.

After that, “Traffic” followed. And then “Sports.” You get the idea.

So is Goldsmith just a boring crank?

Maybe so.

But he’s definitely a successful, well-paid crank.

He teaches at the University of Pennsylvania. He read to Obama at the White House. He gets paid $500 for 30-minute readings of his works. And in 2013, he became the first poet laureate of the Museum of Modern Art.

But who cares about all that?

Instead, it turns out there are a bunch of instructive parallels between what Goldsmith does and what marketers and copywriters should do. Let me tell you about the top 5:

#1 Format rules

Speaking of his book “Day,” Goldsmith wrote:

“When you take a newspaper and reframe it as a book, you get pathos and tragedy and stories of love.”

Very true, in poetry as in direct-response copy. That’s because changing the format of your sales message — a sales letter vs. a video vs. a book — tends to have a much bigger impact on conversions than changing your headline, your offer, or any other aspect of your copy.

#2 Repulsion marketing

Goldsmith calls himself “the most boring writer who ever lived.”

He honed his boring chops working as a disk jockey for a radio show called Unpopular Music. That’s where he learned that challenging someone not to listen (or read) makes the person pay closer attention. And then your content either drives them away, or drives them more closely towards you.

Nothing new, you might say. This is a well-honed positioning strategy in the marketing world as well — email marketing guru Ben Settle being one well-known proponent.

#3 Branding done right

Goldsmith makes a personal spectacle out of himself. He wears paisley-patterned suits, sometimes with a long flowing skirt over his pants. “Every time I’m in public, I’m a persona, and people really hate that.”

Mind you, this isn’t traditional branding.

But exaggerating his natural tastes makes Goldsmith noticeable and memorable, and it’s something anybody (including internet entrepreneurs) can use as well.

#4 Troll management

The article I read about Goldsmith was full of comments by detractors, who were complaining about various aspects of his work.

Meantime, Goldsmith was off somewhere, busily devising the agenda for his upcoming projects — which will no doubt draw more criticism and negative reactions.

And there’s more.

When he was widely condemned of misappropriating racially sensitive material (the autopsy report of Michael Brown) for one of his readings, Goldsmith responded with his own thoughts — but didn’t apologize.

What better way to deal with online trolls as well?

#5 Moving information

Goldsmith says about his work:

“Moving information is a literary act, in and of itself […] How I make my way through this thicket of information — how I manage it, how I parse it, how I organize it and distribute it — is what distinguishes my writing from yours.”

Well, moving information is a sales act as well. In fact, Goldsmith’s attitude above echoes something copywriting genius Gene Schwartz said:

“Copy is not written. Copy is assembled.”

In essence, Gene was saying that sales copy is simply a collection of good sales arguments. And those sales arguments don’t come from introspection. Instead, they come from research, deep into your market. In other words, much of your copy can come straight from forum posts, Facebook comments, and testimonials written by your target audience.

And on that note, I’m signing off from today’s episode of Unpopular Copywriting.

If you want more unpopular ideas, sign up for my newsletter by using the page below. I’ll even send you a link to a free promo of my upcoming Upwork book (ETA 1 week):

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

 

Mystery PUA offers product marketing advice

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Once upon a time, “pick up artist” Mystery made a rather objectifying comment about women:

“Treat a six like a ten, and a ten like a six. You won’t go wrong.”

What does this have to do with copywriting?

Nothing probably.

Except it mirrors very closely the product marketing advice of direct response genius Joe Sugarman. Says Joe:

“A rule of thumb is to explain a complicated product in a very simple way and explain a simple product in a very complex way.”

For example:

When Joe was selling the first electronic blood pressure unit back in 1980, many people were still intimidated by computers. So Joe didn’t harp on the circuits inside or the assembly code that made this gadget work.

Instead, in a one-page ad, he devoted a total of 3 sentences to how the electronic beast works (wrap it around your arm, inflate it, listen for the beep).

No technical jiggery-pokery, no intimidation through jargon.

But sometimes, jargon is just what you want.

For example, a student of Joe Sugarman, named Frank Lewis, was selling grapefruit through direct mail.

Grapefruit. A pretty simple product.

So in a one-page ad, Lewis devoted five paragraphs to describing the unique features of his “Royal Ruby Reds” — everything from their color (“rich red”), taste (“natural sugar”), acid balance (“low”), juiciness (“high”), meatiness (also “high”), smoothness (can’t be “wind scarred”), and shape (can’t have a “sheep nose”).

​​He really sold this thing.​

Mystery would be proud.

Anyways, this advice can be directly applied in case you’re a freelance copywriter, offering your services on online platforms such as Upwork.

For example, it influences how you structure your description of the services you offer — and how you convince clients that you’re worth hiring.

I lay out all the details of this in my upcoming book on how to become a highly paid, top-rated sales copywriter on Upwork.

If you’d like to get notified when this book goes live on Amazon (and when there will be a short free promo period), sign up below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

Honeymoons on Hog Island

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There’s a tense scene early on in the James Bond film Casino Royale.

Jimmy, dressed in khakis and a black button-down shirt, sits down at a high-stakes poker game.

He keeps winning. By the end of the night, he even wins himself the keys to the bad guy’s Aston Martin, and indirectly, to the bad guy’s sexy wife.

Exciting stuff.

And set in a beautiful location, on an unnamed tropical island.

The real-life location of this scene is a private island in the Bahamas, currently worth about $2 billion. The island features exclusive casinos and some of the world’s most expensive hotels (including the The Atlantis, which offers a room for $25,000 a night).

Merv Griffin owned the island at one point, and reality-TV star Donald Trump was a major investor. All of which begs the question:

What’s the name of this magical place?

Why, I’m surprised you don’t know it. It’s none other than…

Hog Island.

Ok, it’s officially Paradise Island now, since around 1959.

But it certainly was Hog Island originally, until big tourist development started up, and the then-owner decided it was time for a rebranding.

Come to Hog Island — your wife is already here

The point being that names matter.

It’s hard to imagine James Bond paying a trip to Hog Island, even if it were packed with dangerous women and beautiful cars. It’s equally unlikely that even with the fanciest hotels and most romantic beaches, Hog Island would ever seem like an acceptable destination for a honeymoon.

But here’s something else to notice:

“Paradise Island” isn’t a terribly creative name. Yes, it’s good enough to sell an island in the Bahamas. But it wouldn’t do much to promote a rocky, rainy, wind-swept isle off the coast of Scotland.

All of which, I think, has some practical applications.

For example, if you are starting out as a freelancer on Upwork, you may be tempted to spend a lot of time on your profile page. Which title should you give yourself? What should you say in the description?

Sure, those things matter, just like the name “Paradise Island” matters. But they are only one part of the total picture of Upwork success and they won’t win you jobs by themselves.

So what to do?

I’ve got lots of advice on the “positioning” part of getting on Upwork. But I can also tell you about the entire process of becoming a $150/hr freelance copywriter. In fact, I’m putting together an entire book on the topic right now.

It will be out in another couple of weeks. And then I will put it up on Amazon.

If you want to sign up to get notified when it’s out, mix yourself up a Vesper martini, unholster your Beretta, and take aim at the deadly link below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

How not to disappoint “The Agent”

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It’s hard catering to international spies.

For example, back in the early days of my freelancing career, when I was a barely hatched duckling fresh out of the freelancing egg, I got a job writing for a woman who called herself “The Agent.”

She was basically a personal assistant, but she aimed to cater to high-powered businessmen, so she positioned herself with a bit of 007 mystique.

Need connections to Fortune 500 CFOs and CEOs? Or a party on a chartered plane flying around the world? Or a seat in a VIP box at the Monaco Grand Prix?

No problem. Talk to The Agent, and she’ll take care of you.

Anyways, The Agent hired me to write a sequence of emails, telling her story and explaining her unconventional services to a list of potential clients.

So I interviewed her.

Looked over her website.

Made an avatar of her ideal customer.

And then I wrote a series of emails in the Andre Chaperon SOS style, really selling her as a female James Bond who gets problems solved, doors opened, and connections made.

I honestly thought I did a good job.

Until I delivered the copy.

The Agent didn’t have any specific complaints. But she thought the emails weren’t really what she was looking for. And honestly, I can’t blame her.

Not because i didn’t do a good job.

But because I failed to do something important.

Something that’s become a pillar of the way I deal with clients these days.

And also something that almost guarantees that clients always wind up happy with the copy I write.

I’m talking about setting expectations. Expectations of what the copy will look like. How long it will take the client to get it. What kinds of results they can expect from it.

I make sure all these things are perfectly clear to a potential client before I choose to accept the dangerous mission of writing copy for them.

The thing is, this is just one part of a 4-step process for making sure clients get what they want. And important as it is, it’s not even the most important of these 4 steps.

For the remaining 3 pillars of continuing client satisfaction, you might want to look inside my upcoming book. It deals with becoming a successful sales copywriter on Upwork.

I’ll be launching it soon on Amazon. And if you want to get notified when it’s out (and when it will be on free promotion, for a short while), then sign up below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

Parris’s big thing

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Yesterday, I mentioned a big and important principle that A-list copywriter Parris Lampropoulos uses to guide him in his work. In Parris’s own words, that principle is:

“What do I need to do to weight the odds so heavily in my favor that I know before I’ve even run the ad that it won?”

“Thanks, Parris,” you might say. “If I knew how to weight the odds in my favor and write a killer ad, I would simply do it! I wouldn’t need this stupid principle.”

Easy, friend.

This principle is very valuable.

And its value will become clear once you see it in action.

You see, in the same interview where he revealed this principle, Parris also told a story illustrating how he uses it in practice. Namely:

One time, he was trying to beat a control for a book on tax loopholes. The control made a giant promise as the headline: “Pay no taxes in 1997.” It was written by some unspecified brilliant copywriter, and it was running successfully for many years. Trying to beat it seemed like a suicide mission.

So what to do? Parris started digging through the research.

It turned out that, on average, readers of this book saved $10,731 on their taxes. So he came up with a new headline,

“How to Save $10,731 on Your Taxes Next Year”

This new headline was more specific than the original. People like specifics, sometimes even more than big promises. So does this mean this angle would perform better than the control?

Possibly.

Possibly not.

In other words, it wasn’t a sure shot. Which means that Parris’s big and important principle still wasn’t satisfied.

So Parris kept digging and digging into the research, until he found a second interesting tip: The IRS allows amended tax returns. In a nutshell, you could go back and change your previous year’s tax return with updated data.

Interesting.

Especially when combined with the first, specific numbers. Because now he had the new headline/subhead:

“Bombshell from top tax attorney: The IRS owes you $10,731. Here’s how to get it in as little as 60 days”

That’s a pretty intriguing statement, and those are some heavily weighted odds. And sure enough, Parris used this one-two punch to beat the long-running control.

Fortunately, most of us don’t have to go up against the world’s best copywriters and their long-running controls.

For example, I work with a lot of clients on Upwork. Most of them simply need well-written copy, delivered on time.

The thing is, many copywriters on Upwork can’t even do this. Which means that there’s a good opportunity for anyone who wants to jump in and start offering sales copy as a service on Upwork.

If you want a guide for how to do this, you’re in luck. I’m putting one together right now, and I will publish it on Amazon soon. It will even be on free promo for a few days after it goes live. To get notified when this happens, you can sign up below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

The brain chemical to replace sleep

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About 10 years ago, a sensational story appeared on various media outlets:

Scientists funded by DARPA (the military’s research and development arm) were working on a chemical to replace sleep.

As a test, they made a nasal spray out of this chemical, and gave it to sleep-deprived monkeys to inhale.

They found that the tired and worn-out monkeys suddenly acted and performed just like normal, well-rested monkeys.

Soon, the story promised, even great apes like you and me will be able to snort our way to wakefulness and focus.

I found out about this intriguing story yesterday, while doing research for an email to my aromatherapy list. I wanted to write about orexin (the brain chemical from the monkey study above) and its connection to all-body inflammation.

The thing is, even though orexin is an interesting and important topic, it’s not a sure shot as a lead for a sales email.

That’s why I was so happy to find the sensationalist DARPA story from above, and to use it as an email lead (it got me some sales, too).

So what’s the point of this?

Well, a few days ago I listened to a fascinating interview with one of the world’s most successful copywriters.

His name is Parris Lampropoulos.

He’s the guy that’s brought in to defeat controls that have been running for years — and that seem unbeatable.

Apparently, Parris has a success rate of 80% in outperforming these world-class pieces of copy.

In the interview I mentioned, Parris revealed the underlying secret principle that allows him to be so successful. He even gave a demonstration of this secret principle as he uses it in practice. And this lesson from Parris is what guided me while I wrote the sleep-deprived-monkeys lead I mentioned above.

Honestly, I think this is one of the most valuable ideas I’ve ever heard about copywriting.

I’ll talk about the specifics of Parris’s big copywriting secret in my post tomorrow.

And I will also discuss it in more detail in my upcoming book on email copywriting for the health space.

Speaking of which, you can get a free copy of that book when it comes out.

All you have to do is sign up, before the book is released. Here’s where you can do that:

https://bejakovic.com/profitable-health-emails/

The marketing genius of colonel Tom Parker

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Without the Colonel, we probably wouldn’t know Elvis.

Colonel Tom Parker was Elvis’s manager from 1956 on.

He made Elvis a household name, and he made himself very rich in the process.

For example, back in 1956, the Colonel signed a merchandising deal to produce a bunch of Elvis tchotchkes, everything from charm bracelets to bookends to stuffed “hound dogs.”

By the end of that year, this contract had already brought in $22 million dollars.

Good. But not great.

After all, not everybody was feeling swept away by Elvis mania — and not everybody was buying Elvis bobby-sox!

No problem .

The Colonel even came up with the idea of selling badges that read “I hate Elvis” and “Elvis is a jerk” — for that other half of the population.

Which I think is a great marketing lesson.

Of course, your product probably doesn’t inspire love or hate on a nation-wide level. And it probably doesn’t make sense to start selling the opposite of what you currently sell.

But the same mindset can apply.

Rather than looking at your detractors and wringing your hands about how they don’t like you, do what 9-figure direct marketing wizard Joe Sugarman used to do:

Look at every problem as an opportunity.

For example, back when Joe was running his Consumers Hero membership program (which sold refurbished goods at cut-throat prices), he got a nasty letter from a disgruntled customer who said he wanted to cancel his membership because the merchandise was junk.

Joe published this bad feedback in the regular Consumer Hero newsletter. He added how he doesn’t really agree, and in any case, he and his team keep striving to do better. And then he went on to talk about all the good news stuff they had in the pipeline.

Just something to consider if you have a business and you’re running your own marketing.

Another thing to consider:

I’ll soon be publishing my Upwork book on Amazon. Once it goes live, there will be a short free promo period. If you want to get notified when that happens, sign up below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

Briefs

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Sometimes it can be good to stand out. For example:

Back in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, one Joseph Sugarman made hundreds of millions of dollars worth of sales through full-page ads he ran in various magazines. He was competing for the attention of readers with other advertisers, most of whom were trying to cram as many features and benefits as possible into their ad headlines.

Not so with Joe. Much of the time, he ran his ads with cryptic one- or two-word headlines I’ll call “briefs.” Examples include:

“Hot”

“Pet Plane”

“Magic Baloney”

“Vision Breakthrough”

“Hungarian Conspiracy”

Joe’s theory was the all the visual elements of an ad — the headline, the images, the logo, etc — serve only one purpose.

And that purpose is to get the reader to read the first sentence.

The ultra-short headlines old Joe used helped do this in a few different ways.

For one, they stood out, relative to all the other ads out there, and they attracted attention. Two, they were easy on the reader. It doesn’t take a lot to digest one or at max two words. Three: even though they were short, all these headlines were curiosity-baiting. And here’s why that’s so important.

Imagine I’d used a different short headline for this post. In fact, imagine it was simply, “Short Headlines.”

I don’t think, and maybe you would agree, that it would work nearly as well as “Briefs,” which hints at what’s inside without giving it away, while at the same time conjuring up images of red underpants in your mind.

Anyways, I think briefs are great. And they should definitely be used on occasion.

But at least when it comes to daily emails, they shouldn’t be used all the time. It stops being novel or intriguing. Nor should they be used as a crutch, when a more direct, benefit-oriented title, headline, or subject line would do better.

For example, I’ll soon be launching a new book on Amazon. It’s titled:

“How to become a $150/hr, top-rated sales copywriter on Upwork”

I could have called this book “Upwork Secrets.” Or “Freelancing Baloney.”

But considering the platform I’ll be selling on, the people I’m after, and the kind of content that’s inside the book, I think I’ll be more effective with the long title.

Anyways, once I launch the book, it will go through a short free promo period. If you want to get notified when this happens, sign up below:

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

Cute aggression

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When I was a kid, I had this strange thing with kittens.

I didn’t like them. They were cute, yes — but in a way that made me want to go over and crush their little kitten heads.

Don’t get me wrong. I never actually hurt any cats. It was just thoughts running in my head, rather than actual instincts to harm. But it was weird. And I certainly thought it was unique.

Not so much, it turns out.

Some scientists have actually studied this phenomenon, and have found it to be relatively common.

They’ve even given it a catchy name, “cute aggression.” They have a theory that the big bubbly eyes of kittens, puppies, and babies trigger parallel systems in some people’s brains — one for cuteness, one for rewards. (I’m not sure how “rewards” translates into a desire to crush, but the scientists apparently do.)

Now here’s the thing:

I thought I was unique — or rather, alone and uniquely weird — when it came to my cute aggression. Many people out there feel the same way about random other things.

Perhaps the best example of such a random thing comes from the reclusive and brilliant copywriting legend, Bill Jayme. On the outside envelope of a sales letter for Psychology Today, Jayme included the “uniquely weird” teaser:

“Do you close the bathroom door even when you’re the only one at home?”

It worked well. The sales letter was a control for eight years.

So what am I telling you?

If you can catalogue those weird thoughts, ideas, insecurities, fixations, and emotions of the people in your market, you can pull them out when it’s time to make a sale.

That’s because empathy is a very strong way of getting people to buy.

Anyways, I have a secret and very effective method for digging up your market’s “cute aggressions.” And if you want to find out what it is, sign up below to get a free copy of my upcoming book on email marketing, where I will discuss this method:

https://bejakovic.com/profitable-health-emails/