Cold Reading

The power of preparation for perplexing performances

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“Tell me Sir, was this real… or was it humbug?”

Houdini was shocked at the power of his own show. He couldn’t believe that the man standing across from him — respected, intelligent, worldly — could be asking him such a question.

“No Colonel,” Houdini said with a shake of his head. “It was hocus pocus.”

The year was 1914. The place was the Imperator, a ship on the Hamburg-New York line, sailing west across the Atlantic. Houdini was traveling on the ship as a passenger, but he agreed to perform a seance act for the large and rich ship’s company.

Houdini walked around the audience, giving out pieces of paper and envelopes, telling people to write down a question, seal it in the envelope, and then put it in a hat that Houdini passed around.

But one of the audience members was particularly distinguished and highly reputable — Colonel Teddy Roosevelt, former President of the United States, traveling back from the UK. Roosevelt had just finished promotion of his new book about an adventure trip he had taken to Brazil the year previous.

“I am sure there will be no objection if we use the Colonel’s question,” Houdini said during the seance, tentatively walking towards Roosevelt. The audience murmured assent.

Then Houdini took out two little slate tablets, which were blank. After appropriate buildup and mystery, he asked Roosevelt to place his envelope, with the question inside, between the two tablets.

“Can you please tell the audience what your question was?” Houdini asked.

“Where was I last Christmas?” Roosevelt said.

Houdini opened up the slate tablets. They were no longer blank. Instead, they now showed a colored chalk map of Brazil, with the River of Doubt highlighted, where Roosevelt had spent the Christmas prior.

The effect of this on the crowd, and on Teddy Roosevelt himself, was immense. Roosevelt jumped up, and started laughing so hard and slapping his legs until tears ran down his face.

And then, the very next day, Roosevelt buttonholed Houdini on the deck of the ship. Roosevelt asked, in a hushed voice, whether Houdini truly had connections to the spirit world.

Houdini did not. It was hocus pocus, and he was ready to admit it.

So what lay behind his spectacular performance?

I won’t tell you the exact details. Like all tricks, it’s underwhelming when you find out the truth. But I will tell you the powerful underlying principle, in a single word:

Preparation.

An immense amount of quiet background work… research… setup… as well as thinking up and making plans for all possible contingencies.

Like I wrote a few weeks ago, I’ve decided to put together a new book. Working title — and maybe final title — is “10 Commandments of Hypnotists, Pick Up Artists, Comedians, Copywriters, Con Men, Door-To-Door Salesmen, Professional Negotiators, Storytellers, Spirit Mediums, and Stage Magicians.”

Some of the commandments I have in mind are clever techniques. Others… well, they’re stuff like this. Research. Preparation.

Few wanna do it. Few take it seriously. But the ones who do are eventually seen as having supernatural powers, while everybody else — ah, it’s not too bad, but I could do the same.

I already have a lot of this book ready, thanks to emails like this that I’ve already written. But it’s still gonna take me a while to pull everything together and get the book published.

Meanwhile, if you want a similar book, with a similar mix of stories and often unsexy but extremely powerful ideas, take a look at my other 10 Commandments book:

https://bejakovic.com/10commandments

Magical incantations to make people laugh, fail, buy, or unzip their pants

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Yesterday, I shared two puzzles, two incomplete stories of two hypnotists, Mike Mandel and Derren Brown.

I asked people to choose which puzzle they wanted the answer to. The requests came pouring in, and the results were clear, two to one. People wanted to know the answer to the Derren Brown puzzle twice as much as to the Mike Mandel puzzle.

My “two puzzles” offer is now over. I replied to everyone privately with the answers to the puzzle they chose. I’ll save the Derren Brown puzzle answer for a book I’ve decided to put together. But if you’d like to know the answer to the Mike Mandel puzzle, here it is:

Mike did his induction in his hypnosis subject… then planted his suggestion to remove the phobia. And then, hypnosis over, he asked the person to try to bring back the feelings of fear they had before.

There are two reasons Mike did this. One was straightforward — to test if he had done his job.

“Why don’t people test their work?” Mike asks. “Because they are afraid it hasn’t worked. But if it hasn’t worked, isn’t it better to know when they’re still in your office than when they phone you two weeks later and they’ve had a nervous breakdown?”

The second reason was more subtle. It’s that the word “try” sets people up to fail — or so Mike claims.

I’ve tested it out on myself, and I agree. Whenever I say, “I will try…” I’ve found that what I really mean is, “It won’t happen but let me make a show of it.”

Mike claims you can subtly do this to other people too. Whenever you want to get somebody to fail at something, simply tell them to try to do it. “Try to bring back those feelings of fear.”

Now try to ignore the bigger point, which is that individual words have real power.

This is true in hypnosis (“try”)… in copywriting (“secret”)… in confidence games (“opportunity”)… in comedy (“moose”)… and in pickup. In the words of pick up artist Nick Krauser:

“I tell my students that Game is not a series of magical incantations to get into an unsuspecting woman’s pants, but that’s only half true. It sort of is.”

Now try to tell yourself you didn’t read anything new here. And try not to be interested in what I promise on the following page:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Is this the most immoral email ever written?

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Or is it the most sensible, the most practical, the most revolutionary thing you will read today?

To find out, ask yourself these three questions:

1. Is your business or career a source of annoyance or frustration instead of a source of pleasure and fulfillment?

2. Have you become tense and irritable because of the incessant, nagging demands made upon you by others?

3. Do you remember my email from last week, the one where I had a little story from Drayton Bird, about how he and Gene Schwartz independently wrote the exact same ad headline, word-for-word?

Well I tracked that ad down. By the tone of it, I guess it’s the Gene Schwartz version.

This ad sells a book — “the most immoral book ever written?” — which was initially published in 1937, then went through a lot of reprints, then went out of print, and was finally resurrected in the 1960s by Gene for his mail-order book-selling empire. Gene is still supposed to be the guy who has sold the most books by mail in history.

I invite you to check out the full ad on the page below. If, after 10 days, you do not believe that Gene Schwartz’s masterful cold reads can dramatically transform your marketing, you may return the ad and owe nothing. Otherwise I will bill you for $0.00 plus postage. Click the link below and then read the page that opens up:

https://bejakovic.com/most-immoral

Tricks to make sales stick

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Last week, I wrote an email about misdirection, and asked for examples. A bunch of people wrote in with good pop culture illustrations.

I also got to work, reading up on the theory of misdirection. Step one was Derren Brown’s book Tricks of Mind.

You might know Brown. He is a stage mentalist and TV illusionist. He’s done a TED talk where he reads the minds of people in the audience, and he’s got shows on Channel 4 in the UK where he demonstrates and debunks the acts of psychics, faith healers, etc.

After a rough start to Brown’s book, about Brown’s conversion from gullible Christian to enlightened atheist, the book picks up and talks psychological principles, just like I was looking for.

Today, I want to share one very cool such principle with you. It’s not about misdirection. Instead, it’s the idea that a lot of the “magic” of a magic trick happens after the trick is over.

Brown describes different techniques to do this.

For example, you can repeat a trick multiple times, so tiny (and different) details from different runs bleed together after the fact, gaslighting the viewer.

Or you can give subtle verbal suggestions. For example, you can instruct an audience member to shuffle a deck of cards “again” — when it’s really the first time, and when multiple shuffles make the magic trick more impressive.

The point, as Brown claims, is that people both love magic because they like being astonished and surprised… but they also resist it, because they don’t like being fooled.

And that’s why, once the trick is over, viewers keep going over the act in their heads.

​​And if the magician does his job right, then viewers will exaggerate cool things that happened… forget details that could make them seem gullible or dumb… and invent new memories that support the idea that this was really an incredible and unexplainable act of possibly real magic.

All of which, if you ask me, applies to sales also.

Making a sale is an emotional manipulation.

And much of the sale is made after the credit card details have been exchanged and the transaction is over.

Sure, a part of that is having a solid product and good customer service.

But, like Brown says, it’s only one part, and might be a minor part.

A bigger part might be the rationalizations, selective forgetting, and false memories that pop up in your former prospect’s, now customer’s mind, after the sale is over.

I believe, like in a magic show, that there are different tricks you can use to make this happen in your customer’s head, even once he’s on his own, late at night, driving home from your sales stage show, with your digital information product sitting in his virtual lap.

What tricks exactly?

Well, I’ve got a few ideas.

But I’d like to hear yours also. Specifically:

How can you write copy, or organize your marketing, to get people to keep selling themselves on your offer after the sale is over?

Get on my email newsletter, then write in and let me know your ideas. No judgment — anything that comes to your mind is valid, and I want to hear it. In exchange, I will tell you a few ideas I’ve had on this question myself.

Free business idea: 9 Chambers of Pain

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Here’s a free business idea for you to run with, if you so choose:

Just a little over a week ago, a new study was published by scientists at the University of Pittsburgh.

They studied over 21,000 patients who came for treatment at pain management clinics around Pittsburgh.

The scientists measured these poor people… probed them… interrogated them… and then fed all this data into a large tube-based computer.

And then they waited.

36 days later, the computer printed out a result:

There are exactly 9 types of chronic pain.

Such as group F (lower back pain radiating below the knee)… and group D (upper and lower back pain).

Each group varied in the location of pain… the severity of pain… as well as in the severity of other problems that went with the pain, like depression and anxiety.

So here’s my business idea for you:

You create a quiz. “Which unique type explains your chronic pain?”

People go through the quiz. You categorize them into one of 9 groups, based on their physical and emotional symptoms. For extra points, you can give it a Wu Tang flavor, and call it the 9 Chambers of Pain.

And then what?

Then you sell them something that helps them. It can be your own offer or an affiliate offer. For example:

Any kind of anti-inflammation supplement…

Or a course on meditation techniques…

Or a visit to a chiropractic clinic or some kind of other physical restructuring.

And here’s the incredible thing:

You can sell the same thing to all 9 groups. Of course, you say something like,

“Based on your unique scientifically-proven pain type… we recommend a free + shipping bottle of our doctor-formulated turmeric dust.”

As I’ve written before, this quiz => same offer funnel works like magic.

Because people like to feel unique… because they want a new understanding of their chronic problem… and because they aren’t very skeptical or critical when they get this new understanding.

Which is why RealDose Nutrition, the first big-name direct response company I ever worked with, built an 8-figure business in record time on the back of exactly the model I’ve just described to you.

And now, if you like, you can start doing the same. You already have the entire marketing concept. All you need is to decide which helpful product you want to sell… and to be quick, so other people don’t swipe this idea from right in front of your nose.

To end:

If you’d like more Wu Tang-flavored business idea, you best protect ya neck and sign up to my email newsletter here.

Free self-assessment: Which ad won?

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Do you want a little self-assessment? If you do, take the A/B test below:

VERSION A

[Illustration: Panel containing a list of symptoms of nervous trouble]

Headline: Thousands suffer from sick nerves and don’t know it

VERSION B

[Illustration: Photograph of a nerve specialist]

Headline: Have you these symptoms of nerve exhaustion?

One of these ads was a big flop and ran only once. The other was a big success and ran over and over.

So which is which?

Think about it…

… think…

… take your time…

… all right. You ready?

The winner is B. But the right answer is less important than what you yourself thought the right answer was. Here’s what I’m thinking.

According to John Caples, who reported this A/B test in his Tested Advertising Methods, headline B won because it has the word you. On the other hand, says Caples, the losing headline is “simply a statement of fact.”

It certainly could be that. But maybe it’s the word these in the winning headline. Or maybe it’s the picture of the nerve specialist.
​
Or maybe, and this is just my guess, it’s that word thousands that killed the losing version. Because dig it:

One of the fundamental needs we all have is to feel special. That need is so powerful that sometimes, we are willing to hang on to our pain because it allows us to keep feeling special.

“Thousands might suffer from sick nerves… but that’s not my case unfortunately. My case is unique.”​​

So if you chose Version A in the self-assessment above, here’s a diagnosis:

You might be too truthful and direct with your marketing. You could benefit by protecting your prospect’s specialness a little more. At the least, don’t bluntly say, “I’ve seen your case a thousand times before. Here’s a cure.”

And if you chose Version B above, you probably have an intuitive understanding of the value of making people feel special.

​​In that case, remember there are simple and easy tactics for making people feel special. But you probably already realized this — since you’re a Type B.

Finally:

Here’s a special offer for you if you guessed A on the test above.

But you say you guessed B instead? How unusual. In that case, here’s a special offer for you also.

Do you think you’re smarter than average?

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I think I’m pretty smart, and I’d bet you think the same about yourself. I mean that literally. I would bet money on the fact that you think you are smarter than most other people.

I’ll tell you why in a second. But first, let me tell you how I broke a nonsensical law a few days ago.

There’s an intersection near the apartment where I’ve been staying for the past week. It has a stop light. There’s never any traffic in the cross direction, or even the chance of traffic in the cross direction.

To top it off, the red light stays red very long… and the green light only appears for a flicker.

So a few days ago, following a few other cars, I drove through that intersection. Even though the light had turned red right before me.

A trivial thing, right?

Well, it turns out I got lucky. Not because of any cross traffic. Like I said, no traffic there, then or ever.

But every time I’ve walked by that intersection since, I’ve seen a lurking cop car on the side, watching the intersection like a cat in the grass watching a mouse burrows.

Gulp. I must not be the only one to think that traffic light is stupid.

And that’s my point for you for today. People act and think in predictable ways. And this can be useful to you when persuading. Or giving out traffic tickets.

And now, let me tell you why I’d bet on you and your smarts.

It’s the same reason I’d bet you think you’re more curious than most other people… that you change your bedsheets less than other people… and that you have sex less often than other people.

Here, check it out. You might learn something about yourself, and about how to persuade others too:

https://thanaverage.xyz/

(Oh, and since you think you’re so smart, you might like my email newsletter. It’s the thinking man’s source of ideas about persuasion, designed for smart people like yourself. You can sign up here.)

At times, you find yourself susceptible to hot reading

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Roughly 72 years ago, a young man we will call J.R. sat down for his “Intro to Psych” class. J.R. was smiling. Today, he would finally get his promised personality evaluation. What would it say?

The professor who taught the class was a certain Bertram Forer. Forer was an expert in personality analysis. A few weeks earlier, he had given each of his students a simple questionnaire to fill out — hobbies, reading interests, that kind of thing. Based on this, and using his expertise, Forer promised to come up with a brief personality sketch for each student.

The end of the school year was nearing, and J.R. had been having trouble deciding what to do over the summer. “Maybe this will help me clear things up,” he thought.

Professor Forer walked around the classroom. He placed each student’s personality evaluation face down on the student’s desk.

J.R. flipped his over as soon as he got it. He saw his name printed at the top. And then, heart beating, he started to read down the page:

1. You have a great need for other people to like and admire you.

2. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself.

3. You have a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage.

…

There were 13 items in total. When he read them all, J.R. sat there, feeling a bit dazed.

There was deep insight there on the page. Stuff that J.R.’s close friends did not know about. Even things he had never articulated himself, but that was undeniably true. (How the hell did Forer guess the sexual stuff?)

Sure, the evaluation wasn’t 100% perfect. For example, J.R. really didn’t agree with no. 12, “Some of your aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic.”

But still, the personality sketch was powerful and accurate overall. “And all from a few innocent questions,” thought J.R. “This Professor Forer really is a personality magician.”

Perhaps you see where this is going. Because J.R.’s personality evaluation has become famous since. Today, it’s known as the standard “cold reading” script.

It turns out Profesor Forer didn’t do much analyzing. Instead, he pulled J.R.’s personality sketch out of a newsstand horoscope book. Not only that, but each student in the class got the same evaluation.

And yet, the vast majority of the students did just like J.R. did. They thought the evaluation described them very well. And they gave high marks to Forer’s little questionnaire for evaluating personality.

There is (I believe) a powerful persuasion technique that comes out of this. I will share that in my email newsletter tomorrow. For now, let me just admit that I’ve known about this cold reading script for years. But I never bothered to find out the history behind it.

I only discovered that today. It was thanks to a very entertaining but insightful video about how psychics, mediums, and faith healers do their work.

That’s also where I found out that, as powerful as cold reading is, there’s something even more powerful. It’s a technique known as “hot reading.” And if you’re reading this, then I suspect that, at times, you’ve found yourself susceptible to it.

Watch the video if you want to find out more about hot reading. And if you want to know about the persuasion technique I will share tomorrow, you might want to sign up for my email newsletter.