Persuasion

I got burned by a deadline, don’t let it happen to you

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This past Tuesday I got an email with the subject line,

“We’re funding your newsletter growth”

The body of the email explained that Beehiiv, the Substack competitor I use for my new health newsletter, was offering to match any money I might put into its Beehiiv Boosts service, up to $2,500.

Boosts are basically a coregistration service for various Beehiiv newsletters – you subscribe to one newsletter, you immediately get a bunch more paid recommendations you can subscribe to with just one click.

I had already used Boosts before. I knew it worked fine and delivered quality subscribers.

So taking advantage of this new “deposit matching” offer to the max was a no brainer. I understood fully that it translated into 1,000-1,250 extra subscribers for free.

To seal the deal, later in the day I got an email from my friend Will Ward. Will wrote:

===

Hey you are using beehiv for your [health] newsletter right? This seems like a pretty good offer. Am considering switching over to max out the matching.

Are you on the $99 / month plan?

===

I smiled and nodded to myself with satisfaction. I’m all over it already, Will.

The next day, Wednesday, I went to check the deadline for this matching offer — by when do I have to deposit the money to get Beehiiv to match my deposit?

My eyes got wide, then shot forward out of my skull, and snapped back into their sockets.

It turned out the deadline had already passed. The offer was only good until end of day, Tuesday. I hadn’t noticed this in the one and only email about the offer.

As that realization sank in, that self-satisfied smile left my face.

“Well,” I said to myself, “I never really wanted this offer anyhow.”

I even meant it in that moment. Of course, it wasn’t true. It was just my brain trying to cover up a screw-up with a tolerable emotion rather than anger or frustration.

The fact is, I got burned by the deadline. But it doesn’t have to happen to you.

Because three hours still remain before I will retire my Most Valuable Postcard #2, at 8:31pm CET tonight.

The reason why I’m retiring this offer, in case you’re curious:

As the name of it suggests, MVP #2 is really just the remains of my short-lived subscription offer, the Most Valuable Postcard, which I ran last summer.

MVP #2 should be a standalone course, with clearer positioning, with its own sexy name, with a bit more bulk, and with an extra zero or two in the price.

So I will retire it. Maybe I will bring the content back in the future, changed slightly and priced much higher.

But if you would like to get it before it disappears, at the current very affordable price, you can buy it today, of your own choosing, at the link below:

https://bejakovic.com/mvp2/

The shutout or prat-out

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I’m now reading the Big Con, written in 1940. It’s all about con men playing the big con — not just street hustlers nickle and diming, but elaborate operations involving dozens of men, which took in $25k or $30k or even $50k at a time from a well-heeled mark.

​(​That’s the equivalent to $549k or $659k or $1.1M in today’s money.)

The Big Con is filled with quirky and unfamiliar lingo that describes techniques based on deep and familiar human psychology. One such term is the “shutout” or “prat-out.” From the book:

“He doesn’t know it, but he has been given the ‘shutout’ or the ‘prat-out,’ a clever method of stepping up the larceny in the veins of a mark when the manager feels that he is not entering into the play enthusiastically enough. It may be repeated several times so that the mark is fully impressed with what he has missed.”

The shutout or prat-out works like this:

The mark — let’s call him James Markham — gets acquainted with an affable, attractive man. Let’s call this second man John Conway, for he is a con artist.

Through various loops and intrigues, Conway convinces Markham that he has access to inside information on horse betting.

Conway gives Markham a tip on a sure-thing pony.

Markham bets.

And Markham wins. His excitement and greed flare up.

Conway feeds Markham another sure-thing tip. Let’s say Challedon to win in race 4.

Markham stands in line at the betting parlor to put down that bet before the race starts.

But there are a few people ahead of him in line. Unknown to Markham, all of them are part of the big con.

Each one is placing very large bets. It’s taking a long time. They finish one by one while Markham hops nervously from foot to foot, dreaming of the score he will surely make once he bets on Challedon in race 4.

Finally it’s his turn to place his bet. But right before he can hand over his money and tell the bookie which horse he wants to bet on, the announcer for race 4 says:

“And they’re off!”

It’s too late. Betting on race 4 is closed.

Markham listens to the race results as they come in. Challedon lags at the rear.

​​Markham listens with attention.

​​Challedon starts to move up. As the horses enter the home stretch, Challedon is in fourth place. But Challedon presses forward. Neck and neck through the finish line. Challedon wins!

​​And Mr. Markham sits there, stars in front of his eyes, calculating the small fortune he would have made had those bastards in line ahead of him been just a little faster with their bets.

Mr. Markham has been given the shutout or prat-out. He is now much more ready to be set up for the sting — to be separated from his $25k or $30k or $50k. That’s the equivalent to $549k or $659k or $1.1M in today’s money, in case you forgot.

But what’s really going on here?

And how can you use shutout or the prat-out in other, less larcenous fields of influence?

Perhaps it’s obvious to you.

Or perhaps I’ve given away too much in this email.

But if not, if there are valuable details you are unsure of or are still curious to learn, then you can find a full treatment of the underlying psychological principle in my Most Valuable Postcard #2, informatively titled the Ferrari Monster.

As I explained yesterday, I will retire MVP #2 tomorrow at 8:31pm CET.

The reason why, in case you’re curious:

As the name of it suggests, MVP #2 is really just the remains of my short-lived subscription offer, the Most Valuable Postcard, which I ran last summer.

MVP #2 should be a standalone course, with clearer positioning, with its own sexy name, with a bit more bulk, and with an extra zero or two in the price.

So I will retire it. Maybe I will bring the content back in the future, changed slightly and priced much higher.

But if you would like to get it before it disappears, at the current very affordable price, you can buy it today, of your own choosing, at the link below:

https://bejakovic.com/mvp2/

How to seek out testimonials

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Yesterday I held a coaching call with a coaching client. At the end of it I asked if he had any last questions for me. He did:

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Do you do anything to seek out testimonials? Because I don’t feel I’ve gotten anything since I’ve purchased your course that enticed me to do it. But maybe I might have missed it. I feel I don’t do a great job of it. I have one follow-up email for people who purchased my [course] a week later and another one for [his other course].

===

Great question.

Testimonials are super important, both for possible future buyers and for that person who just bought — it makes it more likely they appreciate what they just bought, and get value from it, and stick around.

Beyond that, testimonials are super important for you, the person who created the course — or at least they are for me.

Making a sale is nice, I won’t lie.

​​But hearing that somebody actually appreciates your work (as I’ve had happen lots of times) or genuinely had a life-changing experience due to it (as I’ve had happen on a few occasions) makes you feel good about what you do… makes you more likely to stick with it for long term… makes you more likely to put in extra effort with the next product you launch, because you realize what can be at stake.

So how do you seek out testimonials to benefit your present customers, your future customers, and yourself?

Here are three different strategies, ranked in terms of how effective they’ve been for me:

One, like my coaching client said, is an automated followup process. It’s better than nothing, but I’ve found it pretty weak in general.

I had a followup email for my Copy Riddles course back when it was delivered as a “live” course that went out one email a day. After the complete batch of course emails had gone out, I would let a couple days pass, then send out an extra “what feedback do you have for me” email.

​​I did get a few testimonials that way, but it was nothing to write to a motel, hotel, or houseboat about, and certainly not to home.

The second strategy I’ve used is a request for a testimonial inside the product itself. I usually end my courses with a little signoff. Here’s how I end my Most Valuable Email course:

===

We’ve reached the end of this course. I want to say thanks once again for your trust in me, and for getting this course. And I’d like to commend you for making it to the end — most people never do that.

I hope you will apply this Most Valuable Trick for yourself, because it really has been that valuable to me, without any hyperbole. And it can be the same for you. If you do apply it — when you do apply it — write in and let me know the results. I’d love to know.

Good luck, and I hope to hear from you soon.

===

I have had a fair number of people finish courses and write in with feedback after I prompted it like this. Perhaps it’s a better moment than when a followup email arrives — the end of a course is an emotional high, at least if the course is good.

But the third and most effective way I’ve sought out testimonials is simply engagement, as in:

1. Writing engaging emails (the recent “Even numbers for the dead” email drew a lot of replies, including some that were effectively testimonials)

2. Using engagement bait (as I do often, see my “Magic boxes” email from a few days ago for that)

3. Actually engaging directly with readers, in some limited but real way

And of course, when people give you testimonials, you want to encourage more such behavior. That means you feature the testimonial not just on your sales page, but in your emails. Name the person. Say you appreciate what they’ve done for you. And mean it.

Let me give you an example:

A few days ago, out of the blue, I got an email from a new subscriber, Pete Reginella.

​​Pete had bought my 10 Commandments book on Amazon without being previously on my list. He signed up to my list to get the little-known, apocryphal 11th Commandment. He read the welcome email which delivers the bonus, which starts out like this:

“First off, thanks for reading my 10 Commandments book all the way to the end. I’d love to hear what you thought of it, particularly if you thought it was wonderful. Just hit reply and let me know.”

Pete did write in, and I’m grateful to him for it. Here’s what he had to say:

===

Hey John,

I’ve read lots of copywriting books in my short time as a copywriter and I must say…

Yours was actually the only one I couldn’t stop reading.

I actually read it all in one sitting.

It was very easy to consume and well written.

===

So that’s a short how-to course on seeking out testimonials.

As for a short how-to course on the supreme element of your copy to worship above all others…

… ​​​and a short how to course on getting everything you want in life, at least the material stuff…

… ​​and a short how-to course on making your copy easy to consume…

… ​​for all that and more, check out my 10 Commandments book:

https://bejakovic.com/10commandments

One big proof element

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I read a story this morning about Tim Meeks, the inventor of the harpejji.

The harpejji is a new instrument, one of only a few new instruments invented in 21st century to actually take off. It’s a combination of a piano and an electric guitar. It sells for $6,399 a piece, and Meeks sold more than $1 million worth of them last year.

That’s where we are today. Here’s how we got to where we are:

Meeks invented the harpejji in 2007. He made videos of himself playing the thing. He showed it off at music festivals. He had a few other harpejji enthusiasts play it and hype it up for him.

Sales. Were. Meager.

And then one day, Meeks was at a trade show in Anaheim, CA. Somebody tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hey, can you teach me how to play this thing?”

Meeks stared for a moment and then snapped out of his trance. “Sure,” he said. “Sure! Of course! I’d love to!”

It was Stevie Wonder who was asking.

Stevie Wonder loved the harpejji. He bought one immediately. He has since performed a bunch with it in public.

And here we are today. Point being:

One big proof element can be worth 100 small or middle-sized proof elements.

In fact, entire sales promotions, and even entire businesses, have been built on the back of one big proof element.

So if you’re smart, you will work to get yourself such a big proof element, or maybe even to bake it in to your offer when you create it.

But on to business. I have my Most Valuable Email course to sell. And odds are, you haven’t bought it yet, because only about 5.1% of my list has bought to date.

I’ve shared lots of proof elements for MVE so far:

My own results, tangible successes, and intangible benefits resulting from applying the MVE trick…

The reason why of the thing, which I hint at publicly and explain in detail inside the course…

The testimonials and endorsements and even money-making case studies from many satisfied customers.

The fact is though, none of this qualifies as the One Big Proof Element.

So let me tell you that feared negotiating coach Jim Camp used the Most Valuable Email trick on the very first page of his legendary book Start With No.

This book has formed and influenced other influential people, like email marketer Sen Settle… business coach Travis Sago… and FBI negotiator Chris Voss.

Did all these influential folks find Start With No influential because of the ideas inside?

Yes, but — the presentation was also immensely important. In fact, in the case of somebody like Camp, the presentation and the ideas were really an indistinguishable blend.

If you’re a Jim Camp fan, it will be obvious to you how Camp is using the MVE trick in Start With No once you know what this trick is.

And whether or not are a Camp fan, if you would like to have similar influence on your readers, particularly the influential ones among them, then Most Valuable Email might be your ticket. Here’s where to buy it:

https://bejakovic.com/mve

Sympathy for the deadline

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Please allow me to introduce you to someone:

She’s a woman of great beauty and fame.

She’s been around for a long long year, and stole many a man’s chance at happiness, wealth, and even life.

She was there on the bridge of the Titanic, smiling sadly while the warnings of oncoming icebergs, which had long reached the radio operators on the ship, failed to catch the captain’s attention.

She was in the royal palace in Belgrade in the summer of 1914, watching with glee as the crown prince pulled at his hair and yelled “I can’t make up my mind!” and the clock ticked down on the ultimatum from the furious and threatening Austrians.

She stuck around Moscow in late October of 1812, wearing a great big fur, as Napoleon kept waiting and waiting in the abandoned city for a peace offer that never came, while the days flew away, the food supplies dwindled, and the temperature dropped below freezing.

Perhaps you’ve guessed this beautiful woman’s name. But even if not, she’s pleased to meet you.

And now:
​
If you’d like to sign up for my 9 Deadly Email Sins training, the last moment to do so is just three short hours from now, at 8:31pm CET/2:31pm EST/11:31am PST.

After that I will close the cart down, and no amount of screaming, pleading, or clawing on the doors will make it open up again.

This is the last email I will send before then. To get in while there’s still time:

https://bejakovic.com/sme-classified-ty/

I challenge you to figure out what’s really going on in this email

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I wrote up the following email in a deliberate way.

If you can figure out what I did, and do the same regularly, it’s likely to be very valuable for you.

​​I challenge you to try and figure it out:

This past Sunday, I did my Simple Money Emails giveaway via Josh Spector’s newsletter. I also opened up the paid and related 9 Deadly Email Sins presentation for sign up.

One of first people to take me up on both offers was Dr. Stuart Marmorstein.

Stuart is the founder and developer of the Assisted Self Alignment Protocol™. He teaches Applied Kinesiology/Muscle Testing classes to people with doctorates in various healing arts. He also runs a thriving chiropractic business in Houston, and he writes a newsletter to his patients both to keep in touch and to keep future business flowing.

And right after deciding to buy a ticket for the 9 Deadly Email Sins presentation, Stuart wrote me to say:

===

Thank you again for your generous offers. I took you up on the free ones AND the paid one that will help you recoup your ad spend and keep me from wasting mine later!

I’m not sure when your class is next Monday (I’m still currently in Central Time, U.S. and dreaming of being in Portugal). If the timing is right, I’ll be in the class live, otherwise I’ll catch you on the replay. I always get value from anything you write.

===

You might think the point of this email is Stuart’s nice endorsement of me, and showing off his vote of confidence for the upcoming 9 Deadly Email Sins presentation.

And it absolutely is that. But there’s also something more going on in this email.

​​I’m also previewing some of the content I will cover in that 9 Deadly Email Sins presentation, specifically in Sin #7.

​​Because, like I promised you at the start, this email you’re reading does something specific and deliberate.

You might think it’s using the hypnotic word “try” above in my challenge.

But that’s not what I have in mind. ​​

You might think it’s just shameless teasing.

But that ain’t it either.

Maybe what I’m doing is obvious. Maybe it’s not.

​​Either way, it’s something I frequently see business owners, marketers, and professional copywriter not doing in their own emails, even though it’s directly tied to making sales more regularly, more easily, with fewer questions or objections about price, content, exceptions etc.

If you want to find out what I have in mind, then the deadline to sign up for 9 Deadly Email Sins is just two days from now, Sunday Aug 6, 2023 at 8:31pm.

The presentation will happen live, next Monday, Aug 7, at 8pm CET (Barcelona). That’s 7pm if you’re in Portugal, or dreaming of it… 2pm EST (New York)… and 11am PST (LA).

Some time after this 9 Deadly Email Sins presentation is over, I will bundle it up with Simple Money Emails, and sell it for $197, almost double what it costs now.

So if you want to keep yourself from pointlessly wasting your ad spend as well as your education budget… and if you want to confirm to yourself that you bested my challenge and figured out what I did deliberately in this email… then here’s where to get your ticket in time:

https://bejakovic.com/sme-classified-ty/

Emily tried to warn me, but I wouldn’t listen

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Last Monday, Josh Spector’s assistant Emily sent me an email with an alarmist subject line:

“TIMELY: For The Interested Classified Ad Copy Needed”

I was annoyed Emily was pushing me for the ad copy, since there was still a week to go. But I wrote it up and sent it over, along with the link I wanted the ad to go to.

A message immediately shot back. Emily again:

“Thanks for sending your copy and link over. Unfortunately, I’m getting an error message when I click on your link:” — and then a screenshot of an error page on my site.

I rolled my eyes at Emily’s pickiness. Of course it takes you to an error page — I’m still working on it, it’s in draft status!

I took a deep breath and collected myself. I politely replied to Emily and explained the situation. The landing page was still under development. “I will have it ready by the time the ad runs,” I said at the end.

(Cue ominous music. Clouds gather on the horizon, and a sudden gust of cold wind blows the window open in my office, scattering papers everywhere.)

Fast forward to yesterday.

In the eleventh hour before my ad in Josh Spector’s newsletter, I finished all the stuff I needed for it, including that landing page.

I could finally take a break. I decided to set work aside completely for the rest of the day.

I was in the mountains with friends yesterday, so we went for a walk. We had lunch. I packed, and got ready for five-hour ride from the Pyrenees back to Barcelona.

(The dark clouds on the horizon have fully built up now, and they flash with lightning every few seconds. Ominous music swells to unbearably tense levels.)

It was almost time to get in the car and drive home. But even though I’d decided to ignore any work-related stuff for the rest of the day, my resolve broke down.

I impulsively checked my email.

It had been about a half hour since the ad in Josh’s newsletter went out — plenty of time for a bunch of new people to get on my list.

I opened my inbox. But instead of dozens or hundreds of “new subscriber” notifications, I saw…

“Aww dude, clicked that FTI link and it leads to an error page 😳“

“John, I took your offer on Josh’s newsletter but the link is throwing an error.”

“Just tried to get the course. It says that I dont have access to the page”

… plus a dozen or more such messages from existing subscribers, who I’d routed to Josh’s newsletter to get a free copy of my new course via the classified ad.

There’s no knowing how many potential new subscribers, who weren’t yet on my list, clicked on the ad and were taken to the wrong page, with no chance to opt in.

In my daily email yesterday, I jokingly predicted crippling electrical storms or perhaps a meteorite strike to sink my ad in Josh’s newsletter.

But I didn’t account for the real danger:

My own mule-like ability to run a $350 classified ad and genuinely include a wrong link inside of it, which is indeed what happened.

Emily tried to warn me. But I wouldn’t listen.

I double-checked my own link when I submitted the ad.

​​I checked it again when Emily told me it was taking her to the wrong page.

The link was wrong both times, and yet I hypnotized myself into believing it wasn’t.

What’s more, when I clicked on the link myself to test it, it took me to the wrong page. I saw that, but I told myself it was was a website caching issue. “No problem here. It will be ready in time!”

Conclusion:

Too blind… too self-assured… too ready to rationalize away any conflicting evidence.

(Finally, violent storm over, the clouds break. A single ray of sunlight shines through to the soaked and ravaged countryside.)

Almost miraculously, my colossal mistake turned out to be salvageable.

It took me all of two seconds to create a website redirect from the wrong page to the right page. Anybody who clicked on the ad after that would now be taken to the right landing page.

Sure enough, people immediately started signing up for the free course I am giving away via the ad.

And some also signed up for the paid upsell I am offering, 9 Deadly Email Sins. One person who signed up was Shawn Cartwright, the owner of TCCII, an online martial arts academy. Shawn wrote to say:

===

Killer subject line and nice flex on the Pyrenees…

Also, killer offer… and something of real value to the business owners like me who love the idea of being copywriting experts but would rather create their products than perfect a sales page or email.

===

Here’s why this 9 Deadly Sins training could be of real value to business owners like Shawn:​​​​

It’s the email equivalent of Emily writing to me and saying, “Uhhh, your link doesn’t work. Do you want to double check that?”

Over the past year, I’ve coached, taught, and consulted a few dozen business owners, course creators, coaches, marketers, and copywriters on their email marketing and email copy.

I’ve found that my feedback keeps coming back to 9 persistent mistakes. All 9 of these mistakes are easy and quick to fix. And yet they are widespread, costing people sales day after day.

Perhaps you’re sure that you could never write emails which blatantly violate the laws of good sense and effective salesmanship.

You’re probably right. You are probably not as ready to hypnotize yourself as I am… to dismiss conflicting evidence like I did… or to be over-confident that what you’re doing right now is just perfect, with zero chance of being improved.

​​But isn’t it worth finding out what these most common 9 Deadly Email Sins are, to be 100% sure you yourself are not falling prey to them?

In case that’s got you wondering, here are the full details of this training, which will happen live, next Monday, August 7:

https://bejakovic.com/sme-classified-ty/

FREE: Get my new course for free by simply getting on Josh Spector’s list by Sunday and promptly following the instructions in the ad (also free)

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The past two days, I’ve been promoting Josh Spector’s newsletter, because tomorrow I will run an ad there, which will offer a free copy of my new course, Simple Money Emails.

Several readers wrote in to tell me they got on Josh’s list and are waiting eagerly for Josh’s email tomorrow to take advantage of my free offer.

Others wrote in to tell me they have already been on Josh’s list since the first time I wrote about it, several weeks back. They had glowing things to say about Josh himself. For example, reader Anthony La Tour wrote to say:

===

Dude, I’ve already unsubscribed from a few daily emails and yours is the only one I’ve read religiously. I even signed up to Josh’s newsletter a little while ago when you spoke about his newsletter and how to borrow the idea of a one paragraph newsletter.

Josh and I have already exchange some emails back and forth and he’s seriously a cool guy.

I’m proud to say that I’m also going to be launching a “Spector-style” newsletter, following the advice you gave in one of the emails you sent.

I own a couple of your offers and everything you’ve done is top-notch.

Thanks John!

===

On the other hand…

I also had one long-time reader and customer write in to ask about my new Simple Money Emails course — which I am offering for free, if you simply get on Josh Spector’s list by Sunday and promptly follow the instructions in the ad — with the following:

===

Will the people who bought any of your previous courses get the course as an add on or do we need to buy it separately?

===

This reader wrote this in reply to an email in which I had said, “if you are on Josh’s list by Sunday, and you take me up on the offer inside the ad before the deadline, you will get Simple Money Emails for free.”

You might think I am shaming this reader for missing an obvious point. But though I did learn email marketing via Ben Settle, shaming is not what I am doing.

My point is just to illustrate that you rarely have your readers’ full attention — even of the readers who like you, who buy from you regularly, and who read your emails eagerly.

Which is something I address in Simple Money Emails, specifically in Rule #11 of the 12 Rules of Simple Money Emails. And I tell you how to deal with it.

Incidentally, you can get Simple Money Emails for free. By signing up to Josh Spector’s newsletter at the link below. And reading Josh’s email tomorrow, which will have my ad in it.

I won’t be sending out more emails to push you towards this free offer.

In case you want something for free, click on the link below, sign up for free, and you will be rewarded:

https://bejakovic.com/fti

Valuable but quite elitist business practices

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Last week, I got a notification telling me about a new subscriber to this newsletter.

​​A familiar name. A familiar email address. A guy named Ian, who is a good friend of a good friend of mine, named Sam.

I guess Sam and Ian were hanging out in real life. My email newsletter came up somehow. And Ian, who is a social worker and has nothing to do with the shady but fraternal underworld that is the direct marketing industry, decided to sign up.

Then yesterday, Sam, who also reads these emails, forwarded me a text message thread between him and Ian:

===

Ian: I don’t have $100. What is the Most Valuable Email Trick?

Sam: If you get it for free will it be as valuable?

Ian: Hmmm that’s right. Most valuable to whom? Maybe to John as he is pocketing the $100.

Sam: Quite elitist to charge for this knowledge

===

I agree. And here’s another quite elitist practice:

I recently started, or rather restarted, a valuable daily habit. I call it “between the lines.” It goes like this:

1. Look at all the emails I get from readers and customers over the past 24 hours.

2. Paste them into a Google Doc.

3. Go through and ask myself, “What is really going on here? What’s really behind these words this person wrote me?” Then write down the answer in a comment on the side.

I’ve been doing this for a few weeks now.

Lots of interesting stuff pops up.

Other times, I’m just reminded of what is truly fundamental — simple stuff you can’t do without, and vice versa, simple stuff you can build an entire business around.

For example, one “between the lines” comment that I keep writing over and over in my Google Doc is that people really buy because of 1) curiosity and 2) trust.

I guess you can make sales just by doing one of trust or curiosity, by amping up the other. But if you increase both, results multiply.

And so all your marketing, at least all of your email marketing, should really be oriented to building up trust. Or curiosity. Or ideally, both.

Of course, you still have to sell something that people can somehow justify to themselves.

I doubt I will ever sell my Most Valuable Email to Ian and frankly I wouldn’t want to. I’m not sure how he would profit from it aside from satisfying his curiosity.

But perhaps you are a marketer or copywriter. Perhaps you want to write emails like this one, or LinkedIn posts, or whatever. In that case, perhaps I’ve gotten you a bit curious about my MVE trick, and built up trust via these daily emails to make you want to buy.

Yes, if you buy, it will be valuable to me. But it can also be valuable to you, and much more than the $100 you will put into my pocket.

If you want to see what the Most Valuable Trick is all about:

https://bejakovic.com/mve

Certifiable genius invents magical client-getting apparatus

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Once upon a time, I heard an A-list copywriter say there are only two valid archetypes for a guru who is the face of a direct response offer:

1. A bumbling loser who somehow lucks into secret knowledge that opens the path to success and riches, and…

2. A certifiable genius who invents some magical apparatus that the rest of us mere mortals can now profit from, just by pressing a button.

I’ve been promoting Steve Raju’s ClientRaker for the past week. Steve fits the second archetype, the certifiable genius.

Consider the following:

Steve was an actual child prodigy. At age 3, he was tested and retested and found to have the intellectual abilities of kids twice his age.

He could read fluently. He aced all the numeracy tests. He probably knew how to use the word “whom” and where to use it. All at age 3.

As you prolly know, IQ stands for “intelligence quotient.” That’s because the original definition was a quotient — intellectual age divided by chronological age, multiplied by 100.

So if you take Steve’s intellectual age back then, say 6 or 7… divide that by his actual, chronological age of 3… multiply it by 100… well, you get a really big IQ.

At one point, it was predicted Steve would end up proving string theory or fully explaining the quantum realm.

Instead, he skipped university and went to work at a Fortune 500 corporation that makes hydraulics. That’s how it goes.

Steve worked there for 19 years as a kind of independent one-man IT team, implementing entire systems on his own, left alone to do his magic and getting paid big sums of money for his work.

I’m telling you all this to highlight that Steve is not just some dude.

He has the brains and the mental makeup to spot and invent stuff that the rest of us might not ever figure out.

​​That’s probably why I was so amazed with the things that Steve told me when I first talked to him. There were things he took for granted, little tricks he had figured out, which I would look for blankly and never see on my own.

Steve eventually changed countries, moved from his native UK to his adopted Canada. And he decided that he’d spent enough nights drinking Pepsi and coding for 16 hours straight.

So he reinvented himself as a copywriter and direct response marketer.

​​He was a success at that also. Clients hired him after watching a paid webinar he put on. Businesses profited because of him. Stefan Georgi reached out and asked Steve to be one of the coaches for Copy Accelerator.

But let’s talk turkey:

Steve and his large brain decided to reinvent themselves yet again. This past January, he fired all his copywriting and marketing clients. He took a two-month vacation, came back, and started looking for bigger, better, brandier clients using a system he had cooked up himself, which he now calls ClientRaker.

Steve wrote me this morning with an update on his own client-getting activities, using the ClientRaker system:

===

Hi John

If you want to use them, no mentioning of any companies because I’m about to sign NDAs etc

Steve

###

1. It’s for about 3 days work, of which most of that I’ll be sat around watching other people present.

Proposed fees: $150-200k plus expenses split: four-ways between facilitators with additional fees to ________ for admin.

2. Potential JV partner, don’t mention the niche

===

Frankly, I have no idea what the hell Steve is talking about here — chalk that up to my more ordinary intelligence. But I do understand the $150-200k numbers, and the fact he won’t have to work hard to get those.

Like me, you might not be a certifiable genius.

You can still profit from Steve’s ClientRaker system.

I’ve gone through the trainings myself, and Steve has made them push-button easy to implement. Half of it is feeding Steve’s prompts into ChatGPT. The other half is clicking buttons on LinkedIn and using more AI trickery that I’d only heard about from Steve.

The deadline to sign up for ClientRaker is in less than 24 hours, specifically, tomorrow at 8:00 CET/11am PST.

​​If you want this magical client-getting apparatus before it disappears:

https://bejakovic.com/clientraker