Persuasion

Zero-resistance daily emails for your own business

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Last week, I got a message from Nick Bandy, who used to be the lead copywriter at an ad agency named Klicker, and who has since last year worked as a freelance marketing strategist. Nick wrote:

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I’ve known for months that I NEED to start sending emails daily, or at least very frequently. Heard it more times than I can count from Ben Settle, Daniel Throssell, and every other email marketer.

I know HOW to write daily emails. I write the same style of emails for my clients. Yet every time I think about writing them for my business?

Meh. Next month.

I don’t even remember how I found your product (probably stumbled on your site after seeing your name mentioned by Daniel Throssell), but I’m really glad I did.

Literally within 5 minutes of getting your first “prompt” in my inbox, I was cranking out my first email. Zero resistance. It flowed freely from my fingertips like Manekin Pis spraying proudly in the wind.

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Maybe you’re in a similar situation to Nick. Maybe you know HOW to write daily emails… you’ve done it for clients… you’re sure you need to do it for yourself… and yet maybe it’s still not happening?

If so, I figure you have some options.

Option one is to let more time pass. Maybe something will eventually change.

Another option is to try out my Daily Email Habit service, the way Nick did.

A month’s subscription is a whopping $30, effectively $1 per daily prompt puzzle.

It might be just the thing you need to start writing daily emails for yourself, with zero resistance.

Time is passing either way. if you’d like to saddle up on the daily email horse, before tomorrow sneaks up on you:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

Insurance

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I got a message a couple days ago from Neil Pritchard, who runs Leodis Games, a brick-and-mortar tabletop games store in Leeds, England.

Neil’s not your average brick-and-mortar tabletop games store owner.

He has also used his store to build up an email list, which he has been mailing daily for two years now.

Even though Neil has a long and distinguished daily email streak, without any outside help, he decided to sign up for my Daily Email Habit service. Why?

Neil explained in that message from a couple days ago. In his own words, or actually word:

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Well I can answer that in one word.

Insurance

Having emailed daily for over two years I know that 98% of the time I have something to say. But that other 2%? That’s already 14 days that I’ve stared at the screen and not known what to write.

And quite frankly I’ve sent my least engaging emails, where it’s clear I’ve phoned it in.

So I’ve brought myself some insurance. On those days I not only have that days puzzle to use, but if I’m really stuck months of puzzles & your solutions to spark some kind of idea.

Which is more than worth the criminally low price you’re charging.

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Neil’s message made me realize I’ve secretly and unconsciously been enjoying the pleasures of insurance myself for some time.

I get a lot of satisfaction in surveying the stockpiles of toilet paper in my bathroom cabinets… doing the monthly backups of all my email and customer lists… having way more cash in the bank than is smart from any rational investing perspective… and always engaging in one or two money-making projects in the background, along with this newsletter.

Maybe you’re something like Neil, or like me?

Maybe you’re already writing a daily email, but you could simply use, or at least enjoy owning, some insurance?

If so, take a look below for more info on Daily Email Habit insurance and benefits.

Current premiums start at just $30/month (and stay there, if you sign up today).

Apparently, this is a criminally low price for the service and peace of mind that Daily Email Habit provides. Here’s the link — and time is of the essence:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

Arguing with the Dalai Lama

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One time while I was attending university in Budapest, Hungary, the Dalai Lama came and gave a talk.

He sat on stage in a comfortable armchair, smiled beatifically, and spoke for an hour in front of the packed auditorium.

Afterwards, the Dalai Lama took questions.

There was an American guy in the audience I knew well, named Brendan. Brendan was studying environmental sciences, and he was infamous for being loud and argumentative.

Brendan immediately stood up to ask the Dalai Lama a question. It had something to do with environmental policy.

The Dalai Lama nodded assent while Brendan worked his way through his long question. Once Brendan finished, the Dalai Lama started to speak softly once again, sharing his vision.

Brendan listened for a few seconds. Then he got restless. Then he stood up again.

I don’t remember exactly what he said, but he started arguing with the Dalai Lama, in front of the entire auditorium, clarifying his own question, and highlighting important points that he wanted the Dalai Lama to be aware of.

I remember my face getting hot and my arms and legs getting heavy as I sank deeper into my seat, overcome with embarrassment on Brendan’s behalf.

Except of course, that’s not what it was. Brendan wasn’t embarrassed, and he didn’t need my embarrassment on his behalf.

Instead, I was just embarrassed by imagining myself in his situation — getting up to ask my self-important question in the middle of a packed auditorium, and then interrupting to pursue my point further, of the Dalai Lama no less.

It’s a curious thing.

I’ve always hated asking questions in seminars, participating in other people’s talks, groups, and discussions, being put on the spot. Like I said, always get hot, uncomfortable, and embarrassed. Regardless of what I say or what happens next, I come out of it feeling somehow dirty or defeated.

But that part’s not the curious part. I guess that part is common enough.

The curious part is that I’ve actually gone up on stage myself, both literally and figuratively, many times. And I loved it.

I used to do competitive debating. I’ve given talks at conferences. I’ve organized my own trainings and presentations online where I had hundreds of people listening (I hope?) to what I was saying in real time.

That’s the curious part.

Yes, these “stand up and command attention” situations always had my heart beating, my face flushed, and my body preparing to flee.

But inevitably, in every case, I came out of them feeling elated rather than defeated, purified rather than dirty.

What’s the difference?

Why is my instinct to be embarrassed and quiet in other people’s groups and talks and seminars… and to be willing to get up and speak when it’s something of my own, and to even be proud of the fact afterwards?

I don’t know.

Whatever the psychology behind it, the fact remains. I wanted to share it with you.

If you think you are not the kind of person who would ever stand up and command other people’s attention, maybe it’s because you have always tried doing it (or imagining doing it) within the context of other peoples talks, agendas, groups, whatever.

Organize something on your own, with your own initiative… and suddenly that same physical arousal gets interpreted in a positive rather than a negative way.

So much for unlocking the giant within.

Now I’d just like to remind you of my Daily Email Habit service. It helps you start and stick with writing daily emails.

Because yes, an email newsletter is a form of standing up and commanding of attention.

The good news is, it’s something you do for own ends… in a way that you control… and that you benefit from.

To find out more about Daily Email Habit:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

PSA: Beware the anti-launxxers

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This morning at 9am Barcelona time, I wrapped up the Prospective Profit Pricing event for Daily Email Habit.

Since I rolled out Daily Email Habit some 6 weeks ago and only sold it via regular daily emails since, this PPP event served as a kind of launch.

The event lasted for two days and four emails.

62 new people ended up signing up to Daily Email Habit as a result of those four emails.

Considering how small my list is, and the fact that I have been promoting Daily Email Habit pretty much every day for the past 6 weeks, and that I thought demand was near tapped out (there were days in the past weeks when I made 0 sales), I gotta say I’m pleased with how this turned out.

And now, public service announcement #1:

I’ve been seeing a new crop of online marketers who are positioning themselves as anti-launch.

Their spiel is no deadlines, no scarcity, no urgency — “no manipulation!” Just put your offer out there every day, and eventually everyone who is right for it will buy.

I’m not sure if this is just positioning themselves in a contrary way. Or maybe they’re catering to people who have been exhausted by massive affiliate-based PLF-style launches that have to be run every three months in order to generate any income, with a few lonely crickets chirping in the meantime.

In any case, beware their anti-launch propaganda.

It’s ironic, because those same anti-launxxers run plenty of offers with scarcity and urgency baked in — effectively launches, or email promos at least.

But what if they didn’t?

Their core message is still terrible advice if you ask me.

Launches and daily emails are like heads and tails — two sides of a gold krugerand that you can drop into your piggy bank.

Daily emails build desire for what you sell, and overcome objections. Launches, or promos, or whatever you want to call them, give people an undeniable reason to act NOW.

And as for manipulation?

I side with screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, who said that the only bad manipulation is manipulation that’s obvious.

The fact is, not a single person wrote me during this “launch” to complain about my manipulative deadline and manipulative disappearing bonus. If anything, I got a lot of people who wrote me to tell me they are excited to get started, and that this was the push they needed.

End of public service announcement #1.

Begin public service announcement #2:

I’d like to turn your attention to something free, new, and frankly AMA~ING.

I will write a full email about it tomorrow.

But if you are at all interested in copywriting, you MUST MUST MUST click through below.

Do you ever hear me using such over-the-top and positive language?

You don’t, because it’s almost never warranted, and in fact it usually works against you, by letting people down when they finally see your offer.

Well, not today. If you are into copywriting, you have to click through, and in fact, you have to sign up for what’s waiting for you here:

https://bejakovic.com/back-in-town

Last chance to gamble before the Daily Email Habit price increase

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Here’s a curious story about looming deadlines:

In the early days of FedEx, founder and CEO Fred Smith took the company’s last $5k and went to Vegas.

FedEx had a fuel bill of $25k. That last $5k wouldn’t be enough to cover it anyhow.

So Smith went to Vegas and played blackjack. He gambled and won $27k. That was enough to cover the fuel bill.

FedEx had survived for another week. And then it survived another week. Eventually, it turned into something big.

Now let me ask you:

Will you gamble $20 on a month of Daily Email Habit?

Will-ye or nill-ye, the price of Daily Email Habit is going up tonight, from $20/month to $30/month, at 12 midnight PST, just three hours from now.

This is the last email I will send before the fateful price increase.

As a reminder, Daily Email Habit is my service to help you start and stick with consistent daily emailing.

Here’s what that means in real terms, from virtuoso-making guitar teacher René Kerkdyk, who subscribes to Daily Email Habit:

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Just a short raving review:

I just wrote my daily email in 10 minutes going from sheer panic about what to write to a finished email building my expertise and selling my stuff. Thank you, John!

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I have also created a members-only club, Daily Email House, for business owners and marketers who send more or less daily emails.

Until to-night at 12 midnight, Daily Email House is a free bonus in case you sign up to Daily Email Habit. After that, it will disappear as a free bonus, and rise from its ashes as a new, fiery, paid offer.

All that’s to say, maybe the sales page below is worth a look? And right now? Before the deadline sneaks up on you with its cold, sleep-inducing claws?

If you’d like my help writing your daily emails, tomorrow, and the day after, and then next week, until eventually your daily emailing turns into something big:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

“You’re pretty funny”

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A few days, I ago got an email from copywriter and business strategist Nadia Dalbani, who wrote:

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John.

I’ve read 3 of your emails in a row. I haven’t had time to read them the past few days, so I had to have a read-a-thon (a John-a-thon!).

Anyway, I’m so close to buying Daily Email Habit even though I totally read the sales page and you DID say don’t buy this if you don’t plan to *actually* have a Daily Email Habit – I only email my list once a week, so I initially left like yup, NOT for me.

But I can confirm, even reading your emails in reverse order, I am definitely more convinced to start an every single day email habit due to your pitches.

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I remember hearing a story once about how Bill Murray and Chevy Chase got into an actual fist fight on the set of Saturday Night Live.

The two apparently hated each other. It all came to a boil one day when Murray said to Chase, “You’re pretty funny.”

Chevy Chase then started swinging.

I’ve always wondered why “pretty funny” is such an insult, at least if you think of yourself as funny. It’s much more insulting than, say, “not funny.”

(If you have any insight on this for me, write in and let me know.)

In any case, that’s a little how I felt after reading Nadia’s email.

“Pretty good email. Pretty, pretty good. Almost got me. But not quite.”

Nadia lives in London. After I read her message, I started getting ready to buy a ticket so I could fly there, confront her in person, and maybe start a fight.

Fortunately, yesterday I got a new message from Nadia, just in time:

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Alright, alright, it took, like, 3 more emails, but you got me. I’m mega excited to start Daily Email Habit 😄

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Like I say, this is particularly fortunate, not only because it will prevent an ugly confrontation on the streets of London, but because it also backs up the very premise of Daily Email Habit.

For one thing, the emails Nadia responded to were based on prompts I sent out as part of Daily Email Habit. (I eat my own dog food most days.)

For another thing, this little case study backs up the general principle of putting out a daily email… gradually building up desire… gradually chipping away at objections… all while keeping readers interested enough that they keep opening and reading your emails.

This is really what Daily Email Habit is there to help you do.

And if you are thinking of getting started, I can only recommend you act now.

My Prospective Profit Price event is coming to a close tonight at 12pm midnight PST.

After that, the price for Daily Email Habit goes up from a modest $20/month to a wallet-busting $30/month.

Also, Daily Email House, the lively community that I’ve created for those who write more or less daily emails, will stop being a free bonus tonight at midnight.

If you have any questions, or to join now, take a look at this pretty good sales page:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

You’re one mediocre, unread sales letter away from charging 40x more than the competition

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Comes a long but interesting question about magic words that bring you riches:

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Im asking you this for two reasons: A) Your Course on Bullets and B) You’ve been on Ben Settles List, who I’m going to reference.

Long story short I saw a marketer reference a Book and said he was thinking about summarizing and making a Course, that he could probably charge upwards of $300 dollars for.

I have been re-reading ” Ogilvy on Advertising” and was thinking, it’s $25 New on Amazon and is recommended by virtually every top copywriter, marketer etc… Yet Ben Settle and many other sell their info ( and I’m not saying their info is not good and maybe worth every penny they charge ) for MUCH More Money. But on the surface aren’t even in the conversation with the Ogilvy’s, Hopkins’ and many others whose works are supposed to be the Holy Grail.

In your opinion, What’s the difference? Is it Positioning or could it simply be the use of Bullets to create curiosity and build value that allows them to charge So much more?

I mean back to Ben Settle, do his $800 to $1000 products have more useful info in them than ” Ogilvy on Advertising ” or many of the other so-called classics? Im guessing NO

Could the ability to charge so much more just come down to the power of a Good Sales Letter?

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That last part of the question is a reference to a supposed quote from famed direct marketer Gary Halbert, which goes something like, “You’re one good sales letter away from never worrying about money again.”

I don’t know if that was ever true, even for Gary.

I doubt it’s true for anybody today.

One thing I’m sure of, as sure as that the moon is in fact made of cheese:

There’s no “one good sales letter” that will allow you to sell a book for $1k in any mass-market way.

I’ve bought Ben Settle’s stuff before, including books he charges hundreds of dollars for. I never once read the sales page when I bought, except as much as was unavoidable to locate the “Buy Now” button.

Why did I pay Ben so much? Particularly since he makes a big deal about the fact that none of the stuff he teaches is secret or new? Without me even bothering to get the full details of what I was buying?

Positioning, if that’s what you want to call it. But not positioning of the product itself. That’s secondary or even unimportant here.

Rather, it was the gradual, patient, and strategic positioning of the person selling. As Dan Kennedy writes, “The higher up in income you go, the more you’re paid for who you are, rather than what you do.”

That’s the psychological effect.

The mechanism to get there was daily emails.

Emails that, day after day, month after month, year after year, built Ben up as somebody to listen to and respect… put him in a marketplace of one and gave him a mini-monopoly… and did enough teasing of his product to allow me to ignore the fact that there’s nothing new or secret in there, and probably nothing that a careful reading of Robert Collier’s book couldn’t give me.

Ben sums it up himself:

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Don’t get me wrong, sales copy is important.

But if I had to choose between having the world’s best copywriting skills or having top notch email skills, I’d choose email every time. It’s made me (and certain clients who hired me for emails, when I had clients) far more money.

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Email is how you charge 40x more than the competition.

It’s how you can sell at a premium with a mediocre sales page, or even no sales page at all.

Ben’s done it… I’ve done it… maybe you’d like to do it too?

If you would, and if want my help in getting there, then take a look here:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

David Ogilvy endorses the Daily Email Habit approach

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This morning I found myself reading “Quotations of David Ogilvy,” put out in 2023 by the Ogilvy agency, on the 75th anniversary of its founding.

Here’s a quote from Ogilvy that caught my eye:

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Dr. Gallup reports that if you say something which you don’t also illustrate, the viewer immediately forgets it. I conclude that if you don’t show it there is no point in saying it. Try running your commercial with the sound turned off; if it doesn’t tell without sound, it is useless.

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I’m sharing this with you for two reasons.

One is that it’s a useful reminder, even if you never write a TV commercial. Really, it comes down to effective communication. If you don’t illustrate, the reader will forget it. If you don’t show it, there’s no point in saying it.

Reason two is that I was lucky to have somehow learned that lesson early in my copywriting career. Somebody must have shown it to me, because I also remembered it over the years.

The basic idea above — illustrate, don’t just say — is the underlying idea of pretty much everything I’ve done in the marketing space.

It’s the underlying idea of my Copy Riddles program, and its try-and-compare method of learning to write copy, instead of just a bunch of “here’s how” instruction.

It’s the underlying idea of thousands of sales emails I’ve written, both for clients and for myself, and the way I teach others to do that inside my Simple Money Emails and Most Valuable Email programs.

And it’s the underlying idea of my Daily Email Habit service.

Because on most days — not all, but most — I don’t just send a daily prompt for to help you write your own daily email. I also use that prompt in my own daily email, to show and illustrate how it can be done.

About that, I got the following feedback from Chris Howes, who runs a successful music teaching memebrship, Creative Strings Academy. Chris subscribes to Daily Email Habit, and he had this to say:

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But more importantly, I now get TWO LESSONS from you every day. And I often learn as much or more from your regular daily free emails. Together, hand in hand, they feel like someone dropped off a shopping cart from Sams Club full of gifts at my front door and said here you go…

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As David Ogilvy said, “We sell — or else.”

I don’t know what the “else” is. I don’t want to find out.

So if you’d like to buy a month’s worth of daily email puzzles, in order to write your own daily emails, and to get additional inspiration and illustration from my daily emails, here’s where to go:

https://bejakovic.com/deh

Don’t read this before bed

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A gruesome and depressing email today. Read at your own risk:

Last night, of course right before bed, I saw a real-life clip online that I really didn’t need to see.

It showed a heartbroken mother wailing. She had just called 911 after she discovered some rotting human remains in her 19-year-old son’s closet.

The rest of the clip showed the police confronting the son.

He calmly and articulately admitted that, yes, that is a human head and a pair human hands in his closet, and yes, he did murder somebody with a knife. Asked why, he replied, “I always wanted to know what it would feel like.”

Of course, rather than closing my laptop at this point and going to drink some chamomile tea to maybe bleach this from my mind, I investigated this case further.

The murderer looks to be as close to pure evil as you can imagine. Cold, remorseless, shark-like.

He was arrested and then tried. His lawyers went with an insanity defense. It didn’t fly.

He was sentenced to life in prison without parole. The jury felt he was not insane, in the sense that he could clearly distinguish between right and wrong.

But if you see the guy confessing to the murder or talking about the details of it, it’s clear that something is not right in his head. He might not be insane in the legal sense, but he’s certainly not sane in the everyday sense.

If you would dig into the neural pathways, chemicals, bits and blobs of his brain, I bet you’d find they were different to what a normal person has. Maybe this guy was born deficient in some way, or something went wrong early in life, or wasn’t there when it should have been.

I feel like I’m digging myself into a hole with this email. It’s too late to stop now, so let me dig a bit deeper:

I don’t know if we have free will, or like I wrote a few weeks ago, “free won’t.”

But even though the murder case above is as clear of a black-and-white, good-vs-evil, open-and-shut case as you would ever not want to see right before bed, I personally still feel there’s probably much more to it for anybody who would take the trouble to look closer.

Does that mean that the guy is not guilty of murder?

Smart people, such as Stanford neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky, argue exactly this. Sapolsky says that assigning guilt doesn’t make sense when you actually look at what’s happening in the brain.

I personally don’t know.

One thing I do know is that my “shades of gray” way of looking at the world is a handicap, probably for my own happiness and certainly when it comes to influencing others. Because the more black-and-white you see things, the easier it makes it for others to identify with you, to fall in line with your views, to berserk on your behalf, as Ben Settle likes to say.

This black-and-white stuff also works if you write sales copy. (Yes, I have to somehow try to clamber out of that hole I’ve dug for myself.)

The more extreme, contrasted, polarized you make your claims, the more likely you are to draw attention to and to create desire for them.

This is something I go into much more detail in my Copy Riddles program. Copy Riddles gives you source material from info products of years past, and sales bullets from A-list copywriters who promoted those products, to drill this black-and-white stuff into your brain, such as it is.

In case you’d like to find out more, and maybe bleach this email from your mind:

https://bejakovic.com/cr

Glamourous and profitable #1 ranking in an impossible category

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In 1987, Hatton Gardens Hotel in Upton Saint Leonards won the inaugural Loo Of The Year award.

The Loo Of The Year is awarded each year to the best public toilet in the UK, based on criteria such as adequate flushing frequency, urinal privacy, overall cleanliness, lighting, lack of vandalism, and, best of all, a “wow factor.”

The Loo Of The Year awards were set up in 1987 by the communications director of a washroom service company.

That first year, only 50 guests attended, and awards were given in only two categories, hotels and restaurants.

There are now 63 categories, and over 300 guests attended the prestigious event and dinner last year.

Yesterday, I talked about the transformative effect that winning the race at Le Mans had on Jaguar, the car brand. To my mind, there are three key elements in something like winning a top-tier car race:

1. A ranking with a clear number 1

2. An incontestable result, a matter of performance, not popularity or opinion

3. An element of glamour

But even if you cannot get all three, two out of three can still be great for business.

Awards and arbitrary “Top 100” listings only offer #1 and #3, ranking + glamour. The results are definitely a matter of popularity or opinion, but so what?

I wrote an email back in 2019 about the impact that the World’s 50 Best Restaurants listing had on the restaurant and tourism industry.

As one extreme example, a Copenhagen restaurant named Noma already had 2 Michelin stars. Even so, they were struggling to fill tables.

After Noma randomly and unexpectedly came in at the top of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants, 100,000 people tried to book a table there in one day. Suddenly, generating business was no longer an issue.

As for Hatton Gardens Hotel:

At the next year’s event ceremony, in 1988, the manager of the Hatton Gardens said visits to his hotel had doubled since winning Loo Of The Year.

Such is the power of a #1 ranking + glamour, above and beyond a certification… or a gold star… or a label. (And yes, even toilets can apparently have glamour — at least glamour enough to double business.)

So create an award for your industry, or create rankings.

Or better yet, pay somebody else to create them, and to announce you the winner.

Put on a tuxedo or an evening gown, get your photo taken in front of one of those step-and-repeat banners, and watch what happens to your business.

And if you detest awards show, and if paying some rando to create a Top 50 ranking and put you at #1 turns you off, don’t worry.

Tomorrow I’ll tell you how to have success with only elements 2+3 off the list above.

Can you guess what example I’ll use?

I’ll give you a hint. It’s a man who built a massive, enduring career, out of nothing, to become the most famous entertainer of his age. And he did it with a series of incontestable challenges, dares, and contests, all of which featured an element of glamour.

While you ponder that, let me remind you that my Daily Email Habit has been voted #1 among the World’s Best 100 Email Prompt Services by a distinguished panel of email marketers, all of whom happen to subscribe to Daily Email Habit.

Here’s what one of the distinguished panelists, Australian copywriter Allan Johnson, had to say in casting his vote:

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This is a very useful service. I have always struggled to commit to daily writing (emails or not) and protecting the streak is now a priority, so thanks.

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If you’d like to find out what makes Daily Email Habit #1:

https://bejakovic.com/deh