Psychology Behind Advertising

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].

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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:

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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:

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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:

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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:

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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.

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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/

The world’s most handsome email marketer gives me some unsolicited advice

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Two days ago, I started promoting Steve Raju’s ClientRaker training, about getting richer, nicer, classier clients using AI and LinkedIn.

Reader Fotis Chatz, who writes for Ning Li and positions himself as the “World’s Most Handsome Email Marketer” on LinkedIn, bought ClientRaker yesterday.

​​But being excessively handsome is not enough for Fotis. So he wrote in to give me some unsolicited advice about my launch:

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Just bought it.

Your story about him using A.I. is what “got” me. I’m already using FB with a lil bit of success, curious to see what I can do on Linkedin.

Btw, have you considered creating a bonus specifically for this offer? We did it a lot when I was working with Igor (Kheifets). We’d promote an affiliate offer and either give a product of ours that would cover something missing from the offer, or create something from scratch. Great way to make way more sales and win some affiliate leaderboards.

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What Fotis wrote might be unsolicited advice but it’s welcome advice — because I happen to agree 100%. I’m all for creating valuable bonuses, whether for my own offers or for affiliate offers.

I didn’t do it in this case because 1) I’m swamped with other work and 2) because I believe ClientRaker is so attractive that it will sell on its own.

That said, I might create a bonus in the future if Steve ever offers ClientRaker again and if I promote it again. I’ve had several ideas for what I could do, including a training based on the Authority Audits I’ve been doing this week, or another on how to feel comfortable asking for more money.

If that stirs you a bit, I can guarantee you this:

Every time I’ve offered a bonus for an offer, I made sure to also send it to everyone who bought that offer before I did the bonus.

I want to make it a brain-dead simple certainty in your mind that won’t ever be harmed by taking me up on any of my offer early. But you can certainly be harmed by taking me up on an offer late.

In the current situation, if you wait to take me up on this offer, you can miss the current launch window. You may scoff — but life has a way of getting in the way.

And if life does do that, it might mean you won’t be able to get ClientRaker ever — there’s no guarantee Steve will offer it again since he also has lots of things going on and doesn’t need this extra bit of money.

Or you might have to pay more. Because if Steve does run ClientRaker again, I will use all my persuasive skill to get him to double or triple the price.

And most importantly, you will miss out on any new clients you could very conceivably get just by following the simple, paint-by-number instructions Steve lays out inside this training.

If you actually do what Steve tells you to do, and you win yourself a new client or two in the next month that you wouldn’t have otherwise, that can legitimately be worth thousands or tens of thousands of dollars to you — depending on who you work with and what you deliver.

Point being, if you’re considering ClientRaker, it can make sense to get it now rather than wait. The following page has the full details if you want some help making that decision:

https://bejakovic.com/clientraker

I don’t beg pardon for good results, and you don’t have to either

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Yesterday, I made a new offer, Authority Audit. One of the first people to take me up on it wrote:

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You really know your audience (or at least it seems like you’re reading my mind.) This is exactly what I’ve been thinking about, to the point of even redoing all my optins and email sequences. But I know I should be getting way more out of what I got… so thank you for the offer.

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The fact is, I got more people ordering these Authority Audits than I really want to do. I certainly don’t want still more. So I closed the offer down, even sooner than I expected to.

Yes, I’m telling you this to build up my own standing and authority. I’m also telling you as a permission slip in case you need it.

If you got good results, don’t beg pardon for them. Tell your prospects about your results to help them make up their own minds. Take away their confusion and uncertainty, so they themselves can get some of those good results in the future.

But what if you don’t got results yet? One dude interested in the Authority Audit wrote:

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Would this go well for someone that’s starting from scratch?

for a background:

Hated social media and only started one to build some sort of “inbound” system of client acquisition

my plan to write articles and content a la Chris Orzechowski but I’ve yet to find what value is and how to define it.

this is the only concern I have as you’ve proven to be the best at what you do.

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I replied to say that, in his case, there wouldn’t be much for me to review or audit.

I also told him that next week, I will be promoting an offer that might be a better fit — a new training (not my own) for getting clients. For figuring out exactly what value you offer. For defining it in exactly your prospect’s words. So you can start getting leads, clients, results, even if you don’t got ’em yet.

But that’s next week.

For today, I have a little authority- and status-building tip for you.

It’s hidden inside my Most Valuable Email course, as an aside.

​​It has nothing to do with the actual training of the course. Rather it’s something that’s been valuable to me, and so I decided to take a little aside while talking about the MVE trick to share it with people who buy the course.

It’s a little habit you can start today, and tomorrow, to transform how you see yourself and how potential clients and customers see you. It’s something I wish somebody had told me years ago, when I was just starting out. And it’s something that amplifies, rather than clashes with, that client-getting training I will be promoting next week.

​​In case you’re interested:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Announcing: Authority Audit

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I’m reading a book called The Charterhouse of Parma. It was written in 1838 by a guy named Stendhal, who Friedrich Nietzsche called the “last great psychologist.”

​​The Charterhouse of Parma is all about the love affairs and political intrigues at the court of Parma.

​​Two of the main characters are aging count Mosca, who is the prime minister, and his lover, the beautiful and clever duchess Sanseverina.

​​The two plan on running away from their problems in Parma to live in peace in Naples — but they won’t really have much money if they run away. To which the count rightly tells the duchess:

“It will never be the luxury, greater or less, in which we live, that will insure our position; it will be the pleasure the clever folk of the place may find in drinking a cup of tea in your drawing room.”

I wrote this down because I really think it’s true. It’s good to have the trappings of success, and no doubt they will buy you some standing. But it’s poor gruel compared to the endorsement and approval of people who already have standing.

I’ve got a new offer for you today. It’s cheap. I won’t keep it up long. It’s called the Authority Audit.

Over the past year I’ve consulted and coached a few dozen business owners, course creators, coaches, marketers, and copywriters. I’ve found that my feedback on their personal marketing often comes back to the same few fundamental mistakes.

One of these fundamental mistakes is insufficient authority, status, standing. Not in reality usually, but as presented in the marketing itself.

So my offer with the Authority Audit is that I look at who you are and how you present that to the world. And I tell you where you are falling short on the status and authority part. I tell you how you can use what you’ve already got to look much more authoritative. I tell you how you can quickly build up more status to plug up any holes you might actually have.

Like I said, I’m making this offer cheap, $100. You might say that’s a mistake, and that it’s working against my own status and authority. To which I would say — you’re absolutely right.

The reason why the Authority Audit is so cheap is that I want to take what I might tell you and apply it more consciously myself. Because I too am guilty of the same mistakes often.

I’m also planning to create a more in-depth, much more expensive training about this later. And I plan to use any Authority Audits I perform as material for that future training.

I won’t be offering the Authority Audit long, 2-3 days max, and I will close it off without any ceremony and announcement. I also won’t go into detail here as to how it will be organized and delivered.

That’s why I suggest you only get the Authority Audit if you suspect that you’re not doing a good job convincing the world you are somebody… if you can afford $100 right now… and if you already trust me.

​​If all three are true of you, you can order your Authority Audit here:

https://desertkite.thrivecart.com/authority-audit/

How to relax resisting bodies and minds

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I went to the gym just now, and I tried to do something like the splits.

I sat myself down on the mat. I splayed my legs out. But instead of the necessary 180 degrees, which is what the splits call for, my legs only went about 90 degrees. “The squares, not the splits,” they said to me. “That’s all we’re doing today.”

I tried negotiating with my legs, both together and individually. “No,” they kept saying in unison. “No means no.”

But where persuasion won’t work, force will.

So I put my fists on the insides of my thighs. Instead of trying to spread my legs ever wider, I squished my legs in towards each other, against the resistance of my fists.

I kept this up for about ten seconds. I then relaxed for a moment. And I tried the splits again. Result?

Of course I didn’t manage it. But this time, instead of just 90 degrees, I got noticeably further, 98, maybe 100 degrees.

That’s a little trick I learned a long time ago from Pavel Tsatsouline’s book Relax Into Stretching.

As you, might know, Pavel’s legend is that he was formerly a fitness instructor for the Soviet Special Forces. He loves to use the word “comrade” in his training videos and to cite Soviet-era exercise science to back up weird body tricks.

Such as [imagine it with a Russian accent]: “Contract-relax stretching is documented to be at least 267% more effective than conventional relaxed stretching!”

But it’s not just the body that works this way. The mind does too.

There’s a way to bring people into hypnosis called the Dave Elman induction. A part of it is the usual, “close your eyes, relax” guidance from the hypnotist.

Except once your eyes are closed, the hypnotist tells you, ​​​”Open your eyes. Now close your eyes again and relax twice as deeply as before… Now open your eyes. And close your eyes again and relax even more deeply…”

It’s called fractionation, and it’s supposed to be a reliable technique to bring people into deeper and deeper trance.

Does it really work?​
​
Test it out yourself and see. The next time you’re at the gym… or in bed as you’re trying and failing to fall asleep… or perhaps the next time you’re writing a sales email.

And now imagine click below to my Most Valuable Email sales page, and reading all the fascinating and curious things I promise in the headline…

No no, stop imagining. Come back to earth or at least back to this email.

Now imagine that fascination and curiosity building up to an almost unbearable level as you make your way down the sales page…

Seriously stop it. Stop imagining being so fascinated and curious. It’s off-putting.

Except wouldn’t it be fascinating and curious to finally find out what the Most Valuable Email trick is? Of course it would. Here’s where to go to get it:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/

Simple strategy to build your status, turn readers into advocates, and create a content flywheel

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Yesterday, I wrote an email about true magic, in which I promoted my Most Valuable Email course right at the top. I got a reply to that email from reader Jakub Červenka:

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John, I hope you are selling tons of mves.

Had I not bought it already, I would now, just as a thank you for many clever ways how you pitch it.

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Perhaps you skimmed across Jakub’s message just now, without really reading. I hope you didn’t. But even if you did, well…

I always thought that when people write emails featuring a reader comment, it’s all about being 1) pressed for time, because it’s easy to write an email that’s mostly a reader reply, and 2) self-serving, because the reader comment is usually a testimonial or an endorsement of some sort.

And no doubt, both of those are good reasons to regularly feature reader comments in your emails.

But there are other good reasons, too.

For one, it shows off you have readers. Don’t scoff.

Lots of people who write a newsletter don’t have any readers, particularly readers who are engaged enough to reply. So if you do have ’em, and can prove it, it builds your status and authority, independent of the content of the actual reply you got.

For two, it acknowledges and recognizes the reader who wrote in. It’s nice to see your name in print, going out to thousands of people, even if it’s just in an email.

Plus, it can give the reader added benefits. I’ve had Ben Settle featured something I wrote him in one of his emails, and people found me and signed up to my list as a result.

Point being, featuring a reader’s reply can benefit that reader in different ways, making it more likely he sticks around and becomes an advocate, not just a reader or customer.

For three, it encourages more responses in the future. This contributes to all the other benefits I listed above.

I could go on. But if you weren’t convinced by three arguments, what are the odds you will be convinced by a fourth? Slim.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, perhaps you too are in the daily race to find clever ways to pitch your offers. And perhaps you find yourself writing things that are a little too dry and literal. Perhaps you don’t even have any readers replying to your emails yet. If so, here’s a way to fix it:

https://bejakovic.com/mve/