When doctors go on strike, patient deaths either stay the same or go down. Such was the conclusion of a 2008 literature review by four professors of public health at Emory University.
The scientists looked at the results of five doctors’ strikes from 1976 to 2003.
They found that in the absence of doctors, deaths never went up, but often went down.
You can interpret that how you will. I know how I will interpret it, and it’s to tell you that when copywriters go on strike, sales either stay the same or go up.
Well, of course not every time. But in many situations, getting tricky with your messaging, optimizing for the sophistication of your market, or being clever and indirect actually harms rather than helps your sales.
One of the most successful of all copywriters, Gary Bencivenga, summed it up as the “duck for sale principle.” Gary wrote:
“If you are trying to sell a duck, don’t beat about the bush with a headline such as, ‘Announcing a special opportunity to buy a white-feathered flying object.’ You’ll get much better results with, ‘DUCK FOR SALE.'”
If you would like my guidance and help writing emails, which don’t need to be complicated or take a lot of time to get you results, I will soon have email copywriting coaching for sale. The only way to join it is to be on my email list first. You can sign up for that here.