I like to get my contact with the world through a news board called Hacker News. It works just like other news boards — popular and interesting article stick around for a longer time. In general, even the most popular articles stick around for only a few hours.
Yesterday, I went on Hacker News and I saw a terribly uninteresting article had appeared on the front page. The headline ran:
“What’s SAP, and why’s it worth $163B?”
“Geez,” I said, “who cares? I know all I need to know about SAP. It’s some big enterprise software company. Why would I ever want to read more about that?”
So I ignored this article.
And I had to keep ignoring it because a few hours later it was still there, getting more and more upvotes.
This morning, I sat down on a park bench with a croissant and checked Hacker News again. “What’s SAP” was still there, with about 10x the average upvotes of all the other posts on the HN front page.
I sighed, hung my head, and clicked to read this stupid article.
And you know what?
It was fascinating.
I won’t repeat the article here. I will just tell you that it put the current moment into a bigger context and taught me something new about my world. (And yes, that new thing was about enterprise software.)
But this article did more than that.
For example, did you know that until the 1990s, 90% of software sold was custom-built, and not off-the-shelf?
Of course, today, it’s the exact opposite.
Which made me think about the direct response business. Could we be in a similar, pre-1990s situation right now when it comes to DR marketing funnels and sales copy? As in, 90% of copy today is still custom-written, instead of off-the-shelf?
You might say it’s a stupid question, and that it’s impossible to have off-the-shelf sales copy and marketing.
Or you might say it already happened, with companies like Clickfunnels, and with niche marketing providers like Vyral Marketing for real estate agents.
Whatever.
The point of this email is not this question of custom-built vs. off-the-shelf marketing. The point is simply that the “What’s SAP” article got me thinking in a new way.
And that’s really what I want to share with you today. A defense of bad headlines.
Because if you find yourself magically attracted to a headline — “I gotta read this!” — odds are good it’s because you are looking for confirmation of previously held views… or perhaps some small update on a topic you already know too much about.
On the other hand, when you find yourself completely repelled by a headline (“What’s SAP”), it might be time to stop and say, “Sounds horrific! But let me see what this is about.”
A couple days ago, I shared a talk given by a very successful and very influential marketer, Dan Kennedy, about thriving during a recession. In that talk, Dan said:
You pay attention to everybody else who’s in your business. It’s like being Amish. It works just like real incest. Everybody gets dumber and dumber and dumber until the whole thing just grinds to a halt.
So you can’t do that. You’ve got to pay attention outside your little Amish community of jewelers or carpet cleaners or whatever it is that, up until tonight, you thought you were.
You’ve got to pay attention to other stuff because you ain’t going to find any breakthroughs in the five other people standing in a circle looking at you. They aren’t any smarter than you are. They are probably dumber than you are.
I think that covers the M and the B in my M+B+C email formula. Now as for that C:
You might or might not already know that I offer an Email Marketing Audit.
So far, I’ve been selling my Email Marketing Audit by referring to results I have achieved for businesses I’ve worked with. The increases in conversion rates in email funnels… the millions of dollars of sales made by writing emails and managing email lists.
But there’s another good reason you might want to get me to look at your email marketing:
My non-Amish breadth of of experience in this field.
Off top of my head, I’ve consulted and worked on email funnels to sell weight loss supplements… shipping containers… pet supplies… sex and dating info products… essential oils… Internet marketing… fermented food preparation kits… realtor services… and real estate investing education.
Do you think this breadth of experience might help you and your business get out of incestuous and closed-minded marketing practices?
In case you do, here’s where to go to get my Email Marketing Audit: