Joe Sugarman

A Christmas Problem

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It’s Christmas Eve tonight, so I wanted to write a Christmas-themed post.

I rummaged around my brain, and remembered a great scene from the movie “A Christmas Story.”

Little pudgy Ralph, the main character, gets a snowball to the eye from the neighborhood bully, Scut Farkus. Scut then taunts him:

“What are you gonna cry now? Come on, cry baby, cry for me. Come on!”

But instead of crying, instead of running off, instead of just standing there and taking a beating, little Ralphie slowly but surely goes berserk.

He jumps on Scut and beats him to a pulp while a “steady torrent of obscenities” pours out of him.

A problem, about to become an opportunity

Great scene. All I needed for my post was to tie this scene in with some kind of marketing lesson. One problem though.

I couldn’t come up with anything.

I went through a long list of marketing lessons I’ve collected over time. I went through lots of half-baked email ideas I’ve previously laid aside. I sat and stared at the ceiling and hoped for inspiration.

But nothing.

So I gave up. And I went back to re-reading Joe Sugarman’s Adweek Copywriting Handbook. And in there, Joe mentions off-handedly how he always looks at problems as opportunities.

For example, one time he was selling a calculator below the recommended price through an ad in the Wall Street Journal. The manufacturer then complained to Joe about the low price.

“No problem,” said Joe. “I’ll fix it.”

And he wrote a second ad for the WSJ, explaining how he has to raise the price because the manufacturer is complaining, and inviting customers to buy the calculator before the price goes up.

Problem? Yes, and an opportunity too. The second ad outpulled the first one.

So I decided to apply this lesson to my problem (no marketing idea for today’s post), and here we are, you and I, learning something together.

Anyways, no Christmas post would be complete without a present. The present I have for you is currently in the oven, and should be ready in a few days’ time.

It’s my book on becoming a successful sales copywriter on the online platform Upwork.

If you want to get notified when I finish it up, sign up at the link below. And of course, have a merry Christmas, and may you wake up tomorrow to a Red Ryder range model air rifle waiting for you under the Christmas tree.

https://bejakovic.com/upwork-book-notification-list/

How to use satanism to sell your product

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A couple of weeks ago, a festive satanic statue was placed inside the Illinois statehouse.

It’s the holiday season, after all, and all religious organizations that wanted to could be represented.

Predictably, this led to outrage by conservative groups.

Shocked coverage on news outlets across the world.

And a jump in applications to join the Temple of Satan, the body behind the statue.

So what is it that these satanists are promoting? What evil, filthy, depraved trick are they hoping to play on the rest of the world?

Well, the statue itself has the inscription, “Knowledge is the greatest gift,” and it shows a hand, holding an apple, with a snake coiled around it.

And here are some tenets of the satanist faith, taken from their website (I’m cherrypicking):

– Compassion and empathy towards all creatures in accordance with reason

– Beliefs should conform to our best scientific understanding of the world

– The freedoms of others should be respected

It seems these satanists want compassion, reason, empathy, a solid scientific education, and respect for others.

In other words, the Temple of Satan sounds like it’s a cross between the Public Library Association and Amnesty International.

Pretty, pretty boring.

Well intentioned, yes.

But not inspiring or viral at all.

And yet, here we are, reading and talking about them, all because it’s under the satanist umbrella.

Which, of course, is a very good lesson to learn. It’s something that expert copywriter and direct marketer, Joe Sugarman, who made millions selling tech gadgets and blue-blocking sunglasses, called “concept selling.”

Concepts sell better than products.

The Temple of Satan gets attention and new applications to join.

Compassion and empathy — not so much.

So if you’re selling a good, solid, healthy product or service, then it might be time to think of a concept like “satanism” to sell more of it.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be satanism itself. But with a bit of work, you too can come up with a dramatic, attention-grabbing concept, without offending too many religious groups in the process.

If you want a few case studies of how I’ve done this for my own products and for clients, sign up below, and get a free copy of my ebook on email marketing for the health space (ETA February 2019):

https://bejakovic.com/profitable-health-emails/

How to spoil an almost-closed sale

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“When the locomotive starts to chug from a standing start, it really works hard. The amount of commitment and energy that the train must exert is monumental. But once the train starts to move, the next few feet become easier and the next few even easier. So it is with copy.”
Joe Sugarman, The Adweek Copywriting Handbook

I’ve been writing a lot of advertorials lately.

This is for a client based out of Bangkok, who sells physical products online.

Their funnel works as follows:

Prospects first see a video ad on Facebook which demonstrates the product.

They then click through, and are taken to an advertorial (that’s where I come in).

If they like what they read, they click through once more to the sales page, where they get a chance to buy.

And here’s one recent lesson from this project:

It has to do with a first-person, story-based, blog-style advertorial I wrote for a neck brace.

The first version of the advertorial was profitable, though barely so. The client asked me to come up with another version, to see whether we could increase conversions. I told him to simply test out two small changes:

1. Swap out the current headline for a Gary Halbert-style classic along the lines of “The Amazing Direct Mail Secret Of A Desperate Nerd From Ohio”

2. Insert a new lead that immediately offers a discount, with a link to the sales page (only then followed by the current story lead)

My client tested these two things out.

The new headline seems to have made quite an improvement, and is beating the old control by about 30%.

The new lead however, is underperforming the old control.

It seems that, even though prospects already know what the product is all about (thanks to the long video ad on Facebook) and are largely sold on it, they still need to read copy, and a lot of it, to get fully convinced to buy.

It was worth testing.

Now that the results are in, however, it’s really a reiteration of some old-school copywriting principles.

Very much along the lines of what Joe Sugarman, who ran a direct marketing empire that included such classics as BluBlockers, talks about in the quote up top.

You’ve got to get people reading.

You’ve got to get the train moving.

And only once it’s full steam ahead can you break through the last bit of buying resistance that’s holding prospects back.

Anyways, enough about advertorials.

Onwards and upwards to sales emails.

If you haven’t yet signed up to get a free copy of my upcoming book on email marketing, perhaps this post has stoked the old steam engine enough to get you interested.

If that’s the case, here’s where you can sign up:

https://bejakovic.com/profitable-health-emails/