Mel Martin

Introducing the world’s slowest copywriter

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No, not me, though I am a worthy contender. The honor goes to:

“Mel Martin was the world’s slowest copywriter. It would take him three to four months to write a direct mail package. He could get stuck for a month on a letter opening.”

That’s from a sales letter written by Lawrence Bernstein, “the world’s most obsessed ad archivist.” Lawrence’s wrote that sales letter a couple months ago, to sell a collection of ads that Mel Martin had written back in the 1970s and 80s.

Who cares about old ads from decades past? Well, people who care about making sales via writing today. Because, as Lawrence says:

“Mel Martin, the ‘father of fascinations,’ almost singlehandedly catapulted Boardroom Reports to $125 million through the power of his pen and captivating copywriting fascinations.”

When I recommended Lawrence’s collection of Mel Martin ads a couple months ago to my list, more than 150 people ended up buying.

If you were one of those people, and if you had a chance to look over some of Mel Martin’s ads in the meantime, I wonder what you thought?

If you’re anything like me, you might look at Martin’s bullets and think, “Pff, I can do the same. So simple, so basic. Just promises and how-to’s.”

Except, there was clearly something magical and mysterious going on during those months that Mel Martin was agonizing over his copy. That’s why his sales letters pulled in millions of dollars year after year, and that’s why he beat out all competing copywriters he was pitted against.

Maybe you can see the skill and thought in Mel Martin’s finished work.

But if you cannot, then there’s the Copy Riddles approach.

Don’t just look at the finished product… but look at the starting material as well. Try to write your own bullets based on that starting material… and then compare what you did to what Mel Martin did.

In fact, that’s what the first couple of rounds of Copy Riddles are all about — trying to sell the same products as Mel Martin, and comparing your bullets to his.

Do this, and you very quickly realize how much skill went into Mel Martin’s bullets. Fortunately, you also very quickly manage to leech some of that skill from Mel Martin, without spending the months and years of agony it took him.

I’m running a special event today to promote Copy Riddles, which I’m calling the White Tuesday event. It ends later tonight at 12pm PST. The core of the offer for this event is Copy Riddles, plus there are three time-limited free bonuses, which total $2,300 in real-world value:

1. White Tuesday Storytelling Bundle

2. Make The Lights Come On

3. $2k Advertorial Consult

… along with the White Tuesday payment plan, which allows you to get started with Copy Riddles for just $97 today.

To find out the full details of this White Tuesday event while it’s still live:

https://bejakovic.com/announcing-white-tuesday-copy-riddles-event

P.S. If you are already a Copy Riddles member, the White Tuesday bonuses are of course available to you too. To find out what they are and how to claim them, take a look at the page above and act before the deadline.

How A-list copywriters stab you in the heart, and then twist the knife

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Here’s a fascination/bullet written by Boardroom’s “secret weapon” Mel Martin:

“How to travel free on luxury cruise ships. Lots of passengers you meet on board are doing it but never tell you. Page 367”

There’s a lot of hidden psychology in this bullet. Martin uses the first sentence to stab the reader in the heart… and he uses the second sentence to then twist the knife, and to make the wound permanent.

How exactly does he do it?

Well, that’s something I looked at in detail in today’s lesson of my bullets course. That lesson is done and passed. But the course keeps marching on. And it’s still free to sign up for — if you do it now.

For more info, take a look here:

https://bejakovic.com/bullets-signup/

What never to omit in a bullet. Never.

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Today, I sent out the first lesson in my new bullets course.

In case you didn’t read my post yesterday, here’s the rundown:

The course is free, and is delivered by email. Each email talks about a copywriting lessons I’ve figured out by comparing the source material (the book or course for sale) to the finished bullets in the sales copy.

Today’s lesson started at the beginning, with the man who invented the modern sales bullet, or really fascination.

I’m talking about the best copywriter you’ve never heard of. This copywriter is so little know because Boardroom CEO, Marty Edelston, kept this copywriter busy — and kept him a secret. Edelston never revealed who was writing all those early winning Boardroom ads. Other Boardroom employees were also under strict orders to keep this copywriter’s name a secret.

Well, the golden age of Boardroom is past. And the secret is out. The “secret weapon” copywriter was one Mel Martin.

And like I said, Martin really wrote fascinations, not just bullets.

Before Martin, most sales bullets gave straight-up benefits or warnings. But that’s often not enough, not in a competitive market. So Mel Martin added another ingredient to his bullets to make them irresistibly fascinating.

That’s what today’s lesson was all about. It’s something you cannot omit if you want to write successful bullets — or really any kind of successful copy.

Unfortunately, unless you are subscribed to get my bullet course, then you missed today’s lesson. It won’t be available again, unless I package all the lessons up one day and make them available as a course to buy.

That’s the bad news. The good news is you can still sign up to get every following bullet lesson I will send out. For example, tomorrow’s lesson is about a 2-bit bullet ingredient that will keep your reader from saying “So what?” or “Bullshit!” when he reads your bullets and your copy. If you want to get that lesson as it comes out, here’s where to subscribe:

https://bejakovic.com/bullets-signup/