Here, lemme explain…

Remember back in high school the person who you had a crush on, but they didn’t have a crush on you?

Remember how that made you even crazier about them? And how you filled with that stomach-churning jealousy every time you saw them with someone else?

You can do that to your prospects, too.

Well… Not the whole “stomach-churning if I don’t have you then life is pointless” mindset like you had back in highschool…

But taking away your offer – or – talking about who your offer ISN’T for can have a similar effect…

Increased desire.

So say no in your writing. You and your product are not for everyone. I know that my copywriting services are not for people who expect my copywriting to be their magic bullet, or for people who don’t trust my judgement and expertise, or for people who aren’t going to take my copy and use it for great things.

And when I talk to prospects I let them know this.

The result?

I only work with the people I want to, and those people appreciate working with me even more knowing that I turn away others.

It makes them even more valuable. And they are. Because I greatly value their positive mindset and attitude.

Do you see where I’m goin’ with this?

Turn away business in your writing. Here, I’ll send you off with an example:

Whoa, hold on there just a second!

Now I’m definitely NOT saying that buying this product is going to solve every one of your problems and make you a millionaire overnight.

If you think that then I’m going to have to ask you to leave this page.

What I’m saying is if you put it to proper use – if you take the time to go through the directions and use it just as me and many other people have…

You’ll see great results with it. And if you don’t? Send it back. Please. And you’ll receive a full refund, too.

etc., etc., etc.

Have a great one,

David

Today’s post is about the three stages of writing great copy.

Everyone’s writing process differs – but practically every copywriter on the planet goes through these 3 stages in their writing, from Gary Halbert to John Carlton.

In writing your own copy, there’s a great chance you go through these stages too.

But there’s a good chance that you’re not even aware that you’re going through these stages.

And as a result, you might get frustrated, and bogged down when you write copy.

You might think things like, “I just can’t write copy like those other guys do…”

Or… “I’m just not cut out for writing copy…”

Or… “Yeah, I see you using these things really well – but when I try they just don’t seem to work.”

If you’ve had thoughts like these, then there’s a good chance it’s because you just haven’t embraced these 3 stages to writing copy

Once you embrace them, though, things will change.

The frustration disappears and you’ll wonder why it was ever there in the first place.

Writing copy will be a fun and joyful process. I don’t care if you’re the worst writer on the planet – those self-defeating thoughts in your head are not true!

And though at times you may doubt yourself, once you embrace these 3 stages you won’t let it get to you. You’ll confront your doubt and turn it into confidence.

So that’s the point of today’s post – to clear your writer’s block and make writing copy a joyful, wide-open path.

The 3 stages:

1. “I Dunno”

In the first stage, you’re faced with the product/service you’re going to write about. You have a target market identified. Basically, you know who you’re going to sell to, and what you’re going to sell them.

So you research. You research your product/service inside and out. You research your target market inside and out. Find out what they want, and how you can give it to them. Find out their problems, obstacles, dreams, etc., etc., etc.

2. “Get to work!”

Then, you take all of this research you’ve done and you get to work. You pour it all out onto paper, or into the computer, in the form of copy. Things are looking good.

And then…

You get stuck. Or you start to doubt if what you’re writing is good. You cross out headlines, erase whole paragraphs, re-write other sections… but nothing seems good enough.

At this stage, a lot of people give up. They slap something together and call it a day, or they just stop trying altogether.

3. “Like Magic”

For the few who trudge on…

Something clicks and suddenly you “just get it”. You go back to that computer screen or notebook and write the most brilliant copy that product/service has ever seen. It flow “like magic”. And it sells like crazy.

Those are the 3 simple stages nearly every writer on the planet goes through, regardless of their writing process

Not everyone goes through these stages in that order, but they go through them.

And when it comes to that 3rd stage, most think the magic “just happens”, or it “happens by luck".”

But you can get to stage 3 as consistently as 2+2=4

When I say “something clicks and you suddenly get it” – what I mean is you can induce these “click” moments. It’s really simple too.

See in response to my own periods of writer’s block, frustration, and bogged-down-ness…

I’ve developed a method to get through it, so you can tap into your inner-brilliance and write highly inspired copy.

I call it my “You’re stuck… So what?” method

Let me break it down for you…

Every time I write copy, I know I’m going to get stuck.

Before I write a single word, I accept that it’s going to take more than one sitting to make it into brilliant, profit-driving copy.

So when I get stuck, it’s no big deal. I say, “so what?”

In fact, every time I get stuck, I’ve learned that it’s because a big, big, big idea’s coming.

And that idea just might revolutionize the piece of copy I’m writing.

Because right on the other end of that deep, perilous trench of writer’s block is a wealth of great ideas.

Here’s how you get there.

First…

Accept that getting stuck is a part of the process –and believe it or not, it’s a productive part! It just means that your mind is concocting a great idea. If it were a software, it would say, “Please wait, profit-creating thought in progress…”

(you might even want to print that line out and hang it on the wall)

Then…

Go back to your research. Look over the same information you already have for hours and hours. Don’t look for anything specific, just read through it and take in as much as you can. If anything stands out, make a mental note of it.

Then…

Do nothing. Just let all of that info soak in. Let the ideas percolate. Give the “software” of your mind time to process. Take a walk, eat an orange, treat your loved one to a great meal. Do something enjoyable, and don’t even think about the copy.

Because soon after that…

Those ideas will come to fruition. They’ll fully develop in your mind, and want to get out!

You’ll become like a boiling tea pot, steaming with brilliant ideas. And you’ll rush over to your computer and type out every word that comes to your head.

Sometimes I type so frantically that Lou, in another room at the opposite end of the house, yells to me to keep it down because she can hear my typing from the other end of the house.

You can have this experience too, time after time, like clockwork.

Just embrace the 3 stages, and you’ll get there (without all the unnecessary frustration). Follow the method I’ve laid out for you and the good ideas will come, with no frustration along the way. Just good times.

And if you have any comments/suggestions/breakthroughs to share – please do so in a comment

Till next time,

David

A big part of success comes from how good you can do what you do. I have a whole stack of copywriting and marketing books, videos, and audio files dedicated to helping me become the best copywriter and marketer I possibly can.

But just as important as your skill set is your mindset, and how you feel.

I have another stack of books dedicated to this subject: success.

Success is mental, physical, spiritual, emotional. It’s how you think and feel and breathe.

Without realizing it, when we’re filled with self-defeating thoughts and feelings, we block opportunities. We act in ways that attract people and situations who don’t resonate with success. We create more suffering in our lives.

That’s why today I want to help you overcome your self-defeating thoughts. Just about all of us have them.

So the question is… How do you deal with them?

So many self-help books talk about affirmations. In case you’re not familiar with that word, affirmations are when you tell yourself you already are what you want to be. The goal of them is to “re-program” your mind so you finally believe that you are powerful, confident, successful, and in turn, you become all of these characteristics.

But you know what? For the longest time they didn’t work for me one bit

And in fact, they don’t work for a lot of people I’ve spoken with. For some, they work miracles, but for a lot of us there’s just something missing from them…

That’s because a lot of these books are missing the most important step in giving yourself affirmations.

Now, obviously these books help a tremendous amount of people, including myself. So I’m not ragging on them. I’m just speaking for us individuals who want affirmations to work, but for some reason they simply don’t.

See, for years I would try affirmations, and they wouldn’t change the way I felt. I thought something was wrong with me, so I tried harder. And harder. And harder. I filled notebooks with statements like, “I am successful” and constantly walked around with similar thoughts in my head.

But still, no dice.

That is… Until finally I accidentally came across a way to make them work. Once I used this method I truly believed every affirmation I spoke out loud, or wrote down in my journal.

That important step is dealing with what you feel right now

If you feel really crummy, just like nothing is going right for you, or that you don’t deserve success, or any number of other self-defeating thoughts, there’s a good chance that saying affirmations to yourself will feel like trudging barefoot up Mt. Everest.

When you strongly feel negative thoughts and feelings, your whole body just resists affirmations.

So this is what I’ve found to work for me to clear away that resistance.

I call it the “Belief Reversal System”:

The first step is I let myself feel crummy.

I take out a pen and paper, or sit at my computer, and write about how I feel. I don’t do it poetically or anything, I just sit down and write:

“I feel worthless. I feel like a bad person. I feel like I don’t deserve success.”

I’ll do that for every feeling I have floating around inside of me.

What this does:

This gives your feelings the one thing they truly need: recognition and space. See, when you try to just force affirmations into your head, you’re pushing away these feelings you have, and they don’t like that.

They resist the affirmations, which is why they never work.

But if you recognize these feelings, and give yourself space to experience them, they go away. Or they go away enough so that you can take in some positive affirmations.

Then you start the affirmations

After you’ve dealt with your negative feelings, that’s when you take out your pen and write about yourself how you want to be. Or you say it out loud, or in your head – whatever way is right for you.

I like to keep it simple. I’ll write things like:

“Inspiring ideas constantly flow through me. Every day I have more and more ideas about how to dramatically grow my business, and I immediately put them to action. My relationships are full of love. I constantly laugh and enjoy life to the fullest”

I just write whatever feels good.

And you know what? So far a good number of them have come true.

Talk to you later,

David

p.s. If you have any questions about this, or advice about how you give yourself affirmations, leave them below in a comment.

You never know who else has the same question you have, or whose day could be completely turned around by your advice

Something really funny happened to me the other day.

And at the same time I appreciated that I know marketing and copywriting. So without further ado, it’s time for…

“Story Time with David”

(crowd goes wild!)

So the other day I went to one of the national parks in the area. It has these really nice trails that go along the Chattahoochee River here in Georgia.

Beforehand I got a really nice lunch, some decaf (I quit drinking regular coffee due to having way too much of it – that stuff’s addicting), and then I headed off to the park.

But when I got there… I TOTALLY forgot that there’s a $3.00 parking fee.

They make you put $3.00 in an envelope, and then tear this thing off the envelope and hang it on your rear view mirror. Then, periodically, an officer wil come by and check the number on the envelope with the number on the thingy on your mirror.

And if you don’t pay you get like a $50 ticket.

So here’s the deal…

There was no way I was driving back home. I’d already made it to the park, so in my mind, I was staying at the park.

So I thought to myself… “How can I feel safe about parking here, so I can enjoy my hike at the river without thinking every second that a $50 ticket is wating for me back at my car?”

And then I spotted a piece of paper.

And the copywriter in my went wild.

I thought, “I know! I’ll write a letter, put that inside the envelop instead of $3.00, and woo the police officer who comes by to check and see if people paid with my copywriting skills.”

And then things got even better…

As I frantically looked around my car for a pen – guess what I found –

A baby blue marker.

Cha-ching.

I wrote that letter in the most girly handwriting I could. Top that off with the baby-blue marker (don’t ask me why that was in my car, I really don’t know) and that letter looked like a genuine 16-year old girl wrote it.

Here’s what the letter said:

Dear Officer,

I’m sorry, but I don’t have any cash on me today.

If you need to give me a ticket, I completely understand.

Warmly,

D

And guess what?

I still got a ticket…

LOL no just kidding – I DIDN’T get a ticket!

Whoo go me! I had a great, two-hour hike at the river, came back to my car, and saw absolutely no pink slip of doom telling me I owed $50 for not paying $3.00.

So what can we learn from this? (Besides to always have some cash on hand…)

Lesson #1: Always match your message to your audience.

See, most park rangers are men. And most male cops give women a break (I don’t mean any of this in a sexist way – it’s just how things usually happen). Even more male cops will give a teenage girl a break.

By making myself appear to be a teenage girl… Wait that doesn’t sound right… I mean, by making my handwriting look like a teenage girl’s – I provided my target audience [the park ranger] with a voice that he would sympathize with [helpless teenage girl who forgot her money].

Lesson #2: “Everyone craves a feeling of importance” –Dale Carnegie

This is a powerful truth of human psychology. See, in most cases, people try to argue with a cop. They try to talk their way out of a ticket. People get angry at cops a lot of times, too.

So for the officer to feel important, he has to give a ticket. If he gives in to the argument, or succumbs to the rage of the person he pulled over, then he gives away his power, and he feels unimportant.

In my letter, I gladly welcomed the ticket: “If you need to give me a ticket, I completely understand.”

By doing this, I put the officer in a position where he gains his feeling of importance by not giving me a ticket.

Notice the word “need” there, too.

Sub-consciously he’s going to think: “Do I need to give a ticket? Well, no, I guess I really don’t.”

Or at least that’s what I was counting on. And the fact that I didn’t get a ticket means it must have worked.

…But then again Lou (my wonderful life partner) thinks that just no ranger came by that day.

So she pretty much burst my bubble lol

And, sadly, she might be right. But I really don’t think she is! Wait, hear me out:

It was on a Sunday – one of the busiest park days. Officers always check on the parks on the weekends.

But anyways, I guess we’ll never find out

Either way, we can walk away with some good lessons (I know I did).

Talk to you soon,

David

p.s. Leave me your comments! I’d love to hear your thoughts

p.p.s. Also, I swear I don’t make a habit of impersonating teenage girls lol

Today I have a very special post for you.

Because in today’s post, I’m going to show you a letter that made over one million dollars in sales in the  early 1900s…

…And I’m going to teach you how to read that letter in a certain way where you develop a “radar” for brilliant copy. With your newfound ability to spot what makes certain pieces of copy successful–

And others massive failures, you’ll develop a gut instinct for what makes good copy good, and you’ll be able to use this knowledge to pump out your own sales-multiplying copy.

Now, two things:

1. A million dollars in the early 1900s is worth much, much more than that today (probably closer to $20 million)

2. While it was written close to 100 years ago – the lessons about copywriting contained within this letter are timeless.

The letter was written by one of my personal role models, Robert Collier. Collier wrote brilliant letters that engaged the reader on a very human level.

He felt that people had enough stress in their life – so why not write a letter that takes some of it away?

Here’s what makes this blog post so special:

In the next few minutes, you might learn more about copywriting than you ever have (seriously). Because what you’re about to do is read this letter, and as you do so, you’re going to ask yourself some key questions.

Try your best to answer them as you read. Now if you have trouble, or you just don’t know the answer – that’s fine! That’s great in fact. I don’t know the answer to all of them myself.

The point is to get you thinking about copywriting in a very certain way. It’s to get you to recognize brilliant copy when you see it…

But more importantly…

…To get you to know what makes it so good. That way, when you go to write your own copy, you’ll know what works, and why it works.

The questions:

• Overall, why is this letter so powerful?
• Is it easy to read? Or difficult?
• How does this letter make me feel?
• Is this letter personal? Or impersonal?
• What is unique about the offer in the letter?
• How could I improve this letter?

I guarantee you if you complete this exercise with this piece of copy, you will notice a huge difference next time you go to write copy.

What difference will you see?

Well, I guess you’ll just have to do the exercise and find out

(When you do, e-mail me at dtendrich@gmail.com with your results! I’d love to hear from you)

Here’s the letter:

Here’s the most unusual offer you’ve ever received.

For years, it’s been the custom among well-dressed men who were fastidious
about their handkerchiefs to have BOTH their initials embroidered
on them.

But up to now, they’ve always had to order them specially at considerable expense. For there were so many combinations of initials (630 to be
exact) that no store could possibly carry them all in stock.

The result has been that fine quality handkerchiefs individually
monogrammed have cost from 75 cents to $1.00 each. (Your wife will quickly
verify this.)

Now, we’ve conceived the idea of monogramming handkerchiefs without
orders (in quantities that would keep the cost low) and sending them by
mail to a carefully selected list of Business Men who would appreciate the
wonderful opportunity afforded them.

You are one of the men we selected. Your handkerchiefs are enclosed -
four of them monogrammed especially for you WITH BOTH YOUR OWN
INITIALS.

These handkerchiefs are of fine quality, are fully-sized – 18 inches square
and have a neatly hemstitched border. You will readily see that such handkerchiefs should cost 75 cents each when specially embroidered in silk with
your initials.

If you’d like to keep these handkerchiefs, send us – not 75 cents each, not
over 50 cents each – ONLY $1 FOR THE WHOLE FOUR. You can easily
do it by slipping your check or money order in the enclosed envelope.

But, if you don’t want to keep the handkerchiefs, just put them back in
the envelope, paste the enclosed label and stamp over the address and shoot
them back to us.

Isn’t that a fair way to do business? It’s the only way we know in which
individually initialled handkerchiefs can be sold so reasonably.

When you send us the $1, in full payment for the handkerchiefs, please do
not return the label with the stamp attached. Thank you! Every penny
counts in selling handkerchiefs in this unusual way.

Yours for unusual handkerchief value,

-Name Smith

P.S. There’s a birthday or anniversary coming up soon for some man
you know, and you’ll be looking for just such an attractive gift as those
individually monogrammed handkerchiefs.

Why not double the amount of your remittance now, tell us his initials, and we’ll get the handkerchiefs off at once – either to him or to you!

End Letter.

Oh, and leave me comments about how this exercise went for you.

Talk soon,

David

I’ve noticed that there seems to be a huge divide between the level of importance business owners place on their advertising copywriting.

It seems people either realize how powerful learning and applying advertising copywriting can be to their businesses…

Or they don’t take it seriously at all, and might have never even heard of it.

Where do you stand on this spectrum?

Dan Kennedy describes copywriting as “asset building.” He says it’s the fundamental skill in all elements of marketing, because it’s what builds your “assets”.

To Kennedy, “assets” are clients. For instance, if you run a newspaper ad that gets you two clients who each pay you $8,000 – then you’ve added $16,000 in assets to your company. Now, say they pay you this fee every year – over the course of 5 years you’ve added $80,000 to your business from one ad – all because you took copywriting seriously and either spent the time and effort required to learn it, or hired someone who you trusted to get the job done.

What are your views on this?

How important is copywriting to your marketing efforts?

What do you think of Kennedy’s views on copywriting?

What are your own personal views on the importance of copywriting?

Share your answers! Scroll down and leave a comment!

Let’s get a good discussion going that we can all take part in and learn from.

Best,

David

Today we’re getting right down into the nitty gritty, because if there’s one thing that’s going to make your copy blow away your competition – it’s your USP, or Unique Selling Proposition.

A quick story to help you understand what a USP is (then I’ll show you a real-life example of how to go about finding yours)…

I know this guy who’s extremely ADD, ADHD, and a bunch of other acronyms that basically mean he’s hyper as hell and has trouble sitting still.

Growing up they put him on all kinds of meds, like ritalin and stuff. It would help a bit, but he was still a really hyper person. But because doctors attached all of these labels and diagnoses to him, he felt there was a problem with who he was, and he got really insecure. He tried to change into someone else.

This kinda worked for a while – but his true nature would always slip out. I mean, if this guy sat down for more than ten minutes at a time you’d think his ass would catch fire because he’d jump up out of his chair and pace back and forth just to settle down some.

And then he met this girl in Miami…

And this girl really loved him for who he was – ADD, ADHD, and every other acronym and all.

And this did wonders for his self-esteem: suddenly he didn’t care about hiding his true nature, and he started to think that there was something wrong with the doctors – not himself.

And you know what? He was right.

See, when he accepted himself for who he was, this “weakness” of his turned into a strength. He became able to channel his energy into everything he did – and he quickly became extremely successful…

…because he figured out that his energy was contagious!

He could get other people feeling hyper as hell too, and motivated to go out and accomplish all of their dreams. And now, people see his ADD, ADHD, and every other acronym he has as part of his charm. It’s one of the many things that makes him unique. He’s not himself without them.

That’s his USP (unique selling proposition).

Do you kinda see what a USP is now? Can you maybe make the stretch to see how you can make this concept work for your business?

If you’re still on the fence, let me help you out…

Here’s a real-life example…

Say there are 10 personal training gyms in one area. All 10 get amazing results. And all 10 advertise like crazy.

How would you go about differentiating yourself from your competition?

First you’d probably want to see what your competition has going on, right? (duh!)

Okay, so say you checked’em out and all 10 have great equipment, and great facilities – friendly trainers, and clients who laugh and smile a lot throughout the workouts.

But there’s something that your trainers do at your facility that none of these other places do…

You have the most off-the-wall exercises that anyone’s ever seen!

Your trainers do stuff like giant tire flipping…

They’ll get on a bike, hold down the breaks, and make their clients drag them by a cable (my brother actually used to do this – no joke! and his clients loved it!)…

They do giant hammer swinging…

And a ton of other crazy, fun, outrageous exercises every time their clients show up that make them feel the greatest sense of accomplishment.

They never know what to expect when they come for a work out – just that they’re going to have a great time.

That could be your USP. Your gym has the top of the line equipment, but you prefer going outside in the parking lot and doing crazy exercises that are fun as hell. Your energy is off the charts.

If someone is looking for a complete and total experience in a workout – you’re the guy to call. Sure they’ll get results and have a great time at these other places…

…but if they want to experience something that they’ll never experience anywhere else in their entire lives, you’re the gym to call.

So basically, as you can see, a USP is a unique look at your business that separates you, and elevates you, above your competition.

It just puts you in a whole ‘nother league.

For a brand new business it could be that they’re going to work extra hard and give every project 110% because they need satisfied customers to compete with the other businesses who have been around for decades…

For an info product it could be that it’s presented in a really down-to-earth and entertaining way – not like those other products that might have great info, but are boring as hell…

It could be that your company uses the greenest way of doing things, so by choosing you people are helping out the environment…

Or it could be something as simple as when someone calls you, they won’t get a machine that tells them to press 1 for this and 2 for that – but they’ll immediately talk to a real-life human being…

Hey, it could even be that you’re extremely ADHD and contagious!

My point is, when you find what’s special about your business – what it is about you that no one else on this planet – then no one can compete with you. Literally.

Because if you’re completely unique – then there’s no one else like you.

And if there’s no one else like you, then there’s no one to compete with! When you set your foot down on who you are, and what’s unique about you and your business, you’re also making a statment to the world that says…

“This is who I am. If you’re like me, too, or if you like the way I do things, then we’ll make a great fit.”

You’re drawing a line in the sand, and people will admire you for putting yourself out there and making a strong statement.

Here are some questions to help you uncover your USP:

1. What is it about me that makes me a unique individual?

2. Why do people like me and want to do business with me?

3. Why do people constantly choose me over my competition?

4. What are my greatest strengths as an individual? As a business?

5. What was a defining moment in my life? Why was it such a defining moment? What did I learn about myself in that moment, and about life in general?

Then scroll down and post your answers in a comment!

Looking forward to reading’em

-David

How are ya? I hope you had a killer Thanksgiving (for you Americans – for everyone else hope you had a very normal Thursday lol).

Funny story about Thanksgiving…

My life partner, Louisa, and I drove up to St. Louis to visit my family.

(If you didn’t know, Lou is also the co-founder of our design, copywriting, and marketing company Unexpected Ways.)

Now, me and Lou don’t believe in marriage. We completely respect other peoples’ right and choice to get married – but for us, it’s just a title that doesn’t change our relationship at all or add any kind of significant value.

So we call each other life partners.

Now get this…

For the ENTIRE week, my family tried to convince us that we needed to get married as if the world would end if we didn’t.

(Disclaimer: I love my family very much and I know they’re just looking out for me)

Here’s the funny part…

These were their reasons:

1. My aunt told me that her husband’s son had no respect for her because she was just “his dad’s girlfriend.” So she got married to show the little bastard that she was important…
2. Tax cuts…
3. And if one of us gets sick, the other can make medical decisions for the sick one (even though there are other ways of giving people this right)…

Now, notice that not one of them said anything remotely like this:

• Marriage is a sign of commitment, love, and dedication…
• Marriage is a way of letting everyone know how you feel about each other…
• Marriage is a way of making a concrete statement that you’re serious about your relationship, and about starting a family together…

Apparently to my family marriage is just a way to put little kids in their place, get a break from the government, and an answer to the fear of what happens when your loved one gets sick.

Yeah…

I’m starting to think I know why the divorce rate in this country is so high now lol…

Okay, so I’m mostly kidding, and I know my family didn’t get married just for those reasons – but can you imagine me sitting there in conversation after conversation hearing these things over and over? lol

But anyways – on to the good stuff!

When do you tell people your prices?

Ah, the age old question. Luckily it comes with an age old answer.

Unfortunately, though, not enough people know this answer because I’m asked this question all the time. And on tons of websites I visit and sales pitches I hear, I can tell that most people out there still don’t have a clue.

Here’s a general rule of thumb for stating price:

When your reader knows exactly what they’re getting for their money, and they’ve already made the decision that they really want what you have to offer, you tell them the price.

Pretty simple, right?

That’s why on long copy sales letters the price is always at the bottom.

But let’s come back to the first part of that statement…

“When your reader knows EXACTLY what they’re getting for their money, and they’ve already made the decision that they REALLY WANT what you have to offer…”

This is the important part. You have to convince them inside and out that what you have will, without a doubt, improve their life.

Then you tell them how much it costs. That’s because by this point they’ve already made the decision to buy, so they’ll be more likely to shell out for however much it costs.

But any time you tell people how much money you’re going to take from them – they get scared…

They get this instinctual reaction of “is my money safe?”

And you want to immediately answer them, “Yes!”

That’s what the purpose of a guarantee is. So right after you state your price, instantly make your reader feel safe by offering a guarantee.

For instance…

• 100% unconditional money back guarantee…
• Try it FREE for 30 days. If at the end of 30 days you’re not happy, just let me know and I’ll issue a full refund. Say nothing and you’ll be billed for the full price…
• Try it for just $1 for 1 week. If at the end of the week you’re not happy in any way, let me know (etc)…

Cheers,

David

p.s. Scroll down a little bit and leave me some comments! Ask your questions too (I know you have some!)

Interesting copy…

Don’t come across much of that, do ya?

I mean, sometimes you do – and that’s generally the copy that sells a ton of stuff.

But most copy is bland, boring, and just not interesting.

But me and you are different – we’re dedicated to creating copy that keeps the reader on the edge of his seat, wondering what the next crazy idea we’ll say is, wondering how it could possibly be true, and then watching in amazement as everything comes together to make perfect sense…

…Kind of like a good novel.

“But wait! Copywriting and novel writing are nothing alike!” you say.

Oh really?

Think about some of the qualities on writing a good novel…

First: they start smack in the middle of some event: an explosion, a birth, an event, a ceremony…

Second: they create suspense at every turn…

Third: there’s a problem (or two or three or four) that the main character overcomes…

Now how can we throw all of these into our advertising copywriting to produce copy that really sells?

Here’s how…

Step 1.

Tell a story. It can be about you, about someone you know, about anyone (as long as it’s true and real). The story should be about some event in your life or your character’s life that was a hardship, a difficult time. Tell the story of how you overcame that hardship.

Step 2.

Attach your product/service into how you overcame your hardship.

(you get bonus points if the difficult time you went through is something your reader is going through too).

Here’s a very rough example in 4 sentences.

I used to be 40 pounds overweight, weighing in at 220 pounds. Then I watched over 50 exercise videos and took all the best exercises from each from them. I did those exercises for just 10 minutes a day, 3 days a week, and lost those 40 pounds in 2 months. That’s when I realized I’d discovered a workout program that could get incredible results in a fraction of the time.

Now, here’s the exercise that helps you do this…

Step 1.

Write your story – and really let yourself go. Don’t try to make it perfect. Don’t polish it. Just write and write and write.

You should have a page or two of text by the end of this. If you don’t have that much, go back and fill in some more details about what happened. If this seems like a lot to you, the good news is you only have to do this once.

Step 2.

Read through your story and pick out the most important details. Then, re-write it in under 15-20 sentences.

“Whoa – what?! I just wrote 2 pages for nothin??”

Hey, hold it there tiger!

In those two pages here’s what’s happening…

You’re connecting to your inner-story teller. No one can just sit down and instantly pop out an incredible story (unless you’ve had a ton of practice – and even then it’s best to warm up). Remember, you want this story to really come alive in your reader’s imagination.

You want them to experience it – that’s how you keep’em reading.

The whole time you’re writing your 1-2 pages, you’re connecting with your story, re-living it, figuring out the best way to tell it and which details really stand out.

Then, you’re making it short and to the point. That’s because in copy, people aren’t interested in reading a novel, but they’ll definitely read a short, interesting story that lets their imagination go wild for a minute.

Here are a few ways to tie your story into your product/service…

• It was then that I realized….
• That’s when I stumbled upon…
• I couldn’t believe how simple the answer really was…
• If I’d only known years ago that…

Just take these intros, and tell about how you discovered your fat loss secret, or the way to make 6 figures in 60 days, or whatever it is that you were put on this earth to do.

Till next time,

David

p.s. As always I love your comments – and feel free to post any questions that you have, too.

They say his words were like lightning that went straight to the heart of all who read them, twisting and pulling on their emotions, seeping into their minds, practically forcing their credit cards and cash from their pockets.

Yet no matter how great and accomplished this man became, there was one part of his copy that he always drilled away on for hours and hours until it became absolutely perfect:

The headline.

Here's a photograph of the man of legend - though no one knows his name...

And that is why we are here today – to discuss headlines, why they’re so important, and to let you walk away with a simple yet powerful exercise that will have you on your way to writing irresistible ones in half the time.

A little background on this exercise…

I gave a presentation in Orlando a couple weeks ago that was kind of a crash course on the basics of copywriting.

It was a killer experience too – the audience (33 people who were part of a super-focused mastermind group) was absolutely awesome, and nearly everyone participated in the exercises.

It’s the group that my brother Steve Hochman, Bedros Keuillian, Chris McCombs, Vince Delmonte, and Crag Ballyntine are running on creating a 6-figure info product. (Check out the website http://www.fitnessinfosummit.com/ for more info).

Now, here’s the thing. All of these guys are really huge in the fitness world. So that meant I had to really deliver some kick ass content that was just as good as all of the stuff they were talking about.

So naturally I waited till the last minute

Lol no I’m kidding. I prepared for like six months in advance (you think I’m gonna walk into a room of people who paid 14k for a mastermind unprepared?). Er… okay maybe not six months… but I just found out I was going to be a speaker two weeks in advance.

So I prepped for two weeks. And in that two weeks, I concocted some grand schemes of how to make people into brilliant copywriters.

This exercise I’m about to share with you is one of these evil schemes…

Here's a photo of me scheming...

After all, if no one is sucked in by your headline, no one will read the rest of the page. That’s why I call headlines half the battle of writing long copy.

So, without further interruption – here’s the exercise

Disclaimer: It’s simple, but part of what makes this exercise so powerful is how simple it is.

1. Step one: Write a headline.
2. Step two: Reflect on what you think are its strong points and weak points. Compare your headline with other headlines that have been successful in your niche. Reflect on why you think those were so successful.
3. Step three: Cross out the headline you just wrote.

Now here’s what makes this exercise so powerful:

Repeat these 3 steps at least 4 more times.

Here’s why:

By the fifth headline, you’ll start to feel much more confident, and your headline will be much more to the point. Every time you cross one out, the next one you write will be even better.

Every time you find more and more reasons why the winning headlines are so winning, you incorporate that knowledge into your own headline writing. You merge your writing with the behind-the-scenes reasons that make good headlines good.

But don’t limit yourself – if you have a perfect headline on the first go, and you truly believe it’s perfect – then run with it. This happens from time to time.

Or if you need to do this exercise 20 times, then that’s fine too (sometimes I do it 30).

The point of this exercise is to get you really thinking and involved with your headline. It’s one of the most important parts of your copy, because if it doesn’t do its job of captivating your reader, then it doesn’t matter how brilliant the rest of your copy is…

No one’s gonna read it.

Also, good headlines are damn hard to write

I can pump out 2,000 words of copy in a couple of hours if I have my research done (not a final draft or anything, but a really good start). But a headline? I’ll work for days crafting it because they’re so hard to write – because they so important.

But using this exercise I cut down my headline-writing time by at least 50%. Often I’ll come up with my winner in a day.

Take care and, as another famous man once said, “I’ll be back!”

David

p.s. Leave your comments, and if you have any questions too.