Category Archives for General Archives
Free vs. Smart Money
I think we’re witnessing a “New Coke”-level debacle on the Web this week.
The bean counters have apparently taken over the New York Times online site… and driven a stake through its heart.
Let me explain: You remember the New Coke thing, don’t you? Back in the early nineties (you know, last century), Coca Cola — one of the most profitable businesses in the universe — got bored with success. And they took their flagship product — Coke — and futzed with the formula.
Why? No reason. There was no hue and cry for a new flavor, no urgency on any front.
People hated the new fizz. Just loathed it. And, despite having sunk something like the gross national product of Brazil into the marketing blitz… the marketing geniuses were forced to bring back the Old Coke.
None of this surprised me at all.
See, as a veteran freelancer, I often get ushered into the deep, dank inner sanctums of a client’s business. I get to see where the bodies are buried, how the books are juggled, and what the real scuttlebutt is on the bottom line.
I used to be astonished at what I found. (For example… when a typical businessman quotes his most recent profit figures to you… you can pretty much cut them in half. If you’re interested in what’s real, as opposed to what sounds good, that is.)
I am astonished no longer. I expect most large companies to implode at some point… with resulting damage that may or may not be repairable. I’ve just seen it happen too often.
Sometimes it’s like a slow-motion train wreck. Other times it’s like watching someone calmly uncork a hand grenade and swallow it, smiling.
Our culture, for reasons I can’t yet fathom, is rife with a twisted paradigm: Sometimes, success equals insanity.
Here’s a very recent example: Up until Monday, the New York Times online site had a measureable readership of something like 39 million.
I was one. My morning routine included stops at slate.com… the drudge report… the Washington Post site… the Wall Street Journal online version… and the New York Times.
Plus, an assorted menu of other sites, as time allowed.
All, except the WSJ, were free.
Forget about the percieved politics — I read the Times for the quality of the writing. I’m a journalism cult fan. I liked the columnists… or rather, I had LEARNED to like them, after three or four years of reading them online.
Now, however, that game is over. The bean counters at www.nytimes.com somehow decided that the best and most wonderful thing they could ever do… was to charge for access to the columnists. You can still see the headlines and most of the breaking news for free… but for the “good” stuff, you gotta pony up.
Um… no thanks.
Here’s the gamble they took on: Were 39 million people reading the columnists because the writing is too important to miss… or were they reading the columnists because they were good… and free?
My bet’s on the free part.
And if I’m right… the Times just sent 30 million readers out into the blogosphere… where they will quickly discover tons of writers JUST as clever and JUST as savvy and JUST as tuned in as the best of the Times’ columnists.
It’s like the movie star who gets so full of himself, he figures he can indulge in any old movie he cares to slap together… and his “fans” will flock.
Result: Bomb.
Dead box office.
Happens so often, it’s a cliche.
Businesses do it, too. It’s called hubris. You get really, really full of yourself… think you can do no wrong… and guess what?
You’re toast.
Now, the Wall Street Journal understands their market better — they CAN charge for online access and be worth it. Hard to get what they offer otherwise. It can be done… but they have the most efficient delivery of what you want, all neat and tidy and in one spot.
Worth a few bucks.
But the Times? Fuhgetaboutit. They have a great history, but they’re still only as good as their last issue. Day to day to day.
And the Post is just as good (and better in many ways). Also, still free.
We’ll see where this goes. The early reviews on the Times’ move are not good — no one over there, apparently, bothered to imagine how this whorish move would play with the hoi palloi.
What is information “worth”, anyway?
Very intriguing question, worthy of your attention… especially if you’re in the information business (as most Web-based businesses are). I’ll post on that subject in a few days…
Until then, stay frosty.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
Multiple Sources of Info
If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you know I don’t pitch much.
The reason I started posting was simple: Even after writing a dense “Marketing Rebel Rant” newsletter each month… 8 packed pages… I found myself with an expanding backlog of good stuff to write about.
So I started this blog. It’s free, of course, so I don’t feel any restraints about what I write. Sometimes I nail the pulse of my readers, and I hear about it. Other times, I’m just providing a little honest content that probably falls short of earth-shaking… but if I can help even a handful of other writers or marketers, I figure I’ve done my part.
When I started out as a freelancer almost 25 years ago, no one helped me. And during those harrowing first months, I vowed that — if I ever “made it” as a professional copywriter — I would share what I learned along the way.
It was a naked, semi-desperate plea to whatever force runs the universe.
I don’t know if it worked or not… but since I did make it, I am fulfilling that vow to help others as much as I can.
Thus — the free blog. If you look over the posting archives, you will learn many of the crucial marketing and advertising (and life) lessons I had to absorb the hard way… through trial and error. (Mostly error.)
But the main thing is… it’s free. I do offer courses and other learning materials… and I’m damn proud of all of it. Just glance at the sampling of the testimonials I’ve posted at www.marketingrebel.com, and you’ll get an idea of what can happen to you — fast — once you decide to learn the profitable shortcuts from someone who’s already “been there”.
But I almost never push this material on the blog. For the moment, I’m content to allow word-of-mouth do most of my selling for me.
Today, however, I am making a small pitch to you.
My colleagues Bob Bly and Clayton Makepeace are holding a teleseminar aimed at helping freelance copywriters get more (and better) clients.
Here is what they say about these upcoming calls:
American Writers and Artists Institute, Bob Bly and
Clayton Makepeace Present …
Kick Your Copywriting Business Into HYPER-DRIVE!
Give us just one hour on Wednesday, September 14th,
and we’ll give you 30 PROVEN secrets
for making tens of thousands of extra dollars
— and more every year from now on — until you retire RICH!
 2 Ways to find a first client even when you don’t have a portfolio …
 How 2 top copywriters got started – by paying themselves to create a great portfolio …
 5 keys to turning a conversation with a prospect into a lucrative assignment …
 7 ways to make an offer big mailers can’t refuse …
 The #1 blunder new copywriters make – turns clients off like crazy – and how to avoid it …
 How being a direct response bully can make you rich …
ÔÅÆ How to rake in tens of thousands of extra dollars every year TAX-FREE …
ÔÅÆ And MUCH MORE!
PLUS, we’ll set aside as much time as is needed to answer your specific questions about building your copywriting business …
AND you get two valuable guides ‚Äì 7 Qualities of a Great Client ‚Äì And How to Spot the Sorry Losers You Shouldn‚Äôt Touch with a Ten-Foot Pole and How to Get PAID to Build a Power-Packed Portfolio — FREE!
To find out more — and I apologize for the length of this link — just go here:
http://www.makepeacetotalpackage.com/lp/ezine4_2995_lp.asp?s=M115&e=56440
The reason that link is so long, is because Bob and Clayton want to track where people show up from… and this link identifies you as someone coming from this blog.
Now… you know that I offer a course on freelancing, too. Graduates of my course have earned as much as $300,000 and more in their first year as freelancers. The advice and shortcuts I offer include everything I used to become a top, world-class writer… plus everything you need to know to work your own magic on the Web.
Still, I can easily recommend that you check this teleseminar out. All good writers know there are multiple ways to skin a cat… and if I even remotely suspect I can pick a single new piece of information that can help me increase my income, or increase the results of my ads… I’m there.
Robert Allen, who wrote the best-seller “Nothng Down” — which transformed the real estate market, and made a LOT of people ridiculously wealthy — also coined the term “multiple streams of income”. What he’s referring to is a brilliant strategy to get rich, fast… and stay rich, no matter what.
The main idea: Don’t rely on a single source of income. That puts you at risk.
Instead, develop many different ways to bring in moolah. Especially ways that operate automatically, without effort.
It’s the same with information. You really need to get all the info you can, from different sources. My most successful subscribers pay very close attention to the advice I give them… but they aren’t shy about also paying close attention to the likes of Gary Halbert and Dan Kennedy.
We live in a wonderful time for entrepreneurs. There is a glut of information available — a situation that simply did not exist when I was a rookie.
You don’t have to struggle like I did. Top writers are now spilling their bags of tricks wide open… and all you have to do is collect the good stuff, and put it all to use in your own life.
There are also, it’s true, a rather embarrassingly large number of “wannabe” gurus out there ,too. The best of their advice is really just a diluted rehash of what they learned from veteran writers.
I’m not warning you to stay away from the wannabe’s… but if you’re not awash in time, your best bet remains following the tried and true advice from us “old guys”.
Anyway, if you’re freelancing, or considering freelancing as a career, check out Bob and Clayton’s link. There’s no obligation to just see what’s up.
These are top writers, opening the vaults.
Stay frosty.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
They Know What You’re Thinking
Here’s a nice litte factoid to tuck away somewhere: From my many years working with clients, I can safely tell you that… if a great idea pops into your head… chances are somewhere between 12 and 12,000 other people have had the exact thought.
At the exact time.
This is why we have trademark and copyright laws. Because most people aren’t hip to this inconvenient factoid… and they get pissed off when someone “rips ’em off”.
There are simple reasons why this happens. First… many inventions and brainstorms come about when advances in technology meet economic opportunity. Several people “invented” electricity at the turn of the last century, when certain scientific breakthroughs made it possible. Edison just had better PR… plus the vision to get government to fund it. Without public financing, electricity would still be a curiosity, and we’d be running our computers with gas.
Color television was available in the 1920s, for example. However, while the technology was there, no one could afford to buy the sets. So no one broadcast anything. TV only got going when other technology became available to make black and white broadcasting feasible.
The other reason for simultaneous brilliance… is something Carl Jung called the Collective Unconscious. Each individual is hooked into a larger mind-meld with every other human alive, through our common biology. Sort of like being tuned into the same short-wave radio signal.
Don’t scoff. David Ogilvy and other top copywriters were great fans (as I am) of using the power of our unconscious minds. I often “sleep” on ideas… literally… and ask my brain to come up with a headline or concept or whatever when I wake up.
Works like magic.
As a professional creative-type, however, it’s also a source of high anxiety.
I have piles of ideas for books, seminars, new business models, and cool ways to completely transform my life… more brainstorm material than I could ever get to in two lifetimes.
I know many other creative business folks suffer from the same overload.
And it just kills me that — merely by thinking of them — I have sent all these ideas out into the collective open-air market… to be looted by others.
Of course, I seldom consider that I may have had my little brainstorms because some other poor guy had the thought first, and it escaped into my unconscious.
Interesting voodoo here.
The lesson: When you have a truly great idea, jump on it. Not so it doesn’t get away… but because if you don’t, you’ll probably see it on the cover of USA Today in a month or so. With some other slob getting all the credit.
Remember — paranoia is only a problem if they AREN’T after you.
Stay frosty…
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
Afraid To Lose
Reality TV just got a little too nasty, didn’t it.
During the run-up to Hurricane Katrina hitting landfall, I was pretty disgusted with the media. You could see the inner glee of the talking heads as they savored the idea of another catastrophe to obsess on.
This time, surely, they could indulge their thirst for exploring other people’s misery, without the attendant shame of having to deal with Michael Jackson, or the vacuous Aruba murder mystery, or Brad and Jen’s breakup.
However, today, there’s a stunned look on most of them. The glee is gone, replaced by a disbelieving shock. There’s nothing ironic about what just happened, no easy headlines and no funny side stories.
An American city just got bitch-slapped by Nature, and people are hurting. I hope you’ve been able to send a few bucks to one of the more effective relief agencies. I think the Red Cross learned its lesson after botching up their 9-11 windfall. I’m not big on religion, but the Salvation Army knows what to do during this kind of disaster, too.
Just send something, somewhere.
The guys in charge are still lost. Where the hell do you start, even? The New Orleans I grooved through in the late ’70s is gone forever, apparently. They can, and probably will, rebuild… but it will still be a city below sea level, in the path of Hurricane Alley. At some point, someone’s gonna wonder if the rebuilding is even worth it.
Whatever they decide to do, it ain’t gonna help the folks getting relocated right now. There’s no way new money is going to rebuild joints that will rent out for cheap… and that means a huge percentage of the poorer people being evacuated simply will not have anyplace to “come home” to. No matter how long they and their ancestors have lived in the French Quarter.
The unintended consequences of every act, from here on out, will be felt for generations. The political fallout is just starting. (I’ve read that the feds had cut flood control funds for New Orleans by 80% over the last few years, despite the risk of a hurricane hitting exactly as it did being predicted as one of the top three disasters guaranteed to happen in the US this decade. And developers were only recently given the green light to obliterate the wetlands that, in the past, served to mitigate incoming storms and flooding. This will not be pretty.)
The lesson for the rest of us is clear: No matter what you’ve amassed in your life, materially… it can all be taken away in a heartbeat.
What Nature doesn’t stomp, is still being circled by your vulture-like competition. And the IRS, your ex-wife, and identity-thieves are lurking in the wings, waiting for their shot.
Success isn’t about what you have right now.
True success is about what you can have, when it’s necessary to grit your teeth and get moving. Money and fame are ephemeral, wisps of dreams that can vanish without warning. Your favorite guitar, your best friend, your health… all are temporary possessions.
I’ve known a lot of people who gathered the pretty trappings of success… but weren’t really successful. Because, once they “got theirs”, they lived in fear of losing it.
That fear will not keep bad events at bay. It will only cloud your days.
True success is a state of mind… armed with talent. Not the “potential” kind of talent I talked about a couple of posts ago… but honed talent.
The kind of talent that allows you to get knocked back to zero… and climb back to where you want to be, quickly. Short of a health crisis that requires machines to stay alive, a truly successful person knows how to brush themselves off, and get back into the groove before the dust settles.
I’m not saying everyone in New Orleans should just pull themselves up by their bootstraps. That won’t happen. Most people need outside help, and those of us in a position to help should do so. Generously and without second thought.
What I am saying… is that a few people will come out of this stronger than ever. The tools they will use will all be inside of them — honed talent, an ability to set clear goals, and a willingness to search for the necessary info and shortcuts.
Not all of us get tested like that in life.
However, I have noticed that among my closest friends who possess true success… none have been given an easy time of it by Life.
Grieve for the dead, and help your brothers and sisters as much as you can, when you can.
But don’t be caught speechless in the face of disaster, like so many of the young, clueless talking heads on television.
Success requires action, and skill. Consider how you would handle things down at the bleeding mouth of the Mississippi.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
Real Work
My father’s visiting, and I have essentially shut the office until next week.
He’s 84, but looks twenty years younger, and has more energy than I do. Dances twice a week, bowls in leagues, travels the world. (Last couple of trips: Australia, China, Alaska…)
Took him a while, back when I was struggling to find my place in the world, to understand what kind of son he was dealing with here. Pop worked hard his entire life — a foreman in a construction crew that put up most of the big buildings in and around Los Angeles from the 1940s through the early 1980s. He would grab a few hours sleep at night, leave before dawn, slam around hammers and machinery and materials for eight hours, and come home.
A true stud, but a dedicated father.
And then I came along — a kid who drew cartoons and logged hours writing stories. Hard physical labor just mortified me. I knew, as a small kid, that I did not want to work like that for a living. However, most of the jobs I had were exactly like that, until I busted into advertising as a color-blind commercial artist with minimal design skills.
Still, it was working at a desk, and taxing my brain. I enjoyed it.
Anyway, Pop always likes me to have a project for him and I to do when he visits. You know — reroof the house, dig out a basement, that sort of thing.
We’re futzing with the landscape irrigation, actually. And you know what? I love the physical part of the labor. I miss getting dirty, sometimes. (I do get dusty when I write, but that’s only because I never vacuum my office.)
I’ve purged a lot of anxiety these past two days, through sweat and real toil. Not working out in the gym, which is my usual method. But getting filthy in the yard, hauling pipe and finessing fittings.
Not sure what the lesson here is. I just feel… better for the work.
And there’s something pleasing in figuring out how to solve the problems — I was killing the grass because the watering system had broken down. Now, it’s fixed. I’m a proud homeowner again.
I’ll be back with something meatier next week.
In the meantime… go get dirty.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
“The Tabloid Stuff Bumps The Numbers”
Listen up, people.
Homework assignment for all marketers here.
Here’s the story: For eons, almost every top copywriter willing to spill secrets about writing killer ads has revealed a common sordid fact — the headlines of the tabloids like the National Enquirer are among the best study materials around.
It’s a standard part of my speech at seminars. Check out the tabs. You’ll discover what America is really interested in.
Tabloids still outsell “real” newspapers and magazines by astronomical numbers. It’s not even a contest.
And the headline writers pay very close attention to what boosts sales. They are wired into the national psyche.
You’d have to be nuts to skip this mini-education on word-to-sales truth. So what if your spouse is embarrassed when you pick up the latest Weekly World News (the one with the “Cannibal fetus chews through Mom” headline).
No one ever said advertising was nice work. Sometimes you end up facing dark and disturbing insight into the mind of your fellow man.
Ah, the power of words.
Other verteran writers who cop to scouring the tabs: Gary Halbert, Gene Schwartz, Gary Bencivenga, Jeff Paul, Dan Kennedy, David Deutsch, Michel Fortin… the list goes on forever.
And yet… rookie writers remain skeptical.
Like we’re kidding them or something. “Ha, ha, ha, you top writers are all alike! So quit with the tabloid jokes already!”
All right. Don’t believe me.
Instead, believe the top television shows in existence.
There’s a killer article in the current New Yorker magazine (8/8-8/15) by Ken Auletta — “The Dawn Patrol”, all about the war of the morning network shows Today and Good Morning America. I won’t rehash the article here — it won’t kill you to go buy an actual magazine for once in your virtual life — but the candid truths revealed are just gold for savvy marketers.
The audience for these shows are 70% female… just like most general markets in the economy… and thus, there are “rules” that must be followed for success. These rules aren’t made up — they were realized, after fifty years of testing, and paying VERY close attention.
See, these morning shows earn hundreds of millions in ad revenue each year. They carry the water for the networks.
So the producers leave their egos and their “common sense” out of all decisions.
They do what they do because they see that it works. They count up the ratings, and test everything in painful detail.
So, what works? First — as I’ve been saying for years now — it’s all about personality. The weatherman Al Roker’s job has very little to do with the actual weather. He’s there to be a friendly, non-threatening guy who can talk nice to women about how great the day is gonna be. Regardless of the storm outside.
Second — and the reason I’m bothering you with all this — is a quote by a former co-anchor Harry Smith: The minute-by-minute viewer response monitors show that “the tabloid stuff bumps the numbers.”
Not hard news. Celebrity, slander, silliness and outrageous social behavior. The run-away bride, the lost kids, the latest blonde murder investigation, Michael Jackson’s trial… the stories closer to UFO landings than earnest Senate committee reports.
That’s what opens the profit pumps.
And yes, it works for male-dominated markets just as well. Even your staid old CEO perks up when a celebrity walks by (or self-destructs on the national stage).
Now, just as I warn seminar audiences… this doesn’t mean you need to start referring to Bat Boy or Sasquach in your next online posting.
What it means is that… again… the best written headlines are NOT boring, pedantic recitations of the facts.
Rather… the best are attention-jarring wake-up calls to your prospect’s brain.
There’s an old saw in marketing that goes like this: First, sell them what they want. You can sell them what they need later.
What that means is simple — it’s a much easier path to offer something your prospect is already predisposed to like. Trying to educate him on why he needs what you have is a losing proposition.
However, once you’ve established that you can deliver what he wants, he will begin to trust you. And you can THEN start the process of working him into the more complex relationship where you give him what you clearly know he needs.
It’s the same with headlines. You have a split second to get his attention, and you won’t do it by trying to educate him.
Instead, go in through the already-open door in his brain — the door that is ALWAYS open to anything fun, or gossipy, or titillating. Or that makes him do the “whaaaaaaa?” double-take.
It’s the fastest way to bump the numbers.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
How To Be A Sap
Jeez Louise. Did you catch Sunday’s episode of Six Feet Under?
It was… shattering.
I was jarred back to every funeral I’d ever attended, and had emotions wrung out of me I’d long forgotten about.
Screw reality TV. The truly well-written fictional shows (most of them on HBO) can still rattle your cage like classic literature.
That episode was quality emotional-wringing.
Got me thinking, too. About empathy. And writing.
I’ve known people who seem to have shut down their empathy gears. I recall uncles who fell asleep during the pea-soup-spewing scenes in the Exorcist… friends who laughed all through Jaws… and even an acquaintance who wondered what the big deal was when a colleague freaked out over a cherished cat’s sudden demise.
I also first saw Saving Private Ryan with a friend who was still a little shaky over his years in Vietnam during the war. He’d asked me to see it with him for moral support… and he didn’t seem to have a tough time watching the movie. But I kept an eye on him anyway, not sure what sort of poison might be brewing back up.
Those three films — and my experience with pets and people dying and careers ending and relationships imploding — were all emotionally jarring on various levels. Executed by master craftsmen, using scripts written by writers who knew where the tender spots were in most audiences.
I always felt a little estranged from people who either were — or claimed to be — removed from emotional reactions.
In real life, we experience things from inside our heads. It’s a claustrophobic point-of-view even the best Hollywood-quality cameras can’t yet mimic. Everything happens just outside (or just within) our personal space, minute by minute, with no editing and no replay button.
When you personally feel emotional trauma, it’s a second-by-second trial by fire.
Watching a TV show or a movie is a removed experience — pure voyeurism. You’re not there. It’s not happening to you. It shouldn’t have the same power as real life.
And yet… sometimes all the emotion of the real experience IS there, bubbling up from deep inside.
All of the good writers I know are drenched with emotional self-knowledge and empathy for the emotional experiences of others. We aren’t walking around sobbing hysterically… but we are easily overcome with the feeling of a situation.
Sometimes too easily. Several times, while giving a talk at a seminar, I got off on a tangent about something I really cared about, and felt myself start to choke up. I had to back off, and gather my wits. I know other speakers — the good ones — have had similar experiences.
This extra dose of emotion is no accident. You cannot be a good writer without empathy — without understanding, viscerally, what it’s like to feel everything humans are capable of feeling.
At full strength, too. The industrial-quality stuff.
The intensity of your ability to feel infuses your writing with power, and a connection to the most complex tragedies, comedies and dramas of human interaction.
In short… feeling strong emotions is a good thing.
If your emotions are in lock-down… from a bad childhood, or from a misguided sense of what it takes to be a man… you will never be able to get into another person’s head. And you’ll never find that sweet spot of need and connection that makes great literature great… and great sales copy a license to print money.
You don’t have to become a Drama Queen.
But you do need to stop pretending that emotions are some foreign intrusion on your coolness. Embrace your ability to know joy, sadness and yes, even pain. These are the building blocks of a well-lived life.
No one gets out of here without a few tears.
Be a sap. It will help your writing.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
Profitable Doldrums
It’s hot.
It’s damn hot.
It’s August, it’s damn hot, and any self-repecting mammal is laying low in a shady spot catching extra zzz’s.
This includes many right-thinking humans. Europe practically shuts down for the month, and the cities empty as everyone goes on a month-long vacation.
Here in the States, our Puritan genes recoil at such frivolousness. And many business flog away at their markets pretending there’s nothing different going on.
My advice: Calm down. Take a deep breath.
Go have a nice cold drink.
There are, and always have been, “dead spots” in most markets during the year. You don’t want to mail into a major holiday like Christmas or Thanksgiving or the Fourth of July. You don’t want to schedule seminars in June or September if your target audience has school-age kids — or you’ll get caught up in the going-back-to-school and graduation exodus.
Unless, of course, you’re selling stuff related to those events.
And, for many of us, August is just a black hole for sales messages.
Understanding your market on a deep level requires a little focus and effort, to track the buying patterns of your flock. You cannot rely on “common sense” all the time. For example: The best time to send out golf-related pitches is not in the Spring, when everyone is dragging their clubs out of the closet.
Rather, it’s in the shivering months of January and February… when everyone is dreaming of that first warm round. When the pleasing picture of future benefit already has a toe-hold in their mind.
Markets differ in their patterns, and it’s one of your main jobs to find both the bad times to reach your prospects, and the best times.
For many markets, August just sucks.
So don’t panic if your response just took a dive, and you can’t find any good reason for it. Just stick your head outside.
It’s too damn hot to pay attention to anyone’s sales pitch right now.
But that doesn’t mean you need to turn off the lights and go into hibernation.
Instead, use this down month to spend some quality time with your house list. If you haven’t sent them something recently that didn’t include a plea for money… you probably need to. Every once in a while, it pays off huge to just contact your best customers… and GIVE them something.
For free.
No strings attached.
It’s part of the long-term bonding process. All year long, you’re tortuing them with message after message about something they want or need. If you’re writing good copy, then you’re teasing them mercilessly about it, too.
Now, it may be that they are comfortable with being hit on all the time by you.
Still, like any relationship, you stand to gain if — once in a while — you bestow a generous, unexpected gift on them. For no reason at all, other than the fact you are happy they’re part of your life.
And you’re not the greedy bastard they thought you were, never contacting them without wanting something.
They may react suspiciously to this gift, so you really need to make it clear you’re not using it as a ruse to get into their wallet later on.
No strings.
No obigation.
No need to even do anything. You’ve included the free gift in the package you just sent. It’s theirs, to dispose of or use as they please.
You can make it a free report that offers huge value. But that’s kind of cheesy, if you’ve been slamming their bank account for any significant amounts. Much better is a published book — not your own latest best-seller, either. Something you’ve read and profited from.
A real gift.
You’ll be amazed at the good will you can generate with something that costs you a few bucks to send out.
And what do you do to make your nut for the month?
Easy. First, I’m not suggesting you never actually try to sell anything during down times.
Just know that you’re up against huge distractions — like the damn heat… and the fact your prospect may be on vacation a thousand miles away — and structure your offer to reflect that fact.
This is why so many smart marketers plan for “fire sales” during August. Or “we’re cleaning out our warehouse” sales. Or “damaged goods” sales.
Your prospect base may have been cut in half, or worse, for the month. So don’t do any huge rollout. Instead, offer a one-time opportunity, to your best customers, and use the fact it’s a down month as your excuse.
Reason-why copy works because it gives your prospect, literally, a reason why he should buy right now. Just the fact you’re having a sale isn’t a full reason.
But a more fleshed-out reason… like your need to generate some action during a heat-stroked down period… makes perfect sense.
And perfect sense often results in a decision to buy.
Personally, I’ve used August to let my assistant go off on an extended vacation… so I could shut off the phones and devote myself to writing.
Nearly all the courses and books I’ve written were completed during a sultry August break. I plan for the projects in the months prior… but I get the concentrated writing done in an air-conditioned orgy while the world bakes.
Shutting up shop completely can make good sense, too. Give yourself time to regroup, stop obsessing on the biz for a few weeks, let some whacky ideas simmer.
Read some good fiction, to really get your mind off things.
If you’ve been performing Operation MoneySuck all year long, you SHOULD be able to slip away for most of August, and not lose a beat when you return for a refreshed, cleared-brain Fall assault on your market.
Heck, if you have any special ways you’ve been spending August profitably, let’s hear about it in the comments section.
I kinda doubt there are too many of you out there reading this, though.
It’s too damn hot to log on, even.
Keep cool, y’all.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
Fluff
Howdy…
My server, bless it’s bleeping little heart, decided today was a good day to crash.
Nothing new there. Comes with the territory.
Fortunately, my Web guy was on it in a flash, and all seems fine now. However, I’m under deadline here at the home office, and wasn’t planning on writing an entry.
So this is just a “filler” post, so you don’t get a blank page when you log on.
There’s plenty to enjoy in the archives, of course. And I’ll be posting for real in a day or so.
Right now, though, I’m stalking the computer and getting riled up enough to assault another blank page with killer salesmanship.
Grrr.
Thanks to everyone who contacted me as soon as the site went blank — I appreciate people watching my back. We should all watch each other’s backs, all the time, anyway. (Special nod to Phil Alexander, my Canuck magician friend who always seems to be on top of every recent development — and burp — on the Web.)
Stay frosty, y’all.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com
P.S. By the way… please feel free to offer a link to this blog to your list. It’s a nice little bonus, and shows people how hip you are.
Spilling My Bag of Tricks
Several months ago, a fast-talking Web marketer named Rich Schefren tracked me down… and we began a long damn conversation about something near and dear to both our hearts: Creating a killer “money funnel” online that automatically attracted, captured and vitually hypnotized vast mobs of prospects… and flipped them, fast and easy, into becoming eager, loyal paying customers.
That’s Web Heaven.
Rich (and his partner Stephen Pierce) are waaaaay out there on the cutting edge of active Web selling technology. They understand the bells and whistles part on a deep, functional level.
I have never billed myself as a geek, and never will. I hire people to handle the code writing and meta-text wrangling and linking up of ‘Net pages.
It’s not that I techno-phobic. Far from it — I love the Web. Maybe more so than many people who are hip to the infrastructure details (and even the metaphysical “Matrix” style potential).
To me, the Web is, first, a very efficient delivery system for your marketing message.
But second, it’s a living, breathing science fiction novel we get to live in.
That’s what keeps me goggle-eyed. This is fun, and it’s a marketer’s wet dream.
I’m still pissed I don’t have the flying car I was promised in the late fifties (ala George Jetson)… but no one back then had a clue what kind of world would be ushered in when eggheads with duct tape on their horn rims started using silicone to shrink circuit boards.
The big damn Univac became a tiny little chip.
Soon, your phone, iPod and wireless broadband connection will simply be a speck dropped into your ear… and you’ll be able to access your email just by closing your eyes.
And type, I dunno, by tapping your teeth with your tongue. Or something. Maybe just thinking out the message. (I’ll have to check with Isaac Asimov on that detail.)
But for now, the main concern is maximizing your opportunity to make a killing online. With what’s available NOW.
Things are changing at warp speed, too. Certain tactics (like email blasting and old-style pop ups) that worked like crazy just a short time ago are now pretty much “game over”.
And many marketers who were dumb enough to bank their entire online business on a handful of such “too good to last” tactics… are now crying the blues.
It just was so easy, before AOL and hotmail and other large holders of prospects decided to get medieval on marketers by blocking messages.
That’s just one example, of course. Google changes their Adword rules often and capriciously — like an evil mad doctor sowing chaos in the land. Entire populations of emerging nations are plotting to steal your database, or at least buy a ton of your stuff with phony credit cards. And right now, somewhere, a greasy little cyber punk is getting ready to test The Mother Of All Viruses on your laptop.
Veteran marketers — those with experience both online and in the “other” worlds of selling, such as direct mail and print advertising — just roll their eyes at the vagaries of playing the game on the Web.
We’ve seen this movie before. The early days of informercials, 900 phone lines, fax blasting, seminars and a dozen other “delivery systems” for selling messages were also like the Wild West. Just like the Web is today.
And they all eventually ran up against establishment-type competition who changed the rules to suit their selfish desires… and ruined the free-for-all that allowed scruffy entrepreneurs to thrive.
Such is life in the capitalism food chain.
The details of the game are always in flux. Everything changes, sometime so fast you get dizzy.
And what may be making you wealthy today… can be completely outlawed by tomorrow morning.
Thus: Relying ONLY on technology for your marketing viability is a huge mistake.
Because the technology will change. (I’ve known dozens of business based entirely on fax blasting, cheap infomercials, and early varieties of spam… which all eventually went belly up. Yet, to their dying breath, they all insisted they could, and would, make it work again. The glory had only passed briefly, they said. It just couldn’t be gone forever. It just couldn’t…)
Do you know what NEVER changes in the marketplace?
Salesmanship. The art of persuasion. The ability to present your case, inspire trust, and move your prospect along your “money funnel” until he has the reasons and information he needs to give you money.
That kind of skill hasn’t changed since the dawn of time, and never will change. It’s the KEY to getting rich, in any market, in any business, using any delivery system.
And that’s what Rich and I have been urgently talking about for over nine months now. The conversation has been intense… and very profitable for both of us.
What Rich brings to the table is a detailed knowledge of the technology now working online. That’s important. He undertands the “rules” of the Web game.
But what I bring… is a deep, finely-tuned knowledge of salesmanship. It’s what I’ve studied my entire career, and what I use in every copywriting job I do.
It’s why Rich sought me out. His idea was to finally combine the cutting tactics of the Web, with the classic salesmanship of world-class writers like me… to create a “knowledge dump” of amazing proportions.
What we have discovered — after some intense detective work and long hours of going over and over it all — is that the “missing link” of most online marketers… is the ability to inject killer salesmanship into every “gateway” section of your money funnel.
It’s like setting up tiny little salesmen inside your online process… so you apply world-class persuasion tactics at every step. From siphoning off huge volumes of traffic, to capturing names and info, to moving your prospect through your sales process.
From tenative “looky loo”, to intensely loyal customer.
That’s what classic salesmanship chops can do for your business.
Results? If you’ve been following the long list of testimonials I’ve posted at www.marketingrebel.com, you should know that DOUBLING your results at each stage is almost a given.
And wouldn’t you love to double the traffic to your site? Double the qualified names in your house list? Double the sales?
And yet, it gets better.
Often, because you’re only getting “heartbreak” results right now… enough to be profitable, but nowhere near what you SHOULD be getting… just force-feeding some truly effective salesmanship into your process can multiply your results (at every stage) by a factor of up to TEN.
It’s happened. It’s happening right now, as you read this.
But not by relying on technology.
It happens… by getting hip to what’s working now, techology-wise… and then combining that tech-savvy with killer salesmanship.
Anyway, that’s what we’ve been doing.
And now, Rich (and his partner Stephen) are taking this conversation public.
They’ve set up a series of tele-seminars, starting in just a few days. They’re grilling me on the application of killer salesmanship to the online marketing model they know works so well right now.
To get all the details, just hop over to this link:
http://www.carltoninternetstrategies.com/cmd.php?af=276489.
Yes, it’s a mouthful of a URL. Just copy and paste it into your search engine. You’ll see what the fuss is all about, fast.
And you need to hurry, too.
Let me be clear here: I’m not putting this event on. Rich and Stephen are. They’re the ones to go to for the details (and for any weasel-complaining you may want to throw in).
I’m just the guy getting grilled on the hotseat. Thus, my name on the domain. I’m doing this willingly. And I’m excited about it.
But I’m just the guy getting grilled.
I’ve done a ton of live seminars, and also a ton of tele-seminars over the years. I realize there’s a bit of a glut right now, with everyone and his brother asking you to set aside an evening to listen to some “expert” blather on about whatever.
And, truth be told, I’m one of the guys glued to the phone during many of these events. Because I’m a junkie for good info.
Especially the stuff that quickly and easily translates into better marketing.
That’s what I expect these calls to be — a tidal wave of solid, useable information and tactics and secrets you can put to use immediately on your own Website. To bring in more traffic, build your list to obscene proportions, and sell a ton of product.
However, you will be the final judge on all this. Won’t cost you two cents to find out the details… or to get signed up for the first call. No pressure, no hassles, no games.
I’m spilling my bag of tricks open here. Even I’ve been astonished at all the secrets and cool tactics I’ve got in there. Rich is VERY good at pulling the really good stuff out of my head.
It’s a rare opportunity to hear me go into much deeper detail than usual. And, with the “framing” of the model that Rich and Stephen provide, it’s just an amazing opprotunity for any marketer who wants to get, and STAY, ahead of the game.
It’s about the merging of classic salesmanship with cutting-edge technology. No one else I know of is talking about this yet.
Soon, everyone will be talking about it.
Get in early.
Check out the link.
John Carlton
www.marketingrebel.com