29 Copywriting Secrets Stolen From Dan Kennedy (Part 2)

Classics are going to teach you the concepts, but there's no book that's going to turn you into a great copywriter. To write great copy. You got to start writing copy. I find personally that the two things that worked best for me were, one, listening to a lot of copy, right? And I've shared that numerous times where I've taken sales copy that I liked and. And read it out loud, recorded it, sped it up, and then would listen to it over and over again in high speeds. Some of the verbal patterns, some of the pace, and everything else just would naturally be absorbed if I kept listening to it. The second thing I'd say is taking a sales letter that you really like in a different field and then rewriting that sales letter for your product, but trying to change the least amount of words possible. And what that does is starts having you interact with good copy. We're going to talk about copywriting today. And it's funny, because I've never really considered myself a copywriter, and I don't consider myself a copywriter because I've never written copy for an audience that wasn't an audience, that I was a part of it. It's one of the reasons why I think, like, the reports I've written have done so well. I've written a few sales letters, and they've done extremely well. But, like, the last sales letter I wrote was for a program that Jay Abraham and I were doing together. I wrote the sales letter in Jay's voice, and it took me like, a month and a half or so to write. But I. When I wrote it, I was only maybe five years out, four years out, three years out of when I was a customer of Jay's. So when I wrote that sales letter, I was writing it from a standpoint of what would have to be written in order for me, like, remembering that the feelings I felt, the context I was in, everything as a Jay Abraham customer, since I was a Jay Abraham customer and client, I could think about how it would impact me, right? And I think when you want to call yourself a professional copywriter, you're not only writing to audiences that you're part of, you're writing to audiences completely separate, distinct from who you are. So that's why I don't consider myself a copywriter, although I have studied it tremendously and I've written sales letters, but I wouldn't necessarily call myself that. I think I shared this because I pulled up some videos from the past when I went from being in the music and fashion business to hypnosis and hypnosis was much more direct response driven. I realized that I knew nothing about direct response copy, direct response marketing, direct response advertising. And so that started the study. And when I first opened the hypnosis centers, or center first, right, the an ad, a full page ad could get us like 40 or 50 calls. Through split testing, through learning copywriting and so on and so forth, we were able to get the number of calls we got from a full page ad in the daily news from 40 to 50 calls to about 400 calls. So a 10x improvement in response over time. That was partly because I started studying copywriting and therefore I could understand what variables on that page needed to be tested. Whether it was the headline, the caption, the picture, et cetera. And could then begin to write my own ads, which once again, many of the ads that we had for the hypnosis centers were weight loss ads. I have been very fat. I know what it's like to be fat. I know what it's like to struggle to lose weight. So once again, when I wrote those ads, I was really writing to an audience that I understood and I knew. So anyways, as I started to recognize the importance of copywriting in my hypnosis business, as I improved my copywriting ability by reading books, back then the Internet was not as present as it is today and there was much less content. We're talking pre blogs, pre any of that stuff. And that's when I went down to a Dan Kennedy event. And at that Dan Kennedy event I took copious notes and I guess the rest is history, right? And so it's those notes that I plan on sharing with you today. Make sure that you are a member of the Strategic Profits group. It's free. There's a lot of heavy hitters in there. I give away some of the material that I charge for in there and it takes nothing to join Strategic Profits is the name. Hi, Rich, I have a question. How do I learn about copywriting? Are there any books you can personally recommend? Sure, there's a lot of classics, right? Classics are going to teach you the concepts, right? One great book that I have no problem recommending. But there's no book that's going to turn you into, into a great copywriter. To write great copy, you got to start writing copy. Since Sean Vossler is here, I don't know if he's still here, but this book right here, seven figure marketing copy, great book. This will tell you all the concepts. It will also give you some really good templates to follow as well. As it being a really good read. That being said, I find personally that the two things that worked best for me were one, listening to a lot of copy, right? And I've shared that numerous times where I've taken. I've taken sales copy that I liked and read it out loud, recorded, recorded it, reading it out loud, sped it up, and then would listen to it over and over again in high speed. So that certainly helped me a lot because if I found a sales letter I liked, if I listened to it over and over again, some of the verbal patterns, some of the pace, and everything else just would naturally be absorbed if I kept listening to it. The second thing I'd say is taking a sales letter that you really like in a different field and then rewriting that sales letter for your product, but trying to change the least amount of words possible. And what that does is starts having you interact with good copy. I have two books that I created for myself that are nothing but John Carlton's Bullets. When I was learning, but also for a purpose, I would take those bullets and rewrite them for business. Now, these bullets were about fighting or for golf, but I would rewrite them about business. And the. Actually, even the names of the modules for bgs, right? Came from me rewriting bullets. Like the big damn secrets of entrepreneurship that no one knows, right? Or like all of those, right. And the benefits related to each module came from me rewriting John Carlton's bullets. So I think that at the end of the day, Rajesh, you've got to kind of move the pen or type on the keys to ultimately get good, right? Like, it requires thought and it requires, like, interaction in good copy. The third thing that I would say that made the biggest difference in my ability to write well as it relates to sales material would be scripting webinars. And here's why. Because when I would script a webinar, I had to be okay with the way that it would sound coming out of my mouth, right? I'm not going to read a bunch of bullets. That would sound really strange. So when I'm writing out a webinar, it has to be conversational. It has to sound like me and the way I talk, because if not, I'll be reading a script and everyone will know I'm reading a script. So the writing of that script, writing to sell, but knowing that you're going to have to speak it, so it has to sound conversational in your own voice. Probably. That was the last of those three things that I've done. I haven't done that in a while, but that was the last that I've done. And I noticed a sharp improvement because I worked on webinars for about a year. And while I was working on that, my ability to write that conversational way got better and better. So I hope that helps. Hi, Rich. I will rephrase my previous question. How do I use copywriting for writing ads for my online sales coaching service business? Okay, so let's first kind of start with this, right? Because I think that this is really an important point. It's something that for some will be apparent, will be so obvious, you'll be like, rich, why are you even talking about this? And for others, hopefully it's enlightening. When I went into the hypnosis business, right, Rajesh? When I went to the hypnosis business, I was competing with mom and pop kind of hypnosis businesses, right? Or a psychologist, a hypnotist, whatever, and they advertised hypnosis. I did not advertise hypnosis. I advertised solutions to problems. So my audience was so much bigger than the average hypnotist who is advertising hypnosis in marketing. I tell people this all the time. It's no different when it comes to copywriting. The onus is always on you to connect the dots. What I mean by that is that any benefit, any feature, anything that you're doing has to be translated to the benefit of the person on the other side. And so we would advertise solutions to problems while the rest of the hypnosis community advertised hypnosis. Okay, so to answer your question, Rajesh, right, which is how do I use copywriting for writing ads for my online sales coaching service business? The answer is you have to advertise. You have to write to. You have to create videos for that, speak to the problems that your prospect has. I want you. And this is good, I think, for anyone who has to advertise, anyone who markets, right? Open up a newspaper, open up a magazine, right? Flip through it. Notice how when you flip through it, many of the pages you don't give much attention to because it does not apply to you, right? It does not apply to you. One of the biggest obstacles to get over is that this does not apply to me. And the way that you get over that is to speak directly to what the prospect is struggling with, what the prospect finds painful, what is on the mind of the prospect, etc. That's the only way. So they're probably, Rajesh, not thinking about business coaching. They're thinking about their problems. And that's where it all starts, right? So many people, Rajesh, and this might be a good way to start, like just getting your head around it. Many people, most people maybe in Internet marketing, had zero, zero interest in business coaching, right? And if I advertise business coaching back in 2006, it would be de minimis, right? So I wrote a document that led people to that conclusion, right? So while they read the manifesto, the problems that I spoke about, the solutions that I was presenting, the prospect could, see, this guy gets me. This does apply to me. My life would be better with this stuff, et cetera, right? So you have to speak to where it hurts. You have to speak to what's on their mind. Which is why when I said earlier that I've only written to audiences, I've been a part of, that's part of the reason I know what's going on in the minds of prospects that are in markets that I've been either I am a prospect in or I was a prospect in. So it's really a lot easier to know what's going on in their minds. So, Rajesh, that's where you start. You have. There's this great book. It's called the Robert Collier Letter Book. It's one of the classics of copywriting. It's four or 500 pages. It's not a difficult read like breakthrough advertising. It's actually a great read because there's lots of really good sales copy in there from the early 1900s. But if you've ever heard the statement, enter the conversation in your prospect's mind, right? That is from Robert Collier. And it's a great book, lol. Can I learn this even if I'm new on this? Mara lose. We all know how to communicate, right? So you can. We all know how to communicate. Many of us, even if we're not good at selling, we know about selling, right? We also know more about our product and. Or our service and what it can do for someone than our prospects do. So, yes, you can learn on this when you're done with this live stream, you're not going to be a level copywriter. You're not even going to be a copywriter, even if an F level copywriter. But you'll have a better understanding. And that's where it starts. Marlowe's. At least for me. Like, whenever I learn anything new, my biology teacher in high school told me once, I don't get you, Sheffrin. You get all the easy questions wrong. You get all the hard questions right. My reply to him Was that's because the easy questions require memorization. The hard questions require understanding of the concepts. I understand the concepts. My memory just doesn't. It's rote. So I bring that up because for me at least, I like to learn by first having understanding the context. I like to learn from general and theory down to tactics, not tactics up to theory. I like to understand the general environment so that then I know where everything fits. I like, I. I'm like. It's the same reason, Marilu, is that I ask people when I'm coaching them, start with your question, even though it won't make sense and you need to tell me this 15 minute story to understand the question. Because at least if I understand the question, I can be paying attention for anything that's important to that question as you're telling me your story.

Right?

Same thing here with copywriting. I want to like when I learned it. Marketing. Whenever I've learned anything, I want to understand the whole thing first, just in a very general way. So as I learn details, I know where those details fit. I hope that helps. So yes, Marilu, you're in the right place. Rich. Other than actually testing the copy and seeing if it converts, how do you gauge when it's time to stop editing or know this is either good enough or it's pretty good, or is this, or this is just garbage? Jason, the earliest way to do that is to test and also you get a sense of it the more that you look at it, right? Like when you're reading it, are you getting bored? When you have an app read it to you, do you get bored like it's about. I'd say it's more gut than anything else. There's not like a very specific thing, but I lean towards, especially for copy, I lean towards fast feedback. The sooner you get any kind of interaction with the world, the better. Love your work. I'm looking to build a viral wine business. I need to solve the e commerce and fulfillment. I'm building three brands. Winwine online, Learn wine today. Buy wine today. What do you think, Gregory? It's a growing space. So from that standpoint, I think it's a good idea. From the fact that you're doing three at the same time, I don't think that's a good idea. I don't think that's a good idea at all. When you ask me about what I think about starting three brands and three sites at the same time, that is my answer. I don't dislike the idea. I dislike the approach because I want to get to money as quickly as possible. That also allows me to adjust. That lets me know whether I'm on the right track or not. And the sooner I can interact with the world and get feedback, the better. And so the worst thing, in my opinion, would be to try and build three at the same time. Because you're building it based on the assumptions that you currently have, which are subject to change as soon as you make contact with the market. So if you're asking me my advice, it's about minimum viable product. It's about getting it out there as quickly as possible. It's about understanding what assumptions you're making and whether they're valid or invalid and then refining your model before you open number two and three. I hope that helps. I hope that helps you, Gregory. Seriously. Because it's a mistake I see a lot of people make. And you extend out for so long how much you're going to make money that you end up in problems.

Right?

And you end up doing a lot of work that might not be what you need or what even works because you haven't validated Irish. I have one more question. Would you recommend that I start a marketing advertising swipe file? Of course I would. Of course I would. Why would you not? If something's working out there, you need, I think that Rajesh, hopefully you're a member of Steal Our Winners. If you are, I strongly recommend that you access the interview I did with Jesus Caleb on offers and he walks through what he learned from Gary Halpert because he was a Gary Halbert protege. And it's all about finding the sale. Like part of the conversation was about what Gary would do. And Gary would want to look at the five sales letters that have worked to that market before and then read those sales letters and under and analyze each sales letter and make it answer questions for you about the prospect. In other words, looking at the headline, knowing that this, like, sales letter worked, what is it about this headline that got the prospects that I'm trying to go after? Read the rest of the letter.

Right.

And what about that first paragraph? And what about that second paragraph? What does each element of the sales letter tell me about the people that responded? That's Rajesh, why you should start a marketing and advertising swipe file. Just making sure that you're filling it with good stuff. Amit Rich, do you have any tips to build a mindset that resists the shiny object syndrome so prevalent in the direct response industry? Yes, but it's much more of a overall philosophy. I would say of recognizing that you want to get from point A to point B, right? You have a vision of your business and that vision is what you're trying to create. And so that creates a trajectory, right? You're not necessarily, if you're like a really good entrepreneur, you're not necessarily committed to the specifics on how to get there because things change, right? But you're committed to getting there. That's the journey, right? And because that's the journey, ideally you have a general idea or a very detailed idea of how you're going to build that business, right? What you're going to need to attract prospects, how you're going to convert prospects into customers, how you're going to take customers that are worth X and make them worthwhile. And that's going to require you to do certain things. So when what I've always done, and I think it's one of the reasons why I don't have that shiny object problem when it comes to marketing or anything online, is that I have an idea of how I'm going to get to where I want to get to. And when I hear about different things, I am comparing them to what? If it's even in the areas where, like, it would be relevant to, then I'm comparing it to the way that I think I'm going to do it. And I've also come to the conclusion, and this is just my way of looking at the world. I'm not suggesting everyone take it on, but this is my way that opportunities don't come disguised in sales letters. That's just the way I look at it. If I find something that's different. But opportunities in and of themselves are generally not from sales letters. And so while, and I'm just trying to think about this as I'm answering your question, like, where's an area that I do do? The shiny object kind of thing is probably when it comes to supplements, biohacking, et cetera, because I don't have as much command over, I'd like to be 100 and run a marathon. Maybe. Maybe that's the goal, right? To be or do a decathlon when I'm 100. So now that's the goal, right? Like maximum health and fitness at an old age. Now, like, if that's the goal, everything gets evaluated by that, right? And so when I'm hearing about supplements or biohacking shit, I can sort it by will this help me in that goal? If it doesn't, then it's not relevant.

If it is, right?

And so the more clarity you have about your goal, the more clarity about how you're going to get there, the less you are victim of shiny objects. Who would you use for copywriting? For wine? I'm not sure but because I like. No name specific is coming to mind. However, you're looking for a copywriter that can write more to that audience than more about the product. So think about the audience. Think about other things that audience buys and are there any areas where their very direct response driven in areas that these people would buy? And if so, that's the idea there. Okay, so let's see. We got one person. So Robert is in supplements. Chris Vogelman is in supplements. Glenn is in supplements. I didn't know this, so I'm glad to know this. I'm going to give you guys a tip. Wow. A lot of people. Mariluz is in supplements. Supplements for. It's all good. Please share tip. Wow, I didn't know Paul, are you selling supplements? I learned this from Caleb years ago. Let's see. So I'm going to give you this supplement tip. Like I said, I learned it from Caleb a long time ago. But it's been tested and it's been proven. Take your testimonials and this was in regards to a sales letter, but you could take it and apply it anywhere. Take your testimonials and at least in a newspaper ad, if you replaced all your testimonials with MD reviews, like things from MDs, you will get an increase in conversion rates. Significant, right? So then the question is how do you get those doctor reviews? How do you get those doctor testimonials? How do you get the MD testimonials? And the answer is you go to upwork. So generally you can get doctors to review your product and write something about it, like about the ingredients, et cetera, like what they think and that will increase response. When you have lots of MD testimonials, it will boost the response of the supplement because it's adding a shit ton of credibility and that will make a difference. If you guys think that's a crappy piece of advice, let me know. If you recognize how powerful that is and you understand why that would raise response rates, let me know that as well. But it is powerful. I've not ever seen it in any course or anything, but Caleb mentioned that to me years ago when he was doing tons of newspaper advertising and it worked. So hopefully that helps you guys and if it does and you do it, let me know, I'd be happy. So finally, we are now at a Point where I can actually show you my notes. We're going to add me. Perfect. All right. What we were talking about in the last stream, just to quickly review, were these notes that I took when I went to that Dan Kennedy seminar. I think it's the very first seminar I actually ever paid to go to, period. And actually I have a picture from that day, a picture of me and Dan Kennedy 20 years ago. Actually longer than that. Longer than 20 years ago. Can you imagine? All right. Anyway, so what we went over so far, because I think that's important to share that. So Dan Kennedy's copywriting seminar. What do we do before we write? Keeping a swipe file. We talked about that. Not only of competitors, but comparables.

Right.

And then we talked about establishing authority. Why should I listen to you? And why should I listen to you about this? And you have to answer those questions. We talked about other examples of ways of providing credibility. We talked about telling them what it's not.

Right.

As a way of getting their curiosity as well as eliminating things that they've tried before to let them know that this is different.

Right.

We talked about letting them off the hook and why it's so important. And it's. You're letting them off the hook.

Right.

Because if that's the difference between possible and probable, it is possible to win the lottery. Someone does almost every week. But it's not probable for me to win the lottery.

Right.

One of the things that turns what's possible into probable if someone has been struggling to get the outcome is leading them to the conclusion that they couldn't have gotten the outcome the way that they were trying. And that's important because they have to feel capable of getting the outcome what they want with your help, with your product, with your service, but they can't feel so confident that they don't need it.

Right.

Which they wouldn't be reading or they wouldn't be watching or they wouldn't be listening if they felt that way. So they still want the outcome, but to a certain degree, they've given up some hope that it's actually going to happen over time. And so it's not your fault. Is letting them off the hook for past problems. Even though I hate that language and I've never want to use it's not your fault. I want to lead people so that they think it's not their fault. All right. So we went over that, talked about fear and anxiety and how. How much easier it is to sell fear. A fear sale is a lot easier to make than A benefit sale. Because fear has a tendency to move people the fastest and it's right there. So that we talked about guilt, we talked about secrets and the need for secrets. Let's just see if I missed anything there. Okay. Reason why. That's the next thing. There we go. Reason why. Reason why has a place in every ad or sales letter. This is a staple reliable copywriting technique that should be omitted only with a compelling reason why it works so well. Okay. And then we'll get into it a little bit more. It allows the person to feel he is arriving at a logical, sensible decision. Whoops when responding or buying, and to feel equipped to justify his decision or her decision if need be. Tips for use. Don't get confused that you are going to sell logically. You cannot sell with logic, reasons or features that should be presented in tandem with benefits. You have to give them stuff to back up their decisions so that they feel logically concluded, right? You have to arm the person to be able to discuss why buying from you was such a good idea. Also, everything is more believable with a reason, right? That's the whole like subtext to the Robert Cialdini social psychology experiment with the photocopier where if someone asked to cut the line and they said because I need to make copies, which makes no sense, right? What was important was the because. And that's the reason why we find things much more believable when we know why, right? So tell me that you're having a sale, okay? But tell me that because of COVID you have new inventory coming and all the old inventory is still in the store because you haven't been opened. And now you need to slash the prices dramatically so that you make room for the new clothes and also have money to pay those vendors. Now I have a much higher belief that sale is real, right? And so anytime you can provide a reason, the better off you'll be, the more believable you will seem and that is beneficial. Attention getting devices. Now for this, we were talking about direct mail, right? But getting attention is still even more critical online, right? So the reason that you see these all the time, and that's grabbers, is because they bump up response, right? All the big time advertisers, they truly do test use them, right? Rodale boardroom, etc. Grabbers, lumpy object mail, 3D objects, bagged items, currency coins, photographs. As you can see, I've attached a blank to the top of my letter, right? Lift notes or equivalents. Address a reason not to read, provide a Table of contents, right? Present influential endorsement.

Right?

So lift notes are the equivalent when we're talking about. Lift notes are the equivalent. We're talking about something when you're doing direct mail, right? That is not in the sales letter, but is another like piece of paper, right? Might be like a piece of paper folded only. Read this if you decided not to like not to move forward or. And that's a reason to reconsider. It might be the order form. There's all these other elements that are besides the sales letter. And a lift note is meant to increase lift, right? The number of people that then move into the other piece. It lifts response, right? Tease aspect of offer direct attention to present deadline or urgency. Handwritten letter, photocopied or ruled paper. These are all attention grabbers, right? Other loose enclosures. Read this only if sealed envelope. Read this after.

Right?

Audio tape or cd. A very real looking check, right? That used to boost response quite a bit. Don't let operational issues dictate your marketing. That's a big one, right? John Reese, I think first said it in Internet marketing, he said anytime that you change the way you market because any way you back off from the ideal way to market because you don't have the technological chops in your business to make that happen, you're paying a price, right? And I say that as someone who has very little technical ability but has always had people on my team that could make shit happen, right? Like they could take what my vision was and turn it into a reality. And that's incredibly important. That's what Dan is talking about here. You should never let marketing be. You should never let marketing bend to operations ideally, right? Here's a whole bunch of examples that get attention. Lift notes, photographs, post it notes, involvement pieces. That's like Publishers Clearinghouse, right? Moving the sticker from here to there. This is all swipe. So here's a lift note, okay? Dear Blank, as you can see, I've attached a rubber band to the top of this letter. Why have I done this? Actually, there are two reasons. I have something very important to tell you and I wanted to make sure I got your attention. Secondly, since you have forgotten, you may have forgotten to respond to the first letter I sent you. I decided to enclose a rubber band you can tie around your fingers so you won't forget to respond to this letter. Here's what this is all about, right? So just a clever way to start the conversation. And if you opened up an envelope and you saw a rubber band taped to the top of A letter, you'd be like, why am I getting a rubber band? It opens up that curiosity and then gets someone reading.

Right.

Here's a lift note. Are you a small thinker? Weak minded, A pessimist? If you are, please don't read the enclosed letter. It is written to eliminate you. We want and need only decision makers, optimists and the positive minded. We are looking for people who can visualize an opportunity. This letter is only the beginning. The hardest thing to recognize in the letter you are about to read is to conceive and believe that what we offer is real. That's an intention. Getting one because it's challenging. Or qualifying prospects, which is what the next one is, right? Qualifying prospects. Secrets of major direct marketers. If you can get the recipient doing things, they are much less likely not to order. That's why Publishers Clearinghouse would have you move the stamps from one place to another.

Right?

Commonly used involvement pieces. Stickers to remove or replace scratch offs, sealed items to open, quizzes and tests to take, secret words to find tapes to listen to, recorded messages to call. And online we could say like you've seen the spin the wheel for a discount or the one that looks like a slot machine, right? With the three things for a discount. These are all involvement pieces and they work online just as well as they work offline. Self qualification, self scoring quizzes and tests or checklists that are involvement devices and serve to lead a person to an evaluation and determination of his own making that he is a good match with what you offer. That's a good way of describing like the Ryan Levesque approach, right? From an involvement standpoint, this can get a person to read what he might otherwise skip or skim. From a persuasive standpoint, it gives the prospect a sense of control. Are you a good candidate for getting fast and lasting weight loss with positive changes? Right. That was an example. Are you able to lose weight but not the fat roll? Are you able unable to control your cravings? So blah blah, blah blah. Okay, next one is benefit driven sales copy and bullets. Fear is a string. Fear of losing what you have is stronger or mark, consider this, right? Fear that this. Fear of missing out. Fear that this might be the solution to my problems and if I don't read this, if I don't buy this, if I don't get this, I might always regret it. Did you use lift notes against tear sheets? Curious as to results. I've used a post it on top of a tear sheet.

Right.

And the post it was a J mailing so back in the days, right, if you've ever gotten a direct mail offer with which was really just either a magazine ad or a newspaper ad ripped out of the magazine or newspaper with a post it on it that said, hey, I thought you should check this, like, Rich, you should check this out. J letter J. And that's called the J mailing. And the reason why the last, the first initial of the first name was J is because more names start with J than any other letter. So everybody seems to know someone who has a first name that starts with a J. And we did this. We would print our newspaper ad from the newspaper, but it didn't even have to be from the newspaper with a post it on top. That was to the person who was getting it, right? And so they would receive this full page ad, like folded up with a post it note that said it was coming to me. Hey, Rich, saw this, thought you might be interested, Jay. And that had a tremendous response. The same person that asked me about the MD stuff earlier, the gray area of that, you could say the same thing here. Could that be problematic? Yes, it could. And it was problematic for me. And I wouldn't do it again. We went to weight loss list, people who had bought weight loss pills, et cetera, in our demographic area. Turns out, though, I got one very irritated call and that was enough not to do it anymore. From a father whose daughter had died from anorexia, who was on the list. So because she had bought lots of diet pills and now she was getting an ad in the mail that said she should check this out and it was about weight loss, I could see how that would flip out a father and I could see the problem in that. So I wouldn't necessarily do that kind of mailing around personal issues anymore. I learned my lesson, but powerful strategy. These are old techniques and ideas that still work today. Yeah, these are definitely old, man. No doubt they do still work today. But like I took these notes over 20 years ago, which is the best copywriter you meet and which you currently follow? There is no best copywriter.

Right.

If I was just talking about in general.

Right.

The copy that I enjoyed reading the most was Clayton Makepeace. And Clayton was certainly a top copywriter, an A level copywriter for finance. He cracked the nut. For anyone that's in the supplement business, you have Clayton to thank because he was the one that launched the first newsletter and therefore products on natural health with Whitaker and that Magalog mailed 80 million pieces which generated over $4 million worth of royalties. For Clayton, however, like when Clayton would work on sales letters for me as a friend, he really didn't understand, like, the mindset of an Internet marketer. He would talk to them like a small business owner. So for my market, he wouldn't be best. Certainly one of the best writers. I loved what he wrote.

Right.

But doesn't necessarily understand the mindset. I'll tell you, it's a lot easier to be a generalist in marketing than it is a generalist in copywriting because you got to get into the head of the prospects who you're writing to. And if you're a copywriter, like it, you save so much time if you're writing to the same market over and over again because you're also learning.

Right.

You're getting feedback on how your promotions are doing as opposed from jumping the thing. Okay. So I can't tell you, like, who is the best, but I can tell you who are some of the people who I've enjoyed the most.

Right.

So I enjoyed Jay Abraham. I wouldn't consider him a great copywriter either, though he's written great copy. He doesn't consider himself a copywriter, but some of Jay's sales letters really spoke to me. Clayton Makepeace, Gary Bensavinga, Scott Haynes, John Carlton. I love John Carlton style, like, so much. And probably lots of other copywriters. Like, I love Sean's book. I'm sure I've read some of Sean's copy, but I don't know which ones. I've loved some of the things that Todd Brown has written, there's that I've loved some of the things I've written, but definitely Ben Savanga, Makepeace, Ogilvy and Gene Schwartz. Dan Rosenthal. A lot of the old legends. Hey, Rich. I'm looking to grow copywriting skills. I don't have a lot of copywriting background, but I have been in the online marketing world for a few years. Do you have maybe two or three books you would recommend for me to get some solid foundation in writing? Persuasive copyright? If I'm selling marketing services, sure. David. I recommended Sean Vassler's book earlier. Robert Collier. Letter Book's great. How to Write a Good Ad by Vic Schwab is great. Maxwell Sackheim, Anything written by him. There's so many good books out there, but the best thing that you can do if you've been around for a while is start to really spend time rewriting some of the sales letters that you've responded to for your own stuff. Since we're talking about selling marketing services. If you've hired any marketing services, I would look at why you think you responded to those, and I would start to build a swipe file in that area, and then I would start to go through the process, right. Of whatever process would be easiest for you to try and sell someone, whether that person's there or not, whether you would write them a letter, whether you would talk to them, whatever, and think about how you would sell it to that person. And you write it out and then you work on it. Right? But one of the things to do is to take a sales letter for something that's not a marketing service and then make it a marketing service that will give you a lot of experience and it will force you to get in there and interact with great copy. How important is it to have an avatar dialed in when writing copy? I go back and forth on that, man. I really do. I think it depends on the person. You certainly have to know who you're writing to, right? You have to understand the emotional elements that are involved in the marketplace. That's a given.

Right.

And the more that you know what's going to resonate with that person, the easier it's going to be. So I'd say that it certainly makes the job easier. But when I wrote the sales letter with Jay, in Jay's voice for the program that we did, right. I didn't have an avatar per se, but I had myself. And I was like, trying to think, what would I jump up and down for Joy, you know, about. And so from that standpoint, yes, but I didn't have it, like, defined, if that makes sense. I want to show you the guys this. And while I'm pulling this up, let's see if I can answer another question. My daughter just showed. Hi, Ava. Good to see you. So let me show you this picture. This is me 20, like 25 years ago with Dan Kennedy. So I had a little bit more hair, as you can see. And he looks. Well, he lost a lot of weight for a while, then he gained it back. And believe it or not, I still have that T shirt. All right, hold on. I'll share one more and then we'll call it a day. So benefit driven copy, Right. Even though this is selling 101, well over 70% of all advertising copy fails to translate features into benefits. The elementary nature of this should not be a distraction from its vital importance. It is a common mistake to leave the translation of the benefit punchline up to the reader.

Right.

That's what we're talking about when we say connecting the dots. So anytime that you list a feature or benefit right. In your marketing or copy, you should think about another sentence after that so you can.

Right?

And whether you put that so you can in or whether or not you say it in another way, everything needs to be connected to the benefits of the reader. And therefore everything in the product, everything in the service that you do needs to be translated into the reader. So you can. So you'll feel. So you'll experience.

Right?

Writing bullets is an art form. The number one error in bullets is being factual or presenting features without linkages to benefits. Every bullet presents a benefit. Think of John Carlton, the one two punch, right? John Carlton. What he would do very often is write a bullet with a benefit and then have a benefit of the benefit. I'm going to make up a stupid one. The cradle hand technique that cannot anyone out with just one punch. Everyone will get out of your way when you walk in to any bar once you know this, right? So knocking out anyone with one punch so you can.

Right?

Or so it will be right. Like you gotta translate, you gotta connect the dots. Reading is like when someone's reading one of your sales letters or watching a webinar. It's a passive activity. You can't expect them to think at all about like why your product is going to improve their life or their or your service.

Right?

All right, let's just see. Add a testimonial to bullet copy. Make some bullet questions. Flag certain bullets just as you would a headline. Use meaningful specifics. Add how to to a bullet. Intersperse other points of sales pitch and offers. All right. I know we didn't get as far as maybe some of you would have liked today. I hope that answering the questions was valuable to you guys. Let me know what I could do to make it more valuable for you and I will see those of you who decide to join me where we'll finish the notes on this. I'll put it up and give you a link to it and with that to higher profits beyond rich Efren. Over and out.