New Video: Recession Proof Copywriting Tips

Here's a new video I just created on recession proof copywriting strategies. Enjoy!

They Mean Business

I just discovered my new favorite show!

It's called We Mean Business, and it airs on A&E Saturday's at 10am. This 30-minute show features Bill Rancic, winner of the first season of The Apprentice, and a tech guru and interior designer as they revamp a struggling business each week for 30 minutes.

I caught it this morning by accident as the trio helped out a struggling chiropractor. It's good stuff from a marketing standpoint, and a refreshing change from all the home improvement and real estate shows that are usually broadcast during the morning hours.

James says check it out!

What I'm Reading Now

Your Internet Cash Machine: The Insiders’ Guide to Making Big Money, Fast! by Joe Vitale and Jillian Coleman Wheeler

I firmly believe that everyone, whether you work for yourself or someone else, should have their own side Internet marketing business.

If you’re eager to get started in this exciting field, I strongly suggest you check out Vitale and Coleman Wheeler’s book.

Your Internet Cash Machine walks you through all of the basics for starting your own online business, from deciding on what kind of products to sell, to how to deal with trademarks and spam issues. The book covers affiliate sites, Ebay, and creating your own videos.

As someone who’s been studying Internet marketing for the last several years, I found a lot of it too basic for my needs, though I really learned a lot from Nerissa Oden’s article on creating video, and there are a ton of links to other resources that I didn’t know about. But if you’re a beginner, this is the perfect book for you.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Joe Vitale is vital. Vitale and Coleman Wheeler have put together a dynamite resource for beginners. Go out and get this book to add to your marketing library right away. You’ll be glad you did.

I'm In a Book!

Great news. I am profiled in a book just out from Atlantic Publishing entitled The Complete Guide to Web-Based Advertising Copy to Get the Sale, by Vickie Taylor. It's a great step-by-step guide for copywriters and those who need web-based content on how to write great website copy. It also profiles several web copywriters, including yours truly (My profile is the first one in the book).

To learn more, go here.

Recession? What Recession?!

All this talk about recession and layoffs has a lot of people crawling under their beds, fearing the worst. I know I was certainly in that category as I began a big marketing push. But I learned something interesting: the business is still out there. Business is still getting done. Companies are still marketing their services, and they need copywriters and marketing people like me to help them get it all done. Small businesses are starting up left and right, and people everywhere are hiring graphic designers, ordering material, and paying for all manner of goods and services. Just like old times.

Here's another thing I've learned: There are entire groups of people who will never feel the recession. They will never wonder if they're still going to have a job tomorrow, or worry about if they'll have enough money to retire. And they are buying things to, as witnessed by this recent article in The Atlanta Journal Constitution. Expensive Australian water and cell phones inset with Swarovski crystals appear all the rage among the well-to-do, even while others are cutting back.

I have a theory that there are money levels. Reach a certain high enough level, and you'll never sink below it. You'll always have plenty of money to do whatever you need or want, money that is tied up in safe investments. Donald Trump and Bill Gates are in this level.

There's also a lower level that is so low it makes it hard to rise to the top. For these unfortunate souls, times are always tough, no matter how well the economy is doing. But I believe that even these people can rise above this level if they will only realize that there is a way out for them.

So what does that mean for us copywriters? Well, check out this article from millionaire copywriter Clayton Makepeace on five ways to profit from these lean times.

So, how is the recession effecting you and your business? Do you have too many clients? Not enough? Are the people you're working with feeling the crunch? What are some ways you've learned to recession-proof your business? Post a comment and let me know! Let's start a conversation.

5 Success Secrets of the Copywriting Masters

Want to know how the pros really create winning copy that sells? Try these 5 expert tips for starters, and you’ll be well on your way to writing copy that promotes your products and services—just like some of the greatest copywriting superstars of all time.

Focus on the Consumer, Not on Your Product. The question on everyone’s mind is, “What’s in it for me?” Answer that question about your product or service to the prospect’s satisfaction, and chances are good that they will become paying customers. They don’t care how long your company has been in business, or what you were doing that made you come up with the idea for your product or service. They only want to know how it will help them solve a problem that they are facing.

Use Everyday Speech. You’re writing about widgets to ordinary people, not an academic paper on Hemingway’s use of the comma. Avoid the stilted, high-falutin’ Corporatese that poisons many a marketing piece. Use ordinary, everyday speech, and avoid jargon if possible.

Start a Swipe File. This is the one thing that all successful copywriters do, and if you’re going to be writing your own copy, you should too! So start saving those pieces of “junk mail” that you get, and print out and save any web sales letters or emails you come across as well. They can be a fountain of inspiration for your next promotion. Why reinvent the wheel?

Read. You can’t be an effective writer—of any type of material—if you don’t read. Read magazines, newsletters, Web sites, and blogs relating to your industry. If you’re at a loss for industry publications, check out Tradepub.com, which offers free magazine subscriptions and whitepapers for dozens of industries. I get many of my ideas for my blog posts and this newsletter from reading marketing publications.

You should also read outside your industry and for pleasure. Not only is it a great way to pass the time, but it can teach you about language and sentence construction, which come in handy when you’re writing your next promotion. Read business books, as well as your favorite fiction. I like science fiction, but any genre will do, and it all helps you learn how to tell a compelling story, which works as well in marketing copy as it does in today’s bestsellers.

Test, Test, Test. Another thing all successful marketers and copywriters do is test. Run your sales letter or webpage against another, changing only one thing at a time, like the headline. Whichever one outsells the other, use that one as your primary sales message, then test again! Change something else about the letter, like the lead, or the offer, or the guarantee. Heck, even use a different font! Even the most seemingly insignificant element will make people more likely to whip out their credit cards than another. Keep testing and testing until you’ve got something that continues to pull better than anything you set it up against. This becomes your Control. Use it as the basis for everything else you create.

That’s it! 5 super copywriting secrets you can start using right now!

Getting Things Done the Benjamin Franklin Way

“Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.”—Benjamin Franklin

One of the best success strategies used by everyone who has become successful is called modeling, where you find a person who is successful at what you want to do, and then do what they do.

For example, someone who wants to be successful in real estate could model Donald Trump. For copywriting, there’s Bob Bly, Clayton Makepeace, and Peter Bowerman.

But you don’t have to model the success of only those people who are still alive. History is full of successful men and women who can still be an inspiration to us today.

For me, one of those people is Benjamin Franklin. A successful entrepreneur, Benjamin Franklin retired at the ripe old age of 40. He was a skilled writer, invented bifocals, charted the Gulf Stream, created the first insurance company, volunteer fire department and lending library, and was a statesman and U.S. ambassador to France.

He really packed in a lot of successes. Sure, he lived to be 84, but he still couldn’t have done all this without becoming a master of time management.

Fortunately for us, Franklin spelled out exactly what he did in his autobiography.

Rising at 5am, Ben would ask himself one question: “What good shall I do this day?”

Then he would get ready for his day and have breakfast, followed by four hours of work.

At noon he would eat while either reading or reviewing his accounts. Then back to work for four more hours.

At 6pm it was time to “Put things in their places, supper, music or diversion, or conversation; examination of the day.”

Then he was off to bed for seven hours sleep before doing it all over again the next day.

Yes, it sounds regimented, but it was necessary in order for Ben to get things done. Perhaps you can use this as a guide to come up with something similar for your life.

I believe that if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish most anything you set out to do in life, whether it be to become wealthy, start a business, write a book, whatever. And a big part of that is becoming a master of time management.

So start today. As old Ben would say, “Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.”