In September one of my retainer clients decided to move their primary ecommerce email list from being managed internally to being managed by an outside agency.

Up to that point, the list had been on Maropost and revenue tracking had been handled by Google UTMs.

The agency, on the other hand, uses Klaviyo exclusively. As my client has migrated the list to the agency, all the subscribers have been migrated from Maropost to Klaviyo.

One of the promises the agency makes is that they’ll increase your revenue. More to the point, they claim to “help eCommerce brands squeeze an extra $30,000-$225,000+ in untapped revenue in 45 days or less, without paid ads.”

It behooves the agency to make good on this promise because they charge a percentage of revenue as compensation for their work.

Likewise, the Klaviyo account rep is also financially incentivized. He, too, gets a piece of all the revenue tracked by Klaviyo in the client’s account.

And since Klaviyo integrates with Shopify, all the revenue numbers are tracked in real-time and displayed on the dashboard for the client, the agency, and the account rep to see anytime they want.

Up until this transition to the agency, Jennifer* (who is employed by my client) and I had been writing most of the email copy that had been going out, and the emails were primarily text, although my client had begun incorporating more graphic elements. So I would consider our approach to be a hybrid between ecommerce and direct response.

The agency, on the other hand, is purely ecom: heavily designed graphic emails that always lead with a sale on a specific product.

Jennifer and I both wanted to know, would the agency’s creatives perform better?

Here’s what happened…

The agency immediately began mailing super small segments of the list. We’re talking like 3,000 people instead of 50,000 – a huge reduction.

And what happened to revenue? It went up. A LOT.

During my weekly call with Jennifer, she and I wondered aloud how unusual the results seemed based on all our prior experience selling with email. How could you mail a segment that small with the same offers we’d run to the list before and get such outstanding results??

I could not explain it. Neither could Jennifer. “Maybe we just suck at email marketing,” she said.

I formed a hypothesis…

I suggested that perhaps the new Klaviyo account was getting really good deliverability because it was on a fresh set of warmed-up IPs. More emails getting into Gmail’s Primary tab usually means more sales. Could it be that this new set of IPs would slowly get worse deliverability and thus bring the revenue back down?

It was worth monitoring, I thought.

Well, guess what…

My hypothesis was WRONG.

Or, at the very least, it wasn’t the source of the large increase in revenue attributed to the new agency.

Last week, Jennifer informed me that they’d begun digging into the tracking and discovered a massive case of revenue misattribution.

Basically, the new agency was getting credit for ALL MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION REVENUE, even for those subscriptions that had been in place prior to the agency taking over.

That’s why it appeared as if they were driving tens of thousands of dollars in sales with each broadcast. The bulk of those sales were simply rebills being wrongly attributed to the agency.

Another Klaviyo customer who experienced the same problem wrote about it on Klaviyo’s community eight months ago…

“We offer a subscription service and use Recharge as our subscription platform. This presents a problem when it comes to revenue attribution in Klaviyo. Whenever a subscription order is created in Recharge/Shopify, if that subscriber opened or clicked an email from us within the attribution window, Klaviyo counts it as revenue attributed to that email. This skews all of our reporting very significantly, and it makes it nearly impossible to see how our campaigns and flows are actually performing from a revenue standpoint.

“Klaviyo tells me that excluding Recharge customers from Klaviyo’s analytics is a commonly requested feature, but that there is not currently a way to do this outside of creating custom reports that exclude Recharge customers. Unfortunately this would be more of a workaround than a solution, and would require a lot of manual upkeep.”

And how did Klaviyo respond? Alex Hong wrote:

“Unfortunately, there is no way via the Shopify Integration to separate out recurring revenue (i.e subscriptions) and a one time order. The Klaviyo <> ReCharge integration helps in identifying an active customer on subscription, but unfortunately the revenue is still attributed under the Shopify Placed Order revenue. Since all the revenue is coming in through a single metric, it will be hard to differentiate between these.

“When calculating revenue, Klaviyo cannot decipher between Shopify Placed Order metrics that were placed independently of a ReCharge subscription. They all appear as the same type of Shopify Placed Order metrics within Klaviyo. That said, the ability to filter out recurring subscriptions is a widely requested feature, and I have submitted your valuable feedback to our Product Team for future consideration.”

So is there a solution for this?

Besides custom reports, the only low maintenance fix is to hire a programmer to do some custom coding for you. Otherwise, you’re SOL until the programmers figure out a way to separate one-time purchases and new subscriptions from existing rebills.

But why would they do that? All the current financial incentives reward revenue misattribution.

Getting back to Jennifer and my client, she did some additional testing and discovered their revenue tracking problems go beyond recurring billing…

My client still has another list on Maropost that the agency isn’t managing yet. So Jennifer used that list to conduct a simple test.

She clicked on an agency email first. Then she clicked on a link from the other list that was still being managed internally. If the tracking was working properly, the sale would be tracked to the second source, not the first. (Last one in wins.)

But that’s NOT what happened. The sale was actually tracked in BOTH PLACES, thereby double-counting the revenue.

This is what the military calls a SNAFU.

Not only are the agency’s revenue numbers completely unreliable… but the agency and the Klaviyo account rep have both been grossly overpaid due to the rev share agreement that’s in place.

My client is now demanding that Google UTMs be the sole source of revenue tracking. But rather than use UTMs and try to untangle the mess, Jennifer thinks the agency might just drop them as a client because they’re a “problem client” compared with all the other accounts they manage who’ve never dug too deeply into the revenue tracking. In fact, the agency told Jennifer that NONE of their other clients use UTMs.

So what can you learn from this tale of artificially inflated results?

Lesson 1: If you use Klaviyo, you need to audit your revenue tracking asap. 

Lesson 2: Always have a way to cross reference and verify revenue. Jennifer recommends UTMs because they’re reliable and easy to implement.

Lesson 3: Only pay rev share on revenue collected. Otherwise, you’re paying a commission on revenue that’s only been tracked on paper.

This is how my agency Upsender works with clients. We may track a certain amount of revenue in a month. But the amount of revenue collected in that month will always be slightly different due to refunds, chargebacks, and potential delays in vendors paying affiliates.

Lesson 4: If something appears too good to be true (e.g. one agency is significantly outperforming another), then it’s important to know why and how that’s happening. The increase might be legitimate. But there’s also a chance that it’s not.

I’m rootin’ for ya,

Ryan “feeling just a little bit vindicated” Healy

* Jennifer is not her real name

The post Klaviyo Misattributing Revenue? appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

And I teased you that something had happened to destroy that business relationship.

Want to know what it was?

Truth is, I didn’t know myself until 2019. I had to wait a whole 7 years to discover the answer!

Here’s what happened…

My good friend Adam ran into my ex-client in September 2019 and my name came up. Adam had heard my story, so he asked my ex-client about it.

Turns out, I had written an email my ex-client hadn’t liked. It was to sell a survival product. The email told an imaginary story of a family forced to eat their own dog due to starvation.

The whole thing struck me as kind of funny because I would have gladly written another email if he had asked. When I turned in the email, I wrote:

“Here is the advertorial for _____. NOTE: This is very different from anything you’ve sent before. Bill should probably approve this before it’s mailed.”

But Bill never replied nor ever said a word about my email. And, in fact, he continued sending me work for 7 months after that.

I went back and found that email I wrote. It is very vivid. And the fact that my ex-client remembered it clearly 8 years later speaks to the power of visceral stories.

I’ve included the entire email below (minus the product and client names).

Remember, this email never ran anywhere, so I have no idea how it would have performed.

I’m rootin’ for ya,

Ryan “sometimes I cross the line” Healy

Subject:

When Man’s Best Friend Becomes Man’s Next Dinner

Body:

Mark could hardly bear to look his dog in the eyes. He was on the verge of tears when his daughter tugged on his sleeve.

“Daddy, I’m really hungry.”

“I know you are, sweetie.”

“Daddy, why are you so sad?”

In spite of the hard living conditions they had endured the past two months, Mark’s daughter was still as sensitive and inquisitive as ever.

“I’m sad because we’re going to have to say goodbye to Max.”

“Why do we have to say goodbye to Max, Daddy? Is he going to the vet?”

“No. But we won’t see him anymore.” Mark didn’t know what else to say. But he certainly couldn’t tell his daughter the truth:

He Planned for His Family to
Eat Max for Dinner That Very Night

Of course, the idea of eating his own dog… a dog he had picked out himself 7 years ago… turned Mark’s stomach.

He went over his options again in the hopes he had overlooked some way to stay alive.

All the food in the pantry was gone. Even the leftover ketchup and taco sauce packets had been slurped down a week ago. They had combed the house for food, but could find nothing.

Other families in the neighborhood were suffering just as much. They had no food. If they did, they weren’t saying anything, and Mark would have felt embarrassed and ashamed to impose on a family that already appeared to be starving.

In desperation, Mark had laid out a mouse trap he found in the garage — a cheap $1 mouse trap — but with no bait to use, he had failed to catch anything.

And hunting? Mark had certainly thought about it. But he had no gun and no ammunition. Gun stores were sold out. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. There was very little wildlife in the city other than occasional rabbits, and even those had all but disappeared.

Once again, Mark came back to the gut-wrenching decision he had to make…

Eat Max or Starve

After sending his daughter off to be with her mother, Mark reluctantly picked up a sharp kitchen knife and led Max to the back yard.

As he walked, he was reminded of the story of Abraham and Isaac. Is this how Abraham had felt as he prepared the altar on which to sacrifice Isaac?

My God, how he wished he had taken the warnings seriously!

He’d seen dire predictions prior to the food shortages, but he’d shrugged them off. Ignored them. Even made fun of “preppers.”

How stupid he’d been! He had never imagined such severe hardship in a modern and developed country like America.

He had only himself to blame.

And now, as he looked down at his dog, his loyal friend of 7 years, he couldn’t believe it had come to this.

Does the story above seem far-fetched? It’s not. History proves people will eat just about anything when they are starving — including animals and even people.

Fortunately, with the right preparation, you’ll never have to eat your dog. More details here:

-[SIGNATURE]

P.S. Don’t voluntarily put yourself in a bad situation by shrugging off the warnings and sticking your head in the sand.

Make sure you’re 100% prepared for the food shortages that are coming.

This in-depth guide shows you how: [LINK]

The post The Disturbing Email that Lost a Good Client appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

And I don’t mean broke in a figurative sense like I didn’t have much money.

I mean broke in a very literal sense in that I had less than zero dollars.

In September and October 2013, my consumer debt had ballooned up past $70K (again).

And I was getting hit with overdraft fees because money wasn’t coming in fast enough.

As soon as I deposited a client check, I would immediately allocate it to outstanding bills and I was back to near-zero.

I had seen this financial disaster coming in late 2012. And although I had tried hard to stop it, I had failed.

It was like being in a car wreck in slow motion.

I could see the wall approaching. I could anticipate the crunch of metal into concrete. And although I pumped the brakes, I couldn’t stop the car.

It was a complicated situation involving both loss of income and medical bills from the birth of my 4th child.

Back then I’d been writing a lot of copy for one particular client in the survival niche.

I’d written multiple long-form sales letters and dozens of advertorials. The future looked bright.

My client and I got along so well he even flew me out to his business in Illinois.

He picked me up from the airport, put me up in an old house he owned right next to his business, and introduced me to his employees.

He even introduced me to his family. We all had a few meals together. And one evening he took me out to his cabin right on the Mississippi.

We all went out on an evening boat ride — his wife, kids, and their spouses — then ate dinner together and had a great time.

By the end of the trip I really did feel like part of the family.

But something was about to happen that would totally destroy that business relationship.

In June 2012, about 11 months after my trip to Illinois, my client suddenly went radio silent on me.

He’d been sending me a significant amount of work every month. In fact, I would get a list of pieces to write at the beginning of every month.

The work had been so consistent, it was almost like a retainer (even though I billed by the piece). So I always kept space in my calendar for this one particular client.

Then one day he stopped sending me work. No notice. No explanation.

I called. I emailed. I even sent a handwritten letter asking him if I’d done something to offend him.

I never could make sense of why he cut me out of his business because I saw the weekly results and knew my copy was producing consistently.

Example: At the time I was charging him between $500 and $750 for a long form advertorial. I remember one of those advertorials produced $15,000 in revenue from just one email to his list.

Any winners I wrote for him would be mailed multiple times and get similar results with each mailing. I would not be surprised if he grossed $50,000+ just from that one email.

So why would he stop working with me without notice or explanation? Did he begrudge the $500 or $750 he was paying me?

I’ll tell you the answer to that question tomorrow…

But the reason I tell you this particular story is because I lost about $4,000 a month in steady copywriting income when this client disappeared.

And although I had other one-off projects coming in, I was not able to replace that income as quickly as I needed.

With medical bills piling up and credit card debts weighing me down, the loss of predictable income turned into a real personal financial crisis that reached its climax in October 2013.

So how did I get out of that situation?

Two things happened…

1. My father-in-law had compassion on us and gave us a cash gift that provided some breathing room to get our finances in order.
2. More importantly, I met the client who would put me on retainer and ultimately become my longest client relationship. We met in September 2013 and started working together in October.

By the beginning of 2014, I had built up my cash flow again and my business rocketed higher for three years straight.

As I reflected on that extremely difficult situation, I began to think about my best income years vs. the latter part of 2012 and and first nine months of 2013.

And that’s when it hit me…

During all my best years I’d had at least one retainer client and sometimes two.

But during my personal financial crisis of 2013, I’d had ZERO clients on retainer.

When you’ve got at least some stable income coming in each month, it washes out some of those valleys you may experience while waiting for a new client to sign a contract… or a current client to pay you the balance of a project.

Ever since that epiphany, I’ve been careful to have at least one retainer client at any given time, and preferably two or three.

This is one of the “secrets” of building a successful freelance business I wish I’d been consciously aware of prior to 2013.

And I hope that by sharing my own mistakes I can help you avoid the pain and humiliation I had to go through.

I’m rootin’ for ya,

Ryan “retainer clients” Healy

The post What I Learned about Freelancing After Going Broke in 2013 appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

As I write this, I’m responsible for sending 31 million emails a month. To break that down for you, I’m currently in charge of managing six different email lists, five of which I mail 2 to 3 times a day, 7 days a week. In the month of November 2021, I sent out 333 unique emails to these six lists.

And this month is not unusual. I’ve been in charge of sending hundreds of millions of emails since 2015, which have generated tens of millions of dollars in revenue for my clients.

Now I don’t want you to think I personally write every email I send. I do write some of them. But many of them have been written by other people — including writers I’ve personally trained.

If I’m copy chiefing another writer, I’ll review and edit his work. If I’m provided a file of approved email swipes, I’ll select the email I think will work best for my list. Ultimately, what I do is a combination of writing, chiefing, selecting, and editing.

Once the emails go out, I track the results: opens, open rates, clicks, click rates, total revenue, Earnings Per Click (EPC), and Revenue Per Thousand (RPM). There are some other unique metrics I might look at based on the client, but these are the main ones.

All is to say, I’ve had a front row seat in the email marketing arena for the last six years. During that time I’ve trained more than 20 writers on how to write subject lines. Some of those writers have gone on to manage big email lists of their own. In fact, one is a part-owner in a very successful company in the survival niche.

Anyway, the only reason I share all this information with you is so you know I’ve got just a little bit of experience with email. ;-) But enough about me. Let’s talk about you…

You Wrote the Email, Now What?

Okay, you’ve written an important email to send to your list. (They’re all important, aren’t they?)

But your subscribers will never read your email if they don’t open it. And if your email isn’t opened, it essentially becomes digital trash — whether your email ends up in the Trash folder or not. Which ultimately means your subscribers won’t learn what you’re teaching or buy what you’re offering.

So the first step to success with email is getting your email opened. How you do that rests primarily on your subject line. (Your From: line also plays a big role, and I’ll touch on that later in a different article.)

The Goal of Every Subject Line

Once your subscriber receives your email, the best possible outcome is for him or her to read your subject line, open your email, read your email, and then take the action you’ve requested inside your email.

Obviously, the only way this sequence of events can happen is if your subject line does its job. And what is that job…?

The #1 goal of your subject line is to capture enough attention and elicit enough curiosity or desire to get your subscriber to open and read your message.

Just like a headline, getting attention with your subject line is not enough. I read all the subject lines that hit my inbox, but I don’t open all of those emails. I only open some of them.

This is an important point. Almost every subject line in a person’s inbox gets at least a little bit of attention, even if it’s only a split second. The difference is in how the person responds. Did he read the subject line but leave the email unopened? Did he delete it without opening? Or did he open the email and actually start reading?

To get your subscriber to open and read you must go beyond getting attention. You must translate that attention into curiosity and/or desire. You want your subscriber’s inner voice to have a visceral response that might sound something like one of these:

1. That’s different, I’ve never heard of that before…
2. WTF? I’ve gotta see what this is all about…
3. That’s exactly what I need right now…
4. I better act on this so I don’t miss out…

If you notice, the first two inner voices are responding to curiosity while the third and fourth are responding to desire.

Can you combine these? Absolutely. It’s often best to trigger both curiosity and desire at the same time. This way you’re pairing two powerful forces in one subject line.

But, as you’ll see in the 11 subject line templates below, curiosity plays the lead role.

How Long Should a Subject Line Be?

As I’ve analyzed winning subject lines, I’ve found that most fall into a narrow window of about 6 to 10 words. And, all other things being equal, shorter subject lines are better.

This is not to say you should force your subject line to be shorter than it needs to be. Sometimes you’ll have a subject line that is 12 or 14 words long, and you’ll find that every single word is necessary. That’s okay.

In fact, some of the subject line templates I use often require a few extra words. Just know that you’ll have better odds of writing a winner if your subject lines are within that range of 6 to 10 words.

6 Types of Subject Lines that Work Really Well

I’ve identified six main types of subject lines that you’ll want to experiment with. Here they are…

1. Curiosity
2. Informational
3. News
4. Shock Value
5. Controversy
6. Promotional

These are broad types instead of specific subject line templates, which we’ll get into in just a minute. First, let’s dig into each of the six types…

1. The Curiosity Subject Line

The #1 reason people open emails and click links is… curiosity. If you can build enough curiosity into your subject line, people will almost have no choice but to open, read, and click.

Here are a few examples of strong curiosity headlines. Keep in mind, these were written specifically for a conservative political audience…

• Guess Which Famous Actor Told Obama to “Grow a Pair” on Twitter?
  
• This Welfare Mom Has Been Collecting Government Checks for 12 Years – Here’s What She Thinks about Getting a Job

• 3 Armed Men Break in and Threaten to Kill 8 People. What Happened Next Was Exactly What Should Have Happened.

• The Real Reason the NRA Was Created (and It Was NOT to Defend the 2nd Amendment)

And here’s another one I wrote that did really well:

• Nancy Pelosi Wins an Award Nobody Should Ever Want to Win

Pelosi is already a lightning rod among conservatives. Her name alone sparks negative emotion. But now readers will wonder what award she won… why nobody should ever want to win it… and why Pelosi was only too happy to accept it. Lots going on here.

How can you use curiosity in other markets? Here are two ways:

1. Promise a benefit while withholding one key detail the reader needs to achieve that benefit.
2. Juxtapose two seemingly unrelated ideas.

Here’s a winning subject line from Svelte Media for one of their free guides:

• shrink your midsection by eating this

This one promises a simple benefit — “shrink your midsection” — but then conceals whatever it is you’re supposed to eat. Any reader who desires a slimmer belly will want to learn which food they should be eating.

Switching markets, here’s a winning subject line I wrote in the financial market that ran for a number of months:

• How Alaska Could Fund Your Retirement

This one juxtaposes two ideas that are incongruent. A reader will likely think, “What does Alaska have to do with funding my retirement??” And he will open the email to discover the answer.

2. The Informational Subject Line

In some markets (like health, survival, and business) it’s often important to provide useful information. So headlines that promise information can be good. For example:

• Here’s Why Rising Food Prices Are Here To Stay – Sovereign Man

• Unorthodox email strategies that’ll put some hair on your chest – Ben Settle

• How Thieves Can Break into Your Garage in 6 Seconds with a Metal Hanger (and How to Make Sure They Don’t) – Ryan Healy

• 3 Foods Americans Eat that Are Banned in Other Countries – Ryan Healy

• How to poop in the next 24 hours – Peak Biome

• 10 Big Businesses That Will Require Face Masks Even After Mandates End (Avoid These) – Ryan Healy

All of these subject lines promise information of some sort. Notice too how all of them arouse some curiosity — which nearly all good subject lines do.

3. The News Subject Line

In some rare cases, a news headline is the best approach. A news headline merely announces in plain language something newsworthy that happened. Here are some examples:

• Facebook Bans Gun Pages – Ryan Healy

• Buffalo Police Go Door to Door, Confiscate Legal Guns from Law-Abiding Citizens – Ryan Healy

• Woman Who Came Into Contact With Escaped Monkeys Says She Developed Symptoms – The Epoch Times

As you can see, these are simple headlines. But they work well because they are topics the audience is interested in.

In the first example, it’s effective because it also taps into people’s desire to be outraged.

In the second one, it’s effective because it’s outrageous and it naturally makes the reader wonder, “Why?” and “How are they getting away with this?”

In the case of the third example, the news is unusual (almost like a tabloid) and makes the reader wonder what kind of symptoms the woman developed and how contagious they might be.

The problem with news is that it’s time sensitive. If you don’t strike while the news is fresh, it will quickly lose its power. This is especially true for national or international news.

The reason for this should be fairly obvious. Anytime big news happens (the death of a celebrity, for example), it spreads like wildfire on social media. By the time you can get an email out, the news has probably already reached a significant portion of your subscribers.

If you use a news subject line, I suggest two things:

1. Choose a news item that hasn’t been widely covered yet.
2. Get the email out quickly.

4. The Shock Value Subject Line

Shock value subject lines have some similarity with news and curiosity subject lines. But this type of subject line works because people like to be outraged. They like to experience righteous anger. Shock value subject lines give them something to be outraged by.

Here are a couple examples:

• Oregon Man Arrested for Talking about Guns on Bus

When you read this headline, your gut-level response is, “Whaaaat???” Because the headline doesn’t make sense. Why would a guy be arrested for merely talking about guns?

Obviously, curiosity plays a role in this headline. But it’s the shock value that’s most important.

Here’s a pure “shock value” headline that I wrote:

• R.I. State Senator on 2nd Amendment: “Go F*ck Yourself”

No curiosity here. Just a statement of fact. But readers may be thinking, “Did he really say that?” They click to go see the video.

You don’t necessarily have to write much to generate shock value. For example, if you’re an authority figure in your market and you’re known for a specific role or skill set, you could simply say:

• I quit.

5. The Controversial Subject Line

In every market, writing something that may be considered controversial will draw eyeballs.

Think about the things that are considered “sacred” by the majority of people in the market. Can you say something that runs contrary to what the market holds as sacred? And can you support your claims? If so, you could have a powerful subjectline on your hands.

For example, here’s one that did really well to a health list:

• Study Shows Drinking Cow’s Milk Causes Early Death

One controversial post I wrote on my blog years ago generated more eyeballs and traffic than anything I’ve written before or since. The subject line that announced the article was simple:

• Internet Marketing on Life Support

At that moment in time, those words hit hard in my market. I was suggesting that Internet marketing was dying and close to death, which was a very controversial thing to say at the time.

6. The Promotional Subject Line

Promotional subject lines are extremely common. They’re the ones that push for action and usually involve some form of urgency.

If your subscribers have signed up for deals — or you’re running a product launch or limited time special offer — then you’ll be using promotional language in your subject lines at some point.

A few examples:

• Ovation @3500 Is Already 90% Subscribed- Invest Now! – Elevate CIG

• [Starting Now] Doors are open! – Kyle Milligan

• We go live in 1 hour (don’t be late) – Jake Hoffberg

• New day, new mystery … your 40% off savings await! – Kohl’s

• Your last annoying Cyber Monday email of the day! – Shinesty

Which Type of Subject Line Is Best?

First, a caveat. All of these types of subject lines are appropriate in the right circumstances. And your business model may dictate that the majority of your emails and subject lines are promotional in nature.

Nevertheless, of the six different types of subject lines I’ve shared, the one that is the most reliable is the “Curiosity Subject Line.” A well-written curiosity subject line will almost always work well.

The hardest one to use effectively is the “News Subject Line.” Only use a news subject line when you have something that’s really strong — and you’re able to get it out to your list quickly. Otherwise, choose one of the other types.

11 Proven Email Subject Line Templates

To make it even easier on you, I’d like to share some of the most powerful subject line templates I came up with while managing a writing team and running a large political news publishing division.

Some of these templates might not be appropriate for you and your business. But they should still provide some structure and inspiration for you.

Also, please note that my team and I were sending political stories to an older conservative audience, so most of the examples are from that market. If your political views don’t jibe with these, that’s okay. I’m not promoting any particular political view here. I’m just sharing what worked.

So without further ado, here they are. While you’re reading, consider which of these subject line templates you’ll use first.

1. The “Crazy Result” Template

[This Thing Happens] [This Crazy Result]
[This Thing Happens] – You Won’t Believe What Happened Next
[This Thing Happens] – What Happens Next Will [Verb + Emotional Result]

Example 1: When an Armed Thief Put His Gun to the Forehead of a Random Customer, He Never Expected This to Happen

Example 2: Man Waves ISIS Flag on Liberal College Campus – Students’ Reactions Will Leave You Horrified

Example 3: White Cop Kills Black Teen Near Ferguson – Here’s Why Nobody Is Crying Foul

Example 4: Teen Pulls Gun to Steal Air Jordans from Man Exiting Mall – But Those Sneakers Were Never in Danger

Example 5: Black Guest Accuses Fox News of Racism. When Asked for Specifics, She Offers this 6-Word Fail…

Example 6: Thugs Shot This Grandma 3 Times – Then She Pulled This Out of Her Purse

Example 7: Congressmen Jockey for Better Offices, Furniture – You Get to Pay the Bill

Example 8: This State Banned Sharia Law – Now Muslims and Liberals Are Outraged

2. The “Small Thing, Big Effect” Template

[These # of Words] [Unusual Effect of These Words]

Example 1: The 12-Word Sign on a Family Dollar Store that Has the Nation Screaming “Racism”

Example 2: These eight words should send a chill down Google’s spine

Example 3: The 9-Minute Hobby that Produces a Yearly Income

3. The “Try Not to” Template

Try Not to [Cry/Freak Out/Lose It/Laugh] When You See [This Unbelievable/Disheartening/Ridiculous Thing]

Example 1: Try Not to Cry When You See Who the GOP Favors for Its 2016 Presidential Candidate

Example 2: Try Not to Cry as You Watch this Boy’s Tribute to Fallen D-Day Soldiers

4. The “Restore Your Faith” Template

[This Positive Thing] Might Restore Your Faith in [Something Most People Have Lost Faith in]

Example 1: House Republicans Just Passed a Controversial Bill that Might Restore Your Faith in the GOP

Example 2: What This CEO Just Did with His $1.8 Million Bonus Will Restore Your Faith in Humanity

5. The “List” Template

[#] [Tricks/Ways/Methods/Hacks] [to Do Something Interesting/Useful]
[#] [Tricks/Ways/Methods/Hacks] that Could [Amazing Benefit]

Example 1: 10 Useful Tricks You Didn’t Know Your Microwave Could Do (#6 is Pure Genius)

Example 2: 7 Survival Hacks that Could Save Your Life in a Crisis (VIDEO)

6. The “Every Person” Template

[Something] Every [Type of Person] Should [Have/Know]

Example 1: A Geeky Gadget Every Prepper Should Have

Example 2: 11 Email Subject Line Templates Every Marketer Should Know

Sorry, couldn’t resist throwing that 2nd example in there to show you that I eat my own dog food. ;-)

7. The “Guess Who” Template

Guess Who [Said/Did] [This Crazy Thing]?
Guess Which [Person/Country] [Says/Thinks/Does] [This Crazy Thing]?

Example 1: Guess Who’s Defending a Christian T-Shirt Maker Forced to Print LGBT Shirts?

Example 2: Guess Which Senators Want the Feds to Report Ammo Purchases?

Example 3: Guess Which Famous Actor Told Obama to “Grow a Pair” on Twitter?

8. The “You’ll Never Guess” Template

You’ll Never Guess [Who/What/Which] [Person/State/Company] [Verb] [This Crazy Thing]

Example 1: You’ll Never Guess What Vandals Left Behind When They Stole Baby Jesus from This Nativity Scene

Example 2: You’ll Never Guess How Much EPA Employees Were Paid to Misbehave

9. The “Just 1 Tweet/Image” Template

Just 1 [Tweet/Image] Explains [Something that’s Difficult to Understand]
[Person] [Does Something Amazing/Shocking] with Just 1 Tweet

Example 1: This 1 Tweet Sums Up Everything that’s Wrong in American Politics

Example 2: Rob Lowe Absolutely Obliterates Obama with Just 1 Legendary Tweet

Example 3: 1 Image that Explains the Bundy Ranch Standoff in 60 Seconds

10. The “Perfect Response” Template

[Something Shocking Happens to Somebody Famous] – [He/She] Has the Perfect Response
[Name of Person] Has the Perfect Response to [Something Controversial]

Example 1: Fox News Contributor Suspended for Cursing Obama on Air, Her 9-Word Response Is Perfect

Example 2: Trump Has the Perfect Response to Biden’s Israel Policy

11. The “Dear Name” Template

[Dear Name] [Something Shocking, Surprising, or Unexpected]

Example 1: Dear Google, Please Take Me Off Your Dumb Mailing List

Okay, Let’s Wrap This Up…

There’s a LOT of information in this article. I don’t expect you to retain it all or master it until you’ve had the opportunity to actually apply these email subject line templates in your business (or for your clients).

With that in mind, please bookmark this article and share it or even link back to it if you know other people who’d benefit from it.

And if you’re looking for somebody to manage and monetize your email list… review your current email sequences… or write some promotional emails or swipes for your affiliates… I’m your guy.

Just go here and fill out the form to contact me.

I’m rootin’ for ya,

Ryan “subject line templates” Healy

The post 11 Email Subject Line Templates Every Marketer Should Know appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

Obviously, not all press is good press. If your mugshot shows up on the nightly news, it’s going to be next to impossible to spin that to your advantage.

But there are mild forms of “bad” press that can be easily leveraged — if you’re creative enough to do so.

Why do I even bring this up? Because a Georgia woman named Titi Pierce has filed a lawsuit for something Ellen said on her show. Here’s the “offensive” part of the video segment…

Pierce is seeking damages for harassment and emotional distress. According to the NY Daily News:

She claims DeGeneres invaded her privacy by airing her name and phone number, as well as intentionally inflicted emotional distress.

Pierce is seeking unspecified monetary damages and is asking for the episode in question to no longer be allowed on air.

“She’s a real person with real feelings,” her attorney Stacy Godfrey Evans told the Miami Herald. “She is a private, proud person, and she was humiliated on national television not once, but twice.”

I don’t know, if you watch the clip it doesn’t seem like Ellen was going out of her way to mock or humiliate Pierce. It was a pretty tame joke.

But that’s beside the point. If Pierce really wanted to make some money off this, she shouldn’t have paid a lawyer to file a lawsuit… she should have leveraged the unexpected publicity to get even more publicity!

Can you imagine? Being featured on the Ellen show in almost any capacity is like getting a winning lottery ticket.

If I was in Pierce’s shoes, I would have immediately written a press release and sent it around to all the local news stations in Georgia talking about how Ellen mispronounced her name on the show. Local news stations LOVE stuff like that.

Then you could go on all these different shows (where you’re directly in front of your target audience) and talk about how it was a funny joke, and that you laughed too, but that your name is really pronounced TEE-TEE Pierce.

And then you get to plug how you’re a realtor with Coldwell Banker and you help people buy or sell homes in the Atlanta Metro area, etc.

Even better, you could start saying “As Featured on The Ellen Show” in your advertising and marketing. And if it was me, I’d just do it and ask forgiveness later if necessary.

Basically, with a one-page press release and a little bit of effort, Titi Pierce could have been swamped with new clients who wanted to sell or buy a home — no lawyers necessary!

Maybe 50 or 60 years ago, every American would have used her creativity to “make lemonade out of lemons,” but today we live in an overly litigious society where millions of people somehow feel entitled to money for the rather mundane experience of feeling bad about yourself.

Why use your creativity when you can call 1-800-LAWSUIT and hire a bloodsucking lawyer to extort money from a rich and successful person? In other words, why EARN your money when you can FORCE other people to give it to you?

After all, that is now the American way.

Luckily, my readers (that includes YOU) still believe in creativity and hard work. And if you are ever featured on The Ellen Show because of your unusual name or something else, you’ll know how to leverage it for both fame and fortune.

-Ryan M. Healy

The post Woman Humiliated by Ellen Loses Explosive Business Publicity appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

And it’s easy to forget fundamental copywriting principles even if you’ve been writing copy for years.

But here’s what most people don’t know…

Even freelance copywriting professionals sometimes make mistakes, which kill conversions and ultimately hurt clients.

Obviously, it’s important for you to protect yourself — no matter whether you’re writing your own copy or hiring a freelance copywriter.

With that in mind, I offer the following 15 Copywriting Mistakes that Kill Conversions (and Hurt Clients).

How much research do you do before you start writing an ad or sales letter? Probably not enough.

• Research is the foundation of great copy.

• Research tells you who you’re writing to, what they want, what they don’t want, their hopes, fears, problems, and aspirations.

• Research uncovers how your market talks, particularly any kind of slang or market-specific phrases they use.

• Research tells you who your competition is, what kind of claims they’re making, and how you can differentiate yourself.

• Research tells you what the product does, its features, benefits, and advantages over similar products.

• Research provides you with facts and figures you can use to bolster your claims so that your prospect believes you.

• Research does all this and a whole lot more.

It’s been suggested that you should spend twice as much time researching than you do writing, and I think that’s good advice.

The more research you do, the easier the writing is.

But if you decide to take a shortcut by skipping or minimizing the research, chances are you’ll struggle to put words on the page. Worse, you may wind up with a sales letter that simply doesn’t work.

Sometimes the first headline you write is the one you will ultimately use. But it’s more likely that the first headline you write will be rubbish.

Initial ideas can almost always be improved upon, but only if you take the time and effort to make the improvement.

What exactly does that mean?

Well, in the case of writing headlines, that means you aim to write a certain number of them. Perhaps you aim to write 20 or 30 or 50 depending on the nature of the sales copy you’ve written.

I personally don’t feel comfortable until I’ve written a couple dozen or more.

Here’s a tip:

You don’t want to let the headline stop you from writing the rest of your sales piece. So I recommend you write a handful of headlines, pick one, and then keep writing.

When you’ve finished the first draft, come back to the headline. That’s when you’ll want to start writing as many headlines as you can.

At that point, you’ll have many more ideas because of the work you’ve done to write the sales piece.

And here’s another tip:

Sometimes you’ll find great headlines and subheads buried in the bullets you’ve written. I know I have.

That’s why I’ll re-read all the bullets I’ve written. I’ll take the most powerful bullets and test them out as headlines and subheads in the body of the letter.

It’s often a good idea to make a strong promise or challenge a common belief in your copy. But it’s not a good idea to cross the line into hype.

How do you know when you’ve crossed the line?

A good rule of thumb: When you’ve made completely unrealistic (or unbelievable) promises combined with short time frames and exclamation points.

Example:

Hype is deception.

It is loud, exaggerated, and misleading promotion or publicity.

Now, please don’t confuse hype with enthusiasm.

Enthusiasm in your writing is a good thing. It is natural to be excited and enthusiastic about a genuinely good product or service.

Just be careful that your enthusiasm doesn’t run away from you and devolve into hype.

In most cases, it is a mistake to begin a sales message by talking about your product. This is because most people are not interested in you or your product. They are interested in themselves.

It is best to avoid talking about your product or service for at least the first few paragraphs and maybe even the first few pages. Talk about things that are important to your prospect first.

As Harry Browne says on page 85 of his book The Secret of Selling Anything, “Most sales are lost because the salesman presented his product before he knew what motivated his prospect.”

Your goal is to enter the conversation that’s already happening in your prospect’s mind. He’s thinking about a hundred different things, but he’s probably not thinking about your product or service.

• He may be thinking about a specific problem he wants to solve.

• He may be thinking about a specific goal he wants to achieve.

• He may even be worrying about big problems that don’t affect him directly, but that affect his city, state, or nation.

So talk about the problems he’s thinking about… or build anticipation by talking about how he can achieve his goals… or tell a story he identifies with… or challenge one of his common beliefs.

Talk about anything that will capture your prospect’s attention; anything that will interest him; anything that will draw him into the copy.

Only after you’ve gained your prospect’s attention and interest should you shift the focus to your product or service and how it will benefit him.

John E. Kennedy famously defined advertising as “salesmanship in print.”

Here’s what that means:

When you write sales copy, it should sound as if you were in the room talking face-to-face with your prospect.

So whatever your write should sound as if it was something you would really say.

Do not use what I call “term paper” tone — you know, the kind of writing they taught you in high school and college. This kind of tone is borrriiing (not to mention confusing).

Example of what not to do:

When one wakes up in the morning, one sometimes feels groggy, exhausted, and lacking in energy. Therefore, one should examine a new product that addresses these irksome problems.

If you’ve been trained in the evil ways of academic-ese, and you’re finding it difficult to change how you write, then get a speech-to-text program like Dragon Dictate.

Then you can literally speak your sales pitch onto the page.

Or you can just record yourself delivering your sales pitch and then get the audio recording transcribed.

With a little bit of editing, you’d probably have a decent written sales piece that sounds just like you talk.

Selling is a one-to-one experience. It’s me talking to you. Not me talking to “you-all.”

When you write, write to just one person.

Hold him or her in your mind’s eye as you write. Imagine you are sitting in a room together, and you are telling your friend about the merits of your product.

This is how you should write.

Now it’s easy to slip out of that “mental reality” and start writing to a group of people.

Example: “If one of you is a doctor, then you will know what I mean.”

That phrase — “one of you” — implies that you are writing to a group, and will destroy the one-to-one selling environment you want to create in your copy.

As you review your copy, ask yourself: Is this something I would say to a person sitting across from me? If not, change the copy.

It is easy to make broad generalities in your sales copy, and many copywriters do.

But this is something you should be diligent to avoid.

• Instead of saying “many” or “a lot,” can you provide an exact number?

• Instead of saying you will soon run out, can you say exactly how many are left in stock?

• Instead of saying “soon,” can you provide an exact date?

• Can you provide exact dollar figures, deadlines, and customer counts?

Anywhere you can use a specific number, do it!

Always be thinking about how you can replace general phrases with specific dates, numbers, and percentages.

This makes your copy more concrete, more compelling, more believable.

It’s easy to make promises.

It’s much harder to back them up.

Said another way, it’s easy to talk the talk, but it’s difficult to walk the walk.

Remember: Whatever promises you make in your sales copy, you need to back them up with proof: facts, figures, testimonials, and whatever else you can bring to bear as you build your sales case.

And how do you come up with good proof?

Good research, of course! (See Copywriting Mistake #1.)

Some of the proof elements I like to use:

• Quotes and predictions from experts
• Results of scientific studies
• Relevant awards or honors
• Charts and graphs
• Trust seals

There are dozens of ways to add more proof to your sales messages.

Just be sure your proof equals or surpasses your promises.

Social proof can be astonishingly persuasive when it’s used correctly.

Yet it can also hurt sales.

Here’s how:

Let’s say you launch a product and get a handful of testimonials. And then you continue selling the same product for five or six years without ever getting any new testimonials.

If you have a long buying cycle, some prospects may notice and it could cause them to doubt the authenticity of the testimonials and the value of your product.

This is especially true if your testimonials have a date associated with them.

I realize it is not common to date testimonials, but one of my clients did when he posted snapshots of trading portfolios.

Problem? The dates on the trading portfolios were from 2006. He hadn’t bothered to get any new ones in 6+ years.

Naturally, prospects who see outdated portfolios will begin to wonder if something is wrong. They will wonder if the trading strategies still work today as well as they did in 2006.

In this case, it was better for my client to omit the customer portfolios until he was able to get updated case studies.

Social proof can also hurt sales if it is too vague.

Let’s say you’ve got a few testimonials, but they all say something like, “Great product! Highly recommended!”

First of all, this kind of testimonial is not persuasive or convincing.

Secondly, your prospect may think you fabricated the testimonials out of thin air. (And, yes, some people do write fake testimonials, so consumers ought to be skeptical.)

The last thing you want is for social proof to hurt your credibility.

With that in mind, avoid using outdated customer feedback and vague testimonials that sound as if they could have been faked.

And if you are ever in doubt, leave it out.

Better to err on the side of caution than to accidentally create doubt and suspicion in your prospect’s mind.

No matter what you are selling, you will almost always want to include some kind of risk reversal.

Sometimes it’s a money-back guarantee. Sometimes it’s a guarantee to replace the product if it should ever break or wear out.

In the service business, it may not be a guarantee to refund a customer’s money, but rather a promise to do something extra to guarantee a certain outcome.

The key is to minimize the risk so that it’s easier for your prospect to say yes to your offer.

Here’s an example of standard guarantee copy:

90-Day Full Money-Back Guarantee

Try our product for 90 days in the comfort of your own home. If for some strange reason you are not totally thrilled with the product, send it back for a full refund (minus shipping costs). But keep the ______ as our gift to you.

Remember, you have a full 90 days to prove for yourself that what we are saying is true. So there is absolutely no risk to you. Go ahead and place your risk-free order today!

Sometimes a clever guarantee will outperform a standard one. So feel free to get creative.

If you’re stuck for ideas, you may want to visit some of your favorite sites to see what kind of guarantees they offer — both their details and how they’re worded.

There is an art to writing good guarantees, and the more you study them, the better you’ll get.

When you write, you should write only as much as you need to get the desired response — no more, no less.

While the maxim “the more you tell, the more you sell” is generally true, it does not mean you should write more words merely for the sake of making your sales letter longer.

Verbosity is not a virtue.

Edit ruthlessly.

Aim to say as much as you can… with as few words as you can… as simply as you can.

When selling in print, you want a very clear call to action. In most cases, that call to action will be to buy the product or service being advertised.

And in other cases, it may be to complete and submit an opt-in form or a request for more information.

Here’s what you need to remember:

Don’t confuse your prospect by asking him or her to do two different things.

For instance, you would not want to ask him to buy the product and click a Facebook “Like” button at the same time.

(Although you might ask him to buy the product first, and only AFTER he’s purchased ask him to share something on Facebook.)

Now, you can give your prospect more than one option for completing your desired action.

So, for example, if you want the prospect to buy now, you can still offer him two or three different purchasing options (silver, gold, and platinum levels) or two or three different ways to respond (online, phone, or fax).

This can actually have a positive effect on sales because your prospect is no longer thinking “yes or no,” but rather “which one do I want?” or “which way do I want to respond?”

If you have multiple product options, try to keep it to one, two, or three options — but no more than three. Too many choices leads to confusion and lost sales.

Here’s why:

Choices overwhelm people. Too many choices offered at once produces inaction.

In other words, if you give a person too many ways to say yes, you will make it easier for the person to say no.

Making a decision is hard work. It’s emotionally taxing. The more choices and variables involved, the harder it is to decide.

Famous copywriter Joe Sugarman once wrote a newspaper ad selling a watch. His client wanted to sell three styles in three different colors for a total of nine different watches.

Joe wanted to only sell one watch: the men’s watch in black.

His client agreed to an A/B split-test. The results were surprising…

When both versions ran, the ad that featured only one men’s watch out-pulled the other version that featured nine models by a surprising 3 to 1 ratio. In short, for every watch we sold from the ad that featured the nine styles, we sold three in the other ad that showed just the one black watch. (Advertising Secrets of the Written Word, p. 162)

Even prior to this split-test, Joe had told his client, “…offering a customer too many choices [is] a dangerous thing to do.” (p. 161)

If you want to improve your sales, give your prospects fewer choices. Not only will they be happier, you’ll make more sales, more money, and more profit.

It doesn’t matter whether your sales message is on paper or online — the P.S. (postscript) is still one of the most-read parts of your letter.

Prospects who receive direct mail letters often read the headline and first couple paragraphs, then flip to the last page and scan the P.S. and whatever else is below the signature line.

The same thing happens with online sales letters. Prospects often scan the top then scroll to the bottom. If they like what they see, they may scroll back up to the top and continue reading.

So what should you say in your P.S.? Here are a few ideas:

• Reiterate the offer, including the price and deadline to respond (if applicable).

• Reinforce the guarantee. Remove the risk of purchasing to encourage the prospect to take action.

• Restate the big idea of your sales letter. Remind your prospect of the benefits of ordering today.

• Introduce an extra benefit not mentioned in the sales letter. For example, the famous Wall Street Journal letter introduces a potential tax benefit. It says: “P.S. It’s important to note that The Journal’s subscription price may be tax deductible.”

• Intensify the urgency. Tell your prospect why he could miss out if he doesn’t respond immediately.

• Introduce more social proof. Save one of your strongest testimonials for last.

While the P.S. comes after much of the selling is done, it should not be an afterthought.

Spend some time crafting your P.S. to maximize its selling power.

Many copywriters are content to turn in their copy, cross their fingers, and hope it works. This is not a good strategy.

Who’s to say that Headline A is better or worse than Headline B?

Before copy is tested in the real world, all we have is opinions. They may be right, they may be wrong.

Claude Hopkins described the market as “the court of last resort.” Whenever there is a disagreement about which copy to run, let the market issue the verdict.

Naturally, you increase your chances of success if you split-test two versions of your sales copy. One version will perform better. But before you run the test, you won’t know which one.

I’ve seen far too many tests where I predicted the wrong outcome. The version I thought would lose, won. The version I thought would win, lost.

And this in spite of more than 14 years writing and testing sales copy!

Contrary to common belief, split-testing sales copy is not that difficult, especially on the Internet. Tools like Visual Website Optimizer and Optimizely make split-testing brain-dead simple.

Invest the time and effort to split-test your copy and the return on investment will be almost immediate.

Whether you write copy full-time for a living or write copy for your own business as needed, it’s easy to make one or more of the mistakes listed above, especially if you’re writing quickly and editing hastily.

Study these mistakes and keep them in mind as you write. Then spend half an hour (or more) to review your copy after you’re done to make sure you’re avoiding them.

Of course, it’s sometimes difficult to effectively edit and rewrite your own copy. You get too close to it. You lose perspective. You get frustrated.

One of my clients, Paul Burns, sent an unsolicited email to me recently. He said:

“I was beating myself up… over this copy writing problem!”

I decided to take Ryan up for his Copy Critique of my home page. I think being too close to my industry and having difficulty standing back for a clear view was messing me up. I had done all the research on my market and wrote tons of copy, but what I really needed was a professional that could look at my copy from a clear advantage point. Ryan re-wrote my copy with decisive and clear thoughts that I was unable to do. I’m very good at what I do but a man (woman) has to know their limitations. Writing copy is not my forte and as hard as I tried Ryan really came thru. My Sincerest Thanks, Ryan!

Paul Burns
President of Porcelain Tub Restorations
Bowie, Maryland

Paul’s experience is certainly not unique. Many of the clients who’ve hired me have expressed similar frustrations with writing and editing their own copy.

So if you, like Paul, feel you need a second set of eyes to review your copy, then you may want to check out my Copywriting Critique service. It’s one of the most affordable ways to work with me. And the results are worth far more than the fee.

You can learn more about my Copywriting Critique services here.

-Ryan M. Healy

EDITOR’S NOTE: This post was originally published in installments during August and September of 2012. I have since combined all 15 original posts into a single post.

The post 15 Common Copywriting Mistakes that Kill Conversions appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

I guess if this was the first year I had failed to launch a product, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal. But this has happened multiple times throughout the years due to prioritizing client projects over my own.

I’ve been freelancing for more than 10 years now, and creating and launching products has always been a struggle for me.

But I don’t like to focus on my shortcomings since not much positive can come from that. So I started thinking about what I actually did accomplish last year.

It turns out, I accomplished much more than I thought. In fact, so many good things happened that it’s silly to dwell on any perceived failures from the last 12 months.

So what did I accomplish in 2015? Here’s a partial list:

• I had my best year ever as a freelance copywriter (based on gross income and net profit), topping my previous best which I achieved in 2011. This felt especially good since my worst year ever was 2013.

• I wrote the sales letter and email copy for a product launch that exceeded $1 million in gross revenue. This was a big milestone for me because: 1.) my previous record for a product launch was around $250,000. And 2.) as far as I know (since clients don’t always share numbers), my best single sales letter generated over $400,000. So I more than doubled my previous record.

• I paid off $23,462.39 of debt.

• My wife and I went on a 2-day “babymoon” in Frisco, Colorado in May. We then welcomed our 5th child into the world in October. (His name is Ivan.)

• I read 32 books. (Missed my goal of reading 36 books this year by a little bit. I lost a lot of time this summer due to more home projects than expected. I then lost more time in October when Ivan was born.)

• I added 1/2″ of muscle to my arms (circumference as measured when not flexing) and 1″ of muscle around my back/chest.

• The last week of December I achieved my goal of bench pressing two 100-lb. dumbbells, 200 lbs total. It wasn’t pretty, but I was able to knock out four reps.

• I went on my annual bike trip. This year we started in Breckinridge both days and did Vail Pass on Day 1 and Swan Mountain and Loveland Pass on Day 2. What made this year especially challenging is I did both rides on a recumbent bicycle. (See the picture at the top of this post. That’s my bike propped against a rail at the top of Vail Pass.)

• I canceled more than 30 domains, got rid of 10 websites that had been languishing online, and consolidated five hosting accounts down to one (thank you, Jared!). This will save me about $1,700 a year in hosting and domain renewal fees.

• I FINALLY found a CPA who has been able to streamline my accounting and tax reporting. Basically, I spent 8 years with the same CPA. His processes required a lot of involvement from me. And I always had a HUGE tax burden at the end of the year. I went through two other CPAs before finding my current one. I now get monthly income and expense reports AUTOMATICALLY with zero involvement from me. Plus, he’s now running monthly payrolls and I’m paying in taxes monthly, which will help with budgeting and reduce the year-end stress I used to experience.

• I took my kids on two separate two-day camping trips, one to Mueller State Park and the other to Golden Gate Canyon State Park. (I do two camping trips every year with my best friend and brother. Three dads and nine kids… what could go wrong?)

• I took my kids on the Light Rail to downtown Denver for breakfast and sightseeing. Also took my three eldest kids on a field trip to see the Denver Symphony.

• I served on the leadership team for the local Denver chapter of CXO Collective, a company that buys, grows, and sells businesses.

• I set a goal of submitting at least two legitimate business deals to CXO during 2015, and I hit that goal.

So those are most of the high points from last year — even though I have intentionally omitted a few things so as not to bore you.

While I’m grateful for all the things I achieved in 2015, I want 2016 to be different — particularly on the business side.

I want to finally have that breakthrough year where I’m actively creating and launching my own projects. And I think some of my business successes from this past year have positioned me to be able to do this.

Obviously, I need to change my behavior to achieve what I want. And really it all boils down to two specific disciplines.

Discipline #1: Saying “No” More Often

As a freelancer, I’ve grown accustomed to saying “yes” to most of the clients and projects that come my way. I have learned how to say “no” to clients and projects and clients that aren’t a good fit for me. In fact, I’ve already said “no” to a lot of things over the last year.

But I need to say “no” even more.

I’ve already begun practicing this. Starting in August I began referring out almost all the leads that came my way. I did this partially because I was too busy, partially because I had a baby on the way, and partially to make time for my own projects.

Right now, I’ve got a couple solid retainer agreements. I’m already making more than enough to cover my relatively low monthly expenses, so it’s easy to turn away business.

By focusing on ONLY these two retainer agreements and not accepting any new clients, I’ll be able to spend my extra time building a business that does not require my daily involvement.

Discipline #2: Using the First Hour of Every Day for My Own Projects

Along with saying “no” more often, I also need to be intentional about spending the first hour of every day working on my own projects.

This means I must avoid checking email or doing any client work until I’ve logged at least a full hour on product creation or writing sales copy to sell a product I’ve already created.

I’ve come to realize this is the ONLY way I’m going to experience a breakthrough. If I don’t commit to this daily practice, I know that other things will sneak into my day and crowd out any time I might have otherwise had for myself.

Not only that, by the time 5 p.m. rolls around, it’s far easier for me to do just a little extra client work for 30 or 45 minutes instead of trying to shift gears and jump into one of my own projects. Plus, even if I did jump into one of my own projects, my creative energy has already been mostly spent writing for clients all day.

So if I leave myself as the last priority, then most days I’m simply not going to give any of my time or creative energy to projects that will help me break free of client work.

And that is why I fully intend and commit to:

1. Saying “no” more often — especially to new or additional client work.

And…

2. Using the first hour of every day on my own projects.

A long time ago, I made the observation that many of the most successful entrepreneurs and online marketers are either single or married with no kids.

Based on what I’ve personally observed during the five years since I wrote that article, my opinion has not changed.

Are there exceptions to this “rule”? Absolutely. Perry Marshall has four kids. Jason Leister has seven.

Single people and people without kids simply have more time, attention, and energy to devote to their businesses. Their businesses are, quite literally, their “kids.”

I, on the other hand, have five kids now. And I’ve simply not been willing to sacrifice my time with them to do extra business work. That means I limit my work time to a traditional work week. That’s 8:30 to 5:30, Monday through Friday, with a break in the middle of the day for lunch or a trip to the gym.

As a general rule, I don’t work late and I don’t work weekends — although I will put in an extra hour or two on a Saturday or Sunday if I need to fulfill on something I’ve promised to do.

It’s because of my commitment to being a family man who’s involved with his kids that it’s been so difficult for me to break away from the traditional freelancing model.

As you can probably tell from my list of accomplishments, one of my priorities is spending quality time with my kids doing things THEY want to do.

So this year, recognizing that my wife was pregnant from January through September (and therefore somewhat limited), I started by creating a list of activities that I could do with my kids. I then asked the three oldest kids to put their initials next to the three things they wanted to do most.

When I reviewed the list, I discovered there was only one activity that all three of them wanted to do. They ALL wanted to take the Light Rail train downtown for breakfast and sightseeing. That immediately became my top priority. I was not going to let summer pass without making it happen.

So my brother and I scheduled a time to go up early on a Sunday morning when it’s relatively quiet in downtown Denver. He brought his eldest and I took all four of my kids (Ivan hadn’t been born yet).

My brother and I tag-teamed it and had a great time. The kids did, too. It was one of their favorite things from this last summer.

If you have kids, you might try doing this with them, too. You’ll probably be surprised by the activities they’re most interested in doing. I know I was!

I plan to take my kids camping twice again this summer. And I’ll be using the process I’ve just described to plan a few other field trips and outings. This is one thing I don’t want to change. :-)

For one year from mid-2013 until mid-2014, I was part of a local mastermind group with Ryan Masters and Travis Campbell.

Masters and I came up with a specific process for our monthly meetings to help get the most value out of them as possible.

Part of this process involved setting a process goal and an outcome goal each month.

A “process goal” is something you commit to doing every day or every week. It’s something you do repeatedly. An example of a process goal might be: “I’m going to exercise at least three times a week for the next month.”

An “outcome goal” is an outcome you’re committing to achieve, regardless of how you get there. So an example of an outcome goal might be: “I’m going to lose 10 lbs in the next 30 days.”

It’s worth noting that process goals and outcome goals don’t necessarily have to be related.

Anyway, I’ve discovered that process goals are more effective for helping me achieve my goals. Outcome goals are still good, but they are less effective for me.

If I simply focus on the right process, then I know the outcome I want will eventually happen. Working on the right things consistently, every day, every week, every month is what produces results.

What things did you accomplish or learn in 2015? What things are you doing differently in 2016? Please share by leaving a comment below.

-Ryan M. Healy

The post The Year in Review: What I Accomplished in 2015 and What I’m Doing Differently in 2016 appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

I’ve been writing copy full time since 2002, and I’ve been freelancing full time since 2005.

With the exception of one particularly bad stretch that lasted about 18 months, copywriting has provided me and my family with a good living and an above-average lifestyle.

(Not that you’d know it from looking at the outside… I drive a bare-bones Honda Fit with plastic hubcaps.)

And this year looks like it will be my best year ever — even better than my previous best year, which was 2011.

Copywriting has also been good to the people I’ve personally helped to launch copywriting careers.

I can think of three people off the top of my head who were able to quit their jobs and became full-time freelance copywriters due, in part, to my help.

One of them went from waiting tables to making more than six-figures a year.

Anyway, I share this because copywriting is an extremely valuable skill to have, especially if you want to be a “mobile professional” who makes a living on his laptop and can live anywhere he wants.

With that in mind, here are 3 ways to profit from copywriting skills:

1. Collect fees.

This is the traditional freelance model. You write copy for clients and collect a fee for your work. This is the simplest way you can make money from your copywriting skills.

2. Collect royalties.

One way to amp up your earnings as a freelancer is to collect a royalty, commission, or bonus on your copywriting work. This is usually in addition to an upfront fee — so you get paid what you’d normally get, and the royalty is all upside. The most successful copywriters make a fortune on royalties.

3. Sell your own products.

You don’t have to sell clients’ products — you can sell your own instead. This usually involves creating your own information product and marketing it yourself. While this type of business model takes more time to build, the financial rewards can be much greater than freelancing alone.

All of this begs the question: How can YOU get BETTER at copywriting?

You can, of course, dig into the old copywriting classics by Hopkins, Ogilvy, Caples, etc. And I strongly recommend you do that.

-Ryan M. Healy

The post 3 Ways You Can Profit from Better Copywriting Skills appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

It’s hard to talk about practically anything at all (especially politics) without the risk of offending somebody who has a different opinion than you do.

In times gone by, most Americans had similar core beliefs and values. But today it’s not like that at all. Practically all of us belong to micro “denominations” of thought. Anybody who is not part of our “denomination” is seen as a threat, an enemy. It’s “us vs. them,” the “in group” and the “out group.”

We see this broadly in such categories as:

• Republicans vs. Democrats
• Believers vs. Atheists
• Christians vs. Muslims
• Creationists vs. Evolutionists
• Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice

And so on.

These fairly innocuous labels by themselves can cause us to turn off our critical thinking. “Oh, you’re a _______? Well, then, you’re an idiot!”

All of us have a tendency to do this… to shut down, turn off our brains, and denigrate any person who wears a label that’s different than the one we wear. You’ve probably seen this behavior in forums or comment threads where one person forms an argument and another person responds with an ad hominem attack instead of addressing the argument itself.

Now the labels I listed above have both positive and negative connotations attached to them. So if you identify with either a label on the left or the right, you will see it as positive if you’re part of that group, and you will see it as negative if you’re not part of that group. That’s why I said these labels are “innocuous.”

Are there labels that are more polarizing than the ones listed above? Absolutely.

The most polarizing areas of inquiry often come with their own labels invented by one group to disparage another group. For example:

• “Truthers”
• “Birthers”
• “Conspiracy Theorists”
• “Pro Lifers”
• “Homophobes”
• “Sheeple”
• “Right Wingers”
• “Libtards”
• “Leftists”
• “Gun Grabbers”
• “Holocaust Deniers”
• “Jew Haters”
• “Self-Hating Jews”
• “Racists”
• “Anti-Vaxxers”

Anytime a derogatory label is applied to another person, it essentially shuts down all critical thinking and any opportunity to understand the differing viewpoint. Cogent discussion of the argument ceases and is replaced by name calling and mudslinging.

Labels are powerful. Everything you think you know about a group of people is summed up in the label you apply to them — even if your assumptions are incorrect or you don’t fully understand their position.

For this reason, labels are also powerfully divisive. They perpetuate misunderstanding and an unwillingness to associate with “outside” groups who think differently than you do.

If you ever want to truly understand an issue from all sides — even those you disagree with — you must avoid using derogatory labels and focus on the merits of each position, apart from your personal biases.

Difficult to do? Absolutely. But necessary if we want to develop relationships with people of different persuasions. And especially necessary if we ever want to gently persuade them to a different point of view.

-Ryan M. Healy

The post How Negative Labels Destroy Logic and Polarize People appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.

But I quickly realized something about “Game of War”: The only way you can possibly “win” is by pouring money into it.

Of course, “winning” is more theoretical than anything. It is not a zero-sum strategy game like chess or checkers. New inputs happen all the time. Therefore, the person with the most “inputs” — which can only be acquired through in-app purchases — becomes the dominant player.

Ben Gilbert, writing for Business Insider, puts it this way:

It’s not hard to tell from the ubiquitous ads for “Game of War: Fire Age,” featuring a scantily clad Kate Upton, that it is one of the worst variety of mobile games. If you had any doubt, just read Matt Johnston’s walkthrough about how painful it is to gather resources endlessly just to unlock ways to gather more resources without ever engaging in anything close to war.

Despite being painful to play, however, this crappy game is incredibly profitable — as of this writing, it is the number two top grossing app on the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store.

Why are players putting money into “Game of War?” Because the entire game is built around digging hooks into players, getting them invested in its infinite loops and convoluted systems, and then charging money for the ability to stay invested. If you really want to compete, you’ll pay in.

That sentiment is echoed in comments on the piece Matt wrote. “Without spending $$$, building and researching can take months,” wrote commenter JoeBroady.

The game itself is designed to be addictive. All upgrades are based on timers. In the beginning, these timers are just a minute or two. But as you level-up, the timers get longer. Minutes become hours. Hours become days. Days become weeks.

You are constantly being reminded when upgrades are complete so that you can open the game and start new upgrades. Before you know it, you are checking your phone all the time to make sure you aren’t wasting any time that could be used for upgrades.

Anyway, after I realized the game was designed to A.) be addictive and B.) take my money, I stopped. I didn’t write down my password or anything. Just deleted the app and was done with it.

I’m sure my city is still there being “farmed” by other cities who have realized nobody is home.

So that was last summer — both when I started the game and when I quit. Then in February I noticed “Game of War” ran an ad during the Super Bowl. And not just any ad… an ad that featured Sports Illustrated cover model Kate Upton.

https://instagram.com/p/ykqLBgK883/

I wasn’t that surprised. While I was playing the game I discovered other players in my kingdom who would have literally had to shell out thousands of dollars to reach the levels they had achieved in such a short time frame.

These “high roller” players are considered “whales.” They have all the power, which makes it impossible for any newcomers to achieve any kind of success unless they, too, shell out thousands of dollars.

Keep in mind, my kingdom was just one of 30+ kingdoms. “Game of War” adds new kingdoms on a regular basis to accommodate new players. This is their way of creating a level playing field and making it interesting… at least for a little while.

Returning to Gilbert’s article:

It’s the game’s many, many systems for “questing” and base building – combined with the online multiplayer aspect – that make “Game of War” such a moneymaker.

The long and short is this: if you want to compete, you have to buy in. As one commenter put it:

The difference between the big spenders and everyone else is huge. Not just 2, 3 or even 10 times more powerful, but a hundred or two hundred times more powerful. This makes it boring and pointless for everyone except the “whales.”

And this is how “Game of War” makes so much money. Like other free-to-play successes before it, such as “FarmVille” and “Evony,” there is a hard ceiling on your ability to compete unless you dish out real money, and lots of it. You’ve gotta be a “whale.”

The “whales” referenced above are a group commonly associated with free-to-play games. These are the folks spending large amounts of money in order to significantly advance their game. These are the “Rich Kids of Instagram” of gaming, the oil magnates who don’t mind dropping a few thousand dollars to fuel their addiction. These are the people who fund the development and maintenance of free games like “Game of War,” and they represent 1-3% of players.

And that, dear reader, is how “Game of War” is able to afford hiring Kate Upton and paying for Super Bowl ads like this one:

Do you have any experience playing “Game of War” or a game that offers in-app purchases? Leave a comment below with your thoughts.

The post How ‘Game of War’ Can Afford Sexy Cover Model Kate Upton appeared first on Business Growth Strategies.