Whenever it gets too boring, make something EXPLODE.

This could be a “Eureka!” moment in a science lab, with scientists high fiving each other across the room…

A heart wrenching confession to a stranger in a burger bar…

Or the pivotal moment when your hero is on their knees…

But finds the missing piece of the puzzle that sets them on the road to redemption. 

When should you make something explode?

It all comes down to pacing.

When you’ve just had a slow section… 

…like the backstory before your PIG opening…

Jolt your readers awake again with a sudden change in pace.

Take the promo in a surprising direction…

Tell the reader something unexpected…

And throw in action fuelled sentences like they’re fireworks.

Remember, you’re competing with your reader’s favorite blogs, magazines and Netflix shows for attention.

So don’t be boring!

Make your promo like Die Hard and find ways to make stuff explode.

Disclaimer: Hat tip David Deutsch for the theme of this post – yet another golden nugget from his Inner Circle program.

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You’ve got to blow them up until they’re about to POP.

Because here’s the thing…

Your reader craves MASSIVE change.

They’re hungry for life transforming results…

Not mild improvements. 

So, blow up your promises as big as they’ll go.

BUT…

And this is a big but…

You can only make promises your proof backs up. 

Solid, irrefutable proof is what makes your promises believable. 

Because if your promise outstrips your proof…

You’ll break the “chain of logic”… 

And your whole sales argument falls apart like a cheap suit.

So, what do you do if you’re short on proof? 

You could deflate your promises a bit. 

Or “Raise the stakes”.

I’ll share more on that in tomorrow’s post.

The post People want massive change appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

But why?

One simple reason…

PROOF.

Specifics are concrete details you can add to make your claims more believable. 

Specifics show that you know what you’re talking about…

And that you have proof to back it up. 

For example…

Instead of saying “apigenin helps to relieve stressful thoughts at bedtime”, say… 

“Apigenin helps release the happiness hormone serotonin. And with more serotonin, your mind feels calmer, and the risk of cortisol spikes fades away”.

Instead of saying “Dr. Mark Hyman is a best selling author”…

Say “Dr. Mark Hyman has sold over 10 million copies of his books on blood sugar, detoxing and weight loss, some of which are New York Times bestsellers.”

Which of the two sounded more convincing? 

The second version, right? 

So, remember…

Add specific details to make your claims more credible and your copy more likely to convert.

The post Add Specifics to Sell More appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

It’s easier for them to do nothing, to keep their credit card in their pocket and carry on with their day.

But inaction has a price too.

That price is continuing to wince when opening a jar from joint pain…

To continue feeling embarrassed when they can’t follow conversations due to brain fog…

Or to still feel the dread of what high blood sugar means for their nerves, vision and future.

Remind them of this.

When you get to the close of your sales letter or email sequence…

Remind people that inaction is a choice too.

A choice between being trapped on their current path…

Or taking action… and taking their first step to a better tomorrow.

The post Inaction is a choice too appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

They sound transactional.

Which is going to affect how you write.

Do this instead…

Use words like “brothers and sisters in arms”, “fellowship”, and “tribe” .

Then, when you sit down to write…

You’ll naturally write from a position of kinship, and wanting to help people… 

People with shared goals, ideals and dreams…

Which will naturally make the way you write warmer, more relatable and more likely to convert.

The post It’s not a list, it’s a tribe appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

But end up sounding like Kingdom Come.

What’s this got to do with writing copy?

When starting off you want to study the greats.

Read their sales letters… copy them out by hand… and try to replicate their structure and writing style.

But, in case you hadn’t heard…

The robots are coming. 

Which means relying on templates… 

Re-engineering other people’s copy…

And writing in someone else’s voice risks you getting trampled under their algorithmic boot.

Don’t settle for average.

If you’re to survive the robot wars you need to constantly cultivate your own writing style… your own ideas… your own creative flair. 

Because as the internet gets awash with copy penned by AI…

Sounding unique, fresh and unpredictably HUMAN is what will keep your career alive.

The post How to survive the robot wars appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

Sure, curiosity gets clicks.

But conversions?

Not as many as you’d hope.

Try this instead…

Go deeper.

Go beyond curiosity, being entertaining or useful.

Dig deeper into your reader’s psyche.

Say something insightful about why they’re stuck which they’ve never heard before.

Tell a story about someone who also felt trapped until they made ONE key mindset shift…

Or talk about why they’ll be forever be chasing diet guru after guru like  a lost sheep unless they click the link.

Sure, curiosity is powerful.

But digging deeper into your reader’s psyche does a much better job of preselling the click…

And getting more conversions as a result.

The post Go deeper to get more clicks appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

Someone who worries about the same things… 

Faces the same daily struggles… 

And heck, even watches the same TV shows and shares the same worldview.

Because the more you can mirror your reader…

The more relatable your emails and sales pages will be.

So what’s the best way to sound relatable in your copy?

Step one – Create a buyer persona of your reader, and write to that person ONLY.

The good news is that with AI tools you can create buyer personas faster than it takes to boil an egg…

And in a puff of smoke, your reader will appear across the table from you… eager to hear what you have to say.

Step Two – Write about a moment of vulnerability your reader will relate to…

A moment when you hit rock bottom… 

When all hope seemed lost…

And you either had to make a breakthrough or sink like a stone.

Because it’s our darkest moments that will get readers leaning in… 

Feeling the same vulnerability in their own life…

And looking to you to take their hand and lead them to a better tomorrow.

The post The power of dark moments appeared first on The Copywriter's Crucible.

An emotion that makes us do crazy things…

Makes us wildly jealous…

And forces us to feel like we’re in constant competition with our friends, work colleagues, and the Jones’ next door? 

ENVY!

Envy is a super powerful emotion.

It’s envy that drives us to want more money, designer clothes, a flashier car and to fear missing out.

The best way to trigger envy?

Here are three ways to do it:

1) Talk about someone your reader would love to be like.. who has the perfect life and the social status your reader craves.

2) Describe your product’s benefits in vivid detail, and contrast them with the pain of missing out. 

3) Use social proof to show how your product is transforming people’s lives… and taking them from struggling to salvation.

4) Make your offer sound exclusive and limited to only specific types of people. Or was previously only available “by invitation only”.

No doubt about it, envy is a powerful emotion to target.

Try using it in the final stages of your promo to trigger your reader’s competitive urges…

And primal fear of missing out.

#copywriting

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This week I was shaking hands and kissing babies at Affiliate World Asia. Met lots of high level people, particularly at the DRMP and Clickbank meetups.

What I quickly learned is that the key to networking at these events is not to just talk business, but focus on getting to know people and making friends first. 

Here are my key takeaways from Liss Graham’s talk on email marketing:

• You should aim for $1.50 per month in revenue per email subscriber
• If running SMS campaigns make sure you update your T&Cs. Otherwise the fines are BIG!
• Best tools when you have a 100k list – Maropost, Ontraport, Campaign Refinery
• For SMS use Ontraport and Attentive
• For Push use OneSignal, Pishnami, 
• Before sending money driver emails, send a trust building autoresponder – Tell the customer how they’ll be getting their purchase, reassure them that they’ve made the right choice, direct them in how to find their receipt and how to use their purchase when they get it.
• Start with one money driver email per day and then build to two emails
• What to send: Offers trending in the marketplace, what’s happening globally, products related to the niche they came in on, what other relevant interests they may have
• Deliverability – Open rate must be at least 25%. If not, adjust segmentation and remove 1 ESP (e.g. gmail) if necessary to deliver better. It takes one month to fix issues if deliverability goes off the rails
• Spam trigger words to avoid: Free, weight, pounds, viagra, sex, vaccine, COVID
• What to split test: Offers, subjects, body copy, images and price
• Ninja tip – Add content to the bottom of emails to improve deliverability and to subtly push more clicks e.g. 6 early warning signs of Alzheimer’s.
• Email tips – Short and shocking subject lines, curiosity driven, 125 words or less, focuses on universal pain points, killer offers with great conversion and AOV
•  SMS tips – Start weekly post purchase. Stick to internal offers and special content (webinars, special sales etc). Use SMS to test ideas for email subject lines and PUSH. 
• PUSH tips – Can be 10 per day depending on list size, start with 1 per day. Internal offers do best. Great for testing email subject lines and SMS messages.
• Email buyers are worth 5x more than leads.
• Dont make sudden changes to sending frequency or email types overnight. Get on a schedule. But test sending at diff times, images, offer type, content and email length
• Keep track of stats in a spreadsheet
• Pitfalls – Not sending own offers, not sending “content”, not sending aff offers, not sharing other channels, not tracking by TID/subID
• Offers with rebill revenue are great to promote as they content to generate $ over time
• Always be testing new angles. Have an insatiable desire to do better, rather than copy what others are doing. The winners are those who innovate.
• How to reactivate a dead list – Send an autoresponder with best stuff and drip clickers and openers to main list, like nourishing a baby.
• “From” name should identity who the email is from, but you can still be creative with it.

Bonus tip (i learned from the Clickbank party) – Google is suspected to be penalizing stock footage on YouTube ads. So mix up B-roll clips with UGC, and ideally something weird. 

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