Comments on: What To Do When You Don’t Know What To Do

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 00:57:56 +0000

John,
Funny you should put this blog up. I am in exactly this position. I have to put up a website to get new customers to my Electronics Consulting business, having had it royally screwed up by some non-paying ex clients with no idea of ethics. It means writing copy that would attract the kind of client I’m looking for and get them to phone me. Nothing else. If I get it wrong I will probably be staring bankcruptcy in the face!
I have followed Mr Carlton’s blogs with avid interest and (if anyone is interested) report back.
If I get any reasonable amount of success ( I am not asking for much!) I promise, god, that I will buy John’s course and devour every word of wisdom therin.

By: Ken Calhoun

Ken Calhoun — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 19:05:09 +0000

Great question, been there done that. A big part of the solution is having properly positioned yourself as the go to guy Before the s— hits the fan, so that when there’s a crunch, you’ve established rep/credibility ahead of time, over time… and having done that..

hmm what Jason said. :p

I will often crank out a new high ticket product and use a product launch process that generates high sales within a few weeks, sans affiliates, just me and my list. That always works.

If I was new and didn’t have a big list, I’d find out what a hot market is that already exists, find the buyers, their forums, their hot buttons, unleash the sales detective within, mod a prior winning control and go from there.

By: Brett

Brett — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 13:46:54 +0000

Since I started in advertising doing political rather than commercial work, last minute ads were the norm, not the exception, in my career. We are often asked to write and creative direct 5-6 self-mailers every day. And that does not include writing and producing radio and TV at the same time.

Now at that pace you could not always bring your “A” game to every job, but you also could not kick junk out the door and get away with it just from the time crunch.

If I was hung for an idea, I might hit the swipe file, but often times I was writing from an edit suite somewhere and did not have it. What worked best for me was simply to start writing. Even if it came out as the most vanilla bland copy, I would just write. And usually when I stopped tapping the keyboard, I had more raw copy than I could use. But when I read back through it, just looking over my raw data dump would often trigger an angle or creative approach that was not in my head when I put cursor to screen.

That worked for me fairly well. Whether it would work for someone else, I really do not know.

By: Larry Foster

Larry Foster — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 12:37:50 +0000

Even though there are a lot of good answers, I’m anxiously awaiting your answer, John.
And the timing of the question is impeccable.
At the same time as you posted this question I had just made a list of nearly 300 businesses that I was getting ready to mail in order to kick start my consulting business.
Half had web sites. And most are the usual crappy brochure types.
I planned to send 2 letters. One to those that have a site and one to those who didn’t.
Now that you’re going to tell me what to do, I’ll wait for your answer.
Thanks for another thought-provoking, damn useful topic.
Larry Foster

By: Franck Silvestre

Franck Silvestre — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 09:24:20 +0000

I’m glad I visited your blog today. I was going to say like Emette, and I also like Jason Mofatt’s tactic.

What I did, and it worked very well for me was to get a headline (by a top copywriter), and write the rest of the ad with my heart. I had a BIG proof, so even if I’m not a pro, the ad was really profitable.

Franck.

By: Emette E. Massey

Emette E. Massey — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 03:05:51 +0000

John, I’m going to chime in one last time before you unveil your secrets. I’ve been racking my brain over and over then something you said turned on a light . . .

When you mentioned involving human nature it reminded me of a lesson both you and Halbert taught me.

And it was this. You MUST know the hidden, secret desires of your prospects. In other words what are they predisposed to buy?

Knowing this you could make them an offer they couldn’t possibly refuse. Basically your “ad” could be nothing more than the absolute best offer you could afford to make–even if you lost money on the front end. Your copy wouldn’t even NEED to be all that great.

Just make it easy as hell for them to get what they already want.

Emette

By: john-carlton

john-carlton — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 21:06:22 +0000

Great stuff, guys. My buddies Jason and Matt — as well as several others (who obviously have encountered this situation personally, and bring real-world insight to the question) — have nearly outlined the right answer… but not completely.

Everyone is leaving out a couple of very important details, or being too vague about using swipe files.

Again — I KNOW this can hurt your head, trying to wrestle with all the X factors of such a situation (especially if you’ve never had to actually solve it yet in the real world)… but it’s worth the effort to think through all the implications of each suggestion.

Remember — I’ve been telling biz owners to “just switch on a tape recorder and capture your best sales pitch” for decades now… and I can count on ONE HAND the number of clients who have actually DONE it. Human nature is involved here… and that’s something the freelancers in the crowd need to take into account.

I think you’ll very much enjoy what I reveal tomorrow…

John Carlton

By: Ian

Ian — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 18:18:10 +0000

I’d get on the phone with all my happy customers. Get them to verbally give me a short pithy testimonial confirming they got the benefits of my product / service.

Have them typed up. Get permission to include a phone # and maybe email address.

I’d get a hundred of them. Stuff them in an envelope with a note that says.

Dear so and so

In that envelope is 100 testimonials from people just like you who solved by using my product / service. Solved it in 1 day.

If you’re convinced after reading a few I can help you almost immediately then call my personal number and we will get you going right away.

Sincerely

Ian

By: Chris Hobel

Chris Hobel — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 17:31:02 +0000

Hi John first time poster-love the site.

TESTIMONIALS!!!!!! we all should be getting these all along no matter what biz of marketing you are. You will never convey how great you or your product is -BUT your past clients can!!!!

Voice broadcasts of satified clients or having an emergency Hotline teleseminar in which satisfied clients tell inside scoop how they got the best deal thru you etc etc Cd or dvd’s mailed out to target ed clients.

By: Matt Gallant

Matt Gallant — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 17:25:13 +0000

I would use the simplified Carlton formula:

1. What am I selling?

2. Who is it for?

3. What is it going to do for you?

4. What are the terms (cost, guarantee, etc…)

5. What do I need to do next?

I would then “spice it up” by pulling out
my Carlton swipe file and swiping a classic…
——————-
Jason’s answer is another good one…

So, is: hosting a teleseminar…

Matt