Howdy…

Nobody’s ever asked me to give the commencement speech for a graduating class.

That’s probably a good thing.  I’m pretty pissed off at the education system these days, and I might cause a small riot with the rant I’d surely deliver.

See, I have a university “education”.  A BA in psychology.  (The BA stands for, I believe, “bullshit amassed”.)  I earned it several decades ago…

… and while I had a good time in college (height of the sex revolution, you know, with a soundtrack that is now called “classic rock”), made some lifelong friends, and got a good look at higher learning from the inside…

… that degree provided zilch preparation for the real world.  Didn’t beef me up for any job, didn’t give me insight to how things worked, didn’t do squat for me as an adult.

I waltzed off-campus and straight into the teeth of the worst recession since the Depression (Nixon’s post-Vietnam wage-freeze, record unemployment, gas-lines, near-total economic turmoil)…

… so, hey, I should have a little empathy for today’s grads, right?

Naw.

While today’s graduates are facing similar grim economic times, there’s been a significant change in the concept behind a college education.  Somehow, over the years, a bizarre mantra has taken hold in kids minds: “Get a degree, and it’s a ticket to the Good Life.”

A job is expected to be offered to you before the ink is dry on your diploma.

And it really, really matters WHICH school you get that diploma from.

You know what I say?

Bullshit.  Okay, maybe if you go to Yale or Harvard, you can make the connections on Wall Street and in Washington to get your game on.  Maybe.  (More likely, those connections are already available, if you’re gonna get ‘em, through family bloodlines… and the Ivy’s are just playing up their famous track records in a classic sleight-of-hand.)

Put aside the advancement opportunities offered to spawn of the oligarchy, though… and the realities of life-outside-of-academia do not jive at all with the propaganda doled out by the university systems.

Many of the richest guys I know are drop-outs.  Some are HIGH SCHOOL drop-outs.  The few friends who did go to the kind of school whose name causes eyebrows to rise…

… are ALL working far outside their major.  To the point that nothing they learned has proven to be even remotely useful to their adult life.  (Unless they stumble upon another over-educated dweeb at a cocktail party and get into a bare-knuckle Trivial Pursuit marathon.)

Too many people get all confused and bewildered about “education” as opposed to “going to college”.

It’s not the same thing, folks.

Some of the most clueless individuals I’ve ever met have impressive diplomas… while nearly all of the most savvy (and wealthy) individuals I know done got educated all on their lonesomes.

I learned more about history, business and psychology in 2 weeks of serious library surfing (with a speed reading course under my belt) than I did in 4 years of college.

And I learned more about life in 3 months of hanging out with street-wise salesmen than I did from ANY source, anywhere, up to that time.

By all means, go to college if that’s part of your Master Plan to having a great life.  You’ll meet interesting people, and it’s a Rite Of Passage for many Americans these days.

But don’t do it blindly.  Just cuz The Man says it’s what you’re “supposed” to do.

Do some critical thinking before you jump in.

And if you really want that degree in Russian literature, or women’s studies, or political science, or whatever… then fine.  Go get ‘em.  Grrr.

Just KNOW that you can probably educate your own damn self on those subjects… and even get a deeper understanding of it all… by reading every book written about it, and interviewing a few experts.  And if you can get private mentoring from someone, even better.

This can all take place during evenings and weekends, over the course of a few months, while you hold down a day job.  Even if you buy the books, instead of hitting up libraries, you’ll have spent less on this specialized education than you’d pay for a single semester in “real” school.

And, unless you’re the laziest screw-up ever, you’ll actually learn MORE in those few months of intense immersion… than you would with a full-on degree.

You know how I can make this bold claim with a straight face?

Because this is what I’ve been doing as a freelancer for decades.  Every time I wrote for a new market, I spent weeks immersing myself in it… learning everything I could about it from the inside-out.  And this process often made me more of an expert than the client himself.

And I did it over and over and over again.

It was just part of the job.  All top freelancers do this.

Once you lose your fear of self-education…

… you can finally let it sink in that WE LIVE IN THE FREAKIN’ INFORMATION AGE.  The joint is crammed to bursting with books, ebooks, videos, websites, courses…

… the whole world is CRAZY well-stocked.  There are teachers and coaches and mentors available if you need supervision.  (I’ve partaken of this opportunity frequently over my life.) Boards and fan-zines and forums and membership sites abound (for bitching and moaning, as well as for networking with peers).

It’s a cornucopia of knowledge, experience and adventure out there.

Yes, there are blind alleys and pitfalls and wrong turns…

… but once you’re committed to learning something, these are just brief excursions off the main drag… and you can use even your failures as advanced learning tools as you gain expert status.  (In fact, it’s really required that you screw up at least a little bit.  Otherwise, you never get perspective.)

And best of all…

… you can engage with life as you go.  And skip the jarring nonsense of the Ivory Tower bubble.

(One caveat to self-education: You must, early on, read up on how debates are actually taught.  Or join a debate club.

I’m serious.  Best thing I’ve ever done.  As you sample debating, you should demand that you are given the OPPOSITE viewpoint that you currently hold for any subject.  This forces you to look beyond your petty biases, and to open your mind to other points of view.

This is a HUGE advantage to have in your toolkit throughout life.  Everyone else will be hobbled with un-examined party-line nonsense and indoctrinated crap they can’t even begin to defend when challenged…

… while you — with your rare ability to walk in anyone’s shoes, and to feel the pain or glory of alien thought patterns — will forever more see beyond the sound bites and cliches.  And be able to eloquently explain anything, to anyone.

You will actually begin to sense vestiges of “truth” in the wreckage of our modern culture.

I don’t have to tell you how that might apply to marketing, do I?)

Most people will not go this route of self-examination and immersion-learning, of course.  The concept of taking control of your own education seems kinda threatening and foreign to the majority out there.

We spend the first years of our lives sitting quietly in classrooms, being trained to believe we don’t know shit (and that Teacher knows everything).  That’s excellent training for hitting a groove in college and post-grad pursuits…

… but it’s piss-poor preparation for Life In The Concrete Jungle.

Again, nothing wrong about going with the status quo.  No shame.

Just don’t expect to learn much about the way the world works.  You’re learning how academia works.  Different animal.

Wanna hear my short speech on how to prepare yourself for life?  (I’ve edited this from a recent post I wrote for the Simple Writing System mentoring program.  Lots of great stuff keeps coming out of that gig…)

(Okay, quick plug: Check out www.simplewritingsystem.com to start your own adventure as a high-end sales master…)

Here’s my mini-rant: I’m extremely prejudiced about this subject, of course.  If I ran the world, everyone would get at least a taste of being an entrepreneur.

It will taste bitter to most people.  And that’s fine.  No harm, no foul.  Move on to getting that job with The Man.

But for some… it will be sweet nectar.  A thrill like nothing else they’ve ever experienced before.

Being an entrepreneur takes balls.

But you don’t have to “be” a ballsy kind of person.

You just have to understand how to implement your goals… which requires a little savvy about getting stuff done in the face of opposition and obstacles.  Which is the definition of “ballsy”.  Most of the people successful at achieving goals were not “born” with the necessary guts.

They learned the skill of living life with guts, just like they learned every other important skill associated with the gig.

I OFTEN intervene even with long-time professionals (like freelance writers, or veteran biz owners) who are screwing up their efforts to be successful.

My main advice:  “Stop being a wuss.  Everyone is scared.  The successful ones acknowledge that fear, put it aside, and just get busy taking care of business.”

It really is that simple.

Life beyond childhood is for grown-ups.  If you’re scared, you can take a regular job somewhere, and stay far away from the risks and realities of being your own boss.

On the other hand… if you’ve got entrepreneur’s blood in your veins… and you really DO want to be your own boss…

… then allow the reality of doing so to wash over you, and embrace it.

Everyone is unsure of themselves out there.  There are no guarantees in life for anything… and getting into biz is among the riskiest things of all to do.

A tiny percentage of skydivers will die each year while jumping… but a vast chunk of rookie business owners will fail.

This is why you pursue the skills of salesmanship.  Learning how to create a wicked-good sales message, how to close a deal, , and how to bond with a target market is the PRIMARY weapon you want walking into ANY business environment.

Will you still fail?  Maybe.

But you will NOT fail because you don’t know what the hell you’re doing. If knowing how to persuade and influence can make your business sizzle, then learning salesmanship means you’re armed to the teeth.  Like everything else in life, having the right tools for the job at hand is the best way to put the odds in your favor.

MOST people are not meant to be their own boss.  The world needs followers, too.

Here’s what I tell students in the Simple Writing System, when doubts about their future bubble up:  “Just by diving into the SWS, you have shown that there is something different burning inside you.  No one held a gun to your head and forced you to come here to learn these skills.  You decided to join all on your own.

“Even if you’re not yet sure why you’ve joined us here… you need to understand that MOST people would never even consider doing anything like this.

“Independence freaks most people out.  The thought of standing up and taking responsibility for the birth and success of a business is terrifying… and most will refuse to even entertain the thought.

“This is, by the way, why you should always enter the entrepreneurial world WITHOUT relying on your current crop of friends for support.

“They will not support your efforts.  They think you’re batshit crazy for daring to even consider being your own boss.  They will (consciously or unconsciously) sabotage your progress if they can, and rejoice in your failures… because if you DO succeed, that kills their main excuse for not succeeding themselves.  Most folks believe success is all about luck and magic.  When you dig in and actually do the work necessary to succeed, you piss all over their world view that The Little Guy Can’t Win.

“If you’ve made friends or started a network of fellow travelers here in the SWS, great.  Most entrepreneurs have to operate alone (until they find places like this, where they can find help, advice and coaching).  That loneliness just intensifies the fear and sense of risk.

“But I’ll tell you the truth:  As scary as being independent is…

“… once you’ve tasted it, you’ll be hooked.”

Most entrepreneurs who enjoy even a little success instantly become “unemployable”.  After thinking for yourself, after taking responsibility for your success or failure, after engaging the world fully aware and experiencing the thrill of living large…

… you’re worthless to a boss.  He can’t use anyone who thinks for themselves.

Are you wracked with doubt?

That voice you hear — the one knocking you down, digging a knife into your gut and highlighting your worst fears — is JUST A VOICE.

In psychoanalytic talk, it’s your “Super Ego”… the scolding parent’s voice, the doubter of your abilities, the whiny little bastard bent on keeping you down.

And it can easily be sent packing.

Most people allow others to rule their lives.  Rules and bad advice and grim experiences dating back to childhood somehow become “the way it is”…

… and regardless of any proof otherwise, they will obey that voice until they die.

And yet, all you have to do…

… is acknowledge the voice (”Yes, I hear you, you little shit“), realize it’s not your friend… and lock it in a dungeon deep in your brain, where you can’t hear it anymore.

I speak from experience on this subject.  I was ruled by The Voice Of Doom for the first half of my life.  I didn’t even try to take responsibility for my success, because The Voice told me it was hopeless.  That I was hopeless.  That Fate had nothing but failure in store for me.

Then, I realized that The Voice was actually full of shit.  I proved it, slowly at first, by setting a goal outside The Voice’s warnings… and then achieving it.  And then doing it again.

It’s like superstition.  I used to be the most superstitious guy you’ve ever met.  Literally, my life was dominated by superstitions.

Then, one day, I just decided to see how real those superstitions were.  So I violated every single one of them.  On purpose.  If I had previously thought some action was “bad luck”, I would do it, blatantly, just to see what kind of bad luck occurred.

And, of course, no bad luck ever appeared.

The human brain is crammed with bullshit like this.  Superstitions, bad rules, dumb beliefs, unfounded fears and ridiculous feelings of guilt and shame.

Especially guilt and shame.

You know what a fully functioning adult does?  They don’t approach life believing it should be a certain way, or wish that life was a certain way.

No.  They engage with life the way it really is.  You make your own luck.  Rules sometimes make good sense, but deserve to be broken when they’re clearly stupid.  Belief systems often have nothing to do with reality.  (You can “believe” you’re gonna win the lottery with all your heart and soul… and it won’t change reality one tiny bit.)

Fear is a natural part of our defense system… and it can get out of hand in modern times.

So you need to dig in and get to know your fears.  Some are fine — don’t walk down that dark alley if you’re not prepared to deal with the shit that happens in dark alleys.

Others are bullshit — you had a bad experience once when you were 12, and so what?  Get over it, put on your Big Boy Pants, and re-engage with life.

And shame?  Guilt and shame are useless.  On the road of life, feeling guilty about something is like setting up camp and refusing to move or progress any further.

Instead, try “remorse” — recognize when you’ve done something wrong, clean up the mess, fix what you’ve broken as best you can, and make amends to people you’ve hurt.

And don’t “vow” to do better next time.

Instead, actually DO something to change your behavior or habits.  Promises are bullshit.  Action is the only way to move through life in a positive way.

Don’t promise to do better.  Just do better.  This will probably involve learning something new — a new skill, a new way of dealing with life, a new set of behaviors.

Doing this will set you apart from the majority of other people out there, too.

The modern Renaissance Man or Woman is something awesome to behold.  While the rest of the world increasingly sinks into a snoozing Zombie-state — indoctrinated, fooled, manipulated and played– you have the option of becoming MORE aware, more awake, more alert and ready to live life with gusto.

However, no one is going to force you to do this.

If you want to join the Feast of Life, you have to stand up and earn your seat at the table.  You will not be invited in.  You will not stumble in by accident, or stroke of luck.

Nope.  You must take responsibility for your own life… figure out what you want… and then go get it.

It’s a daunting task for most folks… too daunting to even contemplate.

For the few who know it’s what they want, however… it’s all just a matter of movement and action.

Yes, it can be scary.  Life is terrifying, at times.

It’s also only worth living, for many people, when you get after it with all your heart.

There are no replays on this game.  No second tickets for the ride.

You’re allowed to sleep through all of it.  Most folks do.

If that’s not good enough for you any more, then welcome to the rarefied air of the entrepreneur world.

It’s fun, it’s thrilling, it’s scary, and there’s no safety net below you.

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

And that’s the commencement speech I’d give.

Put you to sleep, didn’t it.

Okay, my work is done here.

What would YOU tell new grads?  Lay it out in the comments, below…

Stay frosty,

John

Thursday, 8:06pm
Reno, NV
“Here come Johnny Yen again…” (Iggy Pop, “Lust For Life”)

Howdy…

Oh, my God!

They killed the sales letter again!

Will this horror never stop?

Actually, you can relax.  Just like Kenny in South Park, the traditional sales letter is on some kind of perverse “Permanent Hit List”…

… where every marketer trying to claim he just invented a new fad stands astride the image of a quaking letter…

… and slays it.

Huzzah! Death to you, vile long-copy sales letter!  Take that… and that…

… and that.

This latest round is clever as hell, too.  The new trend is putting your sales letter in a video, and reading along with it.

The irony:  The dude selling you the “Magic Box” product that kills the sales letter forever…

… uses a sales letter to do the killing.

Hey — don’t get me wrong.  I love video.  Been using it in marketing since… well, since it was actual videotape on reels.  (Yeah, shocking, I know.  We were so backward in the last century.)

In fact, the “Magic Box” product I’m talking about is, I’m guessing, an excellent solution for many marketers who can’t figure out how to make a video sales letter work.

And all’s fair in love, war and advertising.  So all the dudes out there telling you the sales letter is dead, and you can sell without selling, and the Web has changed everything…

… well, more power to ‘em.

I just want to clarify 3 things.

Enlightenment Moment #1. Video is not magic.  No one will give you money for your product just because you have video in your marketing.

Video IS a smokin’ hot vehicle for delivering a good sales message, however.  We’ve seen (and heard of) results skyrocket in certain markets simply by introducing video into the mix.

It lets you engage your prospect with visuals, audio, and all the attention-getting power of passion-inflected voice-overs.

Video rocks.  When the Web goes 3-D, then 3-D video will rock, too.

When your monitor starts spraying you with carefully-selected odors, then smells will become a marketing tool.  Taste isn’t far off, either.

The thing is… the best kind of selling will always be a senses-consuming, totally customized experience for the prospect.

The more personalized you can make the sales process, the more you will sell (as long as you don’t screw up the message).

So for now, yeah, video is something you need to test vigorously.  (And those tests will likely show you that video is just as powerful as folks insist it is.)

However…

… it’s not the video that’s doing anything for you.

It’s the experience of being taken through a good sales process in a new way that tweaks more of your senses.

A sucky sales message in a video will still get you sucky results.

Enlightenment Moment #2. There is a trend now among some info-marketers of insisting that you can “sell without selling”.

This is an excellent sales tactic.  Vast mobs of rookie marketers crave this kind of soothing message.  They fear the sales process, and want to hear that they can skip any act even remotely associated with gnarly, unsightly salesmanship.

And so, this is the exact message that is floated by info-marketers eager for the quick kill.  You don’t need to know how to write, and you don’t need to understand anything about selling.

And it’s bullshit.

These guys are (a) excellent writers themselves (even as they insist they’re not)… and (b) astonishingly clever salesmen.

Again, I salute them.  I even urge people to check out their products.  It’s often good shit.

However, it causes my in-box to fill up with questions from confused rookie marketers…

… and it’s annoying to have to haul out the same answer every few months.

Which leads us to…

Enlightenment Moment #3: Let’s review — once again — what a sales letter really is…

… and why people keep wanting to kill it.

Ahem.

Please note this:  There has never been a time in the history of business…

… where long copy sales letters were the “norm” for most marketers.

Most advertising and marketing sucks.  It always has, and always will.

Most advertising “experts” who staff the kind of mega-agencies that create ads for large corporations (from selling cupcakes to selling investments on Wall Street)… are NOT killer salesmen.

None of the mainstream advertising you see for Coca-cola, for example, actually sells Coca-cola.   It just keeps the brand in your head.  (Okay, when they can get away with it, they’ll also try to hypmotize you into craving it… but that’s never been proven to work.)

What causes Coke to actually sell is a complex manufacturing and delivery system that dominates the sugar-water industry.  Nobody walks out of Taco Bell because they sell Pepsi instead of Coke.

However, Coke will fly off the shelves in a supermarket because they have primo shelf position, coupons and cross-sell affiliations up the whazoo, and it’s a leader in creating new vehicles for easier consumption.  (You still call the local soft-drink dispenser “the Coke machine” — even if there’s no Coke in it — because Coke created the industry of delivering cold bottles individually, automatically.)

So yeah, those cute TV commercials with Santa swilling Coke with polar bears isn’t “selling”, as in moving product.

What moves the bottles and cans is the hard-core marketing machine that keeps 7-11 fully stocked, at eye level.

Any marketer with less than a billion dollars in their ad budget, who thinks they’re gonna be successful by “copying” Coke’s commercial style…

… is an idiot.

Copying their manufacturing and delivery system, sure.  Again, if you got the bucks, the distribution channels, the deals with supermarket chains, etc.

Same with cars.  You don’t see a Ford commercial, stumble off to the dealer in a zombie daze, and buy immediately.

No.  You engage with a sales process.

These processes… the dealing with a “sales agent”, or finding yourself at the consuming end of a system that started with sugar water… all rely on pure salesmanship to work.

Top marketers, throughout the long history of marketing, either know this…

… or learn it, quickly.

It’s the only way to become successful in a way you control.  You don’t rely on luck, or on fads, or on the unexpected confluence of events for your success.

No.  You create your success.  By knowing how to sell.

Now… let’s get back to why most advertising and marketing sucks.

In the greater world of advertising, there are the huge agencies who use slogans and art, and call it an ad because no one knows any better…

… and then there is this tiny little sliver of the industry, way off in the corner, called “direct response advertising”.

It’s the bastard child of the big agencies.

The big agencies like slogans and pretty art, because all they want to do is to please their client.  So the client cries out “That’s a GREAT ad!  We can’t wait to run it during the Superbowl!”

And they happily pay vast fortunes to the agencies, believing they have done their due marketing diligence.

Meanwhile, over in the corner (sulking, because we get no fucking respect)…

… the direct response guys don’t care if the client loves the ad.

Because they’re not selling the ad to the client.

They’re, instead, creating an ad that will sell to PROSPECTS.

The term “direct response” refers to the nature of the ads.  There is some element of asking for ACTION.  A response.  Click here to order.  Opt in to get the free goodies.  Call for a quote.

This kind of response scares the bejesus out of the big fancy agencies.

They HATE the idea of being held responsible for any kind of actual RESULT from their nice-looking, salesmanship-free ads.

Because, if Ford ever asked their agency how many cars were sold from the last whiz-bang set of TV commercials…

… the answer would be a shrug.  “We don’t know.  We literally have no clue whether those ads sold lots and lots of cars, or no car at all.”

(Here’s how that game works, btw: At the end of the year, if Ford sold more cars — for whatever reason — the agency retains the account and are heroes.  If Ford sold less cars, they fire the agency and hire another one.  It’s all smoke and mirrors, alchemy, voodoo and wish-fulfillment all rolled into one big ball of bullshit.)

The direct response guys?

They can’t afford to create ads that don’t work…

… cuz everyone will immediately know if the ads bomb or succeed…

… based on the results.

No guesswork.  No magic.  No nonsense about “brand awareness” or “long-term sales strategies”.

You create the ad.  You minimize “x” factors, you test, you count up the numbers, and either it works, sorta works, or fails.

So…

Faced with the prospect of actually having to create a provably-successful ad… the direct response guys have always gone straight to the source of successful selling:

Salesmanship.

Knowing how to persuade, hold attention, overcome objections… and especially how to close the deal.

And guess what?

In one form or another…

… doing this always ends up in some kind of long-copy sales letter.

Infomercials in the 80s were long sales letters.  They were low-rent videos that ran for an hour on late-night cable for spare change, in an age when most marketers were spending a fortune on high-production 20-second spots on the networks (with zero actual selling going on).  (Those crappy infomercials brought in vast fortunes, too, and changed the way marketers think about cable — and late night selling — forever.)

Most ads in newspapers and magazines were small, tidy little affairs with cute headlines.  The ads that worked in newspapers and mags, however, were the full-page monsters that presented better stories that the publication itself… and which sold hard and crazy.

Most businesses, throughout the ages, have insisted on following the herd… and dumped endless piles of cash into sales-challenged marketing that was doomed from the get-go.

And meanwhile, off in that corner of the advertising industry, the direct response guys who knew how to sell just plodded along, piling up results and remaining more-or-less content to stay behind the curtains.

Then the Web arrived.

And with it, the biggest opportunity for entrepreneurial start-ups that civilization has ever seen.

You literally needed just an Internet connection and a cheap computer… and you could start a real business.  Kitchen table optional.

And guess what?

The smart entrepreneurs went straight for the jugular with their marketing efforts.  Without deep pockets, they had to make their advertising work right off the bat.

And so they were instantly attracted to direct response strategies.  Who cares if the ads weren’t pretty, or people bitched about long copy, or — gasp! — complaints rolled in from folks offended that anyone would use the Net to sell anything.

What works, works.

The Big Dog entrepreneurial marketers online are ALL direct response aficionados.

Even the ones who insist they’re not.  (They’re just really, really good at selling you in ways that don’t trigger the “I’m being sold!” alarms in your head.)

Don’t get confused by what stuff is called.

A minute of video is (more or less) equal to around a page of double-spaced copy.  So a 10-minute video is delivering the oomph of a 10-page sales letter.

So, fine, don’t call it a sales letter.

We don’t, anymore.  We now talk to folks about creating a sales message.  The delivery system for that message may be a real letter, or a website, or a video on a site, or a series of auto-responder emails, or a speech from a stage, or a webinar/teleseminar or…

… or any other way it can be presented to a prospect.

It’s not the “letter” part of the phrase that matters.  (The next generation of marketers now coming up the ranks have likely never received a mailed letter in their lives, anyway.)

No.

It’s the “sales” part that matters.

Learn how to sell.  It’s not voodoo.  It’s actually easy, when you have an experienced guide.

Don’t sweat the “writing” part.  If you can sell, you can do all your marketing verbally… have it transcribed into video scripts, or Web pages, or printed ads, or whatever you need… and skip the whole “writing” thing altogether.

But you probably aren’t a natural salesman.  Most people are woefully inept at crafting a good sales pitch.

So learn the simple steps behind selling.  It’s not hard.

However… if you insist on remaining ignorant…

… then you will forever be prey to the dudes who DO know how to sell.

And they will sell you one Magic Box solution after another.  Solutions they themselves have succeeded with…

… because — oops, they forgot to tell you — they are KILLER salesmen.

There are a lot of great products out there for entrepreneurs and small biz owners who can’t afford to have marketing that doesn’t work like crazy.

If you get on my list, you’ll know who we recommend.  We don’t recommend anything we haven’t tried ourselves.

But before you try ANY of the clever new shit out there…

… please… learn how to sell.

Just absorb the simple basics into your skull.

And here’s where I recommend you start.  (Just click on the blue word “here’s” in that last sentence.  Like magic, you’ll be transported to a stripped-down website where you can learn more.  No obligation.  No trickery.  Just the basics on what you can do, right now, to learn more about becoming a killer salesman.)

The best marketers out there are obsessed with closing the deal.

You’re just not in the game if you don’t understand salesmanship.

You are, in fact, meat.  Sustenance for those who do know understand how to persuade and influence and sell.

Okay.

That was a long way around the block to make a point.

But it needed to be made.  And will be needed again, no doubt.

If you appreciate this kind of no-nonsense explanation on how stuff really works…

… then climb aboard.  Opt in, above right.

It’s a minefield out there, when you’re alone and trying to make a business work without knowing who to trust.

We know who the good guys are, and who the charlatans are.

I’m sure you disagree with at least some of what I’ve said here.

The comment section is now open, awaiting your wisdom and input.

Have at it.

Stay frosty,

John

Thursday, 7:41pm
Reno, NV
“Please allow me to introduce myself…” (Stones, Sympathy For The Devil)

Howdy…

This is one of those lessons that arrived accidentally…

… and I had to stop and ruminate about it for a while before it made sense.

I’m lucky I learned it early, too.

It’s provided me with a home base of sanity when the chaos has reached shuddering crescendos and it was hard to think straight (let alone make snap decisions when crisis loomed).

You may find it obvious.

That’s fine.  Just don’t go thinking it’s obvious to the rest of the mean ol’ world out there… cuz it ain’t.

Here’s the story: One of my first jobs working for Gary Halbert was to fly to Detroit… and interview a guy who’d just lost 750 pounds.

Yeah, you read that right.

Gary had an idea for a diet product based on the dramatic tale of this now-slender young man.  It had to be a true story, too, cuz we found it in The National Enquirer.

I mean, it was dripping with credibility.

The photo of the kid at his heaviest made people just stare and blink.  We’re talking about filling up a king-sized bed all by your lonesome, with a little tiny face lost in folds of flesh.

The last time he’d been on a scale, they hauled him over to a machine that weighs horses.

Now, there’s more to this story, of course… including my first encounter with a Michigan ice storm (I flew out there in freakin’ December, wearing my stylish, thin, warm-for-Los-Angeles leather coat… and learned a lesson about chill factor walking out of the airport, tell you what).

Also including the side-story of how the kid, now down below 200 (yep, he really had lost all that weight) went through multiple operations to remove the excess skin, which was donated to burn clinics.

And more.  I can regale a room with the stories from that adventure for an hour.

But this isn’t a post about losing weight.

No, it’s much more important to your life than that.

Let’s continue: Gary and I began a rocky relationship with this kid for a few months, trying to film him for his product (a self-help course for people wanting to lose massive amounts of weight steadily)…

… while navigating the kid’s mounting arrogance, ego and control-freakism.

Gary and I loved to delve as deep as possible into the working personalities of people — that’s where the genius of all great advertising lies.

So we spent many an evening wondering what made this kid tick.

Finally, I hit on something.  “You know what?  Something inside him caused him to get so big in the first place.”

Stay with me.  It’s not as obvious as you might think.

Halbert’s eyes lit up.  We were on to something.

See, at first the kid seemed nice, loving and family oriented.  Poor guy had just sort of lost track of his size, and oops, got big.  Perfect spokesman for a diet product or course.

Soon, though, you could almost feel the invisible manipulation tenacles slithering around your throat as he challenged anyone who dared to question his authority and superiority on… well, everything.

Now, I’m no shrink.  But we soon realized how that kid had used his obesity to control his family to the point their entire lives were devoted to his care.  Like slaves.

And he liked it that way.  And he shed the weight when he figured out another way to keep them under his thumb (by becoming a celebrity via fat loss).

Okay.  So this kid, who at first seemed kinda sweet and loving, turned out to be harboring a nest of demons.

So what?

Well, it was one of those “a-HA!” moments where half a lifetime of puzzles suddenly were solved.

Here’s that lesson: Everybody has demons.

Everybody.

You, me, the mailman, your little love-bug honey, the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker.

Not all the demons are malicious.  Some are fairly innocent… like a constant craving for chocolate, which can impact your desert choices at a restaurant if you’re the type of couple who likes to share.

Or like a fear of heights, which can impact your vacation plans together.

And there are common demons, which seem to inhabit most of the population: Fear of change, greed, road rage (a cousin of feeling powerless against The Man), whack-job political suspicions, predudices… and I’m sure you can add to this list easily enough yourself.

And there are demons whose main job is keep things confusing: The passive-aggressive little trolls who excel at twisting reality into forms only they recognize.

This realization — that everybody’s got demons — at first was a huge relief.

Personally, I had always assumed (for no good reason) that if it was unclear who was at fault in any given situation involving me… I should take the blame.

It just seemed wrong to assign bad motives to other people.  And I knew I had demons in my head — desires and fears and the lingering inchoate rage of barely surviving puberty and struggling in the adult world.

And I kind of enjoyed believing I lived in a world with mostly demon-free people around me.

I could handle my beasts (most of the time).

But the thought that someone else might be harboring the same impulses I had rattled me to the core.  Better to pretend there were pure souls out there in the majority.

This is COMMON, folks.

This is standard operating procedure for most human minds… to not go down that rabbit hole inside your brother’s core.

It’s why the neighbors of the serial killer next door always express surprise.  “He was a nice, quite man.  A little odd, but we never suspected anything.”  (Despite the occasional screams from the basement…)

As a marketer, you have to abandon many of the pleasant illusions that comfort everyone else.  Like believing your customers are different.  Or that you can sell lots of stuff by appealing to the “noble” virtues of your audience.

I’ve often cautioned friends who were nibbling at the edges of the entrepreneurial experience:  You will be startled, at first, by what you discover about your fellow earthlings.

The sheer volume of fear, desire, greed and sick need is unsettling.  It’s a jungle/madhouse/war zone out there.

However, once the initial shock wears off, you’ll be fine.

People are infested with demons of varying levels of nastiness.

So what?

They’re still lovable.  The world is still gorgeous.  And knowing how the universe operates — rather than pretending to know, and being wrong (like most folks) — offers you a supremely better life.

For one thing, you won’t often be fooled.  You’ll be a wicked-good salesman, too… because 99% of all selling is based on understanding the psychology of the process.

And your philosophy of how to live well can evolve (and thrive) based on reality… not wishes and dreams.

Now… what is the FIRST practical application of this advanced knowledge?

It is this: Look around…

… and figure out who’s watching your back.

Most people’s heads are crawling with demons they don’t realize or acknowledge…

… and yet they LISTEN to the gibbering.

I’ve seen this too often, both in business and in private life.

When people operate alone, or in isolated situations, they “take their own counsel”.

What they THINK they’re doing is going over the facts, weighing options, and judging the pros-and-cons objectively.

However, what they’re actually doing…

… is taking whispered advice from their demons.

And that seldom turns out well.

Much later (as the dust settles and the survivors of the decision begin to climb back on the Maslow hierarchy-of-needs staircase)…

… they’ll ask themselves “What the HELL was I thinking?”

And the answer is:  You weren’t thinking at all.

You let the demons into the control room.

Now, how does this affect you as a business owner or entrepreneur?

I’ll tell you:  Most of the biz owners I consult with are essentially isolated.

They don’t have confidants to tell their secrets to… they don’t have people who share their burdens… they can’t brainstorm ideas because no one around them understands what’s going on…

… and they sink or swim, every day, locked inside their own head.

With all those demons tugging and whispering and planting astonishingly dumb ideas in their brain.

This is, essentially, what separates the winners in the marketing world from the never-ending queue of losers.

The winners always — always – network relentlessly…

… and rely on the power of mastermind groups and coaching to stay on the cutting-edge, motivated and happy and on the best possible path at all times.

I know what it’s like to be alone out there.  I started my career completely solo, clueless and barely managing my fear (and the near constant deluge of bad ideas popping into my skull).

I used books as a crutch, and it worked to a point.  I learned a few tricks, and I used the “What would Claude Hopkins do?” philosophy when stuck.

However, as soon as I discovered like-minded souls in my Los Angeles area sandbox, I formed mastermind groups, or joined existing ones.

There is no second-best way to maximize your potential, at anything.

One professional, all alone, may be occasionally brilliant, and may develop a killer reputation.  And actually enjoy the job.

However, you team two pro’s together… especially when they’re simpatico on biz philosophy… and you get way more than just “times two” the brilliance.

No, you get a big-time multiple of brilliance.  It wasn’t just Halbert and I teaming up — it was also bringing our mutual support teams together… the people both of us already trusted for advice and criticism and brainstorming.

Our network was instantly many times larger, and amazingly more powerful.

And — best of all — we finally had someone we trusted and respected… to tell us when we were being fools, or idiots, or about to jump off a cliff.

It works like magic to put your butt on the right track, chugging steadily toward the rewards you seek.

Being alone sucks.

Teaming up rocks.  It’s the only way to fly.

This is why, when you scratch the surface of a top marketer, you discover a long history of using brainstorms and mastermind groups underneath.

I’ve always had partners or people I trust (and solicit opinions and advice from), ever since I discovered the sheer awesomeness of sharing brain-wattage with fellow travelers.

However, I’ve never officially hosted a mastermind group.

Until now.

People have been hounding me to do this for a very long time.  Certainly, whenever I’ve held Hot Seat seminars or Writing Sweatshops, the effect is very similar to a mastermind.

Except it’s just a one time thing.

A real mastermind is ongoing.  So you get to know your colleagues, and they get to know you.

And so their perspective on your plans is coming from a place of trust and familiarity, and a desire to root for your success…

… and to watch your back as you progress.

This is the great victory of a mastermind: You are no longer alone out there.

You’ve got a group of smart people invested in your success.

And you can finally tell your demons to go bugger off…

… cuz you’re getting solid input and criticism now.  The right stuff for powering your rapid ascent up the levels of success and happiness.

Okay, blatant pitch:

I’m now hosting two mastermind groups… for the first time ever in my career.

We started with one.  My biz partner Stan Dahl and I decided it was high time to bring together a great group of people committed to the mastermind concept…

… and get busy.

We let word of this mastermind slip at the recent Action Seminar… and we immediately had more people wanting in than one group could possibly handle.

(The right size for a mastermind is no more than 12… very small and tidy.  Any bigger, and it’s a seminar, not a mastermind.)

So… we split the original single group… into two groups.

Which allowed us to customize each group… so we have one that is primarily for entrepreneurs and small biz owners…

… and another one primarily for copywriters and consultants.

Stan and I have over 50 years between us as professional marketers, business builders, consultants, freelancers, and entrepreneurs.

I can say — without blushing — that we are among the “first choice” consultants hit on by marketers who understand the value of experience and current savvy.

We’re “Success Junkies”, and proud of it.  And we bring a wealth of knowledge, insider advantages, vast resources, and breathtaking skill to the table.

And we’re personally hosting each and every mastermind session of these two new groups.

I’m just letting you know about it.

We start both of them in early April… so you can still grab bragging rights for being among the very first members.

I just checked, and as of right now (while I write this) there are still a couple of spots open.

If being part of a regular mastermind group with me sounds interesting, go here to find out the details of joining:

www.CarltonCoaching.com/Platinum-Group/

I can tell you that, for the first folks who signed up, it was a no-brainer decision.

And if you’re still relying on your inner demons to watch your back as you navigate this increasingly rocky economy and biz climate…

… then maybe you should see what’s up here.

Okay, end of pitch.

I’ll see you again soon.

Stay frosty,

John

Monday, 2:33pm
San Diego, CA
“If you see my little red rooster, please send him home…” (Howling Wolf, master of innuendo)

Howdy…

I’m actually starting this blog in longhand, sitting in the Southwest terminal in San Diego…

… finally dragging my exhausted butt homeward after logging a full week here putting on the now-fabled Action Seminar.

It was a spectacular success, if you’re keeping score.

We directly challenged every seminar model out there… and delivered two frighteningly-on-target days of specific advice, techniques and life-transforming revelations.

Both the roomful of attendees, and the small army of Big Dog experts we assembled, loved the experience.  If you’re following the social media threads of folks like James “Schrak” Schramko, Mary Ellen Tribby, Big Jason Henderson, the Halbert boys, Harlan Kilstein, Brian Johnson, Kevin Rogers, Lorrie Morgan-Ferrero, and the other stellar names who participated…

… then you’re already hip to how the event went.

Excellent buzz.

Shame on you for missing it.

Anyway…

I haven’t got a lot of time here, so I need to focus on what I wanted to share with you here in this post.

There was a ton of practical info for everyone’s “To Do List” at the seminar…

… but there was also a very intriguing element of spirituality, too.

I wasn’t planning to go down that road.

However… … when I stepped onstage to begin Day Two, I told Stan I wanted to talk about something not on our schedule for a few minutes before we re-immersed into the planned sessions.

The subject just settled into my mind as I addressed the crowd.  It was important, mostly ignored by the marketing community, and absolutely NOT what anyone expected to hear from the Marketing Rebel.

Can you guess what I talked about?

Love.

So much of what entrepreneurs (and wannabe entrepreneurs) talk about when they discuss what they do, involves emotion.

Loving what you do, splitting from the awfulness of a J-O-B and super-charging your batteries with passion, generating good vibes that resonate in the universe, and so on.

And you know what?

While most folks talk a good “love” game…

… few really have looked at it critically.

And they fail to realize what they’re dealing with.

I asked the crowd to call out the most powerful emotion humans possess.

Many, incorrectly, said “love”.

Now, I personally thrive on love.  It’s fueled my career, and keeps me motivated.  I may be the only guru out there who openly tells his colleagues he loves them, and who hugs my favorite friends, colleagues and co-workers with genuine warmth both arriving and going.

(When colleagues first meet me, they often balk at the manly hugs.  But once they realize it’s just a tribal greeting — maybe one small step above a firm handshake — they usually loosen up.

(Unless they’re terminal uptight cases.  Lot of them around.

(You can make fun of it if you like… cuz it IS kinda funny to see grown men and women, accomplished in their fields and generally maintaining a dignified attitude, eschewing the offered handshake of a close pal and going in for the “I luv ya, man” hug.

(Tell you what, though.  That’s how you know you’re on the inside.  That’s how you know you’ve been accepted into the pack.)

I haven’t retained much from my hippie days.  (Jeez, we were naive.)

But I believe younger generations have been cheated, mostly, with the overwhelming cynicism and sarcasm and hyper-critical bullshit of our culture.

Screw what you believe is “cool” or “dignified”.  Get over your bad self, stop pretending you’ve got to be aloof to be respected…

… and come here, gimme a hug.

You goofy bastard.  Lighten the fuck up, will ya?

There really is a kind of love out there that isn’t sexual, isn’t whimpy or goopy, and won’t hurt your perceived status in the world.

It is, in fact, the exact kind of love that successful Big Dogs are referring to when they talk about “passion” in markets and marketing.

Now… here’s what you may have wrong about this specific brand of love:

It’s NOT the most powerful emotion out there.

Not even close.  The really powerful ones are fear, rage and greed.

Those monsters grow without being nurtured, thrive in all conditions, and consume entire realities like an invading predator.

And they will swamp love, barely registering a burp after devouring it.  If you let it happen.

No, love is not powerful.

It’s fragile.

You gotta want it.  You gotta pursue it.  You need to understand it, realize what it is and what it isn’t, what it can and can’t do, where it can be found…

… and, especially, how easy it is to lose.

Love withers without constant nurturing.  It’s a needy thing, full of contradictions and almost perverse in the way it will constantly test you, challenge you, and even dare you to abandon it.

When entrepreneurs talk about loving what they do, they are actually delivering — on a silver platter — the one big damn secret to being successful.

You have to be critically aware of your love, embrace the unpredictable nature of it, and commit to it.

The kind of love experienced by entrepreneurs who make it past the rough stages, and burst into the heady worlds of success and fame and wealth…

… is something that, I’ve realized, most people never get to feel.

It’s the love of creating something, committing to adventures with no guarantees, standing outside yourself and murdering your ego in order to better feast on life…

… and allowing yourself to be consumed by a hidden lifeforce you cannot measure, cannot fully control, and cannot summon only when you can “use” it.

Love has no power beyond its ability to transform your experience within the world.

You can’t force it on others.

It will die without constant nurturing.

And it can be a huge pain in the ass when it runs up against the snarling emotional predators out there, hating and snapping in fear and living in cynical denial.

And yet, the successful entrepreneur just shrugs, knowing that love is the secret to earning your seat at the Feast.

Not easy to figure out, difficult to please, infuriating in its irrational tendencies.

But you wouldn’t want it any other way, once you’ve sunk deep into its embrace.

No one is going to invite you to the Feast of Life.   There isn’t room, really, for anyone who isn’t “with” the program anyway.

If you think it’s hilarious to see grizzled veterans of the business wars giving each other powerful embraces, and really meaning it…

… then, sorry, but you’re alienated from the core of human existence.   It may be a long way you need to go to get back (if you even want to try), or it may be a simple shrugging off of your meddling, too-cool-to-live ego…

… but the first step is the same:  Figure out what your relationship with this kind of life-loving experience is.

Not what other people’s relationship is.

What YOURS is.

Then, the REAL adventures can begin in earnest.

Come on.  There’s someone close to you who needs a hug.

Get over yourself, and rise above the suspicious, eat-its-own culture all around you.

The Big Dogs breathe deep, and welcome love into their lives and business and dreams.

Just think about it.

I got a plane to catch…

Stay frosty,

John

Saturday, 8:53pm
Reno, NV
“It’s the end of the world as we know, and I feel fine…” (REM)

Howdy…

Nice big glob of seemingly-nasty news hit the grid this week.

The FTC (brrr, even the name causes Halloween-style chills, doesn’t it) fired a shot across the bow of the good ship Capitalism with their “final guidelines governing endorsements and testimonials”.

In case you’ve been in a coma or something, here’s the Fed-sponsored link:

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

What immediately followed was a lot of hair-on-fire screaming and rending of clothes by both online and offline business owners who use testimonials or endorsements in their marketing.

It was kinda fun to watch, actually.

A lot of entrepreneurs, I’ve noticed over the decades, are skittish enough already about the whole “provide a product to customers in exchange for money” model of doing business.

They’re like “Are you sure we can do this?  Actually accept moolah just for giving people this thing of value we created?”

It’s understandable to be a little paranoid.  Business is part of the grown-up world, all full of consequences and responsibilities and risks…

… as well as the totally uncool embarrassment of finally getting serious about the very adult requirement of applying salesmanship to your excellent marketing adventure.

So, when any of the federal “alphabet agencies” get frisky with new rules, the entrepreneurial world goes bonkers.

Now, I’m not a lawyer.

And I’m not gonna offer anyone legal advice here.  You do what you think is best.  You’re the only one who can correctly judge your own levels of raw paranoia against reality.

However… here is (more or less) what I shared with the folks now embroiled in the Simple Writing System mentoring program (which is steaming full-throttle into it’s second week).

I thought you might want to hear a less-hysterical side to this story:

Ahem.

First, relax.

Every detail of this fresh ruling is still very vague.

The panic around this news is uncalled for. The Feds are not going to suddenly load up their compliance forces with jack-booted thugs and go after entrepreneurs. Their focus is and always has been the large scofflaws. They will follow the money. (Large corporations like Jenny Craig and Subway have alerted their teams of lawyers.)

Yes, the “possible ramifications” of the ruling are a Conspiracy Theorist’s wet dream. Then again, so is every other ruling the FTC has ever put out.

The diet industry — which is used as the most common example when discussing this ruling — needs periodical policing.

However, the first time a regulator tries to define the idea of “typical” results, they are in for a mind-bending exercise in irrational thinking.  What, for example, is a typical dieter?  Someone who needs to lose 15 pounds?  Fifty pounds?  A hundred?

How do you figure it out?  There are three forms of statistical averages — mean, mode and medium.  Each can be a wildly different number.

The Feds will not find an ally among mathematicians or scientists while trying to define “typical”.

Nor will they find an ally in the Constitution… where, last time I looked, there was still a guarantee of free speech.

Of course, what the Feds are responding to are the egregious abuses of endorsements and testimonials.  And God knows, there are liars and thieves and scoundrels in the business community who need to be outed and punished for polluting the joint with their scammy ways.

And it would make the Feds’ job oh-so-much easier if everyone would just stop… selling stuff… by providing context and examples that help prospects decide if they want to participate or not.

You know — all that advertising voodoo that fuels the engines of capitalism.

Meanwhile, over at the FBI, they’re hoping that criminals will stop murdering and plotting and stuff… because it’s really hard to keep order when people insist on being evil.

Also, the Oakland Raiders would like the rest of the NFL to stop picking on them.  Maybe let ‘em win a freakin’ game or something already…

Look — no marketer is forced to use testimonials.

Nevertheless — and regardless of what you may have read in various other blogs — they remain powerful tools for anyone in business. (In fact, let’s hope, real hard, that your competition gets so scared that they never use testimonials again in any way, shape or form.)

And, anyway… even if you do decide to never use a testimonial, you still should know how to collect them, what they should look like, and how to communicate with happy customers who want to say nice things about you.

It’s still the best kind of feedback you can get about your business.

It’s… oh, what’s that phrase… oh yeah: Word of mouth.  A thumb’s up from a satisfied customer.

Again, I’m not a lawyer.  Haven’t talked with one about the ramifications of this ruling (which is not, by the way, an actual “law”, but a recommendation).

Here’s some common sense, anyway: Don’t compensate people for giving you a testimonial, and say so in your ad.  (And if your stuff is so crappy that you have to pay people to say something nice about it… then create better stuff.)

If you get compensation for touting a product on your blog (which appears to be the crux of the ruling, despite the “deeper” readings by the more paranoid among us), come clean on that.  No biggie.

If you’re unsure about anything, pay attention over the next couple of months.

This ruling goes “official” December 1… and between now and then, there will be a lot of discussion about it.  (Is Jared of Subway out of a job?  And, since most diets fail most of the time… because people don’t follow them… will every diet book ever published in history have to be amended to reflect that fact that anyone who actually lost weight is a freak of nature?)

(Will the Home Shopping Network be forced to stop touting celebrity make-over programs?)

(Will any advertiser, ever, be allowed to show people in their ads… for fear that any implication of “typical” is not breached?)

Folks, this kind of hysteria shows up every few years in advertising.

Twenty years ago, for example, the Feds ordered magazines to put a big “Advertisement” slug on top of every long-copy ad run in the publication.

You know… so no one would get confused.  We don’t want anybody’s head exploding because they accidentally read an ad in Cosmo, thinking it was a real article.

Marketers flipped out… until they realized that putting the slug on top of their ads didn’t affect results (and sometimes actually INCREASED sales).  (Oh, the irony.)

The diet industry — which, by the way, I have refused to get involved with as a freelancer for over a decade now — has been subject to endless “you can’t do that” rulings on showing people’s before-and-after tales…

… and in the end, the smart marketers comply, and do and say everything the rulings demand…

… and life (and profit) goes on.

I’m not saying this ruling is something to ignore completely.

We’ll have to see how it plays out in reality… meaning, how the Feds actually decide to follow up, and how any actual enforcement (which clearly appears to violate the Constitutional protections of free speech) manifests itself.

It’s worth a long discussion.

I’m all for hampering the scam artists out there.  (Just to be clear:  If you’re an unethical marketer, I hope you rot in Hell.  After getting your head handed to you here on Earth.)

However, trying to re-invent capitalism by kicking it in the balls is not the way to go about it.

Again… this vague, extremely ambiguous ruling (not a law) won’t go into effect until December 1st, and there will be much input from established businesses between now and then.

The lawyers are loving it.  Let the paranoia ooze and scorch!

This is not, however, the end of capitalism as we know it. Nor are testimonials going away. (Again, pray that your competition stops using them, though.)

Let’s see what other shoes drop over the next few weeks, shall we?

Stay frosty,

John

P.S. And yes, we get affiliate commissions from any sale resulting from someone clicking on any of the banners on this blog.

It’s called marketing, folks.

UPDATE: The esteemed New York Times weighs in on this issue:  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/opinion/13tue2.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

Sunday, 7:57pm
Reno, NV
“It’s alive!” (Baron Von Frankenstein, kickstarting the Monster)

Howdy…

We’ve just fired up the Simple Writing System blog (www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog)…

… which means a stunning (and unprecedented) pile of free tools, tactics, advice and insight can be yours…

… just for the grabbing.

This is an all-out assault on reason and logic.  We’re just GIVING AWAY stuff that — not too long ago — would have cost you a pretty penny just to get a quick glimpse of.

We’ve created a beast here, and it’s name is FREE.

Here’s just a small taste of what’s piling up over there (that you’re missing out on if you haven’t signed in):

• A free swipe file of “home run” ads I’ve written (which few folks outside the target markets have ever seen)… can be in your tool kit tonight.  This swipe file, alone, is causing hearts to skip a beat among marketers and freelance writers who love to rip juicy headlines and sales angles from proven ads.  (Removes any guesswork on who/what to rip.)

• A short (but frightenly powerful) series of special reports channeling the best “how to make the sale” secrets I’ve ever used.  (I used to keep this stuff classified, only bringing it out during high-paid consultations… and here we are giving it away.)

• The actual video (torn directly from the masters hidden in Frank’s inner sanctum) of my “How to persuade, influence and sell the shit out of anything… using the simplest stories you can create” presentation at Mass Control.

What?  You didn’t see that presentation?

It’s marketing theater at its finest… and gives away the storytelling techniques that have earned me a fortune (seriously revealed for the first time in this wacky presentation that held the crowd in thrall).

And it’s free… at least for a few days… at www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog.

More…

• Have you heard the teleclass Ed Dale and I just did… about using sneaky social media tactics to overthrow your niche and capture total, unassailable “leadership positioning”… using only Twitter?

Dude — it’s FREE right now over there.  And coming up:

• Legendary adman Joe Sugarman actually punk’d me during a sizzling interview (which reveals his BEST sales-exploding secrets).  Oh, we’re laughing about it now, but it left me speechless, twisting in the wind last week when it happened.  (And I’m never speechless.  Joe is just that good.)

These are classic salesmanship secrets now lost, overlooked and ignored by most marketers…

… which is a HUGE advantage to you (IF you have the sense to start using them yourself).

• Wait a minute… you haven’t heard of James Schramko yet?

Are you living in a cave?  This guy rocketed (that’s the right word, too) from total obscurity… not even a year ago…

… to the very top of the online  money-making wizards pile.  Respect, fame, wealth and a well-earned rabid fan-base siphoning off his deep knowledge.

Best part: He took detailed notes during his climb to fame and wealth (as a rookie!)… and this webinar we’ve got is the first time he’s shared the really good insider stuff.

And it free!

What are you doing here?  Get over to www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog and grab this cornucopia of give-away goodies now.

Again: We’re only leaving access to the reports, the webinars, the videos and everything else…

… for a few days.

Then: Ffffft.

Gone.

(Big hint: One major reason James was able to zoom to the top… was his obsession with never missing an opportunity to grab the really good info whenever, and however, it became available.)

Here… it’s all free.

More:

• We reveal the next logical (and most lucrative) big step for any smart online marketer to make as the economy continues to morph.

Have you ever wanted to be one of those people who get advance notice on hot incoming trends?  Well, here ya go.

Colette Marshall (the queen of  “Product Sourcing”) spills everything you need to know in the free webinar we’re about to post.

• And get this: Blogmeister Extraordinare Yaro Starak reveals the secrets of living lavishly from a 2-hour workday… using nothing but a blog and some specific email tactics.  (It took him years to figure this out… and he just lays out the 7 simple steps, right here in a cool-as-heck webinar you can own for nothing.)

And how about this:  Just hearing someone’s blah-blah-blah story on striking it rich using a certain tactic is boring… and useless to you.

Unless you have access to the actual “case studies” outlining what was done, and what happened to generate the breakthroughs and hot results.

Well, guess what?

Yep.  Posted for free at www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog.

Look.  I could go on and on just describing the sheer awesomeness of what we’re giving away.

But you can just find out for yourself with a quick click on the link.

And I’m gonna suggest you do exactly that…

… right now.

www.simplewritingsystem.com/blog

I have poured massive quantities of energy, brain-power and time into creating this pile o’ goodies for you.  It took weeks of exhausting work.

I did it just to blow people away.

And it’s all there… for free.

Stop reading.

Go over there now.

This is life-changing stuff.

Stay frosty,

John Carlton

Monday, 9:21pm
Reno, NV
“Stop sniveling…” (Pretenders, “Tatooed Love Boys”)

Howdy…

Quick note here for those in need.

I’ve been almost completely retired from freelancing for some time now.  I still indulge a few long-time clients…

… but I haven’t taken on a new gig in over a year.

I’m devoting my time to teaching, and writing stuff for myself.

This makes me happy.

But it bums out business owners and entrepreneurs in a major way.  Because, often, someone will realize they need copy written…

… and they know, deep down, that I’m the guy who needs to write it to squeeze out max results…

… and… here’s the sad part…  they cannot bribe, cajole, threaten or offer me enough money to come out of this semi-retirement to do the gig.

Man, that’s frustrating.

Here’s the good news, though: I can now offer you… the next best thing.

If you need a writer who meets my strict, Operation MoneySuck, no-BS-allowed requirements for professionalism and quality…

… I now have a small “stable” full of them.

And we’ve just released a simple program that gives you immediate access.

These are professional writers who I have either trained and guided to expert status (over a period of years)…

… or who I have hired myself to do mission-critical work in my own business.

There aren’t many of them.

In my 25 years in advertising and marketing… I have only come across a handful of writers who meet (or exceed) the admittedly-brutal requirements I demand from myself, or from any writer I would work with.

This includes having the chops to guide you to the best possible solution for whatever problem you’re up against…

… to write outrageously-excellent copy that persuades and sells like crazy…

… and to meet all deadlines. (This is critical for any biz owner under a time crunch… and way too many freelancers out there can’t meet a deadline to save their lives.)

All while bringing to the table vast hands-on experience with all kinds of markets… in all kinds of economic conditions… both online and offline.

These are, in my honest opinion, the hottest freelancers available right now.

Best part: They all love working with entrepreneurs and small business owners… something a lot of the more famous writers out there refuse to do anymore.  (Or, like me, have retired from doing.)

So…

… if you’re in the market for a killer writer…

… who has been vetted by me, who has worked with me, and who gets my “thumbs up” for being a trusted veteran professional who can get the job done, on time, within your budget…

… then hurry over to this site:

http://www.carlton-copywriting.com

You’ll get all the details you need there.

And, if you’re interesting in actually talking with a writer, it’s easy to arrange…

… and you can start the simple, fast process right there on the site.

Warning: I cannot over-emphasize how FEW writers are in this stable.

It’s literally a handful.

I’ve plowed through a mob of writers over the years, passing on the vast majority…

… and I’m only allowing this program to go forward because I have finally found enough scribes I can vouch for to justify this announcement.

If you’re ready to talk to writers…

… and you want to be sure you’re talking to one who meets my strict requirements for professionalism and getting the job done right…

… then get over there now.

As you can imagine, this small band of murderously-good pro’s will book up quickly.

To see if this program is right for your situation, just follow the simple directions on the site.

There is no obligation just for talking to any of the writers, of course.

But we’ve got this process down pretty pat… and if your situation is right for one of these writers…

… well, this could be the happiest day of your life.

Cuz once you hook up with a good writer, you can get your biz on the fast track… and jam the pedal to the metal.

It’s a good time to check the site out, too… because we haven’t yet announced this program to the general market.

Right now, it’s still just you and us.

See you over there.

Stay frosty,

John

Sunday, 7:36pm
Reno, NV
“A thief believes everybody steals.” (E.W. Howe)

Howdy…

For those of you bugging me about the next Quiz…

… it’s coming, it’s coming.

Soon.

Tonight, though, I’ve gotta get something off my chest.

And so, a Rant.  By little Johnny Carlton:

Ahem.

There seems to be a parasite bug infecting the brains of many marketers out there.

Let’s call this bug… “Theft“.

It’s not going away anytime soon.

In fact, the very word has been mutating for a long time now… so that what would have easily been labeled “stealing” in the bad-old pre-Web days…

… is now considered smart and brave and even ethical.

Which means that the word “ethical” has also required some definition surgery, as well.

Okay, I gotta take part of all that back, right off the top.  (Note:  Rants often take sudden swerving turns like this.  Just relax and go with it.  You’ll be rewarded for your patience soon…)

This attitude — that taking something of value from someone else is not necessarily “wrong”, and may even be completely cool – has shown its ugly head before in my lifetime.

Remember Woodstock?

Forget about all the feelings brought up by that festival.  Boomer hippies assign the event iconic holiness, while later generations mock what they see as hypocritical bullshit from their elders.

Me? Still love the movie.  In fact, every year or so I line up “Monterey”, “Don’t Look Back” — Dylan’s ‘64 tour of England — “Woodstock”, “Isle of Wight Festival” — the ‘70 edition — and “Gimme Shelter”.

It’s a mini-film festival covering exactly 6 years — 1964 to 1970 — where things changed oh-so-dramatically in the world.  Innocence to grim chaos, told through the soundtrack of the time.  Lovely unintended documentary, these films…

It would have been great if the “spirit” of peace and love really had taken over the universe, and we all evolved into a groovy mind-meld of far-out angelic transmogrification.

Didn’t happen, of course.

The uncritical idealism of the time turned me, for example, away from the entire philosophy of idealism.  I loathe idealism now.  It’s counter-productive and rots minds.

And, as an older-and-maybe-wiser business owner, the most striking part of all these movies for me — aside from the music, which still astounds — is the way the “average” person saw no reason why everything shouldn’t be “free”.

Woodstock became a free concert because of shit-poor planning and bad fences.  They were forced to do it.

The bands were not consulted.  Nor were they happy about it.

And if you know the story, you know that the producers of the concert refused to declare bankruptcy, and eventually paid all their bills (though it took the organization many years to accomplish this task).

That’s old school.  Take your lumps, clean up your mess, and fulfill your obligations.

One year later, at the first Isle of Wight festival, a mob of angry socialist counter-culture types harshed everyone’s mellow by demanding that this concert be “free”, too.

Through a slo-mo riot.

It’s free, or we’ll kill you.

By the time the Stones offered a free concert at Altamont (documented in “Gimme Shelter”), things just got completely out of hand.

While the music still shines, the Isle of Wight film captures the chaos and confusion from the bands’ perspective: What?  Somebody’s gotta pay for putting this thing on, getting us here, and providing electricity for my gee-tar and Keith’s Bee-Three.

You think this shit all happens by magic?

I find this unresolved battle between clueless people waning a free lunch… and the practical folks who understand how lunches actually get made… fascinating.

Folks (including many biz owners) have been getting confused about capitalism since the first trade of something-for-something between cave men, lo, those many eons ago.

It’s particularly gnarly when prosperity collides with reality.

For example: I was a vandal as a kid.  Not proud of it, just saying.

I had no idea who erected the streetlights, or who ran the trains chugging along the tracks behind our house.  Stuff just happened, because that’s the way the post-war world operated.

So, when we took out the streetlight bulbs with BB guns, or derailed the noon Southern Pacific with a pile of railroad ties… there was no connection in our feeble brains about what consequences we were igniting.

We were bulls in the china shop.

Education was provided “free” to me, growing up.  Water came out of the tap, magically.  And, as far I could think it through, free.  Same with the radio, the TV, the mail, all all the other stuff that contributed to this “free” life for me.

It was a rude awakening to discover that, to buy a car and keep the tank full so I could take Suzie to the Who concert, I needed to generate “money” from a “job” to grease the machine of capitalism.

“Free” was so much more fun.

The World Wide Web was created by an unholy alliance of the Armed Forces and elite academia… both of which operated largely outside the demands of capitalism.   (Grants and Congressional budgets are not equal to a paycheck from a job.)

So the concept of “free” took root easily.

If you were among the early adopters of Web marketing, you must remember the snarling resistance to capitalism among the Web-heads dominating the landscape back then.

All software should be open source.  Selling stuff — any stuff at all — “polluted” the promise of a New Way Of Doing Things Online, where everything should be free (as God and Al Gore surely intended).

When non-techie-type people — your neighbors, for example — started flooding online, and finally got over the fear of using their credit card on a Web site, that “free” ethos collapsed in earnest.

Except for the really cool stuff… like music and intellectual property.

Hey — I don’t like the Big Music Moguls any more than you do.  They raped artists and kept a corrupt house since the first needle hit vinyl.

And the Grateful Dead/Coldplay model of allowing rips (and making their real money through touring) is a great tactic… except when it isn’t.

Okay, time out again.  I’m not gonna enter the fray of whether all movies and music should be available free on bit torrent sites.

No.

I wanna get more specific.

I wanna discuss the notion that ripping off another marketer’s ADS is somehow cool and hip and righteous.

This is where I was heading the entire time here.  A slight detour through Woodstock, down the side alley of my vandal past, across the lawn of the Internet, and finally into the parking lot of Marketing And Advertising.

When I was coming up through the freelance ranks, there was not another copywriter alive who thought it was okay to directly rip another writer’s stuff.

Seriously.

It was a sin to copy someone else’s stuff word for word.

You just didn’t do it.

There was theft, of course.  Thieving bastards who thought they wouldn’t get caught would be so brazen as to clip ads from newspapers, white-out the address in the coupon, type in their own address…

… and then submit the altered ad, as is, to their local paper for publication.

This happened to clients of mine.  A lot.  Ads I wrote were nicked in Australia — where US law couldn’t touch them, at the time — and run exactly that way.

These were not copywriters doing the deed.

These were thieves.  The lowest form of life in the food chain.

No one pretended it was otherwise.

As business on the Web progressed through the early years of this century, however…

… a curious thing happened.

Suddenly, it was okay to rip off another writer’s copy.  Word for word.

My fellow “old school” writers were appalled.  But powerless to change this re-definition of the word “ethical”.

I even decided to help the rippers out.  I gave a now-infamous workshop called the “License To Steal Seminar”… where I taught people how to rip 5 of my most successful ads.

Why did I do this?

Because everyone was ripping my ads incorrectly.

It pissed me off.

And so, I took it upon myself to teach budding writers what the swipe-file process actually entailed.

The key: Don’t blindly copy.

Instead, figure out the essence of how the sales pitch has been constructed in a good ad…

… and adopt what you learn when you write your own ad.

When I started out, I stalked Gary Bencivenga’s direct mail pieces because his writing “spoke” to me.

I would literally tear his packages apart, and mark them up with notes as I dissected his bullets, his word choices, and the way he guided his reader through the pitch.

But I never copied any of his bullets, or headlines, or even “close the sale” wording.

It was like studying Eric Clapton’s solo in “Crossroads”.  Sure, learn how he constructed it.  Learn how to emulate it.

But don’t go out and play it, note for note, in one of your own songs.  That would be rightly ridiculed.

Instead, “channel” Eric’s style if you must… but be original.

There are only a handful of notes (plus quarter and half-note bends) in the classic blues scale.  That “Crossroads” solo (correct me if I’m wrong) uses just A, C, D and E, up and down the neck, with bends.

Think about that.  A smattering of notes, arranged to send chills and thrills through a Clapton fan.  He has no legal or moral right to claim those notes as his, and no one else’s.  All musicians share the same scales.

And yet what he did was original, and easily identified.

Same with copy, people.  No writer can claim to “own” words like “how to”, or “absolutely free”, or “here’s what I have for you”, or anything else.

But an entire piece of copy…

… a successful ad really can become a work of art.  Worthy of emulation and inspiration.

However, you are CHEATING yourself if you rip mindlessly.

Look, I advocate swipe files.  They’re a great tool.  I include extensive swipe files — of my own stuff — in the packages I offer.

And, as I said, I offer insight to using these swipe files to help spur your own original creation of a good sales conversation.

Just plain old copying, though… it’s like taking your sister to the prom.

It may have all the appearances of a “real” date, but it’s not legit.  It is not a foundation to build anything on.

And this kind of mis-wired thinking produces a lot of hokey “They laughed when I sat down at the piano… but then I started to play…” kind of knock-off marketing.

It will look and sound silly if you don’t understand WHY that John Caples headline and copy worked.  (For the record: It’s a before-and-after type of head.  The key words are not “laughed” or “sat down”, but the juxtaposition of being put down with the “and then I started to play” tease, promising a story of redemption and new-found respect.)

I am now calm but still rueful about being perhaps the most ripped-off writer in the game these days.

It is not — as some might say — the highest form of flattery.  It is, in most cases, intellectual theft.

And it’s become accepted, without apology.

I’ve had books sent to me by folks who should be ashamed that they’ve copied large sections of my stuff… and pawned it off as their own.  And they are not ashamed at all.

I’ve witnessed speakers go on before me at an event… and tell my stories as their own (which sends me scrambling to adjust my own talk to get around the infraction).

This kind of shit leaves me baffled.

The real professionals in marketing never copy directly.  They may quote other writers, but they are lavish in praise while doing so, to ensure there is no confusion.

And they strive to be original at all times.

There are only so many commonly-used words in the English language.  The rich body of slang is refreshed constantly as we toy with phrases and cultural definitions.

If you can hold a conversation with someone, you can write what you need written for your biz.

You don’t need to steal blindly.

You can have a real date for the prom — all you need to do is get hip to the simple, easy process of doing what needs to be done to attain what you want.

Understanding why a good ad IS good gives you insight to what you must do in your own writing.

It’s not rocket science.  It’s actually easy to get into the groove of being original, once you’ve had just a touch of mentoring.

And when it finally clicks, you are off to the races.  You are no longer a slave to your swipe file, because you know how to have a sales conversation that gets results.

And that kind of knowledge just automatically fuels original thinking.

If you’re hot to embrace the freedom, independence, and wealth-generating mojo of knowing how to write everything you need written to make your biz rock…

… you can check out the Simple Writing System package I’ve made available.

I’m not gonna pitch you on it here.  You can decide for yourself if it’s what you need by going here to kick the tires: http://www.simplewritingsystem.com

It truly is a fun ride.

I’m also in the process of interviewing an astonishing array of marketing wizards — including a number of movers-and-shakers you may not have heard of yet (offering you an obvious advantage by learning their secrets before your competition).

These interviews will be released in just a few weeks from now.

And they will be free. No theft is required to access them.

So I’m just saying… you may want to keep your eyes peeled for the announcements of these free content-stuffed interviews.

It’s all part of my devious plan to help you get past your sticking-points and problems with writing your own fast, easy sales conversations that bring in the moolah.

Thanks for letting get all this off my chest here.

Especially the Woodstock stuff.  Been 40 years now.  Still a hell of a party, regardless of whatever else you might think about the event…

Stay frosty,

John

P.S. Really… what IS so funny about peace, love and understanding?

Friday, 1:04pm
San Diego, CA
“First, learn your craft.  It won’t stop you from being a genius later.”

Howdy.

Quick little note today, to take you through the weekend (while I’m down here in Baja La-La Land speaking at the star-studded “Paid For Life” seminar).

If you — like me in my mis-spent youth, and like the vast majority of folks out there who “can’t get started” — feel a sense of satisfaction over your ability to Think Deep on Big Thoughts…

… you’d be doing yourself a favor by murdering that satisfaction right now.

The best quote I’ve ever seen on this was by biz legend Peter Drucker:

“Brilliant men are often strikingly ineffectual.  They fail to realize that the brilliant insight is not by itself achievement.  They never have learned that insights become effectiveness only through hard systematic work.”

In other words…

… you will never get shit done — no matter how smart you are (or think you are) — until you get MOVING on your ideas.

I, too, was a lost and wandering soul… until I discovered (by accident) the concept of goal-setting and — just as important — the trick to actually putting your goal-achievement plans into action.

That trick?

Get off your butt.

Figure out what you need to know or possess to move to each new step in the plan, and then go acquire it.  Mentoring, information, tools, funding, partners, whatever you need.

Many a fabulous dream has been crushed by the realization that the world will NOT beat a path to your door if you invent a better mousetrap.

Nope.  In this universe, you must breathe life into your dreams, and get the word out.

That requires elbow grease, and the unpleasant reality of needing to work at it.

I grew up with dozens and dozens of smarter-than-me dudes with razor-sharp minds…

… and all but a few of them are slowly curdling in dead-end jobs that never came close to fulfilling the dreams they dreamed.

This is not a crime.  Unless you feel it is.

In which case, you have no one else but yourself to blame.

In this country, in this global economy, in this wired world…

… there is very little standing in the way of achieving almost anything you plan for and set out accomplishing.

That doesn’t mean it’s “easy” to follow your plans.

It’s not.  It takes discipline — which is still a dirty word to most folks.

And it takes a lifetime of paying attention and staying focused and digging in when things don’t go your way.

It is a daunting recipe for most people to even consider.

However, here’s the big secret no one’s hiding from you: Once you engage with life at this level…

… you’ll never go back.

Most of the wealthy entrepreneurs I know and hang out with are lazy.  Or, rather, they’re “selectively” lazy.

When they get after a goal, they are as passionately engaged as a bulldog going after a squirrel.  They enjoy it, they revel in the process, and they gain strength, energy and wisdom (especially self-knowledge) as they progress.

Setting goals, going after them… and achieving them… is more addictive than heroin.

And the side effects are life-changing.  And even disorienting at first.

Your friends will, for the most part, not enjoy your departure from the world of sloth and deep-thinking-without-action.  You may have to leave some of them behind.

You may encounter crushing loneliness… until you discover other like-minded pilgrims on the less-traveled paths of goal-attainment.  (This is why entrepreneurs continue to haunt seminars long after they’ve mastered their business — a huge part of the fun in this journey is in the people you encounter along the way.)

(A finer group of nut-jobs and wacky characters you will not find anywhere else.)

So, just consider “brilliance” as successful entrepreneurs do.

It’s simply not enough.

One decent idea, taken to completion, beats the crap out of a thousand brilliant insights never acted on.

Something to think about, no?

Stay frosty,

John

P.S. If you’re ready to start moving, and you know one of the gaps in your tool kit is being confident about your ability to communicate through writing… you know, for your websites, email, video scripts, ads and everything required for a decent marketing campaign…

… then check out www.simplewritingsystem.com.

I’m not gonna push on this.

When you’re ready, you’ll get over there.

I’m just saying… the tools are waiting for you to decide to get off your duff and get in the game.

Enjoy your weekend.

Thursday, 10:11pm
Reno, NV
“Ain’t it hard when you discover that he wasn’t really where it’s at… after he took from you everything he could steal?” (Bob Dylan, “Like A Rollin’ Stone”)

Howdy…

This is gonna be good.

And a whole lot tougher than any previous quiz I’ve given.

I’ll explain the prize in just a sec.

First, the set-up for the question:

I find it shocking that so many wanna-be-rich marketers out there still think the question of “short copy vs. long copy” is unsettled online.

I can tell you this: For the top guys — the ones sloughing off the vast majority of the moolah being made by entrepreneurs on the Web — it’s settled.

Whether you’re primarily using video, or email, or websites, or social media…

… the Main Big Damn Rule for getting people to part with their hard-earned money in trade for what you offer hasn’t changed since the first caveman traded up to a new cave with a view for a slab of mastodon meat:

The more you tell…

… the more you sell.

Hey — I love a good argument.  Don’t get me wrong.

And I’m always open to hearing someone out on this subject.

I realize that — for many people unsullied by actual experience in the biz world — it’s just plain tempting to believe that the rules of the universe have suddenly changed.

And you no longer have to be so… vulgar… to make a sale anymore.

Because, you know… the Web has changed everything.  Social networking has somehow mysteriously short-circuited the old skepticism, doubt, and fear of getting “taken” that has marred the smooth exchange of money in the past.

Now, hey, we’re all buddies on Twitter and Facebook!

Mi casa es su casa.

How much do you need?  Here, take my wallet…

Naw.

For anyone paying attention to what the entrepreneurs actually making money online are doing…

… there is zero doubt that classic salesmanship still is in operation.

The “long copy” may be broken up into half-a-dozen emails, or several shorter videos, or multiple blog posts, or webinars…

… but it’s still long copy.  You start at the beginning of a classic pitch.  You explain who you are, why you’re credible, why other people endorse you, what you’ve got, why it’s such a big thing, why you need to jump on this opportunity now…

… and exactly what you need to do next to pay me for it.

That final part — the “close” — is one of the most complex human-to-human transactions there is.  It’s simple when you get clued-in and learn the step-by-step process…

… but until you get hip, it’s just damned difficult to convince someone to give you money for what you offer.

If you can find a way to get through this process of persuasion with a few clever bon mots, avoiding any mention of actually (horrors) asking for money… then congratulations.

You’ve just entered a parallel universe.  Where webinars last two minutes, no email is longer than five words, and entire launch processes involve just saying “hi” and waiting for the money to pour in.

Okay, I’m being a dick here.  Nobody’s seriously suggesting two minute videos can do entire sales jobs.  (Are they?)

But this is a point that often deserves a bit of ridicule.

No matter how many times people who know discuss WHY long copy is still king… it never seems to sink in for the majority of newbies out there.

Which brings me to an interesting insight.  It may explain things — finally — in a simple way that makes it too obvious to ignore anymore.

Here’s that insight: There is a very important psychological reason for using long copy that hardly anyone ever discusses.

It’s a glitch in the way almost everyone’s brain works.

And it’s especially prevalent among folks who have become Zombified in their daily lives… lost in a trance caused by too much incoming stimuli from the modern world.

This Psychological Glitch is something that permeates nearly everything that people do…

… and it’s the main reason the world continues to operate pretty much on a permanent Self-Destruct “Who The Fuck Is In Charge” Mode.

This Psychological Glitch affects most of the decisions people make each and every day, all day long…

… on both mundane topics and issues that will decide the rest of their lives.

You see it in effect in the halls of Congress.

You see it in the pages of every newspaper and magazine on earth.

You hear it in every bar, and at every family gathering.

And — most of all — you encounter it every time you try to complete a simple capitalistic exercise in selling stuff.

So here is today’s Quiz Question:

“What is this Psychological Glitch in people’s thinking process that has made long copy so vital for the sales process?”

Yeah, I know it’s not obvious.

I want folks to think a little about this.  Real critical thinking, based on experience and observation and deduction.

When I reveal the answer, I’m pretty sure two things will happen:

1. You’ll slap the side of your head and say “Of course!”

2. And, you will wonder why this fact of life hasn’t been more prominent in discussions about marketing.  (Not to mention international politics, sports, the making of movies, and why your dumb-ass brother-in-law is always so adamant about his opinions at family dinners.)

So give it your best shot in the comments section.

Come on.  It’ll be fun to exercise your brain a little bit.

I know it’s not multiple choice.  Just roll with it.

The first dead-on answer gets a prize!

Now, because this question is so centered on copy, let’s make the prize relevant.

So: I’m giving away a nice, fresh copy of the legendary Freelance Course.

It’s everything I know (from 25 years at the top of the game) about making the Big Bucks as a respected, feared, and sought-after freelance copywriter.

Yes… it’s that same course that has been off the market for years at a time… because it was generating too much hot competition for working freelance copywriters out there.

This course has sold for up to $5,000 (back when I included personal coaching).  And never less than several hundred bucks (when available at all).

Every single writer in my “Stable O’ Copywriters” (the new semi-secret service we’ve created offering biz owners the immediate services of “Carlton Recommended And Supported Copywriters”) has devoured this course.

For anyone who’s ever considered the adventure, huge money, and total independence that a scorching career in freelance copywriting offers…

… this is the Holy Grail.

And I’m giving away a free copy to the first “best answer” to this puzzling question I’ve just posed.

This quiz will run all weekend long.

I’ll give a hint on Saturday if folks are having too much trouble thinking this through.

On Monday, I’ll reveal the intriguing (and rarely discussed) answer on this Psychological Glitch in folks that makes longer copy so damned important.

Don’t be shy.

The last quiz started a mini-riot (despite the correct answer coming in via the third poster).  Nearly 250 responses.

That was fun.  A nice online brawl.

Now, this question may throw many folks (and dampen responses).  I think you should still give it a shot, anyway.  (You have just as good a chance of accidentally scoring here as anyone else.)

Remember: This glitch is rarely included in discussions about short copy vs. long copy.  Or in talks about how to use social media.

It’s psychological.  That means it’s connected to how regular people think.

So consider how you, and the people around you, ponder stuff like “Should I buy that?”

Okay.  Here’s a hint: Check out www.snopes.com, and see if any of the urban myths revealed to be wrong on that site… were ever part of your belief system.

If so — and nearly everyone answers “yes” to that question at first, by the way — ask yourself why you ever thought such an obvious myth was ever true.

Okay, I’m giving away too much now.

Let the quiz begin.

Silence, please.

Brains, begin cogitating.

Stay frosty,

John

P.S. Watch this “P.S.” space for the hint on Saturday… if no one has given the right answer by then.

Monday, I’ll reveal all.

UPDATE & HINT: Okay, it’s Saturday.

And I’ve gotta tell you — there are two (but just two) posts in the attached hulking pile of comments that are close enough to be declared winners.

And no, I’m not gonna reveal which ones they are until Monday.

This is truly evil fun.  I’ve got several high-end copywriters privately emailing me with their answers (because they don’t wanna risk being wrong in public).

And they’re close enough to be pissed off about not nailing it exactly… and  far enough away to not be able to sleep.

Look — I told you this wasn’t gonna be an easy quiz.  I hope you appreciate the opportunity to think hard about communicating with prospects at this deep psychological level.  You win just by trying.

I’m still gonna give another hint for those still playing.

Here’s that hint: Look at the photo up at the top of this post.

It’s a lighthouse in Australia.

Now, ask yourself: What do you know about lighthouses?

Imagine you’re in a conversation with a group of people, and the topic of lighthouses comes up.  Your brain whirls around and clicks on the file “What I know about lighthouses”.

You mentally open that file, and… what happens?

How does your participation in the conversation proceed?

Consider how you — not some hypothetical person — would engage in this conversation about lighthouses.  What are you doing, using that thin mental file on the subject?

Okay, I’m really giving it away now.

Remember: This is a GLITCH in the way we think.  It’s not necessarily a rational response, nor a logical next step.

(Some folks consciously smother this glitch, but it can take years of practice.  It’s the default position for most people.)

I’ll publish the specific answer on Monday.  Understanding this one piece of street-level psychology will help you more with your next attempt to sell something… than all the reading you could do online right now about copywriting.

See you Monday, then…