The Death of What, Exactly?

Hello again.

I'll get back to public speaking next week, I think, when we're all back into the swing of things...

Meanwhile, I thought I'd share a couple of lessons I've re-learned during the Christmas lull.

Firstly, when anyone publishes an ebook or white paper titled, 'The Death of....' you'd be very unwise to take it at face value - of course, they just want your attention. But when Michel Fortin publishes a white paper and calls it 'The Death of The Salesletter', you should certainly read it. As one of the world's top copywriters, he certainly knows what he's talking about. Which is why I'll give you 'The Death of The Salesletter', just for signing up to Roy Everitt dotcom...

Secondly, when anyone talks about the death of anything in business, that claim is almost always premature. We've even had 'The Death of The Internet' and yet, here we still are.

The obituary for email marketing has been written several times, despite the fact that emails clearly still work. And they work despite the fact that we're all bombarded with more emails than we can possibly read, with more links to websites than we can possibly follow, and with more downloadable ebooks than we can possibly use. Email marketing still works well in the right niches. And, being more or less free, it still works well enough in some areas where it hardly works at all - a one percent response or less is fine if you can send a million emails at almost no cost.

But when you have a much smaller list to market to, you need a much better response, which means you have to give a lot more thought to your campaign - to your offer and how you present it. That's when you want your response to be in double figures, or better. That's when you need some real expertise on your side.

So, a twenty-four percent response to an email marketing campaign can't help but be pleasing. That was the response we got to our last campaign. So far, about seventy of the roughly two hundred and eighty-odd people we've emailed have signed up for our latest venture. Over thirty of the original two hundred and thirty or so actually attended our first event, despite it being just a week before Christmas. We're almost nervous about inviting any more in case the venue can't cope with the numbers...

What this shows is that we chose the right medium to market our product. Another product might sell better through printed direct mail, yet another by online sales and pay per click. Word of mouth and referrals will almost always work.

But get your offer right, put your message across well and market to the right people, and you can still sell - even in the week before Christmas.

And even by email...

Roy Everitt, Writing For Response.

PS. What you must not do in these circumstances is pay too much attention to the few people who didn't like your marketing method. If it worked, and you got the response you hoped for, that's all the approval you need. Marketing, as someone once said, is a 'numbers business'.

The Old Ones Are The Best

... sometimes, anyway.

Hello again.

With all the hype and genuine enthusiasm for Web 2.0 in all its manifestations, it's easy to forget how effective 'traditional' (ie, more than 12 months old) marketing methods still are.

For example, when you want to know something, especially something a little bit obscure, do you go to Facebook, or MySpace? Not if you've any sense. You'll see some fascinating stuff and some amazing people there, but in terms of finding just what you need to know, they're not the places to look. Likewise, YouTube.

Nope - you 'Google' when you want to find something. And all the web 2.0 stuff is partly aimed at getting good traffic and therefore good rankings on Google and the rest, anyway.

It follows that putting your business in front of people on Google is still a very good thing to do. So it follows that Google Adwords are still worthwhile, providing you can keep the cost per click down. It also makes sense to have Google Adsense on your pages if you can keep the cost per visitor down.

A few weeks ago, I came a cross a product that shows exactly how one Brazilian man, with next to know Internet experience, made himself a multi-millionaire using Google's pay per click. The idea is very simple - you find a way to get traffic cheaply and then sell on the qualified leads at a much higher price.

The devil, as usual, is in the detail, and it took Canadian marketer Alex Goad months of questioning to uncover the finer points of the technique and put it to profitable use for himself.

Does $3.5 million a year sound profitable enough?

Well, now he's willing to tell us all about it too, in Google Payload.

It's got to be worth taking a look.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS I don't know if Alex Goad (what is it with the name Alex and Internet success?) is planning to put the price up, but I do know he should! Go to Google Payload now, before he realises what he's got!

The Post Launch Profits Prophet

That's me...

Hello again,

As predicted, I didn't win the Post launch Profits affiliates' contest. Hardly surprising when you see the calibre of some of those on the leader board. So I'm not too downhearted.

At Least Alex Jeffreys has confirmed my theory about the value of strong joint venture partners - JV partners like Michael Cheney, Tahir Shah (if you haven't heard of him, you soon will), and David Congreave, although John Thornhill came out on top.

And, at the risk of repeating myself, it is the post launch profits that really count. And you can still get PLP for nothing. Click on the ad to the right, or click here to go to Post Launch Profits' sales page.

Roy Everitt, Writing For prolonged Results!

PS. You might have been wondering where the public speaking articles have gone. Or rather, when they're going to appear. I did say 'in the next week or two'... I guess it's gonna be two... Monday at the latest, I promise!

"Why Should I Tell You...

...My Secrets?"

Hello again.

It's the kind of question any successful person could ask. Why, indeed?

After all, if it's made someone rich, why would they want to share? Won't that just improve the competition and make it harder to become even more rich?

Surely, there's only a limited amount of this 'richness' thing to go round? *

And when someone offers not to sell you their product, but to give it away, what gives? Why would they do that? And yet, they do.

It's madness - but there's method in their madness, as my mum used to say.

Obviously, there's some benefit in there for them, even if we can't quite see it at first glance.

Well, there are at least two good reasons to give something away. Two very different reasons but each equally valid - one short term and one long term.

First, the short-term gain: I'll give you this now and I'll offer to sell you something even better while you still feel that cosy 'he's a nice guy' glow. There's certainly nothing wrong with that, and it's what Alex Jeffreys is doing with Post Launch Profits. You don't even need the warm glow, but the giveaway makes him seem like a straight-up kind of guy, which he is.

(So take his giveaway PLP ebook and certainly don't be afraid to buy the upsell - if Alex has done it it's guaranteed to be good.)

The second reason a 'guru' might give you the keys to his kingdom - or to his library of knowledge, anyway - is that we all get richer quicker if we have help. If I can reach a thousand people and you can reach a thousand, we can both reach two thousand by cooperating. But a guru reaches tens of thousands, most likely, and probably more, and you may have a hundred or less on your list. So what's he or she buying into?

Time to be flattered. If a guru shows real interest and you don't have a killer product and your list is paltry, then he or she's not interested in your list or your product - they're interested in you! I listened to a telesminar the other evening by another Alex, Alex Mandossian, and he listed the three stages of his perfect student:

Year one, student

Year two, affiliate

Year three, partner

With you as a successful partner, Alex Mandossian, like any other guru, gets more success as well.

I don't know about you, but I was never a perfect student - it was always 'Could do better'. But at least now we all have an incentive to really do our best!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. As Alex Jeffrey's affiliate contest for Post Launch Profits draws to a close, I can be pretty confident I haven't won - damn it! But, as Alex has been preaching, the real, sustainable income is in the months after the launch...

PPS Alex M also said that some of his students do the student-affiliate-partner trip in three months rather than three years. Now that's an incentive to really buckle down!

PPPS Of course, if you want to learn more of my secrets, you'll need to sign up for Roy Everitt dotcom. The form is waiting for you, top right on this page.

* Actually, no. There are some very good explanations of why that is in books like Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and others. I'll come back to it another time.

Now Post Launch is Post Launch

Well, perhaps not quite...

Hello again.

If you've been following the progress of Post Launch Profits you might be wondering how it's going. Well, Alex Jeffreys reports it's going very well, thanks.

But the point of Post Launch Profits, of course, is that Alex will continue to profit post-launch.

I'm sure he will, and I'm sure he doesn't need any good luck messages from me. But if you want to be a part of Post launch Profits - and that means you continuing to profit, too - get over to Post Launch Profits right now.

Roy

What Everyone Isn't Doing

Hello again.

If you've been following my posts here or in my emails, you'll know that I'm a keen advocate of networking and joint ventures. That particular route is a pretty reliable one to take if you want to build a list quickly and sell your product quickly. It also gets you noticed.

Which is probably why just about everyone else is promoting it, too.

So here's something that everyone isn't promoting (but top marketers are actually doing)...

Actually, before I tell you what it is, consider this:

As a marketer, you need to communicate a sense of 'you' - your values, your experience, your integrity. I don't know many top marketers who hide behind a company name, do you?

Over 90% of our communication is not in the words we use. Considering how powerful the right words can be, that's pretty amazing.

The spoken word, with the added benefits of tone, accent, intonation, pauses and the rest, conveys more meaning, but it still lacks something...

Use video, and you've got body language to add to the mix.

But even if that's your writing, your spoken word and your video, it's still not quite you.

The only logical conclusion is this: to sell you, you need to present you. And the only way to do that is to appear in person.

You can do that to some extent by networking, and you might speak to ten, fifteen or twenty people during the course of a day, which isn't bad. But networking's main benefit, as we've seen, is in finding jv partners.

So why not speak to fifty or a hundred people in a single hour - and still speak to your ten or fifteen potential jv's afterwards?

Public speaking scares a lot of people, but it's a great skill once you master it, and even grasping the rudiments will impress the majority of people - it's rather like having a book to your name, in the way it immediately makes you an expert. But, unlike your book, public speaking puts you into direct contact with your audience. At the same time, it sets you apart...

However ordinary you may think you are, once you've been on stage you're something like a star.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Good news for those of you who are still nervous about the idea: over the next couple of weeks I'll be passing on some first-hand advice on public speaking - from conquering nerves to getting engagements and, most importantly, working out exactly what to say.

PPS. Sign up for Roy Everitt dotcom and you'll get that advice straight to your inbox, to keep and use whenever your opportunity knocks!

Post Launch Profits Launches!

It's here!

Hello again.

As promised, here's the link to Post Launch Profits

There's already quite a buzz going around about Alex Jeffries' new product.

Almost exactly a year ago, Alex launched his first product. It went pretty well, by all accounts, as well-supported launches often do. But there's a story behind these massive launches that's not often told...

You see, even the biggest launches often only last a few days. A few very exciting and lucrative days, it's true, but a few lucrative days is not enough to build and sustain a business.

No, what you often don't get to hear about is what happens next - how the really successful marketers sustain their income for week after week and month after month. It's something Alex had to learn pretty fast, and that's what he's sharing with the world today. It's how he turned one successful launch into a $100,000 year...

And it's how you can do the same.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about this product, which I know has taken months to write is that it's free... I suggest you download it right away, at Post Launch Profits

Roy Everitt, Writing For Sustained Results

PS It's one thing creating a great product, getting jv partners and affiliates on board and launching it successfully (actually, that's three things), but the next step you'll need to take is to sustain your post launch profits. Alex Jeffreys tells you how. Here's the link again, to Post Launch Profits.

Waiting For the Green Light

Hello again.

This is one I'm bursting to tell you about, but can't...

Not quite yet, anyway.

Remember a short while back I told you how useful it can be to be mixing with top people and with the up and coming people, for that matter, at networking events. It's given us advance notice on three major launches in the last few weeks, meaning review copies of the products and a head start with the strategies they outline.

You'll also remember I mentioned Alex Jeffries, and his imminent product launch. That launch is today, but not quite yet.

But later today, I'll be able to tell you all about his new product, his ambitious plans for it, and most importantly, its absolutely enormous value to you. And of course I'll include a link to take you straight to it.

It's going to be big, it's going to change lives and help people get where they really want to be - and you can get there from here in just a few hours' time!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. To make sure you don't miss the announcement (I know how life can get in the way!) join Roy Everitt dotcom using the sign-up form at top right on this page. I'll email you every time I update this page, and you'll get exclusive advanced notice of some other great stuff too.

Five Ways to Secure a JV Deal...

(By Jacqui Carrel)

Hello.

No, I can't guarantee any of these methods will work, but they will ALL improve your chances of securing that all-important agreement from a major marketer to promote YOUR product.

You see, the main problem you'll have with your jv proposition, once you've got a great product and a good conversion rate and a great 'fit' to your target's list, is getting your jv target to listen to it.

So, keeping the promise I made to you yesterday, here are five ideas you might try:

• Email them personally. I've started with the method least likely to succeed, so you can see that even this can be done well or badly. Emailing these days will often get you nowhere. I get dozens of emails every day, and I expect you do too, and most of them are junk. Of those that aren't, I probably read about ten percent (unless I'm very bored, which isn't often these days), the rest I save for 'later' - which never comes. An email addressed to me by name, that looks like it might be a personal message, will at least get read promptly, so think of an original and personal-sounding subject line. Maybe try a topic you know they're interested in away from work - but it must tie in with the subject of the mail, even if a little tenuously.

• Write to them. A real letter, that is, with a hand-written envelope, addressed to them personally. We hardly get any personal mail these days, so a brief letter, again hand-written if possible, that speaks to them, might just sway them. Maybe tell them you'll follow up with a phone call, or invite them to phone you - don't forget to leave your number! Remember to make a strong sales pitch within your friendly little note.

• Join the forums on their membership sites and read and post regularly on their blogs. Get yourself known by name, at least. You'll have your email and website address in your profile. Then you can contact them through their site or by email or letter, or...

• Phone them. Some people are genuinely too busy to answer their own telephone, but not always the people you might expect. Speaking with them directly is much more likely to give you the results you're after and much more likely to get you off on a friendly footing, too. Even if the answer is 'no' this time, you're more likely to be remembered if you've actually spoken, and a good impression now may well pay dividends next time - in the form of a 'yes'. We all like working with people we know and like - it's simple human nature.

• Meet them face to face. Network, in other words, and try to get to the events where your targets are most likely to be - often as speakers. That doesn't make them untouchable or out of bounds. Networking like this also throws up other opportunities for joint ventures that you probably haven't considered. At the very least, you can speak to several different potential jv partners in the course of one networking day. Know what you're offering and be prepared to think on your feet, because there will probably be other deals on offer that you should consider.

That's my five for today. I've assumed you've done your homework on your 'targets', found or created a great product, demonstrated that it will sell, and that you are the kind of person a successful marketer will be happy to work with.

And I'm sure there are plenty more ways to get the attention of the big guns in Internet marketing - let me know about any you've had success with!

Jacqui

PS. Never forget, we're dealing with human beings here, so what works with one target might be exactly the wrong way to approach another. Trust your instincts, listen to their advice about what works (because that's probably what works with them), but most of all, TAKE ACTION. When you have a good product to promote, for goodness' sake PROMOTE IT!

(Copyright Jacqui Carrel 2007)

Lessons from History

What a Seventeenth Century Frenchman Can Teach Us About Business

Hello again

Isn't it odd how one thing leads to another? Or, how something totally unrelated can give you insight into a problem that was already on your mind - producing a solution from a direction you never expected?

While it's great to find a solution in an unlikely place, it's also good to have something confirmed by an unlikely source. Even from seventeenth century France.

One of the best ways to quickly build a business is through arranging joint ventures with people who have the ingredient you currently lack. That might be a product that you can sell to your list or to a market you have access to, or it can be the market for a product you already have.

But why should anyone help you?

Well, by and large, successful people are incredibly generous if you ask for help. But there is a limit, not least to their time, so they can't possibly help everyone who asks. And they are in business, and the first thing a business person asks, when they have their business hat on, is 'What's in it for me?' In fact, that's the first thing your customers ask, as well, so selling a joint venture proposition to a potential partner is very similar to selling a product to a customer.

That Frenchman, Jean de La Bruyere (1645-1696) had this to say:

'The shortest and best way to make your fortune is to let people see clearly that it is in their interests to promote yours.'

Promoting their interests, in our case, means helping to build their business and their fortune. (For the general public, their interests may be something other than business or finance, like relieving their pain, for example.) But now your 'market' is much smaller, so you need your success rate to be much higher. Which means you have to be very clear exactly what's in it for them and make sure it's something very good!

For most new businesses, finding customers is the major issue. For an online marketer, those customers are probably already in someone's list. Your job, then, is to persuade the list owner that it's in their interests to promote your product.

Not just that it's a great product.

Not just that you're a great person.

Not just that you need the money!

But, that it's in their interests. More than that, they'll want to see some evidence that the product sells well and easily, has few returns and will enhance their reputation if they promote it. They may not have time to evaluate the product for themselves, or to create the sales copy.

So, if you have a product you'd like to promote through one or more joint ventures, you need to be able to show them results from your marketing efforts.

You'll need a sales page that converts visitors into customers - before you approach potential partners. Test this by driving traffic to it using Adsense, MSN Live or similar, as well as free methods like blogs, forums and social networking sites. Then your list owner knows they'll get decent sales when they send their customers there. Two percent conversion is quite reasonable for untargeted traffic, ten times that is desirable for pre-qualified visitors.

Be able to show few if any returns, and most of all, show them they'll make good money! You'll usually have to offer at least 50% commission to a jv partner, more to a top marketer.

Your product must be a good 'fit' with their list, and it must offer something new or unique or offer it in a new and better way.

Put those things in place, though, and you've a much better chance of convincing someone your product is worth promoting.

Getting the attention of your potential partner is another matter. I'll cover that next time!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

I Know, I Know...

Why the Best Information is More Than Just Learned.

Hello again.

No, I'm not trying to be smug, but there I some things I've learned and there are some things I know. The same will be true for you, too.

The difference is this: the things we learn, are things we've learned to be true, with a pretty high degree of confidence, whereas the things we know are those things we've actually experienced in the real world.

Just as a man can never know how it feels to give birth, however much he reads about it and however empathetic and sensitive he is, so you and I can never really know the things we read about but don't experience for ourselves.

And when it comes to transmitting that knowledge to other people, the difference can be hard to hide. Somehow, real experience, whether we mention it explicitly or not, gives a real authority to a piece of information. Mere knowledge, while it may be equally comprehensive in detail and just as accurate, can often lack that authority.

So it is with information products. The feeling may be hard to pin down, but sometimes we know that a product lacks authority, even though it's superficially impressive (and accurate, valid and useful). We can't always put our finger on just why that is, but it's there nonetheless.

So, when you're creating an information product, it's not always enough to have devoured every bit of information you could get your hands on, if you haven't actually used that information in real life. That's why we can all write and speak with greater authority on subjects we've been involved in for years - it's real knowledge, not learning.

Can you turn some of your real, hard-won knowledge into a genuine, authoritative information product? Will that be more valuable, thanks to your authority, than an apparently more valuable piece of learned information?

It's worth thinking about. Knowledge is power, but real knowledge is power with real authority.

Roy Everitt, Writing for Results

PS. Some of the most successful information products are actually produced very quickly, by people with the wit and foresight to learn all about the latest software, for example, by testing and trying it out, then writing or speaking about it. Often, these users' guides and how-to's become an essential must-buy or bonus item for anyone buying the original product.

You can see these in book stores - the 'for Dummies' books are excellent examples, but they are still book shop books, with the inevitable publishing, printing and distribution delays. Online, the equivalent ebooks have been known to appear in days or even hours after the launch of a product.

Chris Starts a Stampede

Hello.

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned a new product I'd seen, by Chris Freville, called 'Web 2.0 Stampede' - a product I was more than happy to endorse.

Having met Chris at Robert Puddy's event at Coventry (the same one where I met both David Congreave and Alex Jeffreys - do you get the impression that was a great event?), he straight away got back in touch with a review copy of Web 2.0 Stampede.

Sometimes, 'professionally written' products are a disappointment. Some writers just can't write (yet thrive anyway), while some well-written products are devoid of good, useful content. Chris's product, on the other hand, ticked all the boxes. It was, generally, excellently written (it falls away slightly at the end, perhaps), is jam-packed with good, useful and original content, and it's set out in a way that makes it all easy to use.

So, it's hardly surprising that the Web 2.0 Stampede sale page has had thousands of hits, because I know a lot of big-name marketers were also happy to endorse the book to their lists, plus he's had a lot of complimentary comments on various forums and blogs. You'll find a link to Web 2.0 Stampede to the right of this article.

If you haven't seen it yet, get there now. Web 2.0 is not going anywhere but up. You'll be wise to go with it!

Roy Everitt, Writing for results

PS. See what all the fuss is about! Click on the blue banner ad to the right to go to Web 2.0 Stampede.

Be Ahead of the Crowd

Stick With Me!

Hello, once again.

One of the major benefits of networking to the extent Jacqui and I do, especially now we're well past the 'novice' stage, is that we often get asked to help in the launch of a new product. Because, to do that, we usually have to see a pre-launch edition of whatever we're helping to launch. So we're among the first people to see the new product.

Which is an advantage in itself, because it means we can put new products into action as soon as they're released, while everyone else is still finding out about them.

It also means I can give you advance notice of the really interesting stuff, so you're ready to grab it and get in ahead of the main wave the moment it goes on sale.

Now, a few days ago I told you about David Congreave and his new product, Lucid SEO. I met David at Coventry (actually, the hotel was in Meriden), and was immediately impressed. Another whom I met there was Alex Jeffreys, who is also very definitely going places.

Alex has been in business online for almost exactly a year and had an excellent first twelve months with his first product, 'Easy Profit Auctions'. To mark that anniversary, Alex's second product will be launched very soon. Putting into place everything he's learned in his first year (including not trying to launch a product at Thanksgiving!), Alex is confident this launch is going to be even more successful than his first, and his next twelve months will be even more lucrative than the last twelve.

Not surprisingly, Alex is determined to get everything spot-on for the big day, to the extent that he hasn't even released the name of his new product. But I can tell you it's an information product designed to help anyone who reads it and takes the lessons on board, wildly successful in Internet marketing.

As soon as Alex is ready for 'proper' pre-launch, as opposed to 'pre' pre-launch, I'll be able to tell you more. Meanwhile, I get to see it first, and I can tell you it's good!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Getting advance copies of great new products is just one benefit of mixing with the successful and the up-and-coming. But as incidental benefits go, it's not bad. And if you're not networking, it's something else you're missing out on!

Grab Camtasia - Free!

Because I can't quite believe they meant to do this.

Hello again.

Excuse the urgency, but this is one opportunity that is genuinely too good to miss.

Camtasia - Free.

Yep - not a trial version or a freeware copy or a special, reduced-usability version, but Camtasia 3, absolutely free.

To get it, before they realise what they've done, go here to download the trial version: http://download.techsmith.com/camtasiastudio/enu/312/camtasiaf.exe to your desktop, or wherever.

Then go to this page and enter your details as requested, whereupon you'll be emailed a 'software key' (a password, really) by Techsmith that enables you to install Camtasia 3, absolutely free. Here's the page:
http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia/pcpls.asp

I'd do it right away if I were you. Alright, so they'll offer you an upgrade to the latest version (version 5, I think), but it's very easy to ignore!

And if you're wondering what the hell Camtasia is, it's that very clever video-capture software that allows absolutely anyone to create a 'how to' video on their computer. Like 'How to build a website', or 'How to use Camtasia', for that matter. And since video is the 'must have' information product now, you'd be daft not to grab it.

Camtasia is a brilliant tool, and I promise I didn't hesitate to steal it!


Roy, Writing For Results

Turning The Black Art into Science

Hello

You know how some people have an air about them, of authority, confidence, ability?

Well, one of the more impressive people I've met on my networking travels recently is David Congreave. Not only does he have that air of confidence and ability, he also knows he's going places.

Even more impressive to me is that he seems to have mastered the black art of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) to the extent that he's made it a practical science. One we can all follow, too. Not that he's working alone. Like most people who really make a go of Internet marketing, David has a couple of joint venture partners in this product.

What is SEO?

SEO helps you get your site high in the search engine rankings without paying loads for 'pay-per-click'. High ranking is vital for visibility, traffic and, ultimately, sales. So if you have any kind of website and want people to find it without paying the earth, you should think carefully about anything that helps you master SEO easily and quickly.

Last night David Congreave was on a teleseminar with very successful marketer Terry Telford (who I think he met at the same event) as part of his new product launch, for 'Lucid SEO'.

Tonight sees the launch proper. Go to http://www.lucid-seo.com/ now, and see just how impressive David's brand new product is.

Roy

PS. As with all these things, the people who put them into action first are the ones who tend to benefit the most. You can hardly do better than getting in on launch day!

PS. David also publishes The Nettle magazine, and now The Nettle 2. Google those and let me know if you're as impressed as I was.

Boom is Busting Out All Over

Hello, once again.

From great ideas going missing (see last Thursday's post), I suddenly have three slightly less stupendous things I need to talk about. I'll stick to one for now...

On Friday, I mentioned the recession that's about to hit, and told you how great an opportunity that can be, as long as you know how to make the best of it.

But thoughts of recessions, depressions and weary, worn-down people reminded me of a story I heard quite some time ago, possibly from Dan Kennedy, possibly not.

It concerned a salesman of the old school (still with us, of course, despite 'everything' being online now), who was selling encyclopedias door to door. At one run down looking home, he was invited in. The couple sat him down and offered him a drink, making him feel very welcome. Clearly, they had very little money and hardly any possessions that didn't look old and tired. The carpet was threadbare, the cups and saucers didn't match, there was an ancient radio in the corner of the lounge, etc, etc.

But the husband wanted to buy his encyclopedias - the complete set of which would probably cost as much as the combined value of all their other possessions.

The salesman doubted they could afford them. More importantly, he didn't think they should. They should spend what little money they had on essentials, like food and fuel.

Still he wanted the books.

The salesman, very politely, said no, and decided he should leave.

At which, the gentle, mild mannered husband flew into a rage, chased him out of the house and down the street, shouting after him: 'Who are you to say what I can and can't afford? What business is it of yours to tell me what I should spend my money on?'

Who indeed?

There are people today, who insist they are trying to sell their products, but who nonetheless get squeamish about actually asking people for their money. 'They might not be able to afford it' is just another excuse we make for not trying very hard.

Our concern is whether the product is worth the money we ask for it - not whether someone else 'should' spend that money. It really is none of our business. We really know next to nothing about them. We must offer them good value and let them choose.

That's our job and that's all our job is...

And as an aside, who knows what value we might now put on all the information in those encyclopedias? They were probably a bargain, and it shows information marketing is nothing new!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Speaking of progress (and valuable information), 'Web 2.0 Stampede' represents a large dollop of both, at a very affordable price, even in these apparently straightened times. Clck on the blue banner to the right, and take a look.

If I Read it in The Papers...

...It must be true.

Apparently, there's a depression on the way. 'Everyone' is saying as much, so I guess it will happen, even if it wasn't going to before.

Sometimes, I think 'everyone' just gets a bit bored with doing okay from time to time...

But anyway, there's a recession on the way and it's great news.

Not for everyone, it's true. But for me, and for you, if we both play it smart.

Because the business I'm in thrives on difficult times and competition and even a shortage of cash. If that sounds counter-intuitive then you may be a marketing executive or the head of a company that's about to 'pull in its horns' in a vain attempt to ride out the recession.

I was born in the 1950's and, although the war was long over, the UK was still deep in debt as a result of it. The UK economy was struggling and a lot of prewar companies didn't survive.

Some, though, thrived.

Mysterious, eh? Some kind of conspiracy? Not really. The companies that thrived during the most difficult periods of the last hundred years (it was much the same in the decade or so after the first war) were the ones who invested in marketing, in a big way. Pretty much all the household names of the fifties and sixties became household names because they advertised - on commercial television, in newspapers and magazines and on commercial radio (mostly 'pirate' stations in the UK back then).

Their goods weren't cheaper and they weren't better - they were just there.

And most of them survived, while the firms who drew in their horns and tried to ride it out, very often didn't.

And, as marketing people, we owe it to our clients to remind them of the lessons of history. When there's a squeeze on, and money is tight, we all tend to spend it on the products that are most visible, and not on the ones that seem to disappear. If there are two items to choose from, we'll choose the one that's put in front of us.

For us, there's a simple lesson:

you must market yourself hard and persuade your clients to do the same. If they want to not just survive the recession, but thrive in it, they must out-sell the competition. Persuade them of that and, for you and your clients, the boom times are here!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

What's the Big Idea?

Hello again

A question for you: Are you an 'ideas' person?

Me, too.

I find ideas passing through my mind at the most inopportune moments. You know the times I mean: when you're in the bath, when you're driving, when someone or something else demands your attention.

Keeping a notebook handy isn't always an option. A voice recorder is sometimes a better idea. Telling the person we're with can help us remember. I never did tie a knot in my hankie...

So, at these moments, we can sometimes be forgiven for not committing the idea to any kind of lasting medium, and so, sadly, forgetting what it was.

Because the problem with passing ideas is that they so often seem to be just that - passing into our brains on one side and straight out of our brains on the other.

Which is all the more reason why we should all remember to take notes on the occasions when we can. When it's easy, convenient and not impolite to do so. I know that, you know that, we all know that.

So why do we so often forget to do it?

Because it's such a good idea?

That would explain why the brilliant idea I had for today's blog entry is apparently lost forever!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Despite that mishap, today has been a very productive day, with a report written, our next major product a few steps nearer completion, another small project ready to send to the customer and a proposal in the air for yet another joint venture.

It keeps us busy...

And it's all such good fun!

Selling Information Products

Hello

Just a quick one this evening...

As a copywriter, part of my business is in creating and marketing information products. In fact, the major products we're working on at Cinnamon Edge right now are information products to be marketed offline and online.

There's no doubt that the online option is the cheaper, easier option for beginners to the information product business. With that in mind I wrote a brief report about a year ago on how to get started online.

A few months ago I updated my beginners' guide and I've just made some more minor changes and posted it online HERE.

If you've been wanting to try your hand at info products but just don't know where to start, then start with my beginners' guide. It's totally free, you don't have to sign up for anything and it doesn't even need downloading.

Just read it on your screen, or feel free to print it and pass it on as you wish. Just keep my details intact if you do.

It's online and waiting for you right HERE.

UPDATE: Today saw the launch of a great new product that takes online marketing into the Web 2.0 age. And if that sounds a little intimidating, rest assured that Web 2.0 Stampede takes you every step of the way with Facebook, MySpace, etc, and every other manifestation of Web 2.0. I was lucky enough to get a preview copy, and it's brilliantly written. You can get your copy by clicking HERE.

Cheers for now,

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. If you're after some more advanced information, leave me a message here or email me here and I'll try to help. I look forward to hearing from you.

PPS. Don't forget, you can be amongst the first to get Web 2.0 Stampede here.

If One Little Word Wasn't Impressive Enough

... How about one little letter?

A few weeks back (on 21st October) I told you how adding one little word to a client's shampoo label had saved the career of a struggling copywriter. To save you a trip through my archive, the word was 'repeat'.

It doesn't take a lot of imagination to see how that almost doubled sales, or why almost every shampoo since then has used the same 'rinse and repeat' mantra. In fact, it's become a cliché for marketers too. As in, 'If it works once, do it again...'

But copywriters can trump 'one little word' with 'one little letter'. There are a few instances, but I'm grateful to the great Ted Nicholas for reminding me of this one: the letter 's'.

And the latest instance of a one letter change to a headline actually tripled the response.

The original headline read, 'Put Money in Your Pocket'

And the improved version was, 'Puts Money in Your Pocket'

Underestimating people's inherent laziness rarely disappoints. Just removing the idea that the product required some effort was enough to multiply response by three. And the change in the headline text is almost subliminal, suggesting that this is a non-conscious reaction, which straight away makes it even more interesting.

There's a lot of psychology in successful marketing. I'll return to the subject here from time to time.

Meanwhile, have you ever improved the response to an ad by changing one letter? More likely is that you've done it by removing the idea there's any work involved with your product. For instance, 'learning' and 'making' are work for most people, while 'discovering' and 'getting' sound easy and even accidental.

So, 'Learn How to Make Money' sounds much harder than 'Discover How to Get Rich', although there are other conscious and subconscious meanings in the phrases 'make money' and 'get rich' that complicate things!

Still, that's for another day, although if you've read much about wealth creation, you'll already know what I'm getting at...

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. To keep up with this and my many other trains of thought, subscribe to the blog, top right on this page.

PPS. Of course, the other lesson from the one letter change is in the value of testing, especially in your headlines.

What's He Got ...

... That I Haven't?

It seems a fair question to me. I mean, why should some people have all the luck, all the money, and that damn attitude that seems to say, 'I deserve it all'?

What do truly, exceptionally, mind-bogglingly successful people have that the rest of the population lacks?

What is it that divides the self-made 'haves' from the unmade 'have nots' (not counting those that inherited or otherwise got lucky)?

In short; what have they got that gets them everything else?

I think that's the wrong question, however we phrase it.

I think what they actually have is something missing.

Something like doubt, fear, uncertainty - or something that creates those unhelpful feelings, anyway.

I've finished Professor Daniel Gilbert's excellent book Stumbling on Happiness, and if you've read it too, you might well know what I'm talking about. You might have come to a similar conclusion already, anyway.

It's that mental process that seems 'unique to humans' - a dangerous phrase, as the Professor points out - which is so unreliable in most of us we really might be better off without it sometimes. It's called imagination.

It's imagination that shows us the worst possible consequences of an action, and it's imagination that makes us fearful for a child's safety when they're out of sight, even when keeping them in sight might put them in greater danger. It's imagination that makes us wonder 'What if I can't do it?'

And that's something that the most ballsy, seat-of-their-pants, outlandishly flamboyant and successful entrepreneurs in the world never seem to allow themselves to consider. Some of them don't seem able to conceive of the idea.

So, next time you're considering a new venture, and wondering 'Should I try this? What if I can't do it?' Stop imagining and just try!

Who actually knows what will happen if you do try? Not you, that's for sure.

And what's the worst that could happen?

No - don't answer that!

Unless you want to stay exactly where you are, that is.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

Networking Tips

Hello again

I make no apology for returning to the topic of networking, but I do apologise for extolling the virtues of networking without offering, up to now, much advice on how to go about it.

So, apology duly made, here are a few tips to make your networking easier and more productive. That's for you and for all the unlucky people you've hitherto pinned in their seats or trapped in a corner without due cause or reward.

Well, maybe you haven't, but here's the tips anyway:

1. Know what you're there for. It's fun but it's also business. If you're trying to achieve nothing in particular then that's about all you'll achieve. Which is a waste of time and probably money.
2. Know what you have to offer, and be open-minded about it. Make a mental list of your skills, talents and interests and try to be imaginative about how you might help other people.
3. Know who else is there - find out in advance, if possible. By the 'who else' I mean the people you've been admiring, hoping to meet (should be the same) or hoping to avoid, and take the appropriate action.
4. When you meet your 'hero', 'heroine' or useful contact, don't ask them for a favour (or a loan). Rather, be friendly, interested in them and what they're up to, get chatting and ask - and this is the critical bit - 'What can I do to help you in that?' or just 'What do you need to help you accomplish that?' After all, you may know someone else who can help them, even if you can't.

Networking is about giving, as much as or more than it is about receiving - at least directly. So be useful, helpful, friendly and open. What goes around truly does come around. To quote the BNI's ugly but true motto, 'Givers gain'.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS Watch this space, or better still, subscribe to this blog, for exciting news about the best, most exciting and (if I have anything to do with it) most fun networking, masterminding* opportunity the Internet has yet seen.

PPS *'Networking' may or may not be a word (see previous posts), but 'masterminding' surely is, if not quite in this context...

The Power of Now!

Hello

We're just back from Steve Foley's eConfex Buy to Let and HMO Summit at Heathrow, where we were helping Steve with some of the 'back of the room' stuff and a bit of fetching and carrying.

Needless to say, there was no time for reading while we were there, but I am halfway through an absolutely fascinating book by Daniel Gilbert, called 'Stumbling on Happiness'. It won the Royal Society's award for Science Book of 2007, no less. Although it is about happiness, it's also about a whole lot more and, being about how people think, it's full of lessons for all of us. That's whether you're interested in people generally or specifically interested in marketing.

One thing Professor Gilbert teaches us is how difficult we all find it to imagine accurately how we will feel about something in the future. In fact, it's an impossible feat. Today is so much more real than tomorrow, and even more so than next week, and so on.

Given a choice of getting something now and getting the same thing next week or later, we often value the instant gratification much more highly, in simple cash terms. Which is an important thing to consider for anyone selling his or her product from the stage at an event like the one we just helped at.

Because, as a general rule, those items are sold at a generous discount on the day. Organisers like to maximise sales on the day, because they're the sales they get a cut from, so the temptation is to encourage maximum sales by cutting prices. The usual message is that the goods will be back to full price tomorrow.

But from what the good professor has said, what should be happening is more like this:

'Buy my product today, and you can take it home with you, get right on with using it and have it working for you while everyone else is still awaiting delivery of theirs. And for only an extra ten percent! But I only have twelve here. If you order now for delivery by post you can get it for the normal price, but you will have to wait about a week for delivery. Remember, I only have twelve to take away today, for just ten percent more, and it's first come first served.'

In other words, instead of giving stuff away cheaply on the day, maybe canny marketers should be charging an appropriate premium for instant gratification. If the theory is correct, they ought to sell just as many and both they and the organiser will actually make more money.

It would be fascinating to see this tried for real and I'll be interested to hear your views or, indeed, your experience of someone trying this at an actual event.

It could be revolutionary...

Have you seen it or tried it? Let me know!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS Professor Gilbert's 'Stumbling on Happiness' has a whole lot more to teach us about how the human brain works (and sometimes doesn't quite work). I'll be returning to it and a few more of his revolutionary lessons, and how I think they might be applied to marketing, in the near future. Subscribe to this site (top right of the page) and you'll not miss a thing!

The Number 1 List Building Secret

Hello again

In a conversation I had with a business partner on Friday, I was suddenly reminded that we were about to reveal to the world the number one list building secret - the method ALL the world's most successful marketers, without exception, use to build their massive lists ...

• EVEN the ones who promote SEO
• EVEN the ones who sell you Adwords guides
• EVEN those who encourage you to create your own information products
• EVEN the ones who own traffic exchanges
• EVEN the ones who say you should sell products from mini-sites
• AND EVEN the ones who say that viral marketing is the way forward

ALL use this method above all others to build their massive lists quickly and, most importantly, almost for free.

We will be using it too, very soon, to virtually guarantee fantastic results. And I'll be in a position to let you in on the secret just as soon as we go live...

Don't stay away too long, or you might miss it!

In fact, to make sure you don't miss our launch - the day when we reveal how the top gurus really make their money, and how you can copy them - subscribe to this website, using the form on the top right-hand side of the page.

Until next time,

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. I can let you in on one little secret, though - all this excitement came about as a result of ... you guessed it ... networking! And if you're not doing that, you really are missing a trick!

Why Long Copy Works

(and why it needn't matter if it doesn't)

It seems to be a perennial debate: long copy versus short copy. But most copywriters know from experience (and from reading the copywriting gurus) that long copy far outsells short copy, especially for high-ticket items.

Why?

Well, first let's look at why short copy might sometimes be better.

Business people are busy people. They don't have time to spend reading page after page of sales material, however excitingly written, before they decide whether or not to spend a few pounds or dollars. It just isn't cost effective – their time is too precious.

They'd be better off buying something a little less than perfect than wasting that precious time.

So, for a low priced item, short copy is the way to go. In fact, it might not be worth investing in a copywriter’s fees for a low cost item. Of course, if the item sells by the million it would be worth every penny, but that's another matter.

In short copy, there's a headline, a story, an offer and a call to action. Call them by other names if you will, but they're the essential elements, and the advantage to the customer is that they know exactly what your offer is, almost at a glance.

For higher-priced items, it's different. When someone is contemplating spending a lot of money (for them) they need to be convinced it's worth it. They may take a fair bit of persuading, but the time spent - yours and theirs - will be worth it if they can save or make the value of that time, plus the price of the product, many times over.

They may not make that calculation consciously, but on some level or other they will be making a judgement on whether you're wasting their time. Even before, that is, they decide whether they'll be wasting their cash buying your product.

Which is why, perversely, it needn't matter. So long as your long copy is constructed properly they can get all the short copy benefits, while you offer all the reassurance and potential persuasiveness of long copy.

You may spend page after page extolling the virtues and numerous irresistible benefits of your product, but a hurried and harassed businessperson needs to be able to scan your copy in seconds and deduce exactly what you're offering, how it can solve their problem and the price they'll have to pay.

Then, if they're interested, they’ll go back and read in more detail. And study after study shows that while long copy outsells short copy, it's the short copy 'scanned' version that the buyer actually sees first and on which they'll most likely base their decision to buy or not buy.

So, when you produce your long copy it needs to have exactly the same elements as your short copy.

In fact, at first sight it should actually look like short copy with a lot of extra detail between the essential bits!

So, you'll need:

· a headline, emphasising the main benefit

· body copy, explaining the product and its benefits

· the offer, which is the price plus bonuses and guarantees

· the close or call to action, made as easy as possible.

Each of these elements must be highlighted with a sub-heading so the busy reader can pick them out at a glance.

And here’s the critical part: those sub-heads must tell a coherent story on their own, to get the message across to the quick-scanning reader.

Here’s how legendary John Caples put it recently: “[Long or short] depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. Generally speaking the more explaining you need to do to get your reader to understand the product’s benefits fully, or the more money it costs, the longer the copy you’ll need.
In many cases, longer copy will work best. But remember, it’s not because it’s long that it works. It still needs to be brief and succinct in the sense that it packs maximum meaning and benefit into each sentence … Distil it down as much as possible without omitting any of the points … of interest to the target market …then render the copy in logical chunks prefaced with powerful, curiosity inducing sub-heads that stop skimmers and skippers, drawing them into the copy. Finally … edit your sub-heads into a logical summary of your entire sales argument.”


So the details (detailing benefits remember), the credibility-building testimonials and explanations of why this is such a terrific never to be repeated offer, etc, all fit in between these compelling sub headings.

End with a PS - the ultimate short copy summarising all the above - and there you have it - long copy that works like short copy. But better!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. I’ll be giving you more tips of the copywriter’s trade right here in the days and weeks to come. But you can make sure you don’t miss a single one by subscribing to this site – it's free and the sign up is top right on this page – AND you’ll also get occasional, exclusive information for subscribers only, PLUS a member’s only free offer in the very near future. But you’ll have to subscribe to find out what that is!

What's Your Net Worth?

Okay, so what is your net worth?

If you're a financier or banker, or you have money matters on your mind, you might well be thinking that's none of my business.

If you're a deep sea trawler skipper, you might think differently.

And if you're a trawler skipper who's especially aware of his or her finances, you might have read the question both ways...

But, if you owned the Internet, you'd probably be able to answer, 'As much as I'd ever want.'

All of which goes to show that we need to understand what we're being asked before we can give a useful answer. From there, we can draw all kinds of lessons about finding out what people want before we try to sell them a thing; about how communication is a two-way affair, and how the best answer in the world may be totally irrelevant to the person asking the question.

Sometimes, though, an unexpected answer to a question we've asked gives us a wonderful insight into a world we would never otherwise have known.

On a more mundane level, a product designed to solve one problem may actually be a perfect solution to another problem we didn't know existed. Apparently, chewing gum was 'discovered' by scientists trying to create synthetic rubber.

Do you have a product that just won't shift? Is it a great product, but without a great demand? If so, could you market it as the solution to a whole different problem - even one you didn't know was a problem?

Maybe; maybe not. But bat around some crazy ideas anyway - you never know. After all, who would have thought people would pay for a food you have to chew forever without it ever being ready to swallow, that has no nutritional value whatsoever and which, as far as I know, is totally indigestible?

Well, all over the world, people buy chewing gum.

And remember, even something that only ever sells to a small minority can make you a fortune if you can spread your marketing 'net' across the whole world.

So I wonder; what's Wrigley's net worth?

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. What? All this talk of 'nets' and not a mention of networking? Well, you ought to know by now that I think that's priceless. But rest assured, I'll get back to it!

World Internet Summit - Sold Out!

I did say the World Internet Summit at Earls Court was the place to be - and it seems too many of you listened!

Well, ok, I was hardly the only one promoting it, but whoever shifted all the other tickets, it seems we did too good a job between us. The event is actually over-sold.

Which is the kind of problem Tom Hua and Brett McFall, who are organising the event, probably dreamed of. Now, though, they have to ask everyone who's bought a ticket to confirm they'll actually be there. So, although the event is sold out, it is possible there may be a few unconfirmed seats to be snapped up at the last moment.

I'd suggest, if you haven't booked yet, that you keep an eye on the World Internet Summit Webpage to see if you might still get lucky.

Otherwise, if you have booked, you'll have an email waiting in your inbox, asking you to confirm you still want your seat.

I've confirmed my place, so I hope I'll see you there!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS Remember, you might still be lucky. So confirm your booking or get on whatever waiting list there might be - and quick!

'But What if I'm Too Busy?'

Hi there,

It's a question I was asked recently, to which I answered, 'Doing what?'

But it's one thing giving advice, and another taking your own!

Which is why I almost forgot to blog today.

Because the question, 'What if I'm too busy?' was in response to my point, that if you're going to have a blog as your website, you just have to keep posting - every day or at least as often as your readers are used to.

The purpose of having a blog is to provide frequent, useful content for your readers and, let's face it, for the search engines. Your blog is a fundamental part of your business marketing strategy - a crucial part of the whole enterprise.

And if you're too busy to take care of your business, what exactly are you doing?

Well, I was busy doing other things, including, ironically, tweaking this site; getting the sign-up box in the right place and changing some of the settings.

None of which will be much use if I don't supply some content to make it worth your while dropping by...

So here it is - today's tip from me: keep blogging!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS And keep networking, too. I think there are still some places left for the Earls Court extravaganza that is the World Internet Summit UK, but you can click here for more information

Back on My Soap Box

Just a relatively gentle reminder, really, of the absolute necessity to get out there and network if you want your business to grow exponentially. And if you want to meet the people who can help you to the next stage, even the next five or six stages, you have to get to the biggest events you can.

Because that's where you'll not only get the best information but also get to meet the biggest names - the people who can help make people like you rich, with nothing more than a few well-chosen words or a single deal.

So, knowing what I know about the importance of learning and networking, I'd be negligent if I didn't tell you about a massive opportunity to network like there's no tomorrow...

AND to learn from some the BIGGEST names in Internet marketing

AND to profit from some amazing bonuses - easily worth far more than the ticket price

AND to witness a live experiment in online marketing

ALL at the WORLD INTERNET SUMMIT UK, at Earls Court, London on 15-18 November.

I'll be there. Most of my JV partners will be there. You can meet Ewen Chia, Tim Brocklehurst and Sean Roach there too, along with Tracey Repchuck, Tom Hua, Brett McFall and others.

Fancy networking with those kind of people?

If you really want to make it big in Internet marketing and you can possibly make it, you must get to Earls Court on 15-18 November. In fact, just cancel any other plans you had!

Because it's not called the World Internet Summit for nothing.

Want to know more? Click here for more information

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. It's a massive event; everyone who's anyone in the world of online marketing is going, so just click here to see who you'll meet. Don't delay too long, though - I've no idea what the capacity is, but I do know it's filling fast.

PPS. Excuse me getting excited, but this really is massive. I only just heard about it yesterday and I snatched up one of the remaining tickets. It's just too good to miss.

'Does a lot for charity...

... doesn't like to talk about it.'

Well, not too often, anyway. But here's a chance to blow my own trumpet that I just couldn't resist, since telling you might just persuade a few more of you to put your hands in your pockets.

Some time ago, before I seriously dreamed I'd be a professional writer, I used to contribute a lot of poems to a BBC website called Get Writing. After a while, in friendly competition with the other writers, I started writing some very short stories, too. 'Worders' are stories of between 60 and 250 words, so they're very short indeed.

Other writers did very similar things on other websites, too, including the successor to Get Writing named More Writing, Writer's Dock, editRED and MySpace. Between the various sites, probably thousands of stories were written, many of them very good.

And now, thanks to the enthusiasm and energy of Irish writer Jenni Doherty, many of those stories have been assembled, assessed and published by Derry publisher Guildhall Press.

Wonderful World of Worders is the end result. Containing no less than 525 very short stories, the volume is being sold in aid of registered charity Action With Effect, which helps destitute children throughout the world, some afflicted with leprosy, others 'merely' homeless.

At £6.95 direct from Guildhall Press' website http://www.ghpress.com/ it's a perfect gift - to yourself, to someone you love and especially to the children the charity works so hard to help.

If you got the Smashy and Nicey reference, well done. Award yourself first prize and get online to Guildhall Press http://www.ghpress.com/ right away!

Go on - you deserve it!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS Just the beautiful opening story, written by eight-year-old Saoirse Doherty, would make Wonderful World of Worders worth your £6.95, even if the other 524 weren't the brilliant and thought-provoking compendium they are. So don't wait, don't think about it, and don't forget I'm in there too!

PPS On the subject of charity - it's not too late to donate to MS Society following my modest success in the Great North Run (I finished!) on 30 September. The link for that is www.justgiving.com/royeveritt

Thanks

Blame Dating Direct...

... and Jon McCulloch for this post.

I'm unashamedly borrowing from Jon's excellent newsletter today because he reminded me of an analogy I'd almost totally forgotten.

Now, Jon not only writes a mean newsletter and blog (at http://www.jonmcculloch.com/), he is also a damn fine copywriter, although you probably can't afford him.

He'd say you can't afford not to hire him, but then he's very picky whom he works with and has a long waiting list, so the point is moot, you might say.

Anyway, Jon met his partner Sarah through an online dating site, and I met my wife Jacqui the same way.

Jon's point, to get to the point, is that when you post your profile on a site like Dating Direct, or any of the dozens of others, the last thing you'd think to lead with is your name, unless you're Brad Pitt, or Angelina Jolie, perhaps. I can't say I ever encountered either of them advertising on a dating site...

And yet, so many company websites begin in just that way - with their name in the headline. As Jon points out, a company website is really just a commercial version of a lonely hearts ad - where the sole purpose is to persuade likely mates to contact us, or leave us their contact details so we can do the 'chasing'. From there, we'd hope to build a relationship with the ones we like.

Put that way, it's obvious why so many apparently excellent company web sites and sales letters fail. No one wants to know your name - they want to know who you are (which is a different thing) and what you have to offer them.

Names don't come into it until you choose to say 'Hello'.

I've no idea if Jacqui would have fallen for the name 'Roy', or if Sarah would have been bowled over by 'Jonathan'.

But both Jon and I can feel pretty chuffed that we got those particular pieces of 'sales copy' spot on!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

Lies, Damn Lies & Information

Having just finished the first draft of a new eBook, the above phrase popped into my head.

I'm sure you'll get the reference, but while accurate statistics can be made to lie by disingenuous use, 'information' can be just plain wrong.

An eBook is an 'information product', of course, and most of the ones I've read have been packed with useful and, as far as I can tell, accurate information. I hope my latest one is, too.

But there is a school of thought that says almost any old junk can be sold as an 'information product', provided you get the sales copy right. In other words, a good sales letter will sell just about anything.

(The converse of that, of course, is that a bad sales letter won't sell even the best product in the world.)

But it's the rubbish masquerading as valuable information, and priced as such that we have to watch for. Information marketing is unregulated, and long may it remain so. Thankfully, most of the most successful marketers know junk when they see it and won't promote it - their reputations are too precious and their consciences too strong.

Still, there are a few who seem willing to promote almost anything - even things that don't fit with their business (and so, presumably, their list) - provided there's a healthy commission in it.

Now there are exceptions, and some marketers, especially writers, seem able to create a new product every few days, but if you're on the list of someone who seems to promote a new amazing, ground-breaking instant money machine every day, to the point where you never buy because you've lost faith in them (or run out of money!) just follow your gut and unsubscribe.

You will have one less irritation and a few hundred fewer temptations every year from then on.

One good way to get wealthier is to stop throwing money away!

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

Accounting For Beginners

Well, yesterday's business (and busyness) spilled over into today, so this will be a very brief post.

Do you ever wake up in the night with a brilliant idea? No, not the ones that seem brilliant in the middle of the night but are clearly bonkers when you review them next morning; the ones that still seem to 'have legs' when you're wide awake.

How many of those have you had? Me too. How many have you actually acted upon?

No, me neither. But maybe the first stage towards acting on them is telling someone else you will act on them. Someone who'll hold you accountable if you don't.

That needs to be someone who's prepared to tell you off when you've broken a promise, not let you off with a warning.

An accountability partner is, I think, the next stage on the networking - mastermind-group road.

I'm counting on mine to help me make me make my latest 'not bonkers' idea into reality.*

It will take a while, but watch this space.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

* That does make sense if you read it really slowly.

Writer in Desperate Appeal

I have to admit I’m desperate. Desperate to know why so many companies are happy to under-perform. Companies with great products and a solid reputation who still don’t make the best of their strengths.

Why is this? Why do so few companies look beyond their local area for their sales? Is there a customs post at the county boundary? Are there trade tariffs if they sell to another part of England? Is it illegal to do business with Scotland?

Might they not be able to translate their labelling into French or German?

No. None of these is true.

And yet…

And yet there are so many firms who could do so much better if they only tried. Or dared.

I dare you. Be bold. Go for it. Try selling into the next county, the next country.

Your local economy may be strong but the global market is about a hundred million times bigger! You really don’t have to do brilliantly well to increase your sales ten fold or a hundred-fold.

Use the Internet to get your offer out to them. Or ask someone like me to do it for you.

Be bolder, be bigger, be better.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

One Little Word...

Yes, I know it's Sunday, but I'll be busy tomorrow, so I might not have time to post here. If I do, just think of this as a free bonus.

Anyway: do you know what I find most rewarding as a writer?

Not the hundreds of words that go to make a carefully-crafted sales letter. Not the thousands that go to make an ebook, or the tens of thousands that go into a book. Not even the fourteen lines of my most successful sonnet. And certainly not the hundreds of hours at the keyboard.

No, what makes my 'job' really rewarding is when one or maybe two little words transform an okay piece of writing into something special. Or, in advertising, when one little word transforms the success of a campaign.

Such as the example of a copywriter who, many years ago guaranteed a shampoo manufacturer that he could transform their sales by changing the wording on the bottles - for a percentage, of course. I seem to recall he desperately needed the money, but whether he did or not, his 'one word' was an act of genius. It was brilliantly simple.

Once they agreed his fee he set to work. For all of about five seconds. His genius single word?

'Repeat', as in 'rinse and repeat'.

Sales of the shampoo, not surprisingly, almost doubled and he did very nicely indeed from then on.

I haven't hit those heights yet, but ...

Recently, some business partners and I were discussing the critical wording on a specifically targeted piece. We needed to offer potential JV partners something more than just another 'opportunity'. I can't go into too much detail until we're ready to release the product, but suffice to say we had one line that 'kind of worked', but not quite.

By the way, I don't particularly recommend copywriting by committee, but that's for another day :)

So we had the line, which began something like 'Join with us...' but we didn't want them to actually join, so we batted round a few ideas before conversation began to move on, at which point I suggested 'Help us...' which I know sounds pretty simple, just as 'repeat' seems simple all these years and all that extra hair-washing later...

In context, though, it was exactly right and not as obvious as it seems, if not as revolutionary as the single word that almost doubled shampoo sales overnight.

One or two words can make that much difference to your copy, too. Always try to read your own work with a cold and analytical eye. Put it away for a day or two before reading it again and try not to 'fall in love' with your words.

Any line that seems superfluous needs removing, but you can often improve a line that now sounds a little flat just by changing a word or two. It's especially true of your most critical line, your headline, but in really great copy, every line 'sings'.

In that sense, good copy is like poetry, because every word has to work to justify its presence in the piece, adding its voice to the 'chorus'.

And when you find one word that transforms a line, a piece, a campaign, you might be singing too.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS As an example, I've just been back and edited this piece - changing a word here, two words there. It's not great copy and it's certainly not poetry, but it's much better for the second look!

It's That 'N' word Again

I did warn you.

Last night, at yet another event, the organiser, no less, expressed her hatred of the term 'networking'.

I have to admit we're not much closer to finding an alternative, but we're on the case.

We thought about it over a glass or three of very nice wine, discussed it over an excellent meal and brainstormed (there's another iffy word) with some very bright, imaginative people.

Still no answer. Maybe we need to get back to basics and ask what we're actually doing at these events, then hone the resulting mass of words to a minimum.

After all, all the events have a few things in common, but as they're held at different times of day, we can't just say 'breakfast', 'lunch' or whatever.

What we actually do is meet people; new people or people we haven't seen for a while. We think and talk about business, build relationships, assess possibilities and potential, form opinions and impressions of the people we meet, introduce strangers who we feel may be compatible or of use to each other. Oh, and we generally have a very pleasant time doing it.

We tell people about ourselves and our business, learn about them and theirs. Hopefully, we follow up and continue the relationships we've just begun.

There's often food and or refreshments involved, sometimes even entertainment.

It's generally pretty informal, although it may be quite structured, and did I mention it's usually fun?

Finally, we develop, or become part of, a network of people and businesses who feel they can work with each other.

Hmmm...

'Networking', anyone?

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Something different next time, I promise. I have a plan...

PPS. Don't forget to take a look at the property 'emergency meeting' I told you about yesterday. You'll find the link in Thursday's post.

Speaking of Networking...

It's a bit of a departure from my usual copywriting and marketing, but we're also interested in getting into property investment.

Now, a few short months ago, property looked like a sure thing. Even paying full price for a property would be worthwhile within just a couple of years or so, and meanwhile some very kind tenant would 'mind' the property for you and even pay your mortgage.

Then, more recently, people started getting nervous. 'Experts' have been doing their best to convince everyone that property is overvalued. That's what's known as a self-fulfilling prophesy, but serious professional investors are probably rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of picking up cheap property for the next few months to a year.

The rest of us might be excused for getting a bit anxious about it all, especially if we've already bought, or committed to buy, a property in the last few months. Others might just steer clear for a while.

So are we about to see a 'crash' or a more modest 'adjustment'?

I don't know, but I think I know some people who do...

They'll be at the 'First UK Emergency Buy to Let and HMO Summit' at Heathrow on 6th November.

You can be there too. It's your chance to hear all the latest 'gen' on the property market, especially 'HMOs' (Houses of Multiple Occupancy), where there is apparently still good money to be made.

It's a one day seminar, and I'll be there. Look out for me if you can make it.

Here's how to get your tickets.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. Actually, I'll be helping out at back of house, and of course I'll be networking like crazy, so I'll be easy to find!

Here's the link again.

PPS If you're at all interested in property investment, now or in the future, this 'Emergency Meeting' is for you. If you can possibly get there, then get there!

Be Your Own Best Client

Two things any good advertising copywriter must have:

1. The ability to write
2. A knowledge of marketing

But do you need clients? Not if you can be your own best customer.

Compare these two scenarios:

1. You get paid to write someone else's advertising copy and get paid roughly in proportion to the time it takes you, plus a small share of the profits your campaign generates.
2. You get paid nothing to write your own product and advertising copy, but then you get ALL of the profits your campaign generates. Plus, you get the everlasting rights to your product and your name on it (if you want). Plus, you get the list of all the people who buy your product, so you can promote other products to them until they ask you to stop.

Plus, you get to say, "I can only write copy for you if you pay me more than the considerable amount of money I could be earning for myself", which is a nice thing to be able to say.

It makes sense for every copywriter to create their own products, to write copy for themselves, and to have their skills and talents working for them - not just for someone else.

Any half-decent writer can create a product in a matter of days, even less, and be marketing it within hours after that. And making money for themselves. Are you?

Maybe you don't know where to start, or even what an 'information product' is?

I've recently updated my beginners' guide to information products, a simple Word document, which you can get just by emailing me at results@royeveritt.com with the subject line 'Beginners' Guide To Information Products'.

I won't pester you with loads of follow up autoresponder messages, although I do try to find time to say thanks for popping by.

Until next time

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

The Dead Man Speaks

Stick around me for any time and you'll hear a lot about the importance of networking...

It's just absolutely vital for any business that the people involved in it, especially if they are the business, spend as much time and energy networking as they can.

We spent a great weekend in Coventry, at Britpack Live, doing mainly that. Yes, the speakers were enlightening and inspiring, and we learned a lot of new stuff, but it was during the breaks and especially in the evenings when much of the serious business was done. And there was some serious business being done, believe me.

A great networking event like that can be a launch pad for a new or small business.

So it follows that anyone organising any kind of get-together or function aimed at business people should do their best to encourage networking. If they don't, a lot of people won't bother to come next time.

Fast forward a week or so from Coventry to a wholly different experience: a 'networking event' where no one was welcomed or introduced, where no one wore a name badge and where the controlling clique spent the evening talking amongst themselves instead of getting to know the newcomers.

Add a couple of speeches so soporific that the liveliest person around (apart from our reporter) was a man with what she described as 'drop down dead disease', and you have a recipe for expensive failure.

It takes a bit of effort to run a successful networking event. It takes a lot more to launch a business from such a deadly launch pad as that!

If you have any part in running networking events, please remember what they're for. If you're building a business and plan to attend them, don't be put off by one bad experience - there really are some wonderful opportunities out there.

So do go - and keep going until you make the contacts you need to launch your business.

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS Some people don't like me using the words 'network' and 'networking' as verbs, pointing out that 'network' is actually a noun. I know. What I don't know is what 'real' verb I could possibly use in their place.

There's a moral in there somewhere about embracing change, but I'll leave you to find it :)

Taking Care of Business

Phew!

It hardly seems possible that it's a week since we said our farewells at Britpack Live.

What a weekend that was - and what a busy week since.

We left with more ideas and things to get done than we have had hours in the day, but here's another task to tick off - Domain name bagged, website created, first post added.

You might have visited my current blog, Writing For Results, or my poetry blog, Well Versed Poetry. The poetry blog will go on, but I'll be migrating some of the best stuff from WFR to this site over the next few days.

Not everyone agrees a blog is the best idea for the index page on your website, and I might change it yet, but it's certainly a damn quick way of getting a new site up!

And it does mean regular new content to tickle the search engines with.

Plus, I'm planning to raise my profile steadily over the coming months as more of my products become available and I get to work with more and more high profile marketers, so a site in my own name was universally agreed by the panel at Britpack Live to be a good move.

By this time next year:

1. I'll have been on stage at least twice, speaking at major UK marketing seminars
2. I'll have become known as a part of one of the most exciting new mastermind groups anywhere in the UK - watch this space
3. I'll even be building a name for myself in the US, Canada and Australia
4. I'll have launched at least one major new product to the UK market
5. But I'll still find time to create persuasive, leading edge copy for my favourite clients

It's going to be quite a year!

Back soon

Roy Everitt, Writing For Results

PS. As well as the old blogs, our existing website, Cinnamon Edge, is still there, newly revamped and now much easier to navigate. Plus, my wife and partner Jacqui Carrel has built a new site dedicated to the other half of our business - information product creation. You can see that here.

PPS. Bear with me a while until I get all the links up and the design the way I want it. Meanwhile, email me here if you need any help, advice (sometimes free!) or have a serious business proposition to put to me.