Copywriters Podcast

Our returning champion is Joshua Lee Henry, the high-powered copywriter and copy chief. He should be a familiar name and face to you by now, with his four great previous appearances on the show. He’s talked about writing leads and offers. And he even did the first and only guest Old Masters Series on this show, about John Caples. Joshua has a very impressive copywriting background and is currently copy chief for Money and Markets, an imprint of Agora’s Banyan Hill company. Today’s show with Joshua is a little different. Instead of tips on writing copy, to be blunt, we’re talking about jobs. As you may have noticed, the copywriting world is in a very uncertain state. A perplexing economy that is roaring along as more and more people are just hanging on by their fingernails is one reason for the uncertainty. Another is the rapid growth of AI, especially ChatGPT. Will it replace human copywriters, many people wonder? Well, not in the financial copywriting space, at least not this year. All you have to do is listen to what Joshua has to say. If you know what to look for and where to look, you’ll find there are opportunities galore right now. Joshua begins by telling us about SEVEN financial publishers who are hiring copywriters right now. Some of these companies are huge. He also tells us about a public financial newsletter company whose stock is up 60% since January. So things are definitely popping in financial copywriting. Again, as I said, if you know what to look for and where to look. The readers (or potential new readers) of these newsletters are numerous. In the tens of millions. Joshua shares some hands-on, real-world tips for getting your foot in the door at the financial publishers. And, for listeners and viewers of Copywriters Podcast only, he’s making a special offer for a training program called The World Of Financial Copywriting. As of today enrollment is closed, but they are opening up registration again for the next five days from the day we release this podcast. And you can get a big discount, using this link: https://copychief.thrivecart.com/wofc/?coupon=DAVID Download.

Long before there was even TikTok, there was a company called Sherwin-Williams. Their famous logo showed a planet-sized can of paint pouring onto a globe, with the tagline “Cover The Earth.” They still use that logo today. But I think in spirt, if not in reality, they need to share their slogan with AI. Because AI is drenching its way into everything. We have a guest today, and he’s our returning champion, attorney Rob Freund. Rob knows advertising and IP law for marketers as well as anyone I’ve ever met. And we’re going to have a wide-ranging discussion with Rob about AI and the law as it applies to copy and other topics of interest to you and me. I am constantly impressed by Rob’s savvy posts on Twitter, and sometimes astounded by the stories and examples he comes up with. We’ll talk about some of them today. And I stand in the company of giants who are also impressed: The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Bloomberg Law, Vox and Forbes. They’ve all quoted him. Plus, he’s lectured about social media law at the University of Southern California and other major institutions, in the U.S. and in Europe. We started by talking about an unusual and slightly disturbing thing that AI said regarding Ben Settle, which Ben posted on Twitter… and a really disturbing story about a lawyer who counted on AI in a way that may get him in trouble with the court. Rob found this story in The New York Times and posted it on Twitter as well. We also tackled important issues like: • Does using AI open a copywriter up to legal liability for plagiarism/copyright infringement? What can we do to make sure we’re on the right side of the law? • From an intellectual property rights perspective -- if you use AI to help you write your copy, who owns the work? • What are the legal implications of people using deep fake technology to create testimonials and phony images of celebrities? Or AI fake voices? And, looking into the future, we asked Rob this question: In the same vein as any developing technology that starts out with no regulation, like the wild west, but eventually starts to get regulated… How do you see AI regulation, especially in the advertising and IP spaces, developing? To connect with Rob: Instagram @robertfreundlaw Twitter @robertfreundlaw https://robertfreundlaw.com Download.

On December 1, 1975, a giant in direct mail died. That was Ed Mayer, who had written a definitive book on the subject 25 years earlier, called “How To Make More Money With Your Direct Mail.” Mayer was a man of many hats—a practitioner, an industry executive, and a teacher. In his obituary, the New York Times reported that Mayer had taught more than 20,000 college students and business executives the hands-on secrets of direct mail. Now you might reasonably assume the following: That was then and this is now. So much has changed. Today, we found out. To prepare for the show, I combed through the book and found 10 great tips that apply whether you were doing direct mail in the 1950s or online marketing today. In some cases, I updated the tips. But more often than not, what worked then works almost exactly the same today. I selected these 10 tips based on this simple idea: Just leaving out ONE of these could crater your sales—or vastly reduce them, at the very least. So even if you tell yourself you know these… ask yourself, are you doing the updated version of every one of these? Because if you’re not, you’re probably leaving money on the table. Let’s take that money off the table and put it back in your pocket. The tips we covered spanned the whole of direct marketing. Mayer knew it all: copywriting, offer creation, fulfillment, list selection and list management. He was truly an industry expert. Our topics included: the one thing that stops sales from happening, more than anything else… the one thing every piece of copy needs to do… why research makes the difference between success and failure in direct marketing… the kinds of words you should never use in your copy… when it’s a good idea to use the same copy over and over again… and much more. The book is called How To Make More Money With Your Direct Mail, by Ed Mayer. It’s out of print and extremely hard to find. Not on Amazon. A couple on eBay. Download.

When you’re being bold and aggressive with your copy, there’s a three-word question you really need to ask: “Is it legal?” That’s because, very simply, you’re putting your business at risk if it’s not. Today we have an expert who lives with this question all the time, and helps his clients get the best answers. Robert Freund is an experienced advertising attorney who focuses his practice on social media marketing and e-commerce issues. His clients include direct-to-consumer brands, marketing agencies, and individual creators. I am constantly impressed by Rob’s savvy posts on Twitter, and sometimes astounded by the stories and examples he comes up with. And I stand in the company of giants who are also impressed: The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Bloomberg Law, Vox and Forbes. They’ve all quoted him. Plus, he’s lectured about social media law at the University of Southern California and other major institutions, in the U.S. and in Europe. So as you can see, Rob really knows his way around the most important issues involving advertising and the law. I was grateful he agreed to share some of his wisdom. Here are the questions we asked him: 1. Let’s start, as they say, at the beginning. A lawyer has so many specialties to choose. How was it that you came to specialize in advertising law? 2. Could you run us through a few basics - things people should know, but either don’t know, or do know but ignore? - Especially, where do people push the line with claims and promises, when it turns out they’re also tempting fate? 3. You had a very interesting tweet a couple weeks ago. Let me quote from it. “The lesson for brands: your policies are not just boilerplate—they can save you from potentially devastating liability exposure. “And it’s not enough to write a good policy; you must also carefully consider how the terms are presented to your users to ensure you can enforce them.” What this says to me is every promise you make online has weight and consequences, or at least might. Could you talk about that? 4. Let’s take this one step further: Do you have a horror story for someone who went over the line? What were the consequences? 5. And, on maybe a happier note, can you tell us about someone you’ve taken out of the fire and away from the host stove, thus avoiding them a trip into the frying pan? What did they do and how did you help them back to safety. 6. Tell us more about your practice, who should get in touch with you with what kind of problems, and what’s the best way to reach out? To connect with Rob: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/robertfreundlaw/ Twitter https://twitter.com/robertfreundlaw https://robertfreundlaw.com Download.

One of the most powerful forms of stories for copywriters is the case study, and I think it’s fair to say most of us don’t use as many of them as we should. Today we’re going to talk to an expert who has vast and successful experience in this kind of marketing. Our guest today, Joel Klettke, is the founder of Case Study Buddy, a business that helps companies like HubSpot and Loom to scale up their case study production and include it in every segment of their marketing—from lead generation and upsells to outreach and nurturing. Overall his company has done more than 2,000 case studies for more than 300 clients. Joel’s also a copywriter and a proud dad of two. I believe his one regret in life is being a fan of the Calgary Flames hockey team. I don’t blame him one bit. The last time the Flames won the Stanley cup was in 1989, and I suppose we should just leave that there. But lucky for us, Joel knows a lot about case studies and he’s generously agreed to share some great tips and insights with us today. Here’s what we asked Joel: 1. What are case studies, the way you look at them? 2. What are the different types of case studies? 3. Why do case studies work, and how do they work? 4. How did you get into specializing in case studies? 5. What does Case Study Buddy do for your clients? 6 . Could you give us an example of a good case study? 7. What would be an example of a bad case study? 8. What are your top tips for writing great case studies? Joel’s company has a newsletter you can get for free: https://casestudybuddy.com/newsletter-sign-up/ Download.

We’ve been talking about AI on this show for a while, and today we’re going to roll up our sleeves. Well, Nathan is, anyway. I may ask a few questions or make some comments, but Nathan is center-stage today. That’s because he has figured out how to use ChatGPT to assist him with writing his emails. They key word is “assist.” It does require work and thought on the human’s part. But, the good news is, AI is helping him save time and become more productive. There are some caveats, which Nathan will cover. Meaning that you can’t just push a button and get fully-finished copy, ready to mail. Here are some notes Nathan prepared for the show, which includes an amazingly generous full set of working prompts to get an AI started writing emails for you. Nathan’s notes for today’s show: This is made for use with the FREE version of ChatGPT. There are paid tools out there that can get close to duplicating this process. I wanted to make this accessible to everyone. What you'll get at the end is a way to crank out emails to send your list and increase your sales. All you need is to be able to copy and paste nine prompts. If you're not great at writing emails, this will make you decent. If you're great at writing emails, this will make you a lot faster and a lot more valuable to your clients. To get the full list of prompts and marketing data sheet template, Go to https://advertisingcheatcodes.com/ai-emails/ Or Contact Nathan at AdvertisingAlchemist.com Download.

The question is: How do you bring your prospect right there when they are reading words you have written, maybe thousands of miles away? The answer was revealed 99 years ago, but it’s not widely talked about in copywriting. Until today. In this special episode of our Old Masters Series, we look at a book by George Hotchkiss published in 1924. He has some ideas about using techniques novelists and hypnotists use. But using them in your copy, to bring your offer to life. To get your prospect to see and experience the best of what you have to offer. All through the words you choose. The book is simply called Advertising Copy. To the best of my recollection, superstar copywriter David Deutsch told me about this book many years ago. So thanks, DD! Now the author, George Hotchkiss, was both a successful copywriter and a major educator in copywriting. He started out as a newspaperman, and then went on to become a copywriter for the George Batten Company, which later became the giant ad agency BBDO. Also, he joined the faculty at New York University in 1908 and went on to start NYU’s Department of Advertising and Marketing. And stayed with them for decades. Guy knows how to write copy and how to teach. On this podcast, we talked about something else from the book Advertising Copy in a show three years ago. The topic at that time was Reason-Why Copy. But what we’re going to talk about today appeals to a different part of the prospect’s brain, and in many ways may be more important. On the show, we talk about six great techniques to amp up your copy. For now, though, let’s look at the power of what we’re about to explore. Let’s say you accidentally cut your finger with a knife, and you’re looking for some sympathy. You could say, “I injured a part of my hand in an accident.” Not very powerful. Or, you could say, “I cut my finger with a knife by mistake.” OK, that might work better. But let’s take it to the next level. How about: “I was cutting up some onions for soup I was making. The knife slipped and wouldn’t you know it, I cut my index finger. It hurt like hell. Felt like an electric shock that came out of nowhere. I howled, and then, suddenly, blood was spurting all over the place. I had to wash it and put some ointment on it, and wrap it up tight with a gauze bandage until the bleeding stopped.” There you go. Now you’ve got a much better shot at getting some sympathy. Why? Because you brought your senses and emotions into the description. And, along the way, your listener’s senses and emotions, too. That was a gory example, so let’s turn to something a little more pleasant. Your sweetheart buys you some fine Swiss chocolates for Valentine’s Day. What do you say to your friends, to make them jealous? You could say, “Dylan bought me some chocolates for Valentines.” OK. That’s nice, but it’s a little vague, right? To make your statement more evocative, you might say, “Dylan got me some Lindt dark chocolate truffles for Valentines.” Better. But how about, “I was so happy with what Dylan got me for Valentines. Lindt dark chocolate truffles. They are so smooth and creamy, and I get a jolt of pleasure each time I eat one.” Again, the description of emotion -- happy -- and sensory experience -- smooth, creamy -- makes it all seem so much more real. And sometimes you want to take your prospect right into the experience of your offer. That’s what we’ll talk about today. Everything we’ve just looked at and cover today is based on an important rule: Demonstration is the most powerful form of selling. We’re going to talk about how to demonstrate, in your copy, the specific things that make people more likely to buy. For this kind of verbal demonstration, Hotchkiss uses three different terms at different points in the chapter we’re taking this from. Those terms are mostly interchangeable, and they are: “Descriptive Copy, Human-Interest Copy, and Direct Sense Description. The best copywriters all use these techniques at key points in their copy. Some of them do it on purpose, knowing how and why they’re doing it. But I suspect most of them just do this by instinct, because they know intuitively that these techniques work. One top copywriter, my good friend John Carlton, is very deliberate and explicit about this. His copy is filled with examples worth studying. And in his teaching, he talks about power words. A lot of them, especially the strong verbs he suggests, are very evocative of specific images, feelings and emotions. So today, we look at what descriptive copy is, why it matters, when it works and when it doesn’t, and how to use it. Download.

In the great financial meltdown of 2009, Colin Chung lost his job with eBay. Despite having no experience in copywriting, he decided that was the next part of his career path. In 18 months, he doubled his eBay income and was earning six figures for the first time in his life. As a freelance copywriter. In one year, he doubled it. Before long after that, Colin was making really big bucks. Not only that. He ended up writing for major clients, including Jay Abraham, Clayton Makepeace, Mike Dillard, Agora, and even a Shark Tank investor! Also, from 2014 to 2020, Colin was the primary coach for John Carlton’s Simple Writing System, where he coached many freelancers, business owners, and other aspiring copywriters. After all this, Colin has decided to reveal his secrets. And I say “secrets” because his approach, as he describes it, is different from the approach any other successful copywriter I’ve ever talked to or heard of. Colin has coached individual copywriters and managed teams of copywriters for clients. His experience goes far and wide. But only recently has he decided to go public with this. Colin also has a very modestly-priced course to help you ramp up your own freelance business. Check it out here: https://garfinkel.thefederation.io/ Download.

About a month ago we did a selection from my half of the no-longer-available Guerrilla Copywriting audiobook. It was so popular, we thought we’d do it again. Here’s some background: Sixteen years ago, in 2007, I produced an audiobook with my friend and mentor Jay Conrad Levinson, author of the bestselling Guerrilla Marketing series. Jay and I originally thought about doing a book together, but that never happened. However, we did do an audiobook. It was called Guerrilla Copywriting. Unlike a lot of things he did and I lot of things I’ve done, this one didn’t sell that well. I don’t think either of us had the bandwidth to promote it, but there may have been another problem -- we tried to jam too much good information into too little time. We had sixty really powerful tips for writing copy. Jay would do one, then I would do one. It ended up being 60 tips in 60 minutes. Plenty of value, but maybe we would have been better off slowing down and taking some time to talk about each tip. Well… the audiobook is out of print now, so I’m free to share my half of the material. I took a look at it the other day and, I gotta admit, it’s pretty good. A couple things needed to be updated -- a lot has happened in 16 years. But for the most part, we’ve got eternal principles that are completely workable today. OK. Today we cover a third quarter of my part, and we’re going to take 25 minutes to half an hour to discuss. You’ll see why it makes more sense to do it that way. I’m starting to think the original was four times as fast as it should have been! Some of this you’re familiar with but you’ll probably see in a new light. And you may hear a few things that are new to you. Everything’s useful, and it stays true to one of the main goals Jay and I had when we did this originally: It’s designed to make you more profitable, and it’s information you can put to use right away. A lightning tour of what we talk about: What to sell people more of… The one kind of humor that always works in sales copy… The Guerrilla Copywriting Four-Point Fail-Safe Copy Formula… How to extract some winning techniques from journalists and use them in a copy context… A golden rule for graphics… The important difference between prevention and cure… and, how to create urgency. Download.

You can’t go a day in copywriting without someone bringing up AI. It may not have taken over copywriting yet, but it has definitely taken over the conversation. In case you haven’t gotten your feet wet yet with GPT 4, Jasper, Copy AI or any other one of the handful of AIs people are currently using, I can tell you, people ARE using it, in predictable and unpredictable ways. Today Nathan and I discussed what we’re hearing and what we’re doing. We started with a really interesting discovery Nathan made that not only saves massive amounts of time on a project, but also slashes the learning curve on how to get AI to do exactly what you want it to do. I shared what I’ve heard from two clients who have an unusual amount of expert knowledge about AI… as well as being top-notch copywriters on their own. You’ll be surprised about one expert’s prediction on who will thrive and who will suffer in copywriting, thanks to AI. Different probably than what you’ve heard before. And another expert solved a tough business problem of his own… in about 10 minutes! Beyond that, a little bit of AI news that may surprise, scare or delight you! Download.