One of the few reasons I read my Facebook newsfeed (most of my time on there is spent in groups) is because of A-list copywriter Bob Bly.
He and I don’t see eye-to-eye on a lot of things.
(He has privately scolded me several times on my wicked ways.)
But, he’s always been one of my favorite copywriters.
And, I have always liked how he gets people thinking and talking in social media.
Case in point:
He asked his FB friends what they thought of my claim in this morning’s email about the only purpose of a website being to build a list. Of course, he disagreed. And, of course, pretty much all the people replying to his post were against what I said, a few (gasp!) even taking what I said out of context.
Speaking of context, for the record:
My email Bob quoted from was talking to direct response marketers who sell with email already (or who want to). Not people who don’t use direct response marketing, don’t use email, couldn’t care less about using email, or who are Coca-Cola or some Fortune 1000 company or whatever.
Okay, so, now that we got that out of the way, on to the fun stuff.
It’s very easy to test out what I claim:
For the next 30 days leave all your education, demonstration, content, branding, articles, videos, testimonials, etc up on your website, but take down all your opt in forms, stop mailing your list offers during that same time frame, and see how your sales stack up to the prior 3 months’ sales. Then, if you want to further test it out, for the next 30 days after that, put your opt in forms back on your site, but take all the content, branding, teaching, demonstration, articles, testimonials, and anything else you think is more important than building a list down, resume mailing offers as usual, and see how your sales go.
Very simple.
But, I doubt anyone will test that out.
Or even consider it.
Why?
Because all the noble appeals to building credibility, demonstration, education, providing value, establishing trust, etc notwithstanding (all of which are important precisely **because they help you build your list**), if you had nothing else going for you but knowing how to use email correctly, you could build a decent business just running traffic to an opt in page, building that list, and then mailing it each day.
No blog, articles, pages of content, videos, personal branding, etc necessary.
No, it’s not ideal.
And, yes, you will almost certainly make MORE sales using the above on your site, too.
(i.e. I do all the above on my sites)
But, you could get by without them if you had nothing but the list, an offer people want, and email.
On the other hand:
You can have the best content, the most teaching, tons of educational videos, and all the usual website bells & whistles… but have no list you’re sending offers to, and you might make *some* sales I suppose. Maybe even a lot of sales if you have a huge brand/blog/site/audience already. But, that’d be a tough row to hoe for most of us mere mortals who don’t live in magic facebook fairy dust land where direct response marketing businesses aren’t first and foremost dependent upon having a list.
Anyway, that’s my take on the matter.
You can obviously do what you want.
But, if you want to try things my way using email, go here:
More:
Since we’re talking lists… and since the April issue is all about list building… and since the printer won’t be in until Monday anyway… I am extending the deadline to get the April issue until tomorrow (Sunday) at midnight.
Now get out of here before I change my mind…
Ben Settle
P.S. tl;dr version…
One of the commenters said:
“A website is a vehicle of influence that enables one to build credibility, establish trust, and quickly bond.”
And the *reason* for a direct response marketing business to build credibility, establish trust, and quickly bond with website visitors is, what?
Show of hands?
Anyone?
Fine, then I’ll spell it out for the class:
To build a list or make a sale (which builds a list)
