Recently a friend and Email Players subscriber wanting to run for state Senator (not sure he wants me to name him or not) asked about what’s more important:
…the message itself or who delivers it?
Is this something you’ve explored and I am just not understanding what I am seeing? I’ve used it in the past to get through doors I can’t open but know someone who can. Tell me (or us through EP) more about this. I get the high level jist of it, am I over thinking it and need to keep it where it belongs at just a fundamental level, or is there more nuances I should be aware of?
The short answer:
Yes, the who is far more important.
Social proof, market place positioning, status, celebrity appeal, etc trump “writing.”
I’ve written lots about this.
And I would argue Status is #1 to everything.
A few examples:
1. Kim Kardashian
She has gotten paid upwards of $800k to tweet about a new brand.
$800k.
For a friggin tweet.
And from what I hear, she’s helped launch many a brand that way.
Yet, you could go round up the 10 greatest copywriters who ever lived — Halbert, Kennedy, Carlton, Bencivenga, Caples, Schwartz, Makepeace, D’Anna, Nicholas, Sackheim… and any other greats — and then blackmail, extort, even force them at gunpoint to write the world’s most persuasive tweet for someone with the same audience but who is not Kim Kardashian and does not have her sex tape & reality TV show status, credibility, celebrity appeal, etc and probably not even come close to making that kind of dough.
2. Bill Burr’s “great man” bit about Arnold Schwartzldhidfkjhdheger
Where he says:
“But because he’s a great man, he had the balls to move to America, became famous for lifting weights. I lift weights. Nobody gives a shit. He lifts weights… “Aah, aah, aah!” Becomes super famous.”
i.e., if Bill Burr writes about lifting nobody cares.
If Arnold does, everyone reads it, even if it’s written in ancient Transylvanian with Dracula’s blood.
3. Warren Buffet
Email Players subscriber Gary Bencivenga once talked about how he had persuaded one of his clients in the investment market to buy a rival newsletter for one reason and one reason only that had absolutely nothing to do (far as I know) with the content of the newsletter.
The reason?
It had a testimonial — they dang near hid in their advertising — from Warren Buffet.
That one testimonial, with Gary’s copy, would have broke the industry.
But without the testimonial?
Even the world’s greatest living copywriter wouldn’t be able to work the same sales miracles.
So that’s my take on it.
Messenger > than the message.
I don’t like it anymore than anyone else probably does.
But much easier to win this game by aligning with reality than kicking against it.
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Ben Settle
