Last week an “Email Players” subscriber doing a bit of freelancing copywriting in the Biz opp niche asked a question about why her emails were getting hundreds of clicks, but only a few sales.

She was following the methodology.

Yet, sales were worse than when just lobbing nonsense at them.

Is it that her emails suck, or something she’s doing wrong?

My answer:

“It’s not you, biz opp is literally full of prospects wanting and indeed even expecting to be bull shatted and lied to, sold the dream, buy, refund or complain… rinse and repeat with another offer. Email Players won’t work unless you’re willing to get down in the dirt with the market and get in their heads. Otherwise might as well just lob typical biz opp copy emails at them.”

And so it goes in the wonderful world of Biz opp.

It happens in the nonsensical “make money online!” niche too.

Those customers don’t want the truth.

They want sweet, candy-like lies.

Thus, I do not recommend selling in those niches and actively warn “Email Players” subscribers if they are going to be in those niches, there’s nothing I can do or teach to help them. And this is especially the case with the upcoming February issue for reasons I’ll be yapping about soon.

Until then, a word to the wise is sufficient…

Okay enough of this.

More info on the newsletter here:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

One of the more intriguing biographies I once read is called:

“The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C. S. Lewis”

Obviously, about the late, great writer and Christian thinker C.S. Lewis who was known to be an especially great debater — both when he was an atheist, then a pagan, and later on when he became a Christian, creating some of the most influential Christian writings ever published.

As a religious man, he often debated atheists and pagans.

And, he often “won” these debates.

Yes, from what I’ve read, even according to the atheists & pagans he bested in these debates, who were simply no match for C.S. Lewis’s dialectal persuasion prowess. He was revered for his skill at such things far and wide by everyone except… himself.

Here’s what I mean:

One thing he admitted was, the more he “won” these debates, the more his own faith suffered, and the more he began to doubt his own beliefs.

This is a little-known psychological “bug” in the human brain.

It can effect everyone to some degree.

And, this is especially true, if you but observe, in direct response copywriting.

Yes, Reepicheep, it’s true.

It’s why so much otherwise persuasive sales copy fails — because it tries to “convince” rather than influence. There is a very distinct difference between these two things that is lost on, I would guess, 99% of copywriters or people who do any kind of direct response selling in any media.

Yes, writing copy that “convinces” works on the hyper buyers who buy everything.

They are, after all, looking for reasons to believe.

But, it turns off the skeptics – who make up 2-5 times more people than the hyper buyers – looking for reasons NOT to believe.

And the reason why it turns off the skeptics is because convincing copy always comes off as Needy, as if the copywriter doesn’t fully believe everything he is writing. This is a very insidious copywriting problem nobody seems to ever address. But now that you know about it, you can adjust your copy as needed.

Don’t know how to do that?

You can start with the upcoming February 2021 Email Players issue.

The entire issue shows how to write copy that isn’t convincing but influencing.

Huge difference between the two.

More on this later.

In the meantime, to check out the newsletter, go here:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

A little while back I wrote an email with the subject line:

“Worshipping the open rate fairy and calling it science”

The email broke apart the entire “oOoOPeN rRrRrAAAAAtEs” schtick from multiple points of view, not just from my experiences and my customers’ experiences, but in the experiences of trained computer scientists and engineers, as well as Gmail’s own particulars, the realities of Android phones mostly not even knowing if you opened an email, and the list goes on.

A big theme in the email was:

Focus on what you can control, not what you can’t.

This goes 100% against virtually all sales, marketing, and copywriting dogma — with their obsession with sales quotas, freaking out over vanity metrics like open & opt-in rates, and confusing a mere result with failure.

Enter daily email reader Jameel Paul.

Jameel is a former hardcore door-to-door “make the sale to these ice cold leads who are calling the cops on you or you don’t eat” salesman.

His reply is reprinted with his permission below.

Hit it, Jameel:

elBenbo you’re 100% right,

focusing on what you “can control” was literally beaten into me from my direct-selling days. 8 years I spent in that industry.

Eight hours a day going door-to-door, or approaching people in the street cold, selling whatever service I had at the time.

All on 100% commission.

An in a day you’d have *so many* variables:

* working outside in poor weather conditions, literally hail, rain, sleet n snow, (and having to smile at customers when you have frozen feet, fingers and you’re suit’s drenched through)

* people not answering the door to you

* the police being called out to stop and question you because you look “suspicious” – when you’re just trying to earn a living like the next man

* would-be customers failing a credit check (for the few people who were interested)

* or other would-be customers who were just leaving as you were approaching, or just getting home as you were leaving

But we got drilled like military to “focus on 3 things”

1. Improve your sales Pitch
2. Increase your Pace (speak to more people)
3. Improve your Attitude

All within our control.

And the sales would take care of themselves. (With the right actions, done long enough)

But after 8 years of selling like this, I left with no list and nothing to export. – That’s why I like what you teach so much.

Anyway, this just a long way just to say I agree wid ya, wise ol’ elBenbo

Something I want to say about this:

I don’t know if Jameel used it or not in his sales adventures, but the secret persuasion technique in the January “Email Players” issue is something that works like gangbusters even on the kind of leads so skeptical of you they call the cops on you.

If anything, the technique thrives under such situations.

But tomorrow – 12/31/20 – is the deadline to get this issue.

After that, too late…

Here’s the URL for clickin’ while the clickin’ is still good:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

Earlier this year I did the proverbial deep-dive into a book called:

“Backstory”

The world’s single most prolific comicbook writer (even more prolific than the late Stan Lee) Chuck Dixon once recommended it. And it contains interviews with golden age screenwriters that are chock-full of marketing, copywriting, and persuasion insights. Them old school screenwriters and directors truly understood human nature & psychology. And when you read how they thought, solved problems, and worked… you start to see all kinds of marketing & copywriting techniques you simply won’t find in any book, course, seminar, or other program.

Take the movie “Rear Window.”

Easily one of my all-time favorite movies.

But, also, one of my all-time favorite marketing “seminars” in and of itself.

Take any of the dialogue between the two characters, for example.

If you have not seen the movie, the main character Jeff is an older, rough-around-the-edges (not at all sophisticated, extroverted, or the type to dress up or go to parties) photographer and “slob hero” who usually lives out of a suitcase. He also has a broken leg from getting too close to a racing car crash he got a photo of, and lives a life of high adventure, with never more than a week’s salary in the bank.

His girlfriend Lisa, on the other foot, is a high society socialite and his polar opposite.

She loves fancy clothes, fancy dinners, and fancy gifts.

She is also young and beautiful and graceful… and can have any man in New York City she wants — including high value men with money, fortune, and fame.

Jeff and Lisa couldn’t be more far apart.

Yet she is madly in love with Jeff.

And it’s fascinating how he keeps her in a constant state of loving him, despite all reason, logic, and practicality telling her otherwise due to them being so opposite, and him not at-all being the kind of guy anyone would think she should be madly in love with.

Anyway, their interactions are like mini masterclasses in persuasion.

And not-so-accidentally:

What Jeff does is how I originally “ethically manipulated” Stefania.

Like Jeff and Lisa, Stefania and I could not have been more opposite when we first met in my old elBenbo’s Lair Facebook group. She was a clubbing New Yorker, Millennial-minded, pro-choice/pro-Bernie liberal, scared of guns, rednecks, and right-wingers who behave like Yours Unruly. Our interactions were very much like Jeff and Lisa’s in the movies early on as far as how opposite we were. And today, she’d tell you she is not only not the same person she was 4 years ago… but almost the complete opposite.

More:

Both Jeff and I used the same persuasion “technique” to keep our women madly in love.

To bend them to our evil ways.

And, ultimately, to make them both way happier as a result.

Here’s why I am going on and on about this:

In the January “Email Players” issue I go into great detail behind how I used this technique on Stefania… how Jeff used it on Lisa (including dialogue from the movie so you can study it in minute detail)… and even another example from the movie “Gone Girl” — where the main character Nick Dunne uses this same technique to help save his reputation and from facing the electric chair. In Nick’s case, he is on a national TV show facing a world where everyone hates him except his sister and his lawyer. It’s known he had an affair, evidence is cooked against him that he killed his wife, the police have all but arrested him, his town despises him, and the show host — Sharon — is known for busting balls for ratings.

His only way “out” is the technique taught in the January issue.

Plus, I also show you the exact part of the script where he does it.

Take all the above, along with the context & real-life examples (from my own businesses as well as various Email Players of the horde’s businesses) inside the rest of the issue, and I daresay it could be the single most potent lesson in persuasion you’ve ever seen.

A tall order for sure.

Especially considering how well-versed many in my Horde already are in persuasion & marketing.

But the proof is in the reading & doing.

Something you can do by being subscribed before tomorrow’s 12/31/20 deadline.

Here’s the link:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

P.S. I am also raising the price on Email Players after the deadline hits tomorrow. I say this as a courtesy so nobody can whine about not being told.

Consider yourself told…

When I put a call out to hire for Learnistic last month, I included this in the email:

+ Are not a low information person who uses terms like: “follow the science!” or “trust the plan!” or “the science is settled!” or “climate denier!” or “follow the process!” or “wear the mask!” etc. If you like to say or post such things on Facebook then it’s obvious you make decisions based on needy social media signaling, low IQ hashtag propaganda, or what hollow-minded media-created experts say… and not the scientific method all Learnistic employees are required to use (the app’s inventor, Troy Broussard, is a Navy Nuclear engineer, and mandates it) to help find software bugs, which is an extremely important part of the job. If this bothers, offends, or makes you go “huh?” that’s good. We just potentially saved both you and us a lot of time.

I included that for a multitude of reasons.

One of which was the delightful weeping & gnashing of teeth from the low information Facebook armchair scientists who think media created celebrities giving advice and nurses on TikTok doing a choreographed dance outside a hospital are “pRo sCiEnCe!”

I prefer they go haunt someone else and get away from my corner of the internet.

Which, I hope, many did after reading that email.

More:

Another reason I want nothing to do with low information people as customers is their gullibility makes for terrible decision making. That’s why politicians who break their own stay-at-home orders and only wear masks for the TV cameras pander to them so aggressively. Why the media talking heads fool them so effortlessly. And why those who would sow discord in any organization – corporate or otherwise – manipulates them so deliberately.

All because low information = bad decision making.

Bad decision making = easily manipulated.

Easily manipulated = used & abused by horrible people to do equally horrible things.

In marketing the tells of low info bros are the blind, out-of-context use of terms like:

“sell the click!”

“open rates!”

“swipes!”

“test!”

“funnels!”

“End your prices with a 7 or 9!”

And, that old chestnut… guru name dropping.

None of them are inherently bad or incorrect.

But the context behind how they are used could very well indicate low info.

For example:

When some rando pounding his chest on Facebook tells you to “split test it!” when you have a question, even though you only have a list of 13 people, any split test is all-but completely pointless. Not even worth your time to set the test up. You’d be much better served quickly writing an email or sending traffic to the thing you are wanting to split test just to see if your offer has any legs in the first place – and then use those sales to pay for more traffic or to build a bigger list you can perhaps do a real test with some day.

Same with the other one-liners marketers like to squawk & parrot.

Gullible marketers mindlessly fall for them all the time because their goo-roo told them to.

Some even foolishly wrap their entire business models around them.

Thus, we have an industry where, for example, almost everyone blindly ends all their pricing with a 7 or 9 just because. Why almost everyone foolishly obsesses over their so-called open rates vs focusing on writing better emails people want to open and read in the first place. And why almost everyone incorrectly thinks selling the click is the ideal way to build a long term, sustainable business, when almost the exact opposite is true.

Anyway, I don’t know where I’m going with this.

Except, maybe to say:

Whoever first said “in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king” wasn’t just whistlin’ yankee, it’s true across the board, in every market, niche, and product category.

On that note:

The persuasion technique taught in the January “Email Players” issue can give you that eye.

I would even go so far as to say you can be a complete newbie at copywriting & selling, and it can work for you to blast up response and sales, while creating a far better, higher quality, and more eager-to-consume what you sell customer or client.

The evil deadline to get this issue is practically here already.

To subscribe while you still have a little time left, go here right away:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

“Email Players” subscriber Paul Campo checks in:

Hey Ben,

From the Republic of the Socialists, that we call CA…I don’t know if this is intentional by you (or maybe I’m the only one) but there’s an element that you bring to your Horde.

Let me explain… I’ve been noticing a lot of “Accountability” products on the shelves. I’ve never been a fan of those. It’s weird, having a stranger “root” you on and hold you “accountable” to forward progression

(I don’t care about letting this fool down he’s probably wacking it on his time-off instead of working).

However… there’s a hand full of people in my life (that I’ve never met expect brief phone calls and email exchanges) that are my “accountability” list. Meaning, when I start feeling down, discouraged, hard on myself, I hear that little el Ben tell me:

“Stop being a bitch and get back to work. Or I’ll kick you out of the horde. Get your shit together – this takes time, and you have all the time the world”.

And yes, you can use this for what you want.

I’ve ruthlessly mocked so-called “accountability” groups, coaches, etc for years.

I ain’t talking about “devil on my shoulder” accountability like Paul is referring to my voice as.

But the accountability industry.

At worst, it’s just flat out pathetic and weak.

At best, it shows those craving accountability aren’t all that “in” to whatever it is they are being held accountable for, and should be doing something else to sell or do (i.e., do you need to be held accountable to watch your favorite TV show each week?)

My opinion.

Do whatever you want with it.

But you now know what I think you can do with an accountability group…

All right, let’s get down to the business.

The January “Email Players” issue deadline is right around the corner.

As a subscriber I expect you to be fully accountable to yourself.

To your market.

And, yes, to your business.

If you need a coach, group, book, or other product for that, don’t bother.

You’ll simply be wasting your money.

Here’s the link:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

“Email Players” subscriber & pizzeria owner Brad Davis chimes in:

Ben,

If there’s one thing i learned from owning a restaurant for 10 years it was this:

Profit is directly related to the amount of facetime you get with your customers on a daily basis.

If you’re running it right, then you should get text messages from your regulars on your night off telling you they came in and missed seeing you.

When you stop getting text messages on your night(s) off then that means you’re taking too many and they’ve stopped expecting to see you.

Soon, they’ll stop coming in as often… or altogether.

And your sales will suffer.

Now I’m learning that daily email is the equivalent to facetime in the restaurant. In fact, I’d say it’s even more important for online businesses as it’s literally the only way to build and maintain a long term business relationship.

I’m loving your newsletters and books. Keep up the good work!

Just more proof of this undeniable fact:

Daily — not weekly, monthly, or when you are “inspired” — contact moves mountains. And it does it for no other reason than something the late, Chicago advertising genius Leo Burnett said many years ago.

He said in a speech:

“… the No. 1 factor in building confidence is the plain old-fashioned matter of friendly familiarity. You simply can’t have one without the other…When you meet a man on the same street corner every morning and learn to like the way he smiles, the way he dresses, and the way he conducts himself you are much more likely to be a prospect for the automobile or the insurance policy he may sometime want to sell you than you are for that of a stranger.”

All right, onward to the important stuff:

The pitch.

If you start applying what I teach in the January “Email Players” issue to your daily contact — emails, social media, videos, podcasts, blog, articles, whatever it is you like to do — I would be green money you’ll see a quick & dramatic “uptick” in new business, new sales, and new profits.

It’s by the far the most powerful persuasion tactic I use.

And, anyone can do the same.

That is, if you understand how it works.

Something the January issue teaches in spades.

Here’s where to subscribe in time to get it before the 12/31/20 deadline:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

There are 3 persuasion tactics I believe work above all others.

I have personally used & tested each thoroughly over the years.

And, I have yet to see them not work over and above all others — especially over the fancy closes, NLP one-liners, & objection-handling techniques used by the Zig Ziglar fanboys.

Anyway, these 3 tactics are:

1. Damaging admissions

This is where you find a flaw in your product and service and admit it. Something the late advertising mogul David Ogilvy used to play like a fiddle in his own ads, and mandated his employees do at every opportunity.

Difficulty to pull of: Not very difficult at all, which is the beauty of it

2. Make the skeleton dance

This is something the great sales trainer Barry Maher worked out years ago, and is where you spin flaws about what you offer into benefits & reasons to buy.

Difficulty to pull off: Usually extremely difficult, which is why it’s so rare

As for the #3:

It’s a topic I wrote about in detail in the January 2020 “Email Players” issue.

An issue that generated many testimonials and case studies from other Email Players of the Horde who started using it in everything from their sales letters and emails to their marriages and love lives (it is, frankly, how I closed Stefania, when I possessed probably none of the traits on her “Checklist” of things she was looking for in a man.) In my own businesses, in just the past 12 months alone, I have also used this persuasion tactic to write the sales copy & emails to launch two offers to the tune of the two most successful launches of my entire business career (when launching Learnistic & when launching my “elBenbo Press” book).

Which brings me to the rub:

The January 2021 “Email Players” issue.

I revisit this topic again inside its crisp white pages.

But, this time, I show many more examples to model & adapt & be inspired by… including the above Email Players of the Horde examples (with their permission) and how I’ve used it in the two above launches, amongst other examples to mine for your own business.

More:

This tactic can be used universally.

With the exception of certain low class markets (like biz opp and “make money online” type offers, where I admittedly have seen it backfire and NOT work), it works across the board in all kinds of markets, niches, industries, and product categories to create customers but who tend to be a much higher quality & caliber to the point where sometimes they even thank you for doing it in many cases.

Best part:

You don’t need any special talents or powers of copywriting, selling, or marketing to use it.

In fact, the weaker your skills, the better it tends to work.

(I have many theories on why, but that’s a tale for another time.

All right, so that’s that.

If you want in on the January issue, here’s what to do:

1. Go to the URL below before the looming 12/31/20 deadline

2. Read the sales letter carefully

3. Patiently wait for your first issue

Here’s the URL:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

After yesterday’s rant about why I hate getting unsolicited books…

Below is a list of all the books I plowed through in 2020.

It excludes several I started but got bored by or decided to put down in favor of something else. But maybe it’ll help inspire someone somewhere to read & curate their reading more.

They are listed in no real particular order.

Except, as you will see, the ones I’ve read multiple times are listed first:

• Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (second reading) — one of my all-time favorite business books
• Marvel Comics the Untold Story by Sean Howe (second reading) — a must-read for anyone wanting to be in the info publishing business, in my opinion
• Slugfest by Tucker Reed (second reading) — ditto above
• Walt Disney: Triumph of the American Imagination by Neal Gabler (second reading) — lots and lots of business lessons embedded, in fact the chapter on Disneyland is one of the single best lessons about World-Building in business I’ve ever run across
• Obvious Adams by Robert Updegraff (probably my 50th reading, not an exaggeration)
• Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz (well past my 20th reading)
• Me, Inc by Gene Simmons — single best book on personal branding I ever done read
• No B.S. Marketing to the Affluent by Dan Kennedy — wish I’d read this years ago
• The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo — nothing anyone who studies persuasion a while doesn’t know, but it reminded me of a few things I had been slacking on doing in my own marketing that’s making a big differences, probably I’ll write about it more in a future Email Players issue
• Bandersnatch by Diana Pavlac Glyer — excellent book for writers, about Tolkien & CS Lewis and their processes for writing & helping each other when they were in the Inklings
• Kobold Guide to World-Building by Scott Hungerford, Jeff Grub, Michael A. Stackpole, Chris Pramas, Keith Baker, & Steven Winter — you have to read between the lines if you want to apply the lessons to business world-building
• Win Your Case by Gerry Spence — anything by Spence is worth reading
• Veneration by Sharon K. Gilbert & Derek P. Gilbert — fascinating book for anyone into digging up some deep Biblical teachings about the real life zombie apocalypse on the horizon
• Corporate Cancer by Vox Day — anyone who hires anyone for business, even a lowly gopher or intern, should read this three times, minimum if you want to protect your business from the SJW rot that’s bringing down billion dollar companies one-by-one right now
• Tales from the Customer Crypt by Vance Morris — I liked it so much, I gifted it to “Email Players” subscribers last month
• Backstory 1 by Patrick McGilligan — all kinds of great psychological insights you can apply to your copy & marketing from Hollywood’s Golden Age screenwriters
• Writing for Comics & Graphic Novels by Peter David — his Trump Derangement Syndrome on his blog that makes him sound bat shyt notwithstanding, he’s one of the most prolific & successful comicbook writers in history, and definitely some valuable insights for any writer
• Rise of the Dungeon Master: Gary Gygax and the Creation of D&D by David Kushner — best “micro lesson” World-Building I ever read
• Washington A Life by Ron Chernow — bio of George Washington, not only is it clear that he is part of a very long list of men who accomplished great things at least partly to get a disapproving mom’s approval, but it’s also clear he was either the single luckiest man alive when it came to not being killed in battle or God really was looking out for him… to the point where even his enemies marveled at it. There’s a lot of lessons embedded in that alone for the discerning marketer
• Larry Hama: Conversations by Christopher Irving — I pulled lots of ideas out not only for my writing, but also the publishing-side of my business
• How to Sell Anything to Anybody by Joe Girard — incredible book I cannot recommend enough

Okay, enough about books I didn’t write.

Let’s talk about the one I just finished writing the first draft of.

If you were an active member of my old elBenbo’s Lair Facebook group (and if you weren’t, no need to keep reading this email) I’ll soon be launching this book about how to create and profit from your own elBenbo’s Lair-style social media platform. And if you have any testimonials or success stories about when you did your time in the Lair, and would like it included on the testimonial list inside the book, email it directly to me before the end of the week.

If I think it’ll enhance the reader’s experience, I’ll include it with your URL.

In the meantime:

One thing I will say about this book I am working on is, the info inside won’t work nearly as well if you don’t know how to build a relationship with your email list beforehand. The framework that made it work so well was not so much a tactic but an ethic. So if the upcoming book interests you, I suggest rapidly implementing what I teach in my “Email Players” newsletter starting right away, and well before I launch the book next year.

Here’s the link to subscribe:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle