Ben Settle

Let me tell you about the country’s top concealed carry instructor.

He lives out in the bung hole of the universe (or within burping distance of it) in the county I used to live in… is one of the NRA’s top-ranked concealed carry instructors… is easily the greatest infotainer I have ever seen (I wrote an “Email Players” issue just on his methods a couple years ago)… and, he is never lacking for business with an almost rabid level of loyalty from his fans, even though:

1. He’s kind of a prick and is “mean”

2. He’s more expensive than other instructors in his area (he donates it all, but his up-sell game during his class is A+)

3. He is harder to get into learn from than others in the area — being booked solid sometimes for months in advance

4. He literally has contempt for his students

Here’s why I mean by contempt:

He actually loves and respects his serious students who go out and actually start carrying after they get their concealed carry license from the Socialist Republic of Oregon.

But, those who don’t?

He literally said in his class:

(Paraphrased)

“People will come say hi to me on the street after taking my class. And the first thing I ask them is, ‘are you carrying?’ If they say no, I tell them to go away. I don’t want you trying to talk to me if after this class you get your license and are not carrying.”

i.e. Don’t waste his time if you aren’t serious.

He only wants to associate with gun owners who carry and not those who aren’t.

Now, there are many lessons to learn just from this.

Such as the amazing persuasion power of not being Needy.

The importance of having cold indifference.

And, especially, his truly spectacular customer *curation* game.

I have never seen anyone curate the way he does.

And, he was one of my inspirations over the years for the 4-point method I use to curate my customers — keeping the low class jackasses and new product junkies out, while making my business, my offers, and my daily emails far more attractive to grownup business owners — and have a far more successful, stable, and ever-increasing-in-profits business.

A methodology I teach in the May issue.

But, that miserable old deadline is coming fast, though.

To get it in time, go here immediately:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

One of my favorite scenes from “The Two Towers” movie is when the Riders of Rohan slaughter an orc party, and then put one of the orc heads on display to frighten off the other orcs in the area.

It was an early inspiration for what I teach in my “Copy Troll” book.

But, it’s also useful for frightening off people who should not be buying what I offer. By displaying their antics, it scares these other “orc” customers off, and lets the ideal customers I want know it’s safe to enter my lush green lands.

Case in point:

If you’ve read my last few days’ emails, and want to see a perfect example of someone who is a magnificent example of:

1. A new product junkie…

2. A hyper “S” personality…

3. A small thinker in info-marketing…

Look no further than a bloke who I broke my own rule (proving even I have to keep any tendency to be “nice” in check…) with, and let resubscribe to get the April “Email Players” issue last month.

Predictably, he gave the same sob sister story others do to be allowed back.

And, also predictably, he did not like the April issue.

The reason?

“There was 6 pages of adverts and 10 pages telling me what not to do. I just expected more – I don’t think I benefited from the issue so I’m sorry to say that I can’t continue.”

Despite his fuzzy math — there was 17 pages of content, more content than the usual 16 pages, and only 4 pages of advertising – it’s been quite useful.

Why?

Two main reasons:

1. Amusement

An info-marketer complaining about seeing (oh noes!) ads that can be studied in an info product is rather like a direct mail writer complaining about seeing direct mail in his mailbox.

It borders on marketing insanity.

But, it’s an *amusing* kind of insanity.

Like when the Joker told the story about the two escaped mental patients on a roof top.

And the one with a flashlight says:

“I’ll shine this light across to the other roof and you walk on it to get to the other side.”

And the other one says:

“Do you think I’m CRAZY? You’ll turn it off when I’m half way across!”

2. A head to display

Even better… it gave me a perfect orc head to display, to keep the rest of the new product junkie orcs away from even thinking something like “Email Players” might be a good idea to invest in.

So if you think like the guy above, consider this email the proverbial orc head staring at you:

Save your money, Chuckles.

I promise you will be better off.

And this is especially true in the paid newsletter henceforth — where there will be lots MORE ads, to the tune of, eventually, if the demand is there, as many as 7 full pages of ads combined (even more than the new product junkie above’s mythical 6 pages in the April issue) — embedded within and as loose leaf inserts. Ads that a small thinking new product junkies will no-doubt be horrified by:

“I’m paying for this – how dare he include these ads!”

… even as they get up-sold on everything else they pay far more for in life — from pricey restaurants, to hospital visits, to new cars, to warranties, to an extra shot of sugar in their coffee, to even buying domain names.

But forward-thinking types?

They will see those ads as the bonus “back door swipe file” it is.

Complete with special offers nobody else outside Email Players are privy to… and, even if they don’t buy from them or have any interest in them, are worth studying.

More reasons for the orcs to scurry back to their caves:

The future of “Email Players” will also be far more akin to the kind of deeper thinking info found in the April issue — which, I even predicted in the first email I used to promote it in late March, would be the kind of info small thinkers would hate, flee, and be warded off by… while bigger thinking types would love, embrace, and profit like crazy from.

Take, for example, one of Australia’s top copywriters & marketing consultants Pete Godfrey.

Right after he read that issue (which you can no longer get) he hunted me down on Skype and said:

“Ben you legend! Still loving the newsletter mate… please…keep publishing.”

And Blas Carrasco, who said:

“I just finished reading this month’s issue and let me say… For me, it’s the best one yet and I know I’ll lose sleep over it because I have a zillion-frackin things whirling around my noggin now. This issue has come at a perfect time as I’m currently working through a sales page for a product I created.Thanks for a badass newsletter and an insomnia filled night.”

And Ross O’Lochlainn, who said:

“Ben… a quick note to say your latest issue…has been a mind blower. I’ve been thinking about what you said in this issue. A LOT.” [Note: his comment was almost a page long, but it has lots of “spoilers” for that issue, so I omitted…]

And Steve Jolly, who said:

“Best issue in my 4 years of EP. Thank you!”

And, as far as the (gasp!) paid ads I am going to be testing more of inside go… the founding father of internet marketing as we all know it — Ken McCarthy – said this after I told him the secret inspiration and motivations I have behind testing them:

“Brilliant aspiration on so many levels.”

HINT:

It ain’t just about money — I make little money in the short term doing these ads, especially compared to when I stuck a single, long form sales letter for one of my own offers in the envelope each month…

Bottom line:

These guys are playing chess and getting cerebral with their businesses, while the new product junkies drool on the carpet while shooting marbles and singing along with Barney the Dinosaur on tv. And, it’s my goal that this email serves as a warning displayed “head” to these marble-shooters to save their money, save their time, and save their energy… and keep playing in the business equivalent of the bin of sticky balls at Chuck E. Cheeses where they will be more comfortable.

Because, as I show over and over and over… they have no place amongst the EPOTH.

(i.e. the Email Players of the Horde)

But, there is always the possibility of hope, for those few orcs with the desire to change their wicked ways.

I say “possiblity” because it’s all up to you.

I can show you my version of the 12-step program.

But you have to follow it, endure the withdrawals for when you crave something new instead of implementing what you have, and change the way you think long term, and make it a part of your “business lifestyle” — and not just a one-time quick fix for your latest new product craving.

And lest someone head to social media to say how “mean” I am:

The Riders of Rohan didn’t particularly *like* slaughtering orcs & displaying their heads.

But, it was necessary.

Not just for the safety of their lands.

But, also, for the safety of the rest of the orcs, too.

And so it is when I write emails to ward off the new product junkies, freebie-seekers, and shallow-thinkers wandering the goo-roo casino. They are probably far better off downloading another free eBook or mindlessly reacting to their social media feeds than hanging around here being pitched every day.

Marbles, after all, are cheap.

But learning from, buying, and implementing my newsletter ain’t…

For anyone still reading this long email who is interested in “Email Players”…

The deadline to get the May issue is Tuesday.

Here is the link:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

I recently read an email from the great and esteemed A-list copywriter Bob Bly about how consumers are ripping-off businesses who use direct marketing.

Specifically, these 3 types:

1. People who buy just to get the premium/bribe/bonus then refund

2. People who are “serial returners” who constantly buy and then return

3. The freebie-seekers — who never buy, have no intention of buying, but will take all your free stuff, get plumb grumpy if you dare tell them about an offer, and, if you let them, will greedily hoard as much of your time as you are foolish enough to give them – which is one of many reasons why I don’t answer non-customer service questions from non-Email Players subscribers, incidentally.

Anyway, it was a great email.

I highly recommend you read everything Bob puts out.

But, in the case of the specific types of customers above, I will say there are ways of repelling them so they never waste your time, energy, or resources. And, I show you my 4-part method for doing so in the May “Email Players” issue.

Doing so can not only build your business, but your peace of mind, too.

Here’s the jolly, candy-like link:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

Below is a follow-up video to yesterday’s follow-up video of Thursday’s email about why the world is crawling with S’s and what this means for businesses.

It’s another one from the dark, in bed, when I woke up.

So, it’s pitch black and you can’t see me.

(You’re welcome)

Anyway, here’s the link:

In other words:

More to come on this…

I recently shot a video in the pitch darkness of my private bed chambers, going deeper into yesterday’s email topic, where I shared some extremely useful and profitable information I’ve been using to make more sales.

A topic apparently not everyone appreciated.

That being the case, let’s not disappoint the scoffers, and keep that momentum going:

Also:

Yesterday’s email was originally a video, but it did not do justice to what I wanted to say, so I wrote it as an email, instead.

So when you hear me reference “yesterday’s video” that’s what it is.

Not long ago, I wrote an email about a guy who said your pal & daily muse was discriminating against blind people, because I don’t sell my “Copy Troll” book as a PDF, so the text can be enlarged, etc.

And right afterwards, a blind “Email Players” subscriber responded:

I have something for you since you can’t tell that guy what you think without serious PC backlash…

I can tell that blind guy to sack up and find a way to make it happen for himself and quit compounding his disability.

Even if elBenbo Publishing doesn’t hand it to him on a silver platter. If he wants it…he should just get it and stop being a soapbox biyatch

I have less than 2% residual vision. Can’t read printed books and I don’t miss a word of your monthly newsletter or “must reads” like Breakthrough Advertising.

How? Determination, sheer will and technology.

I used to subscribe to another newsletter that would arrive every month as a pdf but it had columns, varying size text, text as images…

You name it … a real checklist of “How NOT to communicate with the blind”

“Oh No I guess the information is not for me”

Yeah right..

I hired a guy on Fiverr to read them every month and send me the .mp3.

Not to pirate or circulate.

To learn privately

It goes further

I even asked my retired mother to read a copy of Eugene Schwartz Breakthrough Advertizing aloud while I typed it out WORD BY WORD. Not as good as hand written but it is what it is.

The most painful part wasn’t the typing.

It was the amount of times she wanted to stop and tell me “Oh this is just like Don Draper!”

Anyway I wanted that information just like everyone else and I hate whining. (mine and that of others)

Ben if it wasn’t for the content of your email today I likely NEVER would have told you about my vision.

Why would I? What do you care and how does it help me?

My company manufactures and sells adapted physical education/sports for the blind equipment, an inflatable ice bath for athlete recovery and an online course by a canine physio for people to help their aging dogs live more comfortable lives.

Nobody needs to know my physical shortcomings in order to benefit from what I offer.

As an unapologetic partially reformed high school bully…that reader of yours needs to be spun around and have his tighty whities hiked up hard in a 1980s homage to the wedgie

Keep hating the blind elBenbo you can’t kill this villain 🙂

Signed

A student you can’t shake no matter how you deliver your goods

Jeff Christy

And so it is…

All right, on to the business:

The May “Email Players” issue goes to the printer soon, if you want to get your hot, sticky little claws on it before the deadline, and join the ranks of hardcore players in business like Jeff, and many others in my Horde, go here:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

“Email Players” subscriber Kendra LaBouf shows how to play to win instead of playing to not lose:

I just wanted to let you know how The Email Players Skhema Book affected me.

I received the book two days ago. I read half of it the first day. I got to the part about unsubscribes and realized this is my biggest fear with daily email. I thought, “What about when people unsubscribe?” and you said, “They will.”

So the next day, I read the second half of the book, and still there was this nagging voice that said, “What about when people unsubscribe?” even though you had plainly stated that they will.

I realized then and there that one of my biggest obstacles is I really want to be liked. But trying to be liked has never served me well in any other area of life, so why was I so hung up on it for my less-than-a-year-old business. It’s just a baby business! It doesn’t need to grow up with baggage.

So I sent out my first email using your techniques in the book with the title I can’t even pronounce, and made my pot of morning coffee. Before I had even had a chance to pour a cup, I got a notification that I made a sale from that email!

And the unsubscribes? That happened too. Four of them in the last five hours.

Guess which thing I’m focusing on and calling my mom about?

Thanks so much!

And so it goes…

The April “Email Players” issue is going to the printer tomorrow.

Hit the jump below to subscribe in time to get it:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

Recently, I’ve been re-watching a Q&A video with the late, great Stan Lee called:

“Mutants, Monsters, And Marvels”

This video has had a tremendous influence on my business and thinking over the years, and I like to watch it at least one or two times per year, where I always get some new idea, insight, or method for building a bigger, better, and more profitable business.

One of my favorite parts of Stan’s story is when he was ready to quit the comic book industry.

He’d been writing comics for about 20 years.

And, his publisher kept things so dumbed-down, had so little respect for the intelligence of their readers, and was such a stubbornly annoying trend-follower, Stan decided enough was enough and he was going to quit and go be something else. And when he told his wife his plans, she made a suggestion that, quite literally, completely transformed the entire comic book industry and, by extension, movie industry, and has resulted in probably hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue since the early 1960’s.

What did his wife suggest?

She said:

“Why don’t you tell the kind of story you want since it’ll be your last one? Get it out of your system.”

And so Stan did just that.

Instead of doing a squeaky clean super hero story about the usual super powered Mary Sue type heroes other companies did, he gave his characters very human flaws, unique personalities, and did a lot of things nobody else was even thinking about, much less doing, in comic books at that time, but that we all take for granted now.

The result?

He created the Fantastic Four which turned into the greatest selling comic book in history at the time, along with many other comic books that even today are #1 sellers, and are billion dollar movie franchises.

All because he was fed up with the status quo.

And, because he took a chance.

Even more important:

It occurred to me on my last viewing of the video that he also did something else to tap into an extremely profitable and powerful principle of marketing and business-building around that time in the early 60’s, without even realizing it, that can work like crazy to completely transform and add piles of new sales to businesses today, too — including businesses like yours and mine.

I know this, because I used this secret business principle myself.

Specifically:

About 18-months ago, when I saw an explosion in growth, sales, and profits (and, frankly, joy) unlike anything I’d seen in the prior 18 *years* before doing it.

Enter the April “Email Players” issue.

It takes a lot of guts to implement this into your business.

Especially if you are prone to caring what other people think.

Since I am not overly burdened with that flaw these days, it was very easy for me to implement this into my business, my emails, my sales copy, my content, my marketing, and my information publishing business as a whole.

But, your mileage could almost certain vary.

And, this issue is not meant as a new business plan to be “swiped” for anyone, but a beacon to guide you in implementing this near-magical idea in your unique offers, your unique personality, your unique business, and your unique goals, via showing you exactly how I’ve been doing it, and have done it in various client deals, too.

But, my ways will not necessarily be your ways.

Doing this takes problem solving, it takes patience, and it takes independent thought.

And, people who lack the character to stick with anything after the excitement of the moment has passed (i.e. people addicted to the dopamine drip of buying something new and secksy sounding), and who buy completely on emotion, and who are merely playing business and have never done anything but buy stuff about business & marketing while going around telling people on facebook about how they are “an entrepreneur!”… will get zero value from it. I say this for the benefit of those types of marketing proles who think their lives will change somehow after reading it… just like they think will happen every time they buy a $7 eBook they never read, much less implement during their walk through the goo-roo casino.

But for the grownups?

I noticed this idea has been used by many great businesses.

Not just Marvel Comics/Stan Lee.

But many other giants of industry.

And, it’s telling how many of them were virtual nobodies, hardly noticed, maybe even barely scraping by until they started implementing it.

All right, the deadline to get this issue is tomorrow.

That’s when I send it to the printer.

After that it won’t be available, and even if I someday decide to sell back issues, I will almost certainly omit this issue from the list. Reason why is, I do want to teach and share it with my Horde, but I also want to keep some of the intimate details of my business it exposes as exclusive as I can.

If you’re interested in subscribing, go to the link below while you still have time:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

The infamous man known as “The Knee Pain Guru” recently send me this ditty:

Hey Ben!

I thought to write and share a personal experience about being on your list and an email player’s member for a little over 2 years now…

A few weeks ago you sent out a story about guy who was cancelling his subscription because of the government shut down or the economy or some shit like that.

You basically told him, you can focus on everything that doesn’t work, he doesn’t have enough money, what ever sort of “self-pity” he was spewing out in his email giving a “piss poor” excuse why he couldn’t afford to continue to be a member…

As I read it, I had a real coming to “hey-soos” moment and realized…”F***! I’m just like that guy!”

I’ve been on your list for sometime now and haven’t been implementing the shit you’ve been sending out in his newsletters. It’s an old pattern of mine and to be honest, I got really pissed at myself!

So I went and collected all the Email Players editions I have tucked away around the house and organized them into a binder I can keep handy and reference when I need to.

Next I started reading 8 pages a day…Why 8? Because it’s 1/2 a damn newsletter and I can do that in a short sitting.

Then I started highlighting the implementable “low hanging fruit” as quickly as possible taking a little time each day to write my daily emails using the different examples and strategies provided.

I’m seeing all sort of “layers” and “levels” to copywriting and business I hadn’t seen before because quite frankly…I GOT LAZY!

Don’t get me wrong…

I’ve implement stuff over the past several years and am much further along than I would have been doing nothing. I just didn’t throw myself into your work making it a daily study/practice.

Sales have started to increase and my writing has definitely changed over the past few weeks as I use customer emails, questions, and testimonials to go deeper into the psychology of where they are stuck.

So thank you Ben for kicking my ass and holding that damn mirror up so I can begin seeing real sustainable movement in my business.

And if this helps anyone else on your list or helps you get more sales/subscriptions, then all the better!

Regards
Bill
(The Knee Pain Guru)

Who knew being a jerk can create better customers?

Anyway, on to the business:

The April “Email Players” newsletter issue goes to the printer in 2 short days.

It is, in my shamelessly obnoxious and biased opinion, the most valuable issue I’ve written in some ways, in the newsletter’s almost 100-issue run. My guess is, some people will find the information inside the most profitable thing they ever do in their businesses, while others will be disappointed and natter on about how they want something secksys and ninja or whatever.

For the latter group:

I’ll just have to ramp up my jerk game to make them appreciate it more.

To subscribe in time to get this issue, go here immediately:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle