I hate these misleading articles that lead to a pitch. Pretty cheap. I’m unsubscribing. – M.<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\nApparently, the fact I put an affiliate link in the email that sends people to a website with nothing but MORE free content (there’s nothing even for sale there right now) hurt poor “M’s” delicate sensitivities.<\/p>\n
And while I found his email amusing (hey, don’t let the door hit you in the arse, M)… it was also kind of annoying<\/em>, too.<\/p>\nOf course, I have nobody to blame but myself.<\/p>\n
I probably give as much “for real” useful free content as anyone. The interviews alone<\/em> are worth more than many products you can pay for on those particular subjects.<\/p>\nAnd yet, I am no longer sure giving all this away is a good thing.<\/p>\n
There are two reasons I say this:<\/p>\n
1. My site is like “catnip” to people who only want free stuff.<\/strong><\/p>\nThis doesn’t make them bad people, by any means. But they tend to complain an awful lot and make for lousy subscribers.<\/p>\n
And, even more<\/em> important than that…<\/p>\n2. All this free stuff I give away doesn’t help you as much as if you paid<\/em> for it.<\/strong><\/p>\nNow, your first reaction to that may be, “NO BEN! It DOES help!”<\/p>\n
And, in some ways, I am sure it does.<\/p>\n
But rest assured, free is NOT better.<\/p>\n
I’ll give you a “real life” example.<\/p>\n
Once upon a time I bought the late Gary Halbert’s “Boron Letters”<\/strong> (back when he charged $97 for them — and didn’t give them away free on his site).<\/p>\nAnd because I bought those letters (and it kinda stung my pocket book to do so), I studied them night and day for several months.<\/p>\n
In fact, I read them at least<\/em> 20 times (probably more, but lost count).<\/p>\nI even sat down and copied the book out by hand just to get inside Sir Gary Of Halbert’s “head.”<\/p>\n
This experience was invaluable to me.<\/p>\n
I cannot put a price tag on how much it was “worth” — but I do know my income went up significantly<\/em> after that.<\/p>\nAnd yet, I never would have studied them like that had I got them free on his site.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to the point:<\/p>\n
Free is costing<\/em> you money.<\/strong><\/p>\nIt is NOT saving you money.<\/p>\n
Especially long term.<\/p>\n
And if seeing a sales pitch bothers you — even though you are in marketing and\/or copywriting — then it could be you’re in the wrong business.<\/p>\n
I mean, how can you possibly be a good seller<\/em>… if you’re not first a good buyer<\/em>?<\/p>\nJust something to think about.<\/p>\n
P.S.<\/strong> Like anyone online, I often get hate mail (or “dork mail” as I consider the one I quoted above).<\/p>\nBut I also get a lot of good mail, too.<\/p>\n
In fact, right after the email I got above, the following response — to the exact<\/em> same email the other guy was crying about — came in:<\/p>\n“Ben, I am continually amazed at the wealth of information and the imaginative nature of your e-mails on copywriting, etc. Even when I can’t use one of your e-mails, which is often because of the nature of my writing, I am so very impressed by the thoughtfulness of the content — and how spritely it’s written. Thanks for strong writing and strong ideas! Best, Tim”<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\nThank you, Tim.<\/p>\n
Coming from you that means a lot (Tim happens to be a “for real” business professional, by the way, with the career history to prove it).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I don’t know why… … but it still surprises me when so-called “business people” get their underwear in a wad when they see an offer. You’d think they would realize the whole point of having an email list is to run a business, and not just give away endless amounts of free content forever. Take, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-copywriting-and-sales-letters"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensettle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}