Copywriters Podcast

Our guest today is Joshua Lee Henry, a high-powered copywriter with a very interesting career before he started writing copy. That began 12 years ago, when Joshua wrote fundraising letters for victims of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. At the time, he was also a pastor for a megachurch with more than 5,000 members. Fast forward to 2018, when Joshua started freelancing and wrote for big names including Jay Abraham, Brian Tracy and the Zig Ziglar corporation. Like a number of high-performing copywriters, Joshua moved under the umbrella of Agora, where he has written promotions that have made millions. These days, he is copy chief for Money & Markets, an imprint of Agora’s fast-growing Banyan Hill company. After I spoke at Brian Kurtz’s mastermind a few weeks ago, where Joshua had also spoken, Joshua reached out to me with an idea that was truly mind-boggling: How to structure a lead that truly gets and keeps 100% of a qualified prospect’s intention. I’m not sure he put it exactly that way, but that’s w

Today’s show is our attempt to answer this question: How do you add more impact to every single sentence? It started last week when I read this article from The Economist. It’s a British magazine, and it used to be my favorite. I hardly read it at all anymore. But… I was scrolling through Twitter and the AKA, also called the All-Knowing Algorithm, served up an ad for an article in The Economist with the headline, “What to Read To Become a Better Writer.” So, I clicked. You know, many people say that the AKA knows even more than Google! The article starts with a very strange picture. Three women at an outdoor café. Two are having a drink, laughing, having a great time. The third one is writing on an old-fashioned portable manual typewriter. Scowling and trying desperately to concentrate while her friends are partying. I have always thought the British have a strange way of looking at things. The article recommends five books. I cherry-picked some tips from three of them that would be especially usefu

If you’ve been a copywriter, a media buyer, or a business owner for a while, you have probably realized there are things that happen in this business that people don’t talk about a lot. At least publicly. I’m talking about stuff that you kinda wished you knew about ahead of time, so you wouldn’t be so floored when it happened to you. Copywriting and direct marketing make up a great business, and I’ve found most people, most of the time, are pretty decent. But not everybody all the time. And I know we generally like to be constructive and optimistic on this podcast. But I think it’s also valuable to know how things can go upside down or sideways. You can’t always avoid it, but you may be able to stop it or fix it before it gets worse. Or at least deal with it better than you might have before you knew about what we’re going to talk about today. Sometimes I think the best background for being a copywriter is having a previous life as a firefighter, an ER surgeon, or a hostage negotiator. Because on those

This is a unique edition of our Old Masters Series, because I knew this copywriter personally. It’s Joe Sugarman, and Joe passed away in March of this year. I was sad to see him go, as were thousands of others. Outside of the direct marketing world, Joe is known for his BluBlockers sunglasses, which he took to great success using infomercials. Joe also came up with the Batman credit card. He printed up a huge number, only to find DC comics wasn’t interested in selling them. So he gave them away at events. Joe was a fun guy. And as you’ll hear about in today’s show, quite a prankster from early in his life. Joe wrote a book called Triggers in 1999, and we looked at a few of the most powerful ideas in the book. The information in this value-packed book is familiar on a surface level to most copywriters and marketers, but Joe brings it to life in a unique way with some great stories. Each trigger, by the way, is a powerful copy element that will increase your conversions. I think the reason he calls them

Our guest today, Jason Strachan, went through a powerful turnaround over 10 years ago. He was deeply in debt, not doing especially well as a copywriter. He heard about Gary Bencivenga’s famous “Bencivenga 100” seminar in New York, but there was no way he could pull the money together to attend. However, when Gary offered the seminar on DVD, Jason moved heaven and earth, and might have missed a couple meals, to come up with the money to buy the recordings. And what he learned changed his life. Jason says, “I’ve always had this uncanny gift for assimilating new information when it interested me.” He put what he learned to work and his copy generated tens of millions for clients around the world. Fast forward to today. Jason has boiled down what he has learned over time into a formula made up of only 10 words, and written a book about it. I’ve reviewed the book, called The Magic Word Method.What I like about it is, any one of these words can be used, both as copy and as a strategic idea, to refresh and tur

Our guest today has a unique vantage point in copywriting. As an executive at Boardroom for 34 years, Brian Kurtz worked with many of the most successful and famous copywriters of our time, including Gene Schwartz, Gary Bencivenga, and many others. As the guy in charge, Brian was responsible for selling well over one billion dollars’ worth of products, “$39 at a time,” to millions of people. Seven years ago, Brian started a second career writing books and running mastermind groups. As well as republishing old direct marketing classics. I’ve wanted to have Brian on the show for a long time, and I was thrilled when he agreed to talk about the copywriting legends he has worked with. If you’ve ever wondered what the people at the top of this game were and are like, today’s your lucky day. Brian’s here to tell you. Brian started out by zeroing-in on what the greats of yesteryear (and some of the superstars he worked with are very active today) do differently from other copywriters. We can all suppose, imagine

He’s back -- and I’m talking about Copywriters Podcast’s very own, Nathan Fraser. Nathan’s out with a new book, Sales Funnel Cheat Codes. This is my favorite book of his so far, because it’s so right-on target and full of useful strategies and tactics for putting together a sales funnel that works. The book is chock-full of systems, funnel diagrams, strategy, and simple rules to save you from a lot of mistakes and help you make a lot more money. We had a lot to cover on today’s show. Here’s what I asked Nathan: - What led up to you writing this book? - What’s the worst-performing funnel you ever created? - What’s the best-performing funnel you’ve ever created? - You have an interesting statement in the book: “Advertising is the art of buying customers.” What do you mean by that? - You mentioned that how-to articles and product comparison articles are great places to run your ads. What did you say that? - Who was Monster and what did he teach you about how great ads work? - Could you give us some

OK, we’re back with part 2 of deep headline wisdom from Old Master John Caples and his book “Tested Advertising Methods,” originally published in 1932. Last week we covered the first half of his chapter called “Twenty-nine formulas for writing headlines,” and like I said last week, this chapter is pure gold and no fat. This week we cover the second half. There was simply too much in one chapter to cover it all in one show. Now these formulas are simple, and in most cases you have to do the heavy lifting. They are formulas, but not templates. He shows you where to start, which is always half the battle when you’re writing anything. So today we’re going to cover the second half of Chapter 5 in Caples’s landmark book, “Tested Advertising Methods,” 4th edition. Two groups of headline formulas in the second half of the chapter that, for me, are more fun and more interesting than the ones we covered last week. Don’t get me wrong. The ones we covered last week, which I summarized just a moment ago, are very p

Today we go deep into the headline wisdom of Old Master John Caples and his book “Tested Advertising Methods,” originally published in 1932. What’s so important about this book for today’s show is, it contains a chapter called “Twenty-Nine Formulas For Writing Headlines,” and this chapter is pure gold, no fat. It’s hard to appreciate the immense value of what he says in this chapter. I had to go through it several times to make it into podcast material. It’s clear and simple, but it’s dense. In fact, there’s so much there that I couldn’t fit it into one podcast. We’d have to cover one formula a minute. Going that fast would make it incredibly hard to develop useful ideas. It would all go by in a blur. So today is Part 1. We’ll cover 14 formulas. And we’ll cover the other 15 next week. By the way, don’t get intimidated by the word “formulas.” While Caples is accurate in describing them that way, they’re MUCH easier to use and understand than you might imagine. Now the headline formulas are in the last

Our Old Master today begins a chapter of one of his books with this question: How do you cope when readers do not believe what you have written? And, he answers it: You plug the gaps where belief leaks out. Sounds like a great plan, but it leads to two more questions: 1. What are those gaps? and 2. How do you plug them? Now what’s especially interesting about this Old Master is that he’s not a copywriter. But he is a very successful writer and, for my money, the best teacher of how to write fiction you can find anywhere. And, even more interesting -- the gaps where belief leaks out for fiction writers are largely the same ones that cause problems for copywriters. And so are the fixes. I’ve tweaked his ideas ever so slightly to make them a perfect fit for copywriters. Our Old Master was named Dwight Swain. We talked about five mistakes Dwight Swain identified in the chapter “The Dynamics of Disbelief” from his book “Creating Characters: How to Build Story People.” His main point in the chapter i

Our guest today, Kyle Jordan, has a website where he breaks down online ad sequences. The series of breakdowns is called “Full Funnel Nudity.” We’ll get to that soon enough, but first, about Kyle: His first client five years ago was a technical marketing course company called Data Driven Marketing. As a copywriter and marketing strategist, Kyle increased the traffic to their website by about 400%; doubled the size of their email list in one year; and helped them come up with six new products. But most important, with this first client, Kyle learned the technical side of online marketing from a copywriter’s point of view, in a way that few others have. This know-how led to his specialty, which he calls Funnel Renovations. He has helped multiple clients rehab their funnels and double their sales, just by fixing the funnel alone. He’s also written for famous professional athletes and influencers -- always with the goal of growing the sales of the business. Kyle shared some tips with us today from in-the-tr

A lot of copywriters would like to know how to get into financial copywriting, and our special guest today, Rob Braddock, is just the copywriter to tell you. He started his financial copywriting career about five years ago at Agora Financial, where he did well. Rob left Agora to work at WealthPress. Working with a high-powered team, he wrote copy that resulted in millions of dollars of additional sales. All told, Rob counts about $60 million in sales in his career so far. Not too shabby. He’s gone off on his own and has been a freelancer since last December. Rob agreed to come on today to help people who want to get into financial copywriting understand how he did it, and give them some ideas on how they could get started. Rob’s a Marine Corps veteran and had personal experience doing face-to-face sales before he ever wrote a sales letter… a couple things to keep in mind about what has made him so successful. One thing I especially appreciate about Rob is how he gets straight to the point without getti

Our guest today is Million-Dollar Mike Morgan, who has broken sales record after sales record with his sales letters and VSLs. Mike is now copy chief for Money Map Press, a major direct mail publisher. He’s also a still-very-active copywriter. He doesn’t have time for many podcast interviews, so we’re especially grateful that he could join us today. Here’s why he’s here: Let’s say you’ve just written a great sales letter for a product launch. Well, guess what? Your work is NOT done yet. You still need emails — lots of them. To your list. To your new customers, after they buy. And for affiliates to mail out for you. Plus, you ALSO need ads and advertorials. To get prospects to your page. Oh, and don’t forget. All these things have to be done FAST. Well… Mike has just the solution to your problem. And I’ve got to say, it’s pretty cool. On the show, Mike told us how he did a lot of these things intuitively, but had to develop a system for a new group of copywriters getting started at Money Map Press. H

If you run ads for your business, here’s a tantalizing question for you: How would you like to increase your response by 30%, without writing any new copy? How about 300%? Impossible, you say? Don’t say that to our special guest today, Katie Switzer. Because once she explains a few things, she is going to give you real-world examples where these kind of increases have actually occurred. Katie started out as a mechanical engineer. She learned marketing when she started her own online business for other parents -- she has four children herself. Soon she was taking on marketing clients. Her main focus was improving conversions based on market research and data-driven copywriting Katie has also worked as a marketing manager for a marketing analytics software company. These days, she’s helping business owners collect and understand their marketing data — and use what they find to improve their results. I’ve got to admit, I was pretty excited to hear what she has to say. Here’s what we asked her: 1. At

The ‘R’ word is popping up a lot these days. That word is “recession,” and there’s a good reason everyone’s talking about it. Prices are going crazy. It seems like everything’s doubled in the last few months. If unemployment weren’t so low, it would be a slam-dunk and everyone would say we’re in a recession. This is important for copywriters and entrepreneurs, because there are specific strategies you can use to stay afloat and even grow your business in a recession. We’ll talk about them today. Are you skeptical that anything could work in a recession? A Forbes magazine article says that seven billion-dollar family fortunes trace back to getting started during the Great Depression. So it’s possible to do well when the economy’s in the tank. Now some experts I’ve seen on TV say we’re not in a recession yet. A really bright guy on the left says we’re pretty close, and just as bright a guy on the right says there’s a very good chance we’ll go into a recession soon. I don’t agree with either of them. I th

After a long pause, we are back with our popular Old Masters Series. Today, a deep dive into an important part of the work of Clyde Bedell. He’s not all that well known these days, but decades ago he was one of the top guys you would turn to if you want to learn how to write copy that works. Besides being a highly successful advertiser, he was a prominent teacher. For example, he built a national sales training program for Ford Motor Company in the 1930s. When he was teaching copywriting at Northwestern University, he couldn’t find a suitable textbook, so he wrote one. That turned into “How To Write Advertising That Sells.” It was first published in 1940—13 years before I was born. The book is 8-1/2 by 11 and a massive 539 pages. It’s pretty hard to find a copy these days, but I found one copy on Amazon for $736. Lucky for me, I got my copy years ago when it was easier to get and not quite as expensive. We zeroed-in on one chapter which I would call “7 Keys To Believability.” The word for believability

A big question, maybe THE big question, copywriters ask themselves when they sit down to write, is this: “Where do I start?” Of course you’ve got to already know... your product and its benefits. You’ll need to put together the best offer possible. You may need an origin story for the product. Knowing the price and guarantee are important. But this is all for naught if you don’t have a deep and thorough understanding of your PROSPECT. Because if you’re selling to the wrong person -- or to nobody in particular -- your copy is not very likely to work. I came across eight killer questions -- not for copywriting, but for writing screenplays. From the excellent new book, “The Protagonist’s Journey,” by successful screenwriter and college professor Scott Myers. These questions on his list are for getting to know the hero of the film you are planning to write. Today, though, we’ll look at how we can tweak these questions just a little to create a very powerful tool for anyone who writes copy. Just like with

Our returning champion is Dr. Harlan Kilstein, who has a brilliant innovation in copywriting he’s agreed to share with us. Harlan was a guest here two years ago when he gave us some much-needed information about Facebook compliance. But don’t make the mistake of assuming Facebook is the only thing he knows anything about, because Harlan is a super-successful copywriter and entrepreneur who knows a LOT about a LOT of things. He’s written super-profitable copy for many big names in the direct-response business. He’s created several very successful businesses of his own. And recently he’s come up with a “new” system to sell called Interactive Sales Letters. I put “new” in quotes because it’s not really new at all. In one way. The concept behind it has been around, and proven, for decades. But the way Harlan is using the concept is brand-new… it’s working… and that’s what he’s going to tell us about. 1. To get us started, what is an interactive sales letter and what about the results you’ve gotten so far sh

If you wanted to find out how to make your Facebook ads start working again, who would you turn to? Well, we’ve found someone I think you’ll like. His name is Depesh Mandalia. Besides being a successful online agency owner, with over $100 million in sales for clients to his credit, he is also a gifted speaker, coach and teacher. Depesh left the corporate world when his job kind of evaporated during the 2009 financial meltdown. But he landed on his feet and within 36 months he had his first seven-figure year, at first as an affiliate marketer. He began training entrepreneurs and other marketers in 2018, with something he calls the BPM method. Today he’s going to tell you about it and why it’s very profitable with Facebook in the current environment, even after Apple has clamped down on the data available to marketers. The title of this episode is “Why Nobody Can Make Facebook Ads Work Anymore.” Obviously our guest and his students still can, and what Depesh had to tell us was great. I started out by dra

I’ve been aware that there’s something out there called “TikTok,” but I didn’t pay much attention to it, other than the occasional TikTok video reposed somewhere else. The reason I didn’t pay much attention was I thought it didn’t have much to do with business, and it didn’t have anything to do with advertising. Ummm… I was wrong. TikTok had almost $5 billion in revenue last year, and it had over a billion users. Not only that. 11% of them were over 50 years of age -- old folks, like me. Then I learned about today’s guest, Emmanuelle Daigle. Emmanuelle is a marketing agency owner and the founder of TokTrend, a community that keeps business owners up to date on TikTok and Instagram reels trends. As an early user of the TikTok platform, Emmanuelle has a deep understanding of its users preferences and how to create ads that convert (because spoiler alert, your Facebook ads won't cut it there). Emmanuelle told us about TikTok from way back when, and how she has seen it evolve from its early days. She explai