Switching off the copywriting sex robots

An opinion: The most valuable gold in the late Gene Schwartz’s magnificent “Breakthrough Advertising” book ain’t the main content where it drills deep into the gold mines of headlines, market/product awareness & sophistication, image-building, verbally creating credibility for your offers, and all the other ingenious information inside. I’d argue the biggest slab of gold is in the preface & introduction. Specifically, the 3 gleaming gems below. On vision: “This book is not about building better mousetraps. It is…about building larger mice, and then building terrifying fear of them into your customers.” On swiping: “That’s why memorizing theories won’t make you a market wizard, or rewriting somebody else’s headlines won’t make you a copy writer.” And on… thinking: “The correct solution, the right headline, the perfect ad lies buried in the problem itself. It has never been written before. It cannot be produced by rote, carbon copying or mutations. But it can be sprung to the surface — automatically — by asking the right question.” Each one of those gems is worthy of hours of examination. And, also, of thinking deeply about how to apply them to your business. Here’s another thought: Thinking is practically discouraged in copywriting these days. Something about creativity being bad, the pioneers go home full of arrows, and other one-liners taken totally out of context by the lazy and low info types as blatantly as Picasso's stealing quote is taken out of context by the lazy and low info types. Thus, the rise in what I call "copywriting sex robots." (i.e., fapGPT and other AI that supposedly writes copy for you) And of goo-roo fanboys blatantly swiping everything in sight. And of direct response copywriters so ignorant of their own industry they think split testing was invented on Facebook and branding was invented on Instagram. Whatever the case, here’s the point: The one thing that separates the men from the boys when it comes to copywriting ain’t swipe file content, NLP wizardry, 90-year old headline formulas, or hacks. It’s thinking. He or she who thinks hardest wins. It’s the only way to solve problems, after all. It's leverage vs force in a potentially very massive way, if you do it right. All right, ‘nuff said. Let’s get down to the business: My book “Copy Salesliloquies: Vol 1” This book includes the June 2020, February 2021, June 2021, & May 2022 Email Players issues which were all about copywriting. Plus, it also includes the transcripts of a couple intense line-by-line sales letter analyses (for my Subscription Biz & Social Lair book offers) I did for our $499/month Profit Pirates coaching clients. Lots of stuff I either couldn’t fit into my Copy Slacker book (already 800+ pages). Or stuff I learned since writing Copy Slacker. No, you do NOT need Copy Slacker to learn from the info in this book. If anything, it serves as a nifty “prequel” (or sequel if you already possess it) to my Copy Slacker book you can learn from regardless of your experience, knowledge, or skill level now. It’s also on sale for a $100 off the listed price (so it’s $500 instead of the listed $600) until Sunday September 15 at midnight, EDT. Simply do this: 1. Go to the URL below 2. Read the letter carefully to make an informed purchase 3. Use code WILLIS at the checkout (Make sure you see the price change before entering your info) [( Ben Settle This email was sent by Ben Settle as owner of Settle, LLC. Copyright © 2024 Settle, LLC. All Rights Reserved. No part of this email may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from Settle, LLC. Click here to [unsubscribe]( Settle, LLC PO Box 1056 Gold Beach Oregon 97444 USA