fapGPT predictions that didn't come true

Let me tell you a story about fapGPT: Several months ago on Twitter, everyone was yapping about AI this, and fapGPT that, and it’s going to change the game, and if you aren’t using AI in your sales copy you’re going to be left behind (or, as the broccoli headed ones like to say: “NGMI”), and a bunch of other nonsense many times most aggressively spread by people selling offers about AI, from what I could tell. Well guess what? Almost a year later I hardly see any of these people singing this tune anymore. Even the ones whose only reply whenever I questioned it was: “give it two years, bro.” It's almost like even a lot of them have given up on their predictions of becoming junior masters of the universe using fapGPT in all its glory. In fact, around that time I publicly asked, several times, for someone to show me just one example of competent AI-written sales copy that didn't read like a robot randomly cutting & pasting from multiple swipe file ads. I assumed these guys knew something I don’t. Only one person answered my request. I won’t name him (he’s an Email Players subscriber, but I don’t want to give up his “cover” — as he sent it to me in confidence, from a private membership site he probably was not supposed to share info from. And so it goes with my righteous Spy Network. Daddy has eyes on a lot of places he’s not supposed to…) And what happened was this: He sent me a private email where he copied and pasted some AI-generated sales copy from this private membership site where copywriters were all fapping to AI. The offer was for dog owners. And it sounded like you’d expect machine-generated copy to sound: awkward, choppy, totally not human. Which, admittedly, whoever the guy was who shared it came clean to, and said a good copywriter could smooth it out, etc. Just like I keep hearing other copywriters fapping in the AI sock saying, as well as email platforms all hopping in the AI game talking about. Back to the copy: It just listed a bunch of benefits, awkwardly, while trying to sound fancy. But really, it sounded like Data from Star Trek reading off a bunch swipe file copy from random ads in the same niche, without context or depth or humanity, from his memory banks. That is the best description I can think of for it. Realize, I was quite connected to that market at the time, as I had just lost my own dog a couple months earlier after 15+ years having her, with her last year being extremely difficult watching her waste away day-by-day, cleaning up poops tracked all over since she was blind and walked in it, and the smell of “sickness” all over the downstairs wing of the house (which she had all to herself the last 9 months of her life). I spent several months trying like hell to give her as good a quality of life as I possibly could after giving me 15+ years of the best times I have ever had in my entire life, before putting her down. And I can tell you: That AI-generated copy sounded not just stupid and cold — but had zero empathy. And even borderline insulting in some ways. My Email Players subscriber showed me a few paragraphs from a discussion about the copy. And they all thought it was “cool!” One guy said it made him cry about his dog. Which I call bull sheee-yat on. No real dog owner who loves their dog, has a bond with their dog, and has a strong relationship with their dog would think that copy was anything but nonsensical. And that is what I told my Email Players subscriber: it was “functionally” correct with benefits, certain words dog owners use (although awkwardly stated), no doubt pulled from dog related sources. But it was also clearly not written by a dog owner. Or, at least, not with one with more than a shallow, cartoonish relationship with his pet. And no “smoothing” it over would change that. Back when I would do "rewrites" of ads it was clear it was very rarely easy to "smooth" out shyt copy. It always required a total rewrite, as it goes beyond just the flow of the words and structure of the sentences and the benefits listed. Copywriting goes beyond words and stacking benefits. It’s about relationships, connecting with another human, and solving that person’s problems. AI is just a tool — a machine — and a tool/machine cannot create a relationship with another human being for you any more than your calculator can help you create a relationship with your accountant. AI is probably going to be a very powerful tool for some things. (I agree with the AI crowd that in 5 years, for example, it will do all the menial ticky-tac stuff like balancing checkbooks, etc and save people loads of time). But it won’t build, strengthen, or solidify relationships in a vacuum. It won’t solve serious customer service problems. It won't conduct important negotiations where the stakes are high. And it won’t “write” copy that connects with people with humanity. That’s my opinion. And you know what? So far I’ve been proven correct on this.. Anyway, I talk a lot more about AI inside the non-mechanical pages of the January Email Players issue. I haven’t even scratched the surface here. In fact, I show you how it’s no different than reading copy written by a sociopath, and the sales implications of such. This 150th milestone issue, for the first of what is sure to be quite the turbulent next several years (economically, politically, militarily, and in many other ways) is quite fitting to be one of the topics it teaches in its 64 pages. If you want to prompt your way to success, good luck. I’m not saying it has no uses for marketers. Research seems especially promising, and in fact I have an idea for a TV pilot script which I think using AI will save me 100s of hours of research on. But I would not rely on it to write anything. Not even a grocery list. All right enough of this. The deadline to subscribe in time for the January issue is almost upon you. You can read more about Email Players here: [https∶//www.EmailPlayers.com]( Ben Settle P.S. Another thing I am including with the January Email Players issue is: “Email Players Annual #2: Mad Men Copywriting Secrets” This oversized (literally — in both size and page count) Annual issue exists outside the normal continuity of the newsletter. And I wrote it to both commemorate the newsletter’s 150th issue, and also to teach some cool stuff I’ve learned studying the old masters that have practically be all but forgotten about today. (NOTE: it has absolutely NOTHING to do with the TV show “Mad Men”, which I found extremely boring and overrated — it’s about advertising methods used by the actual Mad Men of the 60’s.) Some of the secrets found inside include: * The sneaky headline trick old school copywriters used to pre-test ads without spending a single dime. * Cunning advice (straight from a private, internal memo at the Leo Burnett agency back in the day) about how to trick egotistical clients (for their own good, of course) into running your sales copy “as-is.” (Old school screenwriters basically did the same thing to get scripts approved, today it’s practically a forgotten trick of the writing trade.) * A powerful Mad Men secret to making your business mysteriously attractive that can be like “catnip” to high-paying clients and others you wish to sell to or influence. * The World-Building technique all the Mad Men agency owners (the ones whose names are still on their companies today long after their deaths) used to position themselves as “the” agency to hire — with certain clients practically magnetically attracted to them, and probably even only them, and likely wanting nothing to do with anyone else. * How to exploit a dangling piece of psychological “wiring” in every human being’s brain to help make your emails and other marketing extremely hard to ignore and a whole lot more engaging. * A sneaky way to adapt Ogilvy’s enormously successful “Man In The Hathaway Shirt” ad from the 1950s into a high converting opt-in pages for your business today. * How the late Mad Man Leo Burnett would address a room of stuck up and snobby vice presidents of giant corporations to keep their egos in check and “prep” them for what he expected of them as clients. * How an old school phone salesman and high school dropout was able to ethically & legally out-negotiate & out-maneuver a room full of high-falutin’, and super educated and wealthy lawyers hired by a bank to get what he wanted. (Nothing directly to do with Mad Men — but what this phone salesman did is something that was quite common for people in the know to do back in the day to get what they wanted in contracts and deals.) * A clever way that certain bashful Mad Men copywriters used their shyness to help create far more powerful advertising. * A (admittedly bizarre sounding to most marketers today) advertising sales trick that David Ogilvy learned from a furniture salesman for turning a product’s flaws into reasons to buy. (Including tips for exactly how to turn high fees, bad reviews, and even slow service into reasons to buy.) * How David Ogilvy used good, old fashioned trolling (he was a world-class troll) to help get compliance and engagement from everyone from heads of corporations during high-pressure negotiations to his own wife in the kitchen. * A ridiculously effective door-to-door salesman technique (that, believe it or not, works even better on Facebook today, I have found) that can help you create headlines, offers, emails, and other marketing that can just seep right into the psychology and souls of your leads and customers, giving them almost no choice but to want to buy what you’re selling! (Does that sound almost like hype? Maybe so. But realize this: it was not uncommon for this technique to works so well it’d sometimes set record for product recalls for weak products.) * Just how brutal and soul-crushing old school Man Men were in their advertising campaign critiques. (One of the most respected copywriters of the day and creator of the famous Pillsbury Doughboy — Rudy Perz — said they’d make him feel like a “martyr”, and the creative director and original Marlboro Man model — Andy Armstrong — once literally suffered a nervous breakdown over one of these brutal critiques, if that tells you something.) * The little-known way the Leo Burnett Agency created such memorable and influential cartoon characters that helped sell truckloads of the products they promoted * The 7-word advertising principle that helped build one of the biggest and most respected ad agencies in human history. (And that is still around today almost 100 years later, while most have long-since floundered.) * Why fire-breathing atheist David Ogilvy was such a big fan of the Catholic Church. (Nothing really to do with copywriting or marketing, but his reasoning could be useful to anyone who runs teams or has lots of employees.) * The Mad Men attitude (almost non-existent today) that can help freelancers, coaches, consultants, and other businesses go from begging to business to having so many new leads practically begging to hire you you might even need a waiting list. (Best part: you don’t even have to be that great at what you do or, for that matter, “do” anything different — this is just a make a simple mindset shift in the way you approach your business.) * David Ogilvy’s bizarre email list-building secret (created back in the 1950’s — long before the invention of commercial email) that can also make your business stand out in an overcrowded marketplace and increase your sales. * A shrewd insurance selling method (that smart radio and magazine advertisers forced their customers to do since it worked so well) that can help drive your email response through the roof. * How an “honorary” Mad Man copywriter (who was a NYC public employee and not an ad man at all) used ANTI-direct response slogans to help create some of the most profitable and memorable advertising every penned by the hand of mortal man. (And yes, what he did can be used to write all kinds of profitable headlines, subject lines, bullets, and any other kind of direct response sales copy.) * A one-on-one interview with a “for real” Mad Man! In fact, the TV show producers even consulted this guy due to him being in the thick of the agency business back then, and who was involved with campaigns like The Marlboro Man, Fly the Friendly Skies, & industry-famous campaigns for Gallo Winery, Proctor & Gamble, Colgate, Vicks, Chanel, Max Factor, Philip Morris, and the list goes on. This interview is a rare look into the psychology behind how these guys worked. How they thought. And, yes, how they made lots of money for their clients and themselves. All right I think this email is long enough. To subscribe while you still can to get in on time, go here immediately: [https∶//www.EmailPlayers.com]( This email was sent by Ben Settle as owner of Settle, LLC. Copyright © 2023 Settle, LLC. All Rights Reserved. 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