Posted by:
Clayton Makepeace
July 3, 2009
Issue #3
Dear Business-Builder,
It's not getting any easier – is it?
If you've spent any time in the trenches of Internet marketing over the past few years, you know precisely what I'm talking about: Those out-of-the-park grand slams are fewer and farther between these days.
Once upon a time, you could just blast an offer – almost any offer – to your customer file or even ice-cold prospect names, then sit back and watch an avalanche of orders come pouring in.
The money was amazing: When one of my clients e-mailed a single note to his 35,000 customers back in the mid-1990s, he raked in $12 million in less than a week.
Ah … the GOOD old days!
Today, that client would kill to get those kinds of results. Like most Internet marketers today, he's working harder and profiting less. Much less.
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Posted by:
Clayton Makepeace
June 29, 2009
Issue #463
- The hard truth "get rich quick" gurus never tell you …
- What it really takes to hit the big time …
- Why what you do the rest of today matters …
- Much more …
Dear Business-Builder,
My mom’s cousin married Ty Cobb’s son, Herschel. Since I’m not good at math, I can’t really tell you what that makes me. Ty Cobb’s grand nephew once removed? I dunno.
But still, I’ve always been proud to be related — even distantly — to the man who invented modern baseball. So a few years ago, I read Cobb: A Biography by Al Stump and later, watched the movie starring Tommy Lee Jones.
Great book; good flick. Not because they heralded Cobb’s exploits on the field, but because they painted a crystal-clear picture of the man behind the legend.
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Posted by:
Clayton Makepeace
June 11, 2009
Issue #196
Dear Business-Builder,
In April of 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt confiscated all gold coins, ingots and notes owned by Americans. Anyone caught with more than $100-worth of non-jewelry gold would be slammed with a $10,000 fine – about $143,000 in today’s dollars.
Fast forward to the early 1970s: Huge federal deficits from the Vietnam War were coming home to roost and inflation was raising its ugly head. The value of the U.S. dollar was plunging. Our cost of living was beginning to soar.
And because owning gold – the world’s most time-honored store of value and inflation hedge – was still a crime, American consumers, savers, investors and retirees had little choice but to watch helplessly as inflation robbed them blind.
That’s when an obscure Louisiana school teacher decided to force the mighty U.S. government to legalize gold ownership.
He didn’t care that he was “just one man” and that he’d be challenging America’s mightiest financial institutions and most powerful politicians.
Nor did his lack of funds to mount such a daunting national campaign faze him.
The fact that a horrendous automobile accident had left him paralyzed from the chest down and confined to a wheelchair didn’t even begin to enter into his thinking.
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Posted by:
Troy White
May 29, 2009
Issue #684
Fellow Business-Builder,
Recently, I spoke at a three-day small business conference in Canmore, Alberta. A hop, skip and a jump from Calgary where I live, the 45-minute drive takes you into this incredible little mountain resort town called Canmore.
The host of the event took out the speakers for dinner on Friday night to this place she had been raving about.
The Trough is an eclectic upstart that has figured this service business out. I realize I previously wrote about Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant lessons, but this weekend was a sign that the owner has been watching some of the “Kitchen Nightmare” shows and learned a thing or three.
Considering the short time they’ve been open, their two recent awards as one of the top 10 new restaurants in Canada shows how good of a start they got.
When you first walk in, it is nothing to oooh and ahhhh about – but that very quickly changes.
It’s unassuming as you enter (classy – but not over the top or trying too hard to be something it’s not) … and quite cozy on the inside (seating ~50 max).
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Posted by:
Clayton Makepeace
May 21, 2009
Issue #190
- Four Principles All Great Opening Sales Copy Shares …
- Seven Proven Ways to Get Your Sales Copy Off to a Fast Start …
- Much More!
Dear Business-Builder,
You’ve stopped your prospect in his tracks with a powerful, emotionally-driven headline and deck …
Your deck copy supports and expands upon your headline structure, adding specificity, intrigue, irony and intensity – all wrapped around powerful reasons why reading your ad is the single most important thing he could possibly do now …
Now it’s time to really get his juices flowing – with powerful, emotionally-driven, opening copy that makes it impossible for him to look away.
And so there you sit; staring at a blank page and wondering how in the hell you’re going to get the conversation started.
Good thing you clicked through to today’s issue of The Total Package – isn’t it, Sparky?
Cause that’s exactly what we’re going to talk about today: Seven great ways to get your body copy started with a bang!
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