How I tricked the Rhodes Brothers, Robert Plank, and Jason Fladlien to teach me for free!

Are you going to turn your research into a WSO?
Sounds like something to hang your hat on.

Hi Tim,

You'll find that in a couple of Jason's very competitively priced products, he teaches exactly how he learnt to write copy, and who's letters he picked apart to learn the process - he sells those 'pickings' too. He also sells the 'templates' he uses to construct his salesletters (not the web design template, the salesletter layout template he uses to write new ones.)

I've bought them, studied them and I recommend them.

I was going to post earlier actually about how well Robert Plank manages his list. He is certainly one to watch when it comes to email marketing.

Tim, I hear you loud and clear and it's a good place to START......but.....having a swipe file doesn't necessarily teach you the logic and reasoning on WHY they may have written a certain headline, opener, or emotional trigger the way they did or why they chose a certain format.

But it's a good start. Really good sales copy isn't as easy to dissect as some people think. I've been writing copy for nearly two decades and even I get it wrong sometimes.

RoD

Hum, Tim Castleman, Jason Fladlien, Robert Plank, and the Rhodes Brothers....gosh these names sound vaguely familiar for some reason

An excellent point and I can't agree with you more Tim - in fact at my recap of the event at our local mastermind group it was stressed to get and keep a swipe file.

Hopefully we can talk all of you guys into coming back and presenting at the 3rd annual event.

It'll probably be held just about the time we get the DVDs ready from the second event

best,
--Jack

Hi Tim,

Thanks for sharing your find..

Another similar idea would be to visit clickbank's marketplace
and check out the trending products. Look at the sales
copy and you know the rest

@Rod

I was lucky to have watched a video presentation of some
researchers who focused on landing pages. They found out
that most of the time clarity trumps persuasion..

What this actually means is that while some of us are searching
for the magical triggers, the hypnotic words, the right words to
put in there to subconsciously put people under our spell and
open their wallets, there are those that are just designing
clean and clear copies that sell.

However, talk is cheap so here is the link to the
video:

http://www.marketingexperiments.com/...ersuasion.html

It was first posted by fellow warrior Michael Hiles

All the best,

Don't forget Clayton Makepeace, enormous free resources including this -

FREE Swipe File | The Total Package

That would definitely be a VERY bad idea.

Jack, good to know that speaking at one of your events means someone else is going to rip off our sales copy.

So your logic is... it's ok to give bad advice because "most" people won't take action on it?

Are you talking about the Gary Halbert videos? That product is a cease and desist notice waiting to happen. Even John Carlton (who owns the rights to Gary Halbert's content) has told Jason face to face that he's planning on shutting down sites selling Halbert's ads, just hasn't gotten around to it yet.

Just something to think about...

Tim, here's where you (and a lot of other wanna-be copywriters) are wrong...

You're keeping a swipe FOLDER instead of a swipe FILE.

What are you really going to get by saving a bunch of sales letters and "deconstructing" all the headlines and bullet points? You're going to get confused, that's what.

Instead, make yourself a "made me buy" file. Every time I've ever bought anything, there's one thing that pushed me over the edge to buy. Just one.

In one sales letter, a guy told the story about how a friend of his (and his wife) flew to a Ferrari factory in Italy to watch it get painted, to make sure they painted their car the exact shade of purple he wanted.

In another, a guy was selling a piece of software plus video tutorials, for $150. But the big hook was "free software." You pay for the training, the software comes along "free" with it... but there's no pick-and-choose. You pay $150 regardless but he decides what the bonus is.

Keep a "made me buy" file of 20 bullet items or less and delete the ones you use, along with the ones you keep seeing in that file and never use.

I don't even have a swipe file right now... I blew threw it about 10 minutes into writing my last sales letter (which sucked in $35K in the first 5 hours).

1. What made YOU buy usually isn't what made someone else buy.

(Added bonus: now you're actually building a swipe file on what made you buy, instead of "this looks cool")

2. Look at the two examples I gave (the Ferrari and the free software). You're writing down the idea that got you to buy, not writing down the bullet or headline and swapping your keywords into it.

I don't have a friend who went to Italy so I have to use a crazy story of my own with a bunch of weird stuff (like the color purple) start at the end and then tell the story that ends up there.

3. In other words, the thing I'm writing into my swipe file can't be found in any headline, bullet, sentence. It's the way they positioned or stacked the offer, the way they told their story in the opener, something like that. Suddenly it's not copying anymore.

Everyone I know who saves the actual sales letter, has a folder containing GIGS of sales letters... it's a huge mess even they can't make heads or tails of.

I guess we can't sell anymore ebooks, video courses, webinars, DVDs, and all the universities in the world should shut down right now because "learning should be free."

another little tip you can use with awesome sales copies, is to write the entire sales page out by hand. Ink to paper.

Doing so will take a long, really long time when the salespage is a long one. Doing so however will help you learn the salespage better and will provide a deeper "link" between you and the copy.

If you do this with dozens of the best salespages you can find, you'll have a ready knowledge about phrase-styles you can use, bullet-point ideas and a whole range of useful stuff you can use.

But this alone will not teach you how and why the salescopy works. And knowing that stuff is vital for you to "work your magic". But combine that knowledge with in-depth knowledge of dozens of salesletters and you'll be able to crank out real winners

Huh.. this thread is a real eye-opener in regards to some of the more well-known Warriors on here.

I honestly didn't take the start of this thread as an intention to steal, but an intention to learn.. Who is anyone to say 'You can't learn from a folder full of sales letters' vs a 'file of 20 or so bullet ideas'?

Just curious, last I checked we're all individuals with our own learning styles and own methods of organizing learning material into a semblance of order that works well for some and sucks for others. To each their own, and if no actual 'stealing and copying' is happening, why isn't that OK exactly?

When someone looks up to you and your work enough to want to look closer and learn how you do it, I'd take that as a compliment and a measure of your success. If that means examining a few of your publicly visible sales letters vs paying you to teach them, to each his own... no one knows that person's situation, maybe something is getting in the way of them purchasing a high dollar course and they're being resourceful by trying to learn on their own.

Better than sitting on their thumbs and not trying to learn a damn thang in my book. Just sayin'.

Seems like a lot of ego is flying around and I hope I don't get tainted! :p That's pretty sad on a forum that is supposed to 'support' people, not tear 'em down or look down on them.

Every person in every profession has been a 'wanna-be' at some point in their lives, and through resourcefulness and education and application have pushed themselves to a position of 'I am'. Do ya'll forget so quickly how you got there or did you get there by stepping on people and flying on ego?

Again, I didn't find this start of this thread offensive or insulting or indicative of an intention to steal in anyway, until about half way down. Then it just turned pretty sorry in my book. Very enlightening as well, to put it mildly.

Warm regards,
C

Copying, especially for commercial use, is plagiarism.

But imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

I know Tim, and I know Robert, and I'm sure Tim had no intention of plagiarizing, nor did he have any intent to publish a PDF of swipes and turn it into a WSO.

Let's not be so grumpy on here, guys, agree to disagree, and not get so bent out of shape.

Well said, Steven.

I've wondered about this myself and I don't know the legality of it,
but if I write a book to comment on Stephen King's best novels
I think this comes under fair use. In other words if my work
is about how another copywriter writes his letter and I reference
his letter then I'm not selling the letter but the HOW TO WRITE
letters like copywriter X.

I don't think all the books that comment on another book has
to get permission from the original author because all of these
books will give raving reviews.

I'm not a lawyer nor play one on TV. Just my thoughts.

-Ray Edwards

Having worked with a major Publishing House, I talked to them about the copyright to use on our books.

This is part of the rights we use, and they (Harper Collins) suggested using. Take a look at the different physical books you have to see how they term the copyright.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author. Short extracts may be used for review purposes.

See the last sentence, short extracts may be used for review purposes.

Well I only 'swipe from Kennedy or Glazer, but they actually tell you to, AND to change as few of the words as possible. Different mindset I guess. Perry Marshall & Glenn Livingston say the same thing about their stuff... 'Swipe away'. As far as I know, the guys making the most money are the least concerned about having their stuff swiped. (I think it is because they are really talented and can easily come up with another winner, or they do just like being more helpful. But in my limited experience, the most successful are the most sharing.)

I personally think that Robert is over reacting.

I am sure that Tim never intended to copy anyone but just to get some good resources to give him ideas.

I have always respected Robert on WF but i have seen another side now that i dont like