This flyer lays out the reasons why people shouldn't be afraid of opossum’s.

Most people have a negative perception of opossum's (probably because they're not the cutest animal around), and this great copy changes that!

Love the friendly headline "Hi I'm your local opossum!" 😂

With some simple copy on a page, this flyer has managed to make people change their mind from thinking of opposum's from scary and gross animal:

To a friendly, harmless, and even helpful animal!

Here's what I mainly use  Twitter for 😂

Interestingly enough, just dicking around and harassing friends often gets a lot of engagement, and it keeps social media fun and "social!"

This sentiment has been popular lately: 
"People's attention spans have become shorter because of TikTok and Shorts." 

I disagree.

Human "attention spans" are the exact same...we just have more media options that didn't exist before.

People used to watch long movies and read long books simply because that's all they had. That was the entertainment option of the time.

If you teleported phones with TikTok to the 1950's, everyone would use it!

The human brain hasn't changed, technology has.

Short content relays MORE information to people in a shorter amount of time, so it's not crazy to think people would consume it.

Attention span hasn't necessarily decreased, we've just compressed the amount of time it takes to relay a message by eliminating all errs, umms, pauses, and useless information.

With that said, it seems the best way to consume media is:
• Short Form = Discovery + entertainment
• Long Form = Go deep on a subject

It's cool we have so many options now!

I did a fun project today: 

Step 1.) Bought a chainsaw on a long pole

 

Step 2.) Climbed onto the roof with the chainsaw 😎

 

Step 3.) Clear out some nuisance branches.

 

Step 4.) Chopped down two trees from top to bottom.

That’s all!

This probably isn't the greatest set of pictures in the world, but this was a fun project 🙂

It's fun to re-visit history and see every new technology get negative press for a while while it disrupts the existing system.

This article says too much reading can be bad:

 

When computers came out it was a problem for some:

 

When spell-check started becoming popular people got scared, much like people are with ChatGPT now:

 

Calculators were a "problem" for some:

 

Wild accusations of technology have always been a thing:

 

Some people thought too many novels were bad:

Image credits:  Pessimists Archive

New tech comes out ➡ Disrupts System ➡ Adaptation ➡ Repeat.

This graphic is so true 😂

Drawing by  Ferraro Roberto

A single notification on your phone can destroy deep thinking time so easily.

Here's some ways I personally combat notifications:
- Don't allow social & email apps to show up.
- Silence phone + turn phone upside down.
- Leave phone in different room.
- Use "Focus Mode" at night.

 

I like this ad because the headline copy and image work together to show your tires are the only part of your car that touch the road.

The headline uses underlining for "you're only safe as your tires" and the image cleverly removes the body of the car and just shows the tires:

 

I like this quote: 

Quote

“Once you understand the motivation, reward and punishment structure of any system, you can begin to control it.” 

- Guido Van Rossum (founder of the Python programming language)

I once heard Cesar Millan (the Dog Whisperer) say all dogs like at least 1 of these 3 different rewards: 
- Toys
- Food
- Affection

Once you know the type of reward a dog responds to best, it makes it much easier to train!

Hugsy likes toys, food, and affection:

 

Sid is primarily motivated by food, and is "meh" on the rest:

 

Poe mostly responds to affection:

 

Knowing the reward/punishment structure seems to help in any system!

- Training neural networks
- Training dogs
- Raising kids

Here's a funny term I heard:

A doctor friend said a lot of her patients have “Million Dollar Pee” because they take so many useless supplements 😂

I hope you're having a great holiday season!!

This picture sums up Christmas & New Year's in Austin: Cold enough to wear some long clothes, but warm enough to work outside without freezing to death 😂

Here's an idea for the U.S. Department of Education:

Crowd-source short form videos for every subject & every grade K - 12. Students can casually browse these like TikTok as a supplement to their classes.

Here's An Example: 
Take this 3rd grade Language Arts curriculum and put a $10,000 award for the best short video for each section (1 minute or less)…

Educators across the world will flood social media with their entries.

The $10,000 prize is split up into: 
• 1st place: $6,000 
• 2nd place: $3,000 
• 3rd place: $1,000 

You then take the winning videos and add them to playlists on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube Shorts. 

Now let’s do the math…

The U.S. Department of Education budget in 2022 was $636 billion. 

Each grade curriculum is 32 weeks, with 5 lessons per week. 

• 160 lessons per grade X 12 grades = 1,920 lessons 

• 1,920 lessons X $10,000 per prize = $19,200,000 

• $636 billion / $19.2 million =  .003% of budget

Conclusion: 
For just .003% of your US Education budget, in one month, you could give high quality supplemental materials to every student in the country (technically the world)…and turn social media from a time-suck to kids, into a powerful teacher that benefits millions!

 

Evidence crowd sourcing works has been proven by @xprize and @DARPA. Interesting analogy is @thesamparr and @ShaanVP offered $5k for anyone who can make a clip viral…it resulted in hundreds of clips, hundreds of creators, and hundreds of millions of views…for just $5k 😳

Even if this program cost 5x or 10x what’s quoted here it would still be an intensely efficient use of funds.

This same competition could be held every year, or whenever there are changes to the curriculum…massively increasing the quality of the education as people compete.

This program could bring out a whole new generation of digital educators.

A high school English teacher in Missouri may discover she has the skills to educate millions of students online, rather than just 100 students in person.

Digital education would advance quickly with this method.

I hope someone takes this idea and runs with it!

My content consumption has changed in the last few years.

I’d say for every 1 blog post, I’m viewing 100’s of Reels/TikToks/Shorts

I've also noticed far more growth on my short videos than my blog posts recently (see full stats here).

How many blog posts do YOU read vs watching short form video? Reply to this email and let me know!

Instagram has seemingly been the best performing platform so far. 

Here's some stats:

 

I believe of all the social platforms, YouTube view counts are probably the most honest.

YouTube Shorts definitely boosted view numbers on my channel:

 

...however my lack of posting long form video hindered subscriber growth 😞

 

Overall I'd say the YouTube Shorts videos have helped the channel get more views and activity but not subscriber growth without long form content being added:

 

 

TikTok has been "meh" performing so far, although definitely doing something. 

I started with almost no followers, now have almost 2,000....so that's something. 

 

LinkedIn was kind of a long shot here because it's not known as a video platform, but it's doing decent.

One benefit of LinkedIn is that it brings in a totally different audience than other social platforms. 

 

 

Here's an example of a great cold email! 

- It seems personal, but doesn't use any personalization (less work).
- It gets straight to the point of what's important to me.
- Shows proof he can deliver the results.
- Gives a juice screenshot with stats.
- Offers to give some suggestions if I reach out.

I love seeing good emails in my inbox in a sea of bad emails!

“Once you understand the motivation, reward and punishment structure of any system, you can begin to control it.” - Guido Van Rossum (founder of Python)

Fun fact: Every time you fill out one of these Google Captcha's you're slightly training an A.I. 

A.I. systems for self driving or identifying objects need massive amounts of human labelling to learn from, and you're labelling these 9 pics as either:

- It's a car
- It's not a car

The A.I. system then shows these same pics to many other humans (sorry you're not that special 😛), and then determines if it was correct or incorrect about labelling the images. 

...and that's how it learns and gets better. Neat huh!

Canva just released  "Canva Docs" , which is interesting for writers that use tons of visuals in their writing 👀

I played around with it and it's kinda neat. 

Their built-in editor AI is pretty sweet. Check this out:

My prompt: Write me 5 reasons copywriting is awesome 

The result:

And it even has text-to-image generation:

I asked it to draw: "Show me a guy putting on sneakers in the dessert"

Not sure I'll be switching from Google Docs over to Canva docs just yet....but so far no editor has even COME CLOSE to Google Docs for me except this...so I'm impressed already!!

Remember how "The Will Smith Slap" was what EVERYONE IN THE PLANET was talking about for a while?

Whatever happened to that? 

Then everyone was talking about the Johnny Depp divorce thing. 

Then everyone was talking about Iran....

Some topics capture the public imagination, and the whole world gets obsessed for a short period of time....then moves on. 

This is known as  "The Current Thing." 

Here's some cool visualizations of "The Current Thing" from 2022:

Or here's some more "Current Thing" for 2021:

This cycle seems to play out across every industry, every country, and every group...it's cool to see it in visual form like above!

Have you been using ChatGPT (the A.I. writing tool)?

Outside of testing it out, what have you been using it for? 

I've been using it for: - Running ideas by it.

- Occasionally drumming up headline or subject line ideas.
- Asking it to come up with content ideas.

I'm starting to use it a bit less now as the initial novelty has worn off....and it's interesting to watch how others are using it:

Some responses from Twitter :

 Jason:  I’ve been going to subject matter expert episodes of long form podcasts on YouTube (1hr to 2 hour) coping the transcripts and then asking ChatGPT to summarize in long sentences and 20 points what was said in the interview.

Kamphey:  I ask for FAQ for topics, to add more sections to blog posts. I used it to figure out subsections, subheadlines. I asked for clickbait titles, buzzfeed type titles. I asked for B2B titles, and subheadlines and subsections. I asked it to summarize youtube videos.

Olivia:  Since we are a content agency we are exploring its power with: 1. Headlines 2. Summaries 3. Outlines 4. Content Ideas based on research? 5. Articles 6. Tweets 7. Threads 8. Text extraction 9. Copy

---------------------------------------------------------

What's interesting is ChatGPT likely won't take away a SINGLE job in the whole world (for now)...

...but it's going to make some jobs a whole lot easier, and restructure what some job titles do.

Example:

"Manually-Writing-Numbers-On-A-Chalkboard-Guy" probably didn't lose his job the moment electronic spreadsheets came out:

However he probably shifted certain tasks to computers over time, so he didn't have to begrudgingly add numbers all day...instead a computer could do it faster, and he could focus on more important stuff:

Then the spreadsheet technology got even better and he would have to re-train himself to use something more like this on a modern computer:

Ultimately "Manually-Writing-Numbers-On-A-Chalkboard-Guy" would be able to start his on company managing the books for multiple other companies....and raising his potential income level by A LOT:

Inside our Copywriting Course forum and Office Hours we've been working side-by-side with A.I. tools, and it's been invigorating to have new tools to use for creativity! 

Although sometimes you have to beware of using these tools wrong, like for trying to game search engine results:

It's been fun showing people how to leverage A.I. to make awesome content....although the best content is still an A.I. + Human collaboration:

This old Range Rover ad has it all:
✔ Grabbing image
✔ Interest-grabbing headline
✔ Great copy showcasing it’s features and benefits

This is definitely a frame-able piece of marketing, and one of my favorite ads of all time! Look at that beauty:

Copywriting Tip: Sometimes a simple Before & After photo will explain an entire product without much need for copy.

For example, this simple advertisement for a charging device shows a 1-outlet device replacing multiple charging bricks:

You instantly understand the product.

Since that charging device is a PHYSICAL PRODUCT you can see, it's easy to do a before & after of it. But if you sell a service you can show the after results of using your service, like these ads:

So instead of showing the service itself you show the RESULTS of the service.

I like to destroy all distractions on my computer with an extension called "Focus45." Hit the button and for 45 minutes it'll block access to your time-sucking websites:

If you need to access a blocked website (which is very common) there's a way to temporarily bypass it for a minute by entering a code like this:

Here's a demo in action →

I just like that it's a quick and easy way to avoid getting distracted by all the fun stuff out there!

Got to hangout with Andrew Tate today!

Just kidding, this is not Andrew Tate (a controversial social media character), it's my friend Ayman…but the similarities are uncanny, and when we go out people always tell him he looks just like that guy 😂
 

81% of people say that email is their primary form of communication at work because it’s:

• Time-stamped
• Reliable
• Archivable
• Deposition ready

I will say a huge portion of my introductions and initial contact with people is now over social networks, but when it comes to making sales (according to my own business and clients businesses), email is still reigning king:

Email is hard to replace because it keeps evolving. Email in 1999 is not the same as email is 2022, it's barely the same product:
• Spam is wayyyyy down.
• Images and gifs load easily.
• Gmail Tabs help sort junk and notification emails.
• You can store unlimited emails.
• You can send gigantic attachments.
• Easy to sort email in folders.
• Email is accessible on any device, through many different platforms.

Even social networks use email to get you back. I get roughly 2-3 notification emails a day from Facebook alone. 

Anyways, email might be useful thing to learn in 2023! Like how I build this newsletter every week:

When trying to schedule a hangout with someone, a 45 second call is way better than 15 back-n-forth interspersed text messages!

Few understand this:

I think scheduling and communicating over text is great, and do it all the time, but when working out a potentially complex schedule there's nothing like a good ole phone call to sort it out quickly!

Here's two pieces of advertising:

One gives gives you 6 reasons to own the car. The second one gives you 10 reasons NOT to own the car 😂 

Since the AMC Gremlin car is pretty hideous, this ad appeals to it’s more practical qualities, giving you 6 reasons to own it:

Then this Volkswagen GTI ad uses reverse psychology, giving you “Ten Reasons NOT To Buy.”

This is a fun way to grab some attention, by saying NOT to buy the car, but then listing great reasons to buy the car:

An underrated convenience: Having a printer in your home.

It seems so outdated and un-needed, but I have a wireless printer tucked away in a junk closet that's always on:

I always wonder why I need this thing...then I'll have to print a random form (like a Defensive Driving certificate), and it's so nice to just hit "PRINT" from any device on my network and it happens.

A printer is ULTRA CONVENIENT when needed, and VERY FRUSTRATING when you need to print a random form and can't do it!

Maybe a printer could be a Christmas idea for someone??

Interest in the keyword "Copywriting" from 2004 to present has skyrocketed since January 2022.

What's your explanation? Reply to this email and let me know!

My eating got 10x better when I installed a gas grill outside my kitchen.

For example here’s lunch the other day:
- Lamb kabob 
- Mini peppers
- Asparagus 

You really don’t need any extra sauces or prep besides this.

Other friends who bought basic grills said their eating improved immediately as well!

Unless you’re an expert grill’er, I would stay away from “egg shaped” grills or fancy pellet grills with timers and phone apps. 

Everyone I see buy those stops using them after 6 months. 

My advice for grilling is to buy a regular-ass gas grill (turn knob, flame turns on). It's super easy to use, and your food will be more delicious.

Yesterday I grilled these up for dinner 😍😍😍

As AI keeps getting better, people ask: “What will humans do?” 

The answer is: 
One human will do what used to take many humans.
For example....

It used to take a team of 50 humans to manually light oil lamps that illuminated a few popular streets in a city:

...now a team of 50 can run the entire electrical grid and illuminate every street in the same city in an instant.

Or it used to take a department of 10 humans to receive, sort, deliver, and send mail for a company. Handling tens of thousands of pieces of physical mail.

....but now as 1 person and a laptop, I’ve personally sent out over 15,000,000 emails this year.

It used to take a team of 100+ humans with T-square rulers and drafting tables to create blueprints for a simple building, with many potential errors. 

...now 1 human can copy/paste detailed CAD models with electrical, internet, and HVAC conduits and thorough safety checks.

 

AI and technology amplify human capability. 

Think of a process or company that needs 10, or 50, or 100 humans to operate…now imagine in 20 years being able to do that entirely by yourself.

By the way, all the art used in this essay was 100% generated by AI! I show you how in this training video I just made (CC Members Only):

....by the way, I've been playing around with ChatGPT just released by OpenAI. You can watch me test it out here and ask it questions like how to get rich and to write code for me:

If anything overtakes Google Search, it’ll likely be something like this:

Are you selling a product in 2023? 

To make $1,000,000 in 2023 you would need: 
• 5,000 people to buy a $200 product 
• 2,000 people to buy a $500 product 
• 1,000 people to buy a $1,000 product 
• 500 people to buy a $2,000 product
• 300 people to buy a $3,333 product
• 200 people to buy a $5,000 product 
• 100 people to buy a $10,000 product
• 50 people to buy a $20,000 product
• 5 people to buy a $200,000 product

Knowing these numbers is a helpful way to "Work Backwards" into your 2023 monetary goal. You can modify the number here and calculate different amounts:

"1 dog year is 7 human years" is what I've always heard....but that's not totally accurate! 

This super cool chart clarifies that statement with more info based on weight:

How old is your pet according to this??

...and how old do you think this little guy is?? 🙂

Here's a funny story how over the years I've swung the price of this book (This Is Earl Nightingale) from $15 to over $450 several times. 

Currently if you search this book it's at $244: 

....yet 5 days ago it was about $20 🤔

So I talk about this book all the time. I originally bought a copy ~15 years ago that was signed by the author Earl Nightingale:

If I’m ever confused, pissed off, sad, or lazy (or other non-desirable state)….I pick up this book and open a random chapter:

Within a few minutes of reading one of the chapters (each 1 to 3 pages long), I generally have a paper/pen out and am jotting out the quickest solution to my problems.

It’s almost like a sure-fire way to make me feel better since it gets me thinking RATIONALLY about an issue I may have, rather than just “oh poor me complain complain complain” shitty circular thinking that gets you no where.

So for a $15 book I bought 15 years ago, it's had massive returns for me!

So 5 days ago I posted an Instagram Reel about the book, and I watched the price go from $20, to $150+, to $200+ 😂

It's a combination of enough people wanting to buy an original copy (no longer printed), and a very limited supply of those copies, plus this isn't like a super popular book lots of people sell:

I personally have an affinity for this book because it was one of my most-referenced books of the last 2 decades. 

Earl Nightingale has so much wisdom that's sometimes tough to swallow and very matter-of-fact.

Here's some fun little nuggets of wisdom from it:

“Your total environment is an exact and merciless mirror of you as a human being.” 
- Earl Nightingale

“The amount of money a person receives will always be in direct proportion to the demand for what he does, his ability to do what he does, and the difficulty of replacing him.” 
- Earl Nightingale

"A happy plumber makes a greater contribution to the world than a miserable university professor."
 --Earl Nightingale

“We become what we think about. People who think about becoming lawyers, become lawyers. A bad environment makes you think bad thoughts. A beautiful environment makes you think beautiful thoughts.” 
-Earl Nightingale

Can you simply describe your own product/service with this framework?

Example 1: 
Feature: Sun cream. 
Benefit: No sun burn. 
Experience: A burn free summer. 

Example 2: 
Feature: Blackjack Guide.
Benefit: Win more money than your friends.
Experience: Bragging rights from your weekend in Vegas.

Example 3: 
Feature: QMS building framework.
Benefit: Connect, Organize and Visualize your QMS data.
Experience: Faster quality management decision-making than your competitors.

Example 4: 
Feature: Micro exercises.
Benefit: No burnout.
Experience: A refreshed mind and body.

Write your product/service out like this, and reply to this email with your answers!!
• Feature: ?
• Benefit: ?
• Experience: ?

I've been very resistant to these "Shorts" videos for a while....but I'm not gonna deny some of these results:

Suuurreee the numbers are all probably highly inflated, but it's an interesting format to get tons of different information in a small amount of time. 

I posted our analytics on all these platforms in last weeks SWIPES Email, and I'll update again after roughly a month of posting!

I'm currently thinking through my 2023 goals, and perhaps some “Month-Long Experiment” ideas for 2023 plus their desired results.
Here's an example:

#1.) Observe Sabbath (no religious connotation): 
I would pick a day of the week to use little-to-no technology.

Result:
Hope to read more, disconnect just enough, regain long focused periods without distraction of fun technology.

#2.) Sober Month No drinking, no nothing, mayyybbbe caffeine. 

Result: Just make sure can still do it, no way to escape, reduced calories, potentially better sleep.

#3.) Calorie Restriction Month 
Set a strict calorie cutoff for each day. 
2,100 calories for workout days 
1,500 calories for non-workout days 

Result: 
At those numbers I guarantee go into a calorie deficit. Forces me to make good food choices, and high penalty for poor choices. 

I’ve tried many of these before, and usually find some small action to get the desired result faster without doing a month of the same thing. Ideas I’m not 100% sure need a full month but seem interesting: 

• Everyday writing habit month 
• Wake up really early month 
• Morning/evening stretching month (maybe while I brush/floss)
• Solve a trivial inconvenience each day 
• Track all of your time for a month
• No added sugar month

I really liked this blog post documenting a bunch of similar experiments and their results.

Do you have any month-long experiments you'll be doing in 2023??

CopyWork is a copywriting exercise where you hand-copy ads to learn how they were written. 

When you learn piano you first copy other songs, then later you create your own songs. 

It's a similar concept with copy. 

You first copy famous pieces, then create your own.

For example here's a world-famous Volkswagen ad:

Here's a CC student's CopyWork for that popular Volkswagen ad:

Here's another students rendition of it:

And another:

If you want to practice CopyWork on your own, here's 31 different ads to pick from:

Feel free to pick one of those ads, write it out on a sheet of paper, and reply back to this email with a photo of it!
 

Last week I became one of those "Short Video" people. Last week we posted one video per day to: 
- TikTok 
- LinkedIn 
- Instagram 
- Facebook 
- YouTube Shorts 

Here's the results after one week on each platform →

TikTok: Bad 

The first video we posted got ~700 views, then all downhill from there. 
Possible reasons: 
- I just suck. 
- I'm not a great demographic fit for TikTok.
- We've only been consistent for for one week and need more time.

 

Instagram: Pretty good 
- Getting some views. 
- Getting some comments and messages about vids. 
- People reaching out saying they like them. 

The increase in reach are very visible on Instagram:

I do feel kind of self conscious that I mostly use Instagram for purely personal reasons, and now I'm blasting people with, "HEY IT'S NEVILLE LEMME TELL YOU STUFF ABOUT COPYWRITING!!!!"

LinkedIn: Decent

- People watch and comment.
- People messaging about the vids.
- LinkedIn in seems like a solid platform that's not as glamorized as TikTok, and I think the bar for content is MUCH LOWER. 

One neat thing is LinkedIn stats show you detailed demographic info:

 

Facebook: Meh. 
- The shorts don't look good on Facebook Pages, it's not made for it.
- Views are meh.
- Engagement is very low. 
- It gets SOME views, but engagement is like zero compared to our other posts.

 

YouTube Shorts: Good
- Getting likes. 
- Getting comments. 
- Getting subscribers. 

The plan is to keep posting at least once per day across all platforms. 

I noticed when other friends did this it took about 2 months straight before any real growth happened.

It'll be an interesting experiment to see if people like these! I'm open to feedback to improve!! Email me back if you have suggestions!
 

When you incentivize something....you get more of it.

Around 2003 Google introduced its ad product called AdSense,  and it literally “ignited” the web! 

Content publishers could finally make money from their content, so more was made.

Twitter is about to throw its hat in the ring, giving rev-share to content makers for video and written content:

Pretty much every publishing platform is now giving creators money for content (of course only a small percentage of creators get enough traffic to create real revenue), but it's a good step in the right direction.

The most common cold email I got this year was people/agencies offering to make YouTube Shorts, IG Reels, TikTok Clips etc (like I showed above).

It kind of reminds me of people cold-pitching making websites in the early 2000's, and people cold-pitching building Apple iOS apps in 2008.

Short video clips have kind of turned into a media form of their own, so it's logical this is a big service being offered all over the place.

Here's some sample cold emails I get everyday:

I've engaged with many of these pitches, but the major problem I've seen with these pitches is:

I ask for samples of their work, and they are very poor quality 😞

Most of the clips they send me are poorly picked, or poor quality. 

Compare that with some of the recent clips I've had released with captions, graphics, and lots of editing: 

I've tried making some of these Shorts clips myself just to figure out how much work it is....and honestly it's almost as much work as making a full YouTube video 😂

There's so much editing, shortening, and picking out solid lessons that goes into it....it's much harder than it looks. 

Last week was my 40th birthday, and I'm thankful to have friends/fam that surprised me with like 2 weeks worth of celebrations! Think I got like FIVE cakes for this bday 😂

The week before my bday a group of us went to Mexico City:

I got several Mexico City bday surprise cakes 🙂

A Spa Day...

Then back in Austin a surprise party on actual bday:

Then over the weekend a BIIIGGGGGGG SURPRISE came when I was lured out to the lake with the help of Sam and Sara:

Where a bunch of friends were waiting and surprised me in the driveway of this dope house with the "Dancing Tesla" feature where it plays music and flashes the lights 😂

I got ANOTHER cake!

I was so surprised, had no clue this was happening:

My friend Noah was there (also a lot of people wore onesies) 😂

He cooked an awesome lunch one day:

Noah also did a full roast 😂

My friend Nick Gray was there too:

He organized a bunch of fun games including "Sardines" and "Celebrity":

One day we all jumped in the lake....and it was 37F degrees outside 🥶

Then immediately jumped in the hot tub 🙂

The house was ammmmaaazzziinnggg:

Someone really thought through all the details:

It was probably one of the best layouts of any house I've ever been in:

Anyways, it was an awesome birthday and I was thankful for that and all the fam/friends involved in putting it together!!

20 years ago I was in a college entrepreneurship club with 200 members.

Only 2 people out of 200 actually had a business: 
- Me (ran a rave equipment drop shipping site). 
- Dude who patented a roofing device inspired from his family’s business.

Since then entrepreneurship has boomed, and I think a few things have changed:

 

1.) It was VERY taboo and weird to openly speak about money.

It was common courtesy to NOT ask people about money or finances…and you rarely heard people openly discuss their personal finances.

I used to openly list my finances on my first blog NevBlog.com, and this was considered an insane move. 

Nowadays people openly say on their Twitter profile “I sold a company for $10.5m.”

So it's cool to see people more open about money, so more people can learn how to make it.

 

2.) Owning a business was HARD, cost a lot of money, and little information was available.

Even a website cost a lot of money in hosting/bandwidth. Just owning a computer cost thousands of dollars.

Nowadays you can run a huge website or social following from a phone, essentially for free.

 

3.) Owning a business wasn’t cool. It was looked upon as an odd and un-safe thing to do.

Entrepreneurship was starting to become slightly cooler, but it was investment bankers and finance people that were looked upon with admiration, not entrepreneurs.

That’s changed.

It's neat to see in 1 generation "starting a business" go from a fringe/weird activity to a mainstream thing possible for anyone! 

I asked people what they wanna build in 2023, you can see 300+ responses here: 
copywritingcourse.com/blogs/233-what-are-you-building-next-year

The most common answers with 10+ responses each were:

• Start an eCommerce store (surprisingly tons of these)
• Starting a blog.
• Starting a social media presence.
• Building community membership site.
• Start a retail website.
• Start freelancing or consulting.
• Write a book & blog combination.
• A side income of some sort.
• Get to multiple streams of income.

The things is, all of these things are do-able in one year. 

If you break a year down into 4 quarters (3 months each), you can easily "work backwards" into your goal:

So this Black Friday we're offering 1 year of Copywriting Course for 55% off if you grab it before tonight!

If you use coupon code BLACKFRIDAY (expired) right now, you'll get 55% off, PLUS TWO FREE MONTHS of access!

That means if you buy today you'll have access to:
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- 24/7 copywriting forum for help, advice, and re-writes.
- Weekly Office Hours where you can come chat with me directly.

....alllllll the way till the end of next year!

Copywriting course is usually $97/mo, so times 14 months that's $1,358.

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Sometimes a simple comparison helps you *instantly* understand something. 

This simple graphic seen on Instagram *instantly* shows your fullness level after eating 400 calories of 
oil -vs- beef -vs- vegetables:

I first learned what a "calorie" was when I was 26 years old, and comparisons helped me understand it better.

I ate King Size Snicker's bars all the time which were 440 calories each.
"440 calories" on it's own meant nothing until I started comparing it to  other foods.

I was shocked I could eat 12 clementines and get less than 440 calories! I even made this image for myself back then:

These comparisons slowly helped me discern good foods and bad foods.

Using comparisons (or "analogies") are very useful when explaining something!
 

 

I love this quote:

Quote

The mediocre teacher tells.
The good teacher explains.
The superior teacher demonstrates.
The great teacher inspires. 
- William Arthur Ward

I'm not a big hot sauce person, but for some reason this one just hits the right spot:

- Very flavorful.
- Goes on anything.
- Not hot enough to wreck stomach.

Cholula is great in general, but the Chipotle flavor is even yummier!

Yesterday was my 40th birthday, so here's 40 lessons l've learned about life...

Just kidding, I dunno anything, I'm just gonna have fun 🤩

I was in Mexico City last weekend celebrating a bit, and this weekend I'll be in Austin. 

Friends have stuff planned but I don't know what it is yet 😬

"Be clear, not clever" is generally great advice, especially when trying to sell something. 

However sometimes "cleverness" and "beauty" can work!

For example I think this graphic of bicycle parts is both beautiful and clever:

 

Or what about this clever (and kinda funny) ad for Pringle's Hot & Spicy 😂

 

Or this beautiful Rolls Royce ad just showing how pretty the car is:

When selling and writing, I think clearness is best.....but every once in a while some cleverness and beauty can go a long way!

The "Compression of Information" marches forward as we get better technology. 

For example I made a 7 minute video about "Becoming Indispensable", but recently put out a YouTube Short video that's only 39 seconds....and to be honest it kinda gets the same point across, but 10x more efficiently!

To me, copywriting has always been about getting information from one brain to another brain....or one brain to a MILLION brains. 

Whichever the most efficient method is best. 
 

This "compression of information" has happened to reading:
🕓 🕓 🕓 Books: Days to read.
🕓 🕓 Magazine Articles: Minutes to read.
🕓 Tweets: Seconds to read. 

Also it's happening to video:
🕓 🕓 🕓 Movies: Hours to watch.
🕓 🕓 YouTube Videos: Minutes to watch.
🕓 "Shorts" Videos: Seconds to watch. 

I've been experimenting with some shorter form content all this year, maybe you could follow me on those platforms to see it?

• Instagram
• YouTube
• Twitter
• TikTok
• LinkedIn

Do you like shorter form content? Do you consume it?? Reply and let me know!