Jump to content
Change words, change the impact

The S.W.I.P.E.S. Email (Friday November 11th, 2022)

Swipe📁Wisdom🧠Interesting🧐Picture🖼 • Essay📄Sketch✎
A fun email for Friday. I hope you enjoy!

Edition: Friday, November 11th, 2022

🎤 Listen to this email here:

Swipe:

Here’s some clever ways to turn boring data & stats into easier visuals:

1.) This was a clever way to spice up a boring “bar chart” and make it into a “Battery Bar Chart!” 📊

battery-bar-chart.png

2.) Instead of boring bar charts show boring megaton data, this chart uses nuclear explosion visuals to show the different sizes of nuclear blasts.

nuclear-explosion-size-data-chart.jpg

3.) Instead of using words and data to describe lethality of different drugs, these viles each show a lethal dose of 3 different drugs, and shows how shockingly little is needed to overdose.

This visual hits home harder than plain numbers and data:

drug-overdoes-images.jpg

We are visual creatures. Our minds are ~6X likely to remember a message if it's combined with an image:

image-vs-non-image-line-graph.jpg

So if trying to get data across, sometimes it's beneficial to make it an image!

Wisdom:

This is a neat quote:

earl-nightingdale-quote.jpg

Quote

“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

This is a cool way to judge which career path or business to get into:
→ Demand for what you do
→ Your ability to do it
→ The difficulty of replacing you

In fact we could make a measuring scale out of this:
→ Demand for what you do (Rate 1-5)
→ Your ability to do it (Rate 1-5)
→ The difficulty of replacing you (Rate 1-5)

A janitor is a job associated with low pay because MOST people in the world are capable of doing the job.

If an average janitor needs to be replaced, it's very easy:
→ Demand for what you do (3)
→ Your ability to do it (3)
→ The difficulty of replacing you (1)

If an average brain surgeon needs to be replaced, it's very difficult:
→ Demand for what you do (5)
→ Your ability to do it (3)
→ The difficulty of replacing you (5)

Interesting:

I've given other note-taking and organization apps like Notion and Coda many solid tries....but I keep winding up back on Google Docs.

90% of what I love about Notion is being able to navigate to different pages quickly via it's sidebar menu.

If Google Docs had something like this, it would like beat the pants off any other up-and-coming app.
I wish Google Docs would add this functionality, like:

google-doc-browser.png

 

Picture:

Editing a physical paper "back in the day" had a whole markup language of its own, shown in this graph:

proofreading-markup-symbols.jpg

If you were an editor or proofreader, you would know most of these!

I only knew two of these symbols: The "insert" mark ^ and the paragraph mark

How many of these symbols did you know??

Essay:

Features -vs- Benefits is a common discussion in copywriting. 

Feature: Something your product has (ex "Water Resistant Cloth").
Benefit: Result after using your product (ex: "You stay dry in the rain").

For example you can sell the features of an umbrella: 
Unbreakable stems, wooden handle, water resistant cloth.

-or-

You can sell the benefits of an umbrella:
Keeps you dry in the rain, keeps the sun off when it's hot.

features-vs-benefits.jpg

 

Selling the "benefits" of a product is usually the wiser decision. Even David Ogilvy said so:

david-ogilvy-quote-about-features-benefits.png

My advice on the Features -V- Benefits debate is:
 

USE BOTH!

I prefer trying to sell the benefit, and backing it up with the features. So:

This umbrella keeps you dry, keeps you cool, and never breaks.

We do this by starting with a strong wooden handle, then use unbreakable stems to hold up the fabric, and use water resistant cloth to keep you dry.

The result is the sturdiest umbrella you can buy for life.
[BUY HERE]

 See how both benefits and features were used to create a strong sales pitch? 

Sketch:

Love the use of "rhyme" to help people remember important stuff.....such as which bear to run from 😬

How-To-Survive-A-Bear-Attack-Graphic.jpg

Something I got from people's comments on Twitter were Polar Bears are by farrrr the most dangerous bear!

  • If they're Polars, they'll soon be spitting out ya molars
  • If it's a Polar, you cannot control her

If you take away one thing from this email....it's don't play with Polar Bears 😂

I hope you enjoyed these Friday tid-bits!
Sincerely, 
Neville Medhora

nev-head.webp


 Join Copywriting Course
 Follow @NevMed on Twitter
 Sponsor this Friday newsletter to 56,381 people

61 Comments


Recommended Comments



That's a great suggestion for Google Docs - your Friday email always has at least one useful tip that makes daily life easier.

P.S. Keep shining your light bright - the world needs more people like you.

P.P.S. Have you heard of Sapling.AI  integrating with Google Docs and Gmail?
Feel free to use my referral link for your own free trial.
100x better than Grammarly and cheaper... it checks your typing for errors and even suggests complete sentence rewrites - whatever website you're working on.

Link to comment

I recently came across this idea for features/benefits.

Feature: sun cream
Benefit: no sun burn
Experience: a burn free summer

I liked the idea of extending the benefit into a beneficial experience. But also paired with your take, which I agree with, use all of them. 'Features' has become a dirty word but it's the feature that often has a lot of the clarity.

My most recently used rhyme to remember:

When in doubt, zoom out.

Helpful for adding perspective to even the seemingly grandest of catastrophes! 

Link to comment

I just want to point out that Google Docs actually has that functionality (I'll add a screenshot) - all you have to do is, for example, select a text and press ctrl+alt+1 (it'll become header one style and be added to your table of contents, which is shown on the right-hand side. Perhaps you already know this and what you want is something different, but it does look a lot like what it already has.

google-docs-sidebar.png

Link to comment

Neville, I really don't know if this is gonna catch your attention but,

This is by far, one of the most outstanding emails I have ever received. It's crisp, on-point, and super valuable. 

Looking forward to reading more such engaging emails.

Link to comment

You can can create a table of content sidebar using headings in Google Docs, and it looks like you can add a sidebar on as an extension (If you Google it you can find directions, haven’t done it myself). Best of luck! 

Link to comment

Guest
Add a comment...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...
Guest