Think about how you buy. If it comes highly recommended, you’ll buy with no hesitation. 

- High Ratings
- Testimonials
- A friend telling you about something
- Seeing someone important use it
- Aggregate testimonials important.
- If long text, summarize for people.

I most often see people leave social proof out.

Example 1: 

Example 2:

 Example 3:

 Example 4:

 Example 5:

"85% of our customers get a 5X return or more."

"3,500+ clients served."

"15 years in business."

"BBB Accredited"

Your images can often tell the whole story without a lot of copy needed! 

- Don’t post generic pics that convey zero info.
- Showcase different uses of the product.
- Explain whole product in images if possible.
- Treat your images like a presentation or slideshow.
- Make image so good people screenshot it.

This is a huge mistake on most sites. Lots of wasted space with useless images.

Example 1:

Example 2:

Example 3:

Example 4:

Example 5:

So many products can be used for many different things, but many pages will show only one use. 

Showing multiple uses makes the product more valuable to the customer!

- Show off different ways people can use.
- Show unique customer use cases.

Example 1:

Example 2:

What people want is a TRANSFORMATION. 

How will their life get better with this product?

- Saves them time.
- Makes something easier.
- Make another product better.
- Makes them smarter or more educated.
- Makes them seem rich.

What is the transformation that will take place?

Example 1:

Example 3:

Example 4:

Example 5:

Example 6:

Often the most overlooked thing is just TELLING PEOPLE WHAT TO DO NEXT.

- Try to pick only one action.
- Either tell them what to do, or make it obvious.

Ultimately everything we’ve talked about in this presentation is to lead people to take an action.

Example 1:

Example 2:

Example 3:

Example 4:

Example 5:

I'm feeling thirsty, so let's start off today with THREE DRINK SWIPES!

I thought this was a fun and clever ad from Guinness that was released around the Kings Coronation:

For this Banana Shake ad for McDonald's I like their use of dumb puns!

“Go bananas” “It’s got appeal”

I’m Loving It 😂

This ad justifies drinking Kool-Aid over soda for it’s nutritional value and price value. I might call BS on the “nutritional value” of it, but overall this old print ad does a great job of justifying the purchase of Kool-Aid over the competitor!

One upside of social media is how people are incentivized to put a lot of information in a small amount of space.

Here's 3 examples:

This image shows four ways of reducing traffic noise to a residential area:

This little square lists 72 different AI tools all categorized: 

This chart shows booms & busts happening with regular frequency.

I love when something takes a lot of complex data and simplifies it like this:

Small square + Lots of Info = Cool!

The email subject line of this SWIPES email is always pretty standard:

I was out of town all this month, and am excited to be back home in Austin!

Here's a pic of me in Barcelona:

Cool hotel I stayed at:

It's times when I leave this long that I realize how cool it is to work primarily from the internet.

Happy to be back home again!

This happens at every wedding I go to: 

People take pics on their phone and immediately post to Instagram where they get shared/liked/commented instantly.

3 Months Later you get an email link from the bride/groom with professional photos…wayyy after the moment has passed😕
I was discussing with a friend that it'd almost be cooler to hire someone to take good pics with their phone and immediately post them during the event! 

They would post from their phone, tag people, and the event would spread on socials. 
This whole "I'll send you photos 3 months later" thing seems antiquated now and really misses the fun of posting them around the main event. 

Also anytime I've hired a photographer part of the deal is I get their raw photo dump right after the shoot. 

I make sure they know at the end of the photo session I'm going to pop that SD card into my laptop so I have the photos now!

Here's a fun book I've been reading: The Wright Brothers.

Reading about historical events makes you realize huge technological shifts followed by fear is totally normal.

In 1903 the Wright Brothers made the first official powered flight, and it's fun to read accounts of how "flight will totally change EVERYTHING and we are not ready for this!!!! "

Now we completely take flight completely for granted.
 

This is neat: The Wright Brothers (who invented airplanes) funded the development of the first powered airplane with their bike shop, shown here:

And this was the simple ad they’d post in the Dayton, Ohio newspapers:

They designed a popular bike called "The Van Cleve Bicycle" which was their most popular bike, and it sold for $60.

So that ad played a small hand in developing the first aircraft 🙂

10+ years ago I was sending something at the post office, and as I finished up, the clerk said to me:

Quote

"Have a great day....it's a choice!"

I've thought about that random passing comment almost every single day since then. 

You can CHOOSE if your day will be good or bad. 
Which will yours be 🙂?

The format of this chart easily demonstrates how Apple’s 2022 revenue was the combined revenue of alllll these big tech companies 😬

I like how the layout of this chart so easily demonstrates the point.

This ad for the unique-looking Ford Pinto has no copy or anything…just an awesome visual of the product!

Same with this Ford Econoline van ad...extremely little copy, just letting the product speak for itself!

I wrote a blog post full of copywriting formulas here, mainly these:

#1.) AIDA: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action
#2.) PAS: Problem, Agitate, Solution 
#3.) PASCA: Problem Agitate Solution Call to Action 
#4.) 4 Ps: Promise, Picture, Proof, Push 
#5.) FAB: Features, Advantages, Benefits 
#6.) The Before-After-Bridge 
#7.) 5W’s and H: Who, What, Where, When, Why, How 
#8.) Tell A Story 
#9.) PAPA: Problem, Agitation, Provide, Action 
#10.) The 7 Steps 
#11.) 4U’s: Urgent, Unique, Ultra-specific, Useful 
#12.) APP Formula: Agree, Promise, Preview 
#13.) FOMO: Fear of Missing Out 
#14.) PSR: Problem, Solution, Result 
#15.) 4 Ps of Persuasion 
#16.) STAR: Situation, Task, Action, Result 
#17.) PASTOR: Pain, Agitate, Solution, Testimonial, Offer, Response 
#18.) FAPE: Feature, Advantage, Proof, Evidence

The funny thing is after writing examples for each of these copywriting formulas, it seemed like almost every formulas was just a slight variation of either A.I.D.A. or P.A.S.

• AIDA: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action
• PAS: Problem, Agitate, Solution 

Do you use any formulas like this? Reply to this email and let me know. I personally use AIDA almost every single day.

It's happening....we are almost officially mid-year 😬

Mid-year I like to re-visit my yearly goals (which often get forgotten), and also ask questions of myself, such as:

- What worked this year?
- What DIDN'T work this year?
- Am I on track to hit yearly goals? If not, how to course-correct?

This is the time of the year I prep for Q3 and Q4, as those are often the biggest revenue months for many businesses:

Hopefully you take the rest of this month to reflect on how you can crush the rest of 2023:

We'll be closing down our $97/mo plan for a bit this weekend, so if you want to jump inside the Copywriting Course at that price point, now would be a great time to JOIN if you want some guidance.