Every Sunday morning I like to write about 3 random things that are on my mind.
Sometimes these things are about business…
Sometimes they’re about life…
And other times they’re truly just random.
So with that said…
Let’s jump into the first thing on my mind this morning…
1. Some people are self sabotagers and they are their own worst enemy…avoid these people like the plague
The older I get, the more I realize that some people are their own worst enemy, and no matter how much you help them, it ain’t gonna make a difference.
For example…
I had a friend after college (Tim), who had a lot of potential in life…
He was fun to be around…
And he knew damn near everyone.
So I figured he’d land a good tech job, and be pretty successful.
But that never happened.
In fact, Tim could never hold a job for more than 6 months.
Why?
Cause he would always find a way to screw it up.
One time he drank too much the night before a big presentation, and wound up missing the presentation.
Another time he was in line for a significant promotion, and he accidentally sent a NSFW email to his boss about a month before the promotion was set to happen…
Another time he got caught hooking up with a woman in the basement at their company Christmas party (they were both let go a few weeks later).
This shit happened over and over with him.
And at the time, I couldn’t really understand why he was doing this.
It made no sense to me.
But now being a little older, I see what was going on.
Tim was a self sabotager.
Anytime things started going well…
He’d find a way to screw it up.
He wasn’t consciously doing this…
Or doing it on purpose…
But deep down a part of him felt like he didn’t deserve the success (or the money) so he’d find a way to screw it up…
That way he didn’t have to deal with it.
I can tell you there are a LOT of people out there that do this.
And my advice is to avoid them as much as you can.
You don’t wanna be marrying or hiring someone like this.
You want to keep them at arm’s length.
Otherwise you’ll just get sucked into their self sabotage and you’ll have new problems on your hand.
Alright let’s hop to the second thing on my mind this morning…
2. I’m taking my own advice and calling a few of my customers every single week
One of the BEST things you can do to improve your copy (and your offers) is to get on the phone and talk with your buyers.
Like actually pick up a phone and call them.
I haven’t done this for a while…
So over the weekend I decided I’m gonna start doing it again.
I even went out to Best Buy yesterday and bought a $50 phone just to do this.
My plan is to call 3-5 customers each week.
And simply talk with them about what they’re struggling with, and what they want to achieve.
I think this will give me a lot of new insights…
And as a result, my copy, and the offers I put out will be a lot more dialed-in.
If you have your own offers, or you write offers for clients…
I highly suggest you do this…
Cause it will give you insights that you can’t get anywhere else.
Alright let’s hop to the third thing on my mind this morning…
3. Why has the $25,000 fee for hiring top A-list copywriters not changed since the 90’s?
Think about this…
Back in the 90’s, top copywriters like Clayton Makepeace, Gary Bencivenga, David Deutsch and others were charging $25,000 for a sales letter.
That was the defacto fee for an A-list writer.
Well here we are nearly 30 years later, and that’s still the fee most A-listers are charging.
Why is that?
In that same time period, everything else has increased in price…
Houses have gone from an average of $150k to an average of $520k.
A year of college tuition went from $2000 to around $10,000 a year (for an in-state public college)…
So most high priced things are going up…
Yet A-list copywriters are still charging $25k?
Why is that?
I think part of it is simply supply and demand.
Copywriting has expoded in popularity in the last couple years.
So there’s a LOT more top-level copywriters today than there were in the 90’s.
I also think a lot of A-listers just see everyone else setting their fees at $25k so that’s where they set theirs.
The reality is most A-listers are probably undercharging.
I mean if you’re delivering results, you could easily push that to $35k or $50k.
So I don’t really know why it’s not happening.
But if you have any thoughts on the matter, I’d love to hear ’em.
Just reply to this email and let me know…
Alright, time for me to wrap this baby up.
Hope you got a nugget or two from it.
Enjoy your Sunday,
– Justin
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