In the previous post I discussed the new special report “The Maven Matrix Manifesto” from Rich Schefren and Jay Abraham.

I’ve now finished going through the report and, as with pretty much everything from Rich and Jay, it’s well worth reading.

As I suggested in the earlier post, in many ways the report is simply an updating and reframing of many of the core concepts of positioning.  However, the core of the report is something I haven’t seen in this form before – an 11 step process for creating a “Maven” or positioning blueprint.

For a copywriter, there are two ways that come to mind to use this.

Firstly, to create a “Maven” blueprint for clients.  Most clients are going to be clueless about this sort of thing.  They may have a vaguely formed idea of their positioning but going through a structured process such as that included in the “Maven Matrix Manifesto” is likely to be a very valuable exercise.

Free tip for copywriters.  Charge your clients for creating the blueprint.  There’s a fair bit of work involved and used properly this will benefit the client for years to come.  It’s very valuable so don’t give it away!

Secondly, create a “Maven” blueprint for yourself.  My friend and mentor Pete Godfrey talks about the need for copywriters to engage in “shameless self-promotion”.  This is a great way to create a distinct identity for yourself and stand out from the crowd.

If you don’t already have it, here’s where to get the “Maven Matrix Manifesto”.

Noticed this item today in the online “Advertising Age”…

“Subway keeps trying to get off its diet of Jared, but it just can’t quit him.

Like him or hate him (love surely isn’t an option), the seemingly ubiquitous sandwich-chain spokesman who lost 245 pounds on a diet of heroes is now notching his 10th year with the chain”

The article goes on to talk about how the character remains enormously popular and, most importantly, continues to pull in sales for the company.

The article also talks about how Jared has outlasted four ad agencies and several attempts to get rid of him.  Every time Jared has been dropped (at the behest of an ad agency wanting to try something new) he’s been brought back to revive sales.

This is a wonderful example of a company and ad agencies getting tired of advertising before the customers do.  It’s mainly the fault of the ad agencies, in my opinion, because rather than focus on what works, they’re more interested in being “creative” and trying something new.

Now, as a writer I have some sympathy for the creatives.  I often find when I’m writing, particularly for a client I’ve written for before, that I feel obliged to try something different.  But you know what?  Most times I end up going back to the tried and true stuff that I know works.

I accept that you need to try new things to see if you can improve.  That’s where testing comes in to maintain the integrity and the scientific basis.  And that’s the great strength of Direct Response Marketing, of course.  You  can measure the results and you know objectively what works and what does not.

At the end of the day, results are what matters.  And that’s why Jared is still fronting for Subway.  Great campaigns can last a very long time.  Think of the “Marlboro Man” ads.  So make sure you don’t end a winning campaign too soon.  The time to change is when the advertising stops producing sales and you find something more effective.

That is, when the customers tell you to change, not the ad agency.

I’ve mentioned previously that I love movies and recently went to see the new movie “There Will Be Blood”.  Now, for copywriters and marketers movies and stories can contain many useful lessons.

Why?  Well because, used properly, stories can be employed in copywriting or your general marketing material to great effect.  Basically, stories enable you to engage the reader and slip “under the radar” and disarm their natural scepticism to some extent.

And good stories are so powerful because we humans seem to be hardwired to respond to them.  Everyone loves a good story, right?

Now, this topic deserves a lot more attention than I’m going to give it in this post.  For the moment I’ll simply suggest that books by Joseph Campbell (for example “The Hero With A Thousand Faces”) or “The Seven Basic Plots” by Christopher Booker are well worth reading.

Back to “There Will Be Blood”.  The movie has been widely applauded by critics and is in line for all sorts of industry awards.  The lead, Daniel Day-Lewis, has been praised (rightly, in my opinion) for his performance.

However, as of the time of writing this post, the box office take in North America has been around $27 million.  In other words, the movie has not been a success at the box office, despite all the “buzz” and good press.

The reason, in my opinion, is that it’s not a good movie or a good story.  Without spoiling the plot for people, the story isn’t terribly interesting.  There’s very little tension.  None of the characters are very appealing.  The movie is dominated by Daniel Day-Lewis as the oilman Daniel Plainview (Day-Lewis is on screen for most of the movie).  But the character is strangely one-dimensional.  We never really get to understand the man.  The other characters are hardly developed at all.

The “story” as such is a pretty transparent anti-business movie with the almost obligatory anti-religion sideswipe.  The ending is, well odd.  And it doesn’t really reach any sort of satisfying conclusion.  It’s left up in the air.

(Note to copywriters.  People hate unfinished stories.  If you start a story in your copy or “tease” people, make sure you don’t leave them hanging.  “Blind Bullets” are different, because the way to answer that nagging question, of course, is to buy the product.)

It’s typical in many ways of the direction taken in the last 30-40 years by the “artistic” end of the movie business.  It used to be the case that movies and stories usually had a “Happy Ending”.  Well, starting sometime in the twentieth century “Happy Endings” became less fashionable and a darker tone, more nihilistic really, came into vogue.  “Film Noir”, “Anti-Heroes”, the whole counter-culture thing. 

The problem is that there is a very good reason why classical stories have “Happy Endings”.  People like that and while the purpose of stories is to pass on certain lessons about life, one of the other purposes is to provide people hope.

So, movies like “There Will Be Blood” are just a big downer.  As a result, few people will want to see it again and few will recommend it to others.  Have to say, I’m glad I saw it and it certainly held my attention.  It’s a long movie (almost 3 hours) and it was only about 30 minutes from the end that I felt like it was dragging a little.  However,  it was more like the macabre fascination of watching something horrible unfold, rather than being engrossed in the story!

As a copywriter, I’m always keeping an eye out for examples of both good and bad advertising.  I particularly look at headlines.

Came across this example recently.  It was a short classified style ad on Facebook.

The headline was “Low Testosterone?”.  The body copy went on “New supplement increases sex drive, boosts energy levels and improves mood.  Now available in Australia.”  There was then a link to click for more details.

Now, the body copy is OK for this style of ad but the headline is a good example of what Clayton Makepeace terms the “fake benefit”.  What he means is benefits that writers and marketers think are benefits of their product but that the consumer doesn’t really care about.

For example, a supplement might balance blood sugar levels.  However, does anyone wake up in the middle of the night and say to themselves “Oh no!  My blood sugar level is out of balance!  I must do something!”

Er, no.  They might be highly concerned about the effects of blood sugar levels (low energy, too much energy or whatever) but blood sugar levels being unbalanced isn’t what they’re concerned about.

Similarly in this case.  Do guys wake up in the night and say “On no!  My testosterone is too low!”  Not really.  They might well be concerned about low sex drive and low energy, however.

To be fair to the advertiser, some men will know that low testosterone is a problem that results in low sex drive and energy.  These people presumably already know they need something to boost testosterone and the ad might be aimed at getting these people to switch supplements.

However, I’m guessing this isn’t the case.  And the headline as it stands is narrowing the potential audience that will be reached.

So, always think through whether your advertising is hitting the “pain points” that your audience really is concerned about.

A few posts back in  “Stop Press! Australian Copywriting Genius Attacked By Crazed Online Marketing Guru…”  I talked about attention grabbing headlines.

I also mentioned that there was another “hidden” copywriting and marketing lesson in that post.  What I was referring to is what’s called the “Zeigarnik Effect”.  This is, put simply, the need for people to complete unfinished thoughts.  Or, more simply, to know what happens next.

There is something deeply ingrained in the human psyche that drives us to want to know how something works out or what happens next.  You can see this effect in action most clearly in soap operas.  The attention of the audience is captured and retained by the desire to know “what happens next”?  (“Who shot JR?” for readers old enough to remember “Dallas”!)

In copywriting, it can be a very powerful device when used properly.  If you capture your reader’s attention at the beginning of the letter with a story and then break the story before the conclusion, there is a very powerful drive for the reader to keep reading to find out what happens.

As an example think about the classic “Wall Street Journal” sales letter that begins with the story of ”Two young men”.   What was the difference?  You have to read to the end of the letter to find out.  (Note:  For readers not familiar with the letter and to avoid the psychic torture of not knowing what happens (!) the answer is that the successful guy had specialised knowledge that he got from the Wall Street Journal, of course!)

This technique is also known in NLP as a “loop” and you can use multiple loops together.  That’s a topic for a different post.

One thing to keep in mind is that if you start a story or open a “loop” you must finish it or you’ll drive your readers nuts.  I don’t have hard data to back this up but my guess is that unfinished stories or loops will adversely affect the response to your sales letter.

And this post is a lesson in itself.  I left it too long to finish the story.  Well, I concluded it now so we can move on.  And in the next installment…

(…tune in to the next exciting episode to discover more sales boosting secrets!)