Sorry for this day-after-Thanksgiving darkness, but a major story on various Internet news sites this morning caught our attention making a powerful hard sell point:

Judith saw a Wal-Mart ad on AOL indicating a Black Friday sale.

The original meaning of the term “Black Friday”came from a market crash in September, 1869, when some financiers failed to corner the gold market. The crash was followed by a depression. So Black Friday came to generally mean a day when a public calamity occurs

More recently, the term Black Friday refers to the day after Thanksgiving during which retailers create discounted sales and make enough sales to put themselves “into the black ink.”

The Wal-Mart ad indicated that the sale would begin at 5 AM and last until 11AM that morning, and that prices would be seriously discounted during that window.

By limiting the buying time, Wal-Mart purposely manufactured urgency and ratcheted up the frenzy by limiting the discounts to only that period creating a manufactured scarcity.

And the result?

Wal-Mart shoppers break down the doors of a store on Long Island, NY, to rush in for their Black Friday discounts, and a worker is trampled to death.

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Yes, it’s that time again, when giant turkeys and homemade pies threaten to keep us at the table far longer than our waistlines can endure. But every year endure they must because we know how to show our gratitude for a well cooked meal. We do, we do!
 
We gobble it up, ask for seconds, and then return for leftovers before we’re finally ready to call it a day.
 
But what about the rest of your life? How well do you gobble up the gifts that are given to you? How well do you show your gratitude then?
 
Because no matter the challenges, there are still so many, many gifts that life bestows upon you. And not just once in awhile, here and there, but over and over again. When we allow it.
 
How Well Do You Receive? (more…)

Any number of times we’ve found ourselves caught up in the “Prince Charming” fantasy of success when listening to one of the many charismatic Personality Marketers who promote from the stage or through teleseminars.
 
And, unconsciously we wanted to believe, and did, that we would receive all that was promised during their “offer.” So we pulled out our credit card and bought “the magic” only to discover months later—when our intelligence and wisdom clicked back in—that we’d bought into a largely limited or over-inflated program that didn’t come close to matching what we wanted or needed.
 
On a few occasions we were able to get our money back. On too many occasions we were . . .

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NOTE: This post is a bit abstract but bear with me, it will make sense.

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Field theory and marketing? Not for hard sell. But Soft Sell marketing—absolutely!!

In a textbook Einstein co-authored he said that the most important concept to appear since Isaac Newton was the concept of the FIELD.

Simply put, a field is the “energetic space” between two objects connecting them. It’s the field between the two entities that is essential for describing them.

When it comes to marketing, it’s the emotional field.

Here’s a graphic to make this concrete:

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We grew up during the 60s and we were hopeful for the betterment of our country and the world. We were not just idealistic then but tender-hearted. We not only wanted a better world, we fully believed it was possible. Maybe that’s just part of being in your mid-20s, maybe not. But that’s who we were.

Then Jack Kennedy was assassinated. Then Robert Kennedy. Then Martin Luther King. And the Vietnam war was in full rage. Riots across the country. Kent State – students shot. The government—Lyndon Johnson (Democrat) and Richard Nixon (Republican)—seemed to be lying without conscience.

For us, first came disillusion—“I can’t believe they’re doing this.” Then confusion—“I don’t know what to do.” Then rage—“Tear it all down.” Then resignation—“What’s the point?” And finally apathy— “Why the hell bother?”

The last was the worst. A whisper announcing the loss of belief—even the possibility of belief.

We were . . .

Without a place—inside or out. Without a sense of belonging. Without any desire to belong.

Hope? Only a set up.
Care? For what?
Consciousness? Emotionally too expensive.
Conscience? What was that again?

Bleak. Only the past was open to remember. The future? Without light.

Until . . .

This morning when we awoke, delighted with Obama’s victory last night.

And, during two conversations—

One with Jae Jans and his wife Andrea Segovia, in their mid-20s, and wise beyond their years . . .

And the other with our friend Tom Justin, our age, a big-hearted conservative . . .

We spoke of something we’d never felt or were aware of before. Our realization emerged in pieces until finally we saw clearly that all those years ago we’d not just become disaffected with politics and politicians—we’d lost our souls, at least that part of our soul that is made up of and needs to participate in the common good.

We both cried—from realizing the loss and from the joy of an awakening.

Yes we supported Obama. We’ve never not been liberals. We were thrilled to hear him talk about hope—the hope in possibility. But we had not realized, not until this morning, how lonely we were for that part of ourselves that Obama’s win allowed us to touch—and believe in again.  

Because It Truly Is All in the Connection,

 Judith & Jim 

PS — Have you been moved by this election? We’d love to hear.
 

Recently we attended a local seminar. The presenter, a young man in his late twenties we’ll call Andrew, was using Power Point to show the buyers of his Internet marketing  program The “buyers” were all male and all white.
 
Judith said, “I’m curious. All the buyers in your power point are males and white males. It’s hard to listen to your presentation when I’m not represented. And neither are lots of other people in this room.”
 
Andrew looked stunned.
 
With other audience members nodding in agreement, Judith went on…   (more…)

 The following is an excerpt from our Soft Topic Copywriting Secrets Home Study Course.

When is the last time you received a piece of sales copy . . . say, an “urgent” letter in the mail . . . or a “don’t miss this” notice through email . . . or a pre-recorded phone pitch . . .

 Only to find out it was completely irrelevant to what you do or care about?

What did you do? You probably didn’t give it a second chance. Tossed it straight into the round file—or CLICKED delete before even looking—or slammed the phone down with an annoyed CLUNK.

Why? Because there was no match between you and the message. No connection. It was coming at you without being about you.

This scene happens across the Internet thousands, perhaps millions of times a day. An email promotion that has nothing to do with you other than you are on someone’s list.

As a marketer, if you’re the one sending out the promotion, this scene is the kiss of death—or, rather, the kiss off of income and profits.

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We’ve been involved in Internet marketing for almost four years and to date no one has ever given us a solid definition of what marketing actually is.

Typically people describe marketing as “making yourself known in the marketplace” or “occupying space in the consumer’s mind.” But neither of these perspectives provides a solid action guide that takes you from the beginning to the end of a marketing campaign and leads to effective promotion and successful sales.

So, in order for you to be clear about the actions you take when designing a marketing campaign and all the details within your campaign, here is an active and productive way to view marketing.

Preparing Your Reader to Buy

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We just  received an email quoting very successful copywriter, Bob Bly. He’s been writing for years and is very well known in Direct Marketing as well as in Internet marketing industries.

A few of his many clients are: AARP, CBS Market Watch, Forbes, Harvard Business School, Kiplinger, McGraw-Hill, Nature, Nightingale-Conant, New York Times Syndicate, Prentice Hall, Scientific American.

Here’s the quote:

 “The teaching of how to make money marketing information on the Internet has gone from an honorable, honest profession to a hype-filled, slime-infested jungle. Each day, the claims get more and more outrageous.

‘I made $1 million in 17 seconds on the Internet!’ one promoter screams.

‘Join my Delta Mega Force Team today and get a Rolls Royce with your first affiliate commission check,’ another shouts even more loudly.

“Does brag-and-boast advertising like this - especially from so-called marketing gurus you never heard of before — make you skeptical?

“To me, these outrageous promotions … sorely lacking in credibility … make me want to toss my cookies!”

That’s what we’ve been saying. Outrageous. Not credible. Hype-filled.

Copywriters who depend on hyperbole aren’t believable because their copy isn’t authentic. It lacks a sincere emotional connection because they’re not sincerely emotionally involved. Their entire focus is on making the sale rather than truly servicing those who might be interested.

When genuine, heartfelt emotion is absent copywriters are compelled to use hype which pushes them over the top because they’re forced to try to generate a feeling response from their readers but they only have their brain-space to work with.

We welcome Bly’s acknowledgment of the problem for which Soft Sell Copywriting and Soft Sell Maketing is a solution.

Because we all need to treat our potential customers with respect and dignity. And it serves our own integrity and the growth of our businesses to use a caring conscience to create compelling  presentations in our writing, whether blog post or sales letter.

It’s the human-to-human, heart-to-heart connection that makes for the best sales. 

Because It’s All in the Connection,

 Judith & Jim

I just came across an article about a new book, “The Way We’ll Be,” written by conservative pollster, John Zogby. He is a political right of center opinion taker and I point that out not for political reasons but to highlight the fact that what he writes about in his book would not automatically be expected from a man of his political leanings.

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