Learning Direct Response Marketing (Strategies/Book Summaries/Case Studies)

[Black_Dragon43]

I found it very chaotic and not really adding much. The guy probably is a better writer than a public speaker.

It is a bit all over the place, but solid ideas. Drayton Bird is Europe's Gary Halbert... he built the biggest DR agency at the time and got acquired by Ogilvy & Mather.

 

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[MetalGear]

Hi @MTF I have been struggling to learn direct sales and marketing myself.

Check out below, Positioning by Ries and Trout was eye opening.

Top Marketing Books:

1. Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind by Al Ries and Jack Trout
2. StoryBrand by Donald Miller
3. Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy
4. The Psychology influence of Persuasion by Robert B. Cialdini
5. The Icarus Deception by Seth Godin

Honorable Mentions:

1. Made to Stick By Chip Heath & Dan Heath
2. Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal

 

[MTF]

I’m following as I love direct response and your write ups are always amazing. Hmm… maybe you could consider selling summaries of books?

Book summaries are a commodity

Now then… your title. Could you come up with something better than “How To Learn Direct Response Marketing - Progress Thread”?

Why? I think it's simple and explains what the thread is about. Unless I'm missing an error in it. If you think I should rename it, I'll come up with a different title.

 

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[MTF]

On second thought, can this be a cultural difference, too?

I can't help but feel that the common pushy and salesy approach is American style of selling. It's relatively rare in Europe. I absolutely hate it when a sales clerk follows me and keeps trying to sell me stuff even when I repeatedly say I'm fine and just want to check what they have without anyone bothering me.

Another thought - can this be a personality thing, too? I'm automatically on guard when someone is too loud, too friendly, and too extrovert. This is also pretty common on Instagram these days and feels incredibly cheesy and cheap.

 

[MTF]

I don't think so. You can do it if you feel it's necessary, but if they make you miserable it's only going to make you less effective in the long run. Also, they don't work well on anyone. They might work well on a larger proportion of your audience, but it can also mean the smaller proportion that it doesn't work on has their needs unfulfilled and you could be losing out. It's hard to say and it depends on the product, market, and salesman.

There are different salesperson archetypes and ways of doing things. And, while a master salesman might be able to emulate multiple of them to better mold themselves to the person they're talking to, you don't need to do that to be successful. Focusing on the type you have most affinity with is perfectly fine.

@Andy Black for example, is most definitely a relationship-builder. You seem to fit that archetype as well, judging from your attitude on educating.

@Black_Dragon43 is the challenger type, most likely, which you could equate with being "pushy".

You've also got the problem-solver type, the hustler, and whatever else. There are many ways of looking at it, but there are clearly stark differences in approach, and usually, it's hard for the intuitive types to relate with the more cerebral ones. Same with the prospects.

Some people need time and space to process. Others will never act unless they are put under enough pressure to commit. Some need hand-holding and tutorials. Others need concepts and reasoning.

I think the key here is to realize that you will only ever resonate with about 15% of your niche. That's your audience. Unless you're a sales god, in which case you can maybe reach 50% and speak to millions.

"An above average market penetration rate for consumer goods is estimated to be between 2% and 6%. A good penetration rate for business products is between 10% and 40%."

Those numbers are most likely the same for salesmen. 2-6% B2C, 10-40% B2B.

So those really skilled pushy aggressive salesmen who go balls to the walls with their selling and convert like crazy... still only convert 20-30% of people, fail to close 20-30% and completely alienate 40-60% of people. Same for the non-pushy roundabout approach.

I think it's important to be aware of, and understand all the different types so you can mix and match things based on the situation. But focus on the stuff that works for you.

Interesting. I wouldn't guess that even the best copy can capture so little of the audience. Obviously, financially it doesn't matter if it's a big niche. Just interesting that we're working with minority of the target audience.

This also makes it sensible to pick the part of the audience you want to appeal to and write copy in a way that will appeal to them.

I assume that people in more "questionable" niches need to be more pushy but there's no such need if you're in a category of one.

 

[MTF]

Without positioning, the right product/market fit, and finding the niche and segment you can communicate well with, it's probably going to be very difficult.

Yeah I think that offer creation is more important than copy. I'm sure I bought a lot of things with terrible copy but that offered something relevant to me and valuable.

In the end, even the best copy won't sell what has no value. Still surprising that so many of their projects fail. But as Gary Halbert said, you're only one sales letter away from striking it rich.

It's also what Alex Hormozi believes (that offer trumps everything else).

Omg. You're the first person I've seen use the correct version of the word in years. Years!

Lol I was sure I wrote "tidbits" but I responded after a series of breath holds so maybe my brain wasn't working correctly lol. I follow American English spelling. Titbits would be in every other dialect so there's no "correct" spelling.

Edit:
Just realized my phone was set to Australian English and it changed tidbits automatically to titbits. To me, the latter looks weird (like many words with non-American spelling).

 

[MTF]

[Maybe it wasn't obvious, but I was just jokingly shilling for my preferred use of the word. Language evolves and there is no "correct" form of anything, unless you're French/Romanian/Whatever nation and believe in the authority of whatever language institute at the National Academy and think some bureaucrat can dictate language. I'm heavily anti-authoritarian and believe language to be a beautiful form of emergent capitalistic expression, so policing words is but ironic humor.]

Haha okay got it.

My point is not that you should believe you're an expert and sit on your a$$, but that you should position yourself outward to evoke the inbound interest by expressing the things you've mentioned. In other words, you should reach out to people indirectly to attract them, then use direct response to convert them after they've already qualified themselves.

So how do you reach out indirectly? Do you mean content marketing or just hanging out on social media and helping people for free?

That's the power of inbound marketing. You do by not doing. You sell by not selling. This is Dao.

Damn I wish I was smart enough to understand Daoism haha. I once listened to a podcast about it and still didn't get it lol.

 

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[Andy Black]

Thanks, that's a good example and definitely makes it less cold.

Which one? Me messaging people in the forum, or that Facebook post?

As for that thread... I deliberately titled it to only appeal to people who want to know *my* thoughts about inbound marketing and sales. I'm only bring this up because it's literally my philosophy on inbound marketing and generating leads. If I'm to run Google Ads campaigns for a local plumber then they don't want as many visitors to their site as possible, and the definitely don't want loads of phone calls and enquiries. They just want to speak to the most motivated people. I only want to get into conversation with people actually interested in reading the content.