INTRODUCTION

When it comes to marketing, there’s one important element many business owners are missing. This single element is the key to more sales, more profits — and more of the success all entrepreneurs pursue.

This alchemical business ingredient: copywriting.

WHAT IS COPYWRITING?

It was a harsh winter in New York City. The year was 1904.

The wind howled outside, and rattled the windows of the tiny bar on the street-level floor of one of Manhattan’s iconic skyscrapers.

A young man in a rumpled suit sat by himself, at a corner table, smoking a cigarette and drinking from a mug of cold coffee. John E. Kennedy was a neatly-dressed man, and his eyes were alert. He did not drink alcohol. He was in the bar for a different purpose. He kept glancing at the door, as if he were waiting for someone. He was.

Over a half hour earlier, Kennedy, an unknown copywriter, had scribbled a note and sent it upstairs, into the corporate offices of the glittering tower above. He had sent the note to Albert Lasker, one of the most powerful men in the advertising world at that time.

The note said, “I can tell you what advertising is. I know that you don’t know.”

It was brash. A bold move. And a total bluff.

Kennedy was betting the note might intrigue Lasker. Kennedy thought he had come up with a unique angle on how to define advertising, an angle he had never heard from anyone before. He smiled and tapped his cigarette on the ashtray next to his coffee mug. The note really amounted to the most daring bit of copy he had ever written. It was short. It was simple. It was copy about copywriting.

The front door of the bar swung open, and Kennedy looked up. When he saw the young man, the messenger he had paid to carry the note to Lasker’s office, Kennedy smiled. It had worked. He flicked his cigarette into the coffee that had grown cold as he waited, shrugged on his coat, and put on his hat.

He was about to meet with the world’s most influential ad man, Albert Lasker.

That meeting would change advertising forever.

Kennedy had no idea that Lasker had been searching for a satisfactory answer to this very question for seven years. Lasker’s curiosity was sparked by the mysterious note from a total stranger, so he met with Kennedy.

In that historic meeting, Kennedy gave him a three-word definition of advertising: “Salesmanship in print.”

It seems obvious now. Not so much in 1904.

It was a keen insight from the brilliant young John E. Kennedy. This meeting changed Kennedy’s future—within four years, he was making well over six figures as Lasker’s chief copywriter, at a time when that salary placed him squarely in the top 1% of all income-earners in the world.

Along with Kennedy’s future, the nature of advertising was also forever changed. Even today, in the internet age, our marketing and selling processes are still informed by Kennedy’s insight.

Advertising, and by extension copywriting (which is the writing of ads) is simply salesmanship in print.

In our case today, “print” can be extended to include not just paper and ink, but also web pages, videos, podcasts, social media updates, and more.

It is my proposal to you that copywriting is, in fact, the most pivotal and essential business skill you can learn.

THE WORLD’S MOST VALUABLE SKILL

There is virtually no other skill that can make you as much money as copywriting. Nearly all internet millionaires know this secret: more than their product, more than their traffic-generation techniques, more than their email campaigns, more than who their joint-venture partners might be, it’s their copywriting that has made them rich.

The wealth secret of nearly all businesses, and especially internet- based businesses, is the secret of great copywriting. This book will teach you how to use that secret for yourself.

I have seen the power and the effectiveness of this skill first-hand. For over thirty years, I’ve written sales and marketing copy for hundreds of clients, including banks, real estate brokers, hair-transplant surgeons, auto dealers, insurance agents, radio stations, hot tub dealers, pet stores, furniture stores, TV stations, and high-tech firms.

I’ve had the privilege of writing copy and conducting marketing campaigns for Fortune 500 companies, for the largest broadcast companies in the world, and for the top names in leadership and business.

All my knowledge of the fundamentals of copywriting can be found in this book. Every piece of the puzzle I have used to make a high six- figure personal income is right here. At the end of this book, you will know all my best copywriting secrets.

Each chapter will cover a different aspect of copywriting, and how to use those skills for your online (or offline) business. The wealth of knowledge that you are holding in your hands could easily cost you tens-of-thousands of dollars if you tried to obtain it on your own. It represents an investment on my part of an estimated $250,000. That’s what I have personally spent on my own education in this area. That, and decades of my life.

One of the main reasons I wrote this book is to save you that time, trouble, and expense. In other words, to save you the thirty years and the $250,000.

This book will give you the power to increase topline sales of any business, while simultaneously decreasing advertising cost. The result is increased bottom-line profits.

If you truly want to start your own business or create a second income stream, one of the first things I would recommend you learn is the basic skill of powerful copywriting.

Now, this is not some get rich quick scheme. This is a serious business skill that can provide you with a comfortable six-figure annual income for the rest of your life.

You can run your business from anywhere. You can dream up promotions and campaigns, write the copy, and put the plan into profit all in the same day.

And yes, you could retire from your present job and use your copywriting skills to build your own marketing empire, working wherever and whenever you want.

Or you can keep struggling along like most internet marketers and small business owners. That road leads to nowhere.

You don’t need to learn the new “shiny object of the week system.”

You don’t need the latest greatest website.

You just need a skill that is valued and that has the power to give you leverage.

The skill I recommend starting with is the ability to write persuasive copy.