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Newsletters Without Websites, Part 2 — From Questionable To Worst
[cue 60's Lost In Space announcer voice] 
. . .
‘Last week we left our intrepid hero confronted by a Mental Cyclops bent on selling newsletters without an online presence to support it. Desperate, he tried to lure our hero into his lair, but Professor Robinson (ok, work with me here) was not so easily misled.
Little did he know, his situation was about to turn from bad to worse . . . for the Cyclops had one more scheme in his nefarious brain . . .’
See, my very blog-worthy Mr. Referral didn’t need a copywriter because all he had were a pile of audios with some other guy. What he wanted was some hapless writer to transcribe those audios and turn them into a newsletter.
You need a transcriber for that bub, not someone who specializes in salesmanship-in-print — not a copywriter.
I explained all this to him. He was not happy. Hell, that made two of us.
Not only was I burning daylight talking to someone who didn’t understand nor appreciate what I did (and didn’t want to understand), I also knew I had to talk to the guy who referred him and get him on the same page with what a copywriter does and does not do.
Sheesh.
Never mind that Mr. Referral’s project was doomed from the outset. No list . . . no website . . . no blog — how the hell was he going to make money off his newsletter? Better question — with none of the support structure to SELL and MARKET it — how was he going to tell people he had it for sale?!
I politely passed on the project for a couple of reasons –
#1 I’m booked to the end of ‘08.
#2 (but nearly as important as #1) — he needs a VERY junior copywriter to handle this project. I don’t do transcriptions. Transcriptionists do transcriptions. And I told him it was best to get his audios transcribed by professionals and then get a VERY JUNIOR copywriter to put into a newsletter format. It would cost less money that way. But seriously, I bet he didn’t listen to that, either.
#3 — I do my level best to only tackle projects that have a chance of succeeding. And this one had a zero to worse chance. The guy already thought he knew it all and wasn’t open to another way of accomplishing his objective. That type is always a nightmare to work with and they are never happy with the product.
Now . . . did this cautionary tale make you ask yourself: ‘Gee, how much thought and how much time have I put into my online presence? Have I been doing what Mr. Referral did and thought people would flock to sign up when I’ve given them no venue in which to do that?’
Then good. It was supposed to make you think and reassess.
When you can’t be there to meet your potential customers and walk them through your sales process, the gestalt of your online presence (website, blog, email, forums, etc.) needs to function as your 24/7/365 personal sales team.
Now given that, I can reasonably predict the success of his newsletter endeavor, can’t you? And since he wasn’t interested in hearing anything else, we can can also say, and be reasonably confident in predicting – it doesn’t look good.
As The Robot said, “Danger, Will Robinson! Warning! Warning!” ***
*** Note to The Redhead: And yes, I do want one for Christmas, honey. See, they have plenty. And see that one in the foreground? The one with writing on his chassis? Yep, it even has my name on it.
Technorati tags: worst practices, best practices, newsletter subscriptions, copywriter, marketing strategist, provocateur, ROI Copywriting, Walter Terry
By Walter |
Topics: Client Top Secret, Marketing Mishaps, Pro Analysis |