A kung fu tip for beating the hell out of controls written by better copywriters
Published: Thu, 04/29/21
“Don’t attack strengths, attack weaknesses.”
Seems so obvious.
Certainly it is in the kung fu realms.
But you can see this wisdom being violated constantly in both business & in fighting. Whether it’s a smaller guy foolishly trying to brawl with a bigger & stronger guy or a less experienced copywriter trying to “out-benefits” a seasoned pro. It’s why old school pros like the late, great Jim Rutz would — as soon as getting a copywriting assignment — immediately demand to see the past 16+ controls for a product. Invariably he’d see where one of those brilliant control ads buried the lead as a throw-away bullet or claim, and he’d take that powerful idea, put it up front & center, and spank the current control.
In other words:
He used those other copywriters’ weaknesses at not seeing the gold in their own research to beat them at their own game.
Another example:
“Email Players” subscriber & the man universally considered to be the world’s greatest living copywriter Gary Bencivenga who focused not on bigger and more dramatic claims to beat the best-of-the-best copywriters, but looked for bigger and more dramatic proof elements — turning his opponents’ own writing skills & flair for great, benefit-driven copy into a weakness he could use against them.
Even in my own freelancing career I’d focus on attacking weaknesses vs strengths.
I had no choice if I wanted to win a control.
In fact, I remember when “Email Players” subscriber Captain Chris Pizzo hired me to beat his flagship product’s control. He had 3 different versions and brought me in to try to beat them.
I looked at those ads which were all really good.
Far better “written” than anything I could do at that time.
And I didn’t have nearly his flair for writing benefit-driven copy.
But what I could win on was wrenching on the market’s insecurities (dug up by his hiring the Nielsen company to analyze his 10,000 best customers), and hurling as much Bencivenga-style proof lightning bolts at it as possible.
Thus, I didn’t try to attack his ads’ strengths.
I attacked their weaknesses.
(Lack of proof & lack of wrenching on insecurities.)
The result?
My version won handily against all that better written & more benefit-laden copy.
And, of course, he couldn’t have been more thrilled.
(That was why he hired me, after all.)
Point here is this:
It’s all about attacking weaknesses, not strengths.
And while most hardly ever think to apply this to client-acquisition or competing in business as a whole… doing so can ramp up your nasty little goals 10, 100, even 1000 fold if you know how.
Which brings me to the May “Email Players” issue.
The entire issue — from start to finish — is about this exact topic.
Simply read it, pick one or two or three ways you like (there are many), then apply them to getting clients (or selling any kind of offer when applicable, like I do), and enjoy the surge of new business during a time when everyone is hiding in under their beds from the flu like it's the end of the world.
The deadline is tomorrow when I send it to the printer.
After that I turn “Email Players” off in the cart, so nobody can buy from a while.
And that’ll be that.
Here’s the link:
https://www.EmailPlayers.com
Ben Settle