Inside the Copywriting Brain That Powers My Funnels | #Marketing - Ep. 24
45:52 Share

Greenlight.com slash Spotify.

This episode is brought to you by Amazon Business. How can you free up your team from time-consuming office tasks? Amazon Business empowers leaders to not only streamline purchasing, but better support their teams so they can focus on strategy and growth, free up your teams, and focus on your future. Learn more about the technology, insights, and support available at amazonbusiness.com.

Do you have a funnel but it's not converting? The problem 99.9% of the time is that your funnel is good but you suck at selling. If you want to learn how to sell so your funnels will actually convert, then get a ticket to my next Selling Online event by going to sellingonline.com slash podcast. That's sellingonline.com slash podcast. This is the Russell Brunson Show.

What's up, everybody? This is Russell. Welcome back to the show. I've got a special episode today. I drug one of my favorite people in the room to come talk with me, and he's a little nervous. It's his first time on the podcast, but I'm excited because he's here in town. Heath is our head copywriter for now five years, right? Yeah, it's been five years.

So the way I found Heath originally, and no one could hire him, so don't Google his name. I'm not going to tell you his last name. Just kidding. No, the way I found him initially is Kelly Felix. I hired him for something, and he was showing me how he had scaled his credit repair thing to like $100 million a year or something. And I was going through all the trainings, and he's like, oh, one of the things we use a lot are advertorials.

And I had never – I'd heard of one but I'd never done one before. I was like, do you know anyone you recommend? And he's like, oh, there's this writer named Heath. He's like the best in the world at avatarials. You should hire him. And so that's how we first got introduced. And I don't know if you remember this or not, but he made me a video. It was like an hour-long video explaining why I should never use an avatarial for my business. I was like, he just told me to not use his services. This guy is great. And then we've been working together ever since then. Yeah.

Yeah. I always say like you hired me by me saying no. Like the power of no is actually pretty – it can be pretty powerful. No, I was. I was overworked at the time. I was stuck in an American Inn hotel because our RV was getting worked on. Oh, yeah. You were living in an RV at the time. We were living in an RV at the time and we got in contact and I was. I was overworked. I was doing four different projects. I was a partner on this gummy brand that ended up falling apart.

And then you – yeah, I got content and then I was looking at it and I was like, but it's already converting. Why do you need an editorial? So I did. I did this whole big long – it was like a 40-minute plus video and I just talked you out of not hiring me. I was like, I must have you now. And then that was the key that gets you to – and then I couldn't keep you off of me. You kept hitting me up for things and so, yeah. Anyway, he's an amazing copywriter. So he's in the office this week. We're writing copy. We're actually doing an article.

on Friday, me, him, and Sean Vossler are doing an event where we're going to be going through Napoleon Hill's truthful advertising and geeking out for advertising for a full day. Um, but he's in office today writing copy with us. And so I thought we'll record a podcast episode and I don't talk a lot about copy and copywriting and things like that. And so I asked him if he'd come in and,

Reluctantly, he said yes. So do you want to tell me about some of your background, how you became – how you got into the writing world? Yeah. I mean I've been a writer for a long, long time. I knew I wanted to be involved in film and my background has always been in comedy and I love film, comedy, comedians and writers. And so I always –

I looked up to certain people that I've always admired. One of my heroes has always been Steve Martin and Mel Brooks. And so I always – I looked at their trajectory and what do they do. Same with Conan O'Brien. And I saw a lot of them. They'd go off to college. They would go into the literary field, the writing field. And I was like, okay, well, I'm going to go in that field, that area. So I just –

Just was pushing myself that way. So when I went into college, I didn't have great grades in high school, but then I really busted my butt in college to get perfect grades. I wanted to get perfect grades because I knew I wanted to be a writer in some capacity. I knew I wanted to create stories. So I went and I have a bachelor's in English and creative writing. And then I went back and did my master's.

in fiction. And I just told myself, I'm going to get a career in writing somehow. I'm going to, I don't know what that's going to look like. I needed to make a living in writing. I didn't want to be a financial advisor. What my dad was, he was always trying to push me to be a financial advisor. The one thing I do appreciate with my dad is he always told me to be my own boss. So he was, I was raised, he was, he's been an entrepreneur my whole life.

And he always told me, you know, be your own boss. And I always thought being your own boss meant to be a financial advisor. I was like, no, this is the worst. I couldn't do it. I couldn't do numbers. I couldn't deal with finance. I just, it was so confusing to me. So that's, I got into, I was just at the time after it was after my bachelor's is when I was like, okay, I'm going to get a job in writing. I didn't know what that would look like. Did you know about copywriting at that time? I didn't know about copywriting at that time. I, no, no, I didn't.

It was, yeah, 2012. And I was just like, I just be able to use words to make a living. Cause at the time my whole goal was I have a family to support, uh, my wife and daughter. And so I was looking around and that's when I stumbled. This was when I was in Arizona where I'm from and I found a e-comm company. There's a lot of e-comm out in Scottsdale, Arizona. So it was an e-comm company and

Yeah.

And so they hired me and that's when I, that was my first intro into copywriting and I got thrown into the fire of, I mean, I was writing, every day was kind of different. I'd be writing baby formula supplements to bodybuilding supplements the next day.

I was easily the unhealthiest one in the office. I was not taking care of my body, and I was click-clacking away, telling other people about how their metabolism works. Put it in frame, because how tall are you? I'm 5'7". So 5'7", and right now you're like what? I'm 167. 167. How much did you weigh at the time that you were writing the weight loss ads? Boy, I ballooned up to 260, so I was a meatball boy. I was a hefty boy. Okay.

Did writing the copy for those things, was that part of what transformed you, getting shredded and losing weight, all that kind of stuff? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You were halfway through the research like, oh my gosh, this makes sense. You know what's so funny? The reason why I wanted to lose a lot of weight or lose weight is because I was getting tired while reading.

I was just getting so fed up. I was trying to get through because once I got into grad school, I was really busy. We were reading like a novel a week and I had to do a lot of reading and quickly and understand it and analyze. And I was getting really sleepy. And that was my motivating factor was to so I can read more. How nerdy is that? So I just wanted to get shredded for books. Yeah.

and that's, yeah. So that's really why I did. Yeah. I, I, and then now I'm, yeah, healthiest I've ever been. So that's awesome. Um, very cool. So I want to talk, I mean, obviously we could go for days talking about copywriting. Um,

and different things. But I want to bring some unique stuff because I don't think a lot of our audience knows about some of the things I want to ask you about. So in my world, everyone knows about funnels. They know about landing pages, upsells, downsells. That's what we spend so much time on. Maybe we'll come back to that. But what I originally tried to hire you for was a different type of creative and something that –

that I think was really big back in the day. Like you'd see magazines and they'd have these advertorials, right? They would push somebody to go buy something online or to call a phone number or whatever. But then people started using them almost like pre-funnel. Like before the funnel starts, there's this page, this advertorial page. Will you explain kind of what

What an advertorial is, like how you kind of got into them. I want people to understand what that is so they can see how this might potentially fit into their business model. And then we can talk about specifics on advertorials after that. Yeah, advertorials. And they've been used for – when I got into it and then once I did my research and got more into it, I didn't realize. They've been –

used for a very, very long time. And it's a sneaky way of... The reason why it's called advertorial is because it's an ad, but an editorial. So it's made to look like an editorial piece, like you would read in the newspaper. It just looks... It blends in with the newspaper. It looks as though it's just another article written. And the way it...

also is very much like an article and then it pushes you into a call to action to buy a book, to put information to get a free...

There are old ones where you can get free cassettes. Test out these cassettes. Check out these records. Free recipe book. You can still see them. I mean there's so many of them today even if you go to the checkout line at the grocery store, you pick up a Women's World magazine and that is filled with abattoirs in there. They'll tell a big –

an amazing story of a transformation of someone losing weight. And then it would go into a call to action to get this recipe book of what they've used. So I got into it.

Yeah, let's see. It was through – his name is James Van Ellswick. He became an early mentor for me in the native space. So James did a lot of – and continues to do a lot of work in the native space through Taboola, Outbrain. Native advertising. Native advertising, yeah. So when you go to any of the news sites and you see the ads at the bottom and you click on it, and oftentimes it will take you to an article –

It's an ad, but it's made to look like an article as if you're still on that site or you're still involved in that world. And it's read as if like an editorial piece, but it's an advertorial. So it's like a pre-sale. It's a pre-sale to sales page. So it's a way for people to get information. It's used for cold audiences, really, really cold audiences. And it's a way to first understand the problem and then get them interested and then get them over to the sales page.

Like you said, it's interesting because most – the sites I see those ads on typically, they are like the news sites and you scroll down and they look like they're almost like just articles on the news site. But there's usually things like Taboola right above it or something. And usually they're crazy pictures. Always like a crazy picture of like some person like peeling their skin like eight inches away from their face or some weird like –

banana that's green or like purple or like weird things that catch your attention and you're like what is this thing and you click on it takes you to what looks like an article on that site and then at the end of the article usually and it's not the structure in a way where it's kind of salesy but not feels more like an article but then it pushes you to the part where where someone's going to buy right yeah so that's kind of the visual for you guys trying to imagine what it looks like it's it's something that's happening it's between the the new site and

and then from there we go to your funnel. - Yep, and there's all sorts of different types of advertorials too, and also a level of aggressiveness of like how aggressive

the abattoir might be depending on what site you're on. So like you talk about those thumbnails, those different images, they can be really, you know, really kind of a strange fruit that they're holding. And it talks about like some sort of weight loss supplement and it'll, it'll mention like, you know, unbelievable fruit burns three pounds overnight. And so you click on it. Oftentimes you'll go to what's called a jump page. That's also an abattoir. A jump page is just a very short one and it,

It's a page between the website you were just on and a VSL, a video sales letter, which is a long form video that sells you, of course, the product. So that jump page is used for compliance reasons, but also as kind of like a tease. It gets you to want to click over to that video, to watch the video. And that jump page will be maybe two, three paragraphs. It's very short. And then I'll just have a button that says watch now.

So that's another type. And then you'll have other types that are more longer. It all varies of how they look depending on e-com or an info product, finance. It all depends on the industry. Interesting. Now, I saw – this is way back in the day, so it's been a while –

um but it was actually pre-click phones we were we were building on our our uh nerve cell nerve pain offer back then we're looking at all the avatorials that's where a lot of that traffic was coming from and um i saw a lot of companies like the acai berry and weight loss companies who in the avatar they'd have two products where they're like hey step one you need to get the acai berries instead of two you got to get the whatever whatever wrap or it was pushing the two different funnels i remember talking with media buyers and saying that like for every one cell you get on number one you get like

like half a cell number two or something. So increase their cart value by having, did you see many of those or do people kind of shit? I haven't seen them for a long time. So it's one of the things that stopped working. Yeah. I'm not sure about that. I can't even recall. I'd have to like look at that, but I don't remember that. Yeah. Like step one, go buy the.com secrets books. You understand a funnel step or two, get your free click funnels account, you know, like, and it would be on one page. Yeah. It was in the article. Yeah. It was in the page. Basically. Like here's the step-by-step process. Oh,

It was like this is a system. So you need like the acai berries are the supplement and this was like a wrap. And it was almost like her face cream. Like this face cream is the step one. This was step two.

Anyway, so I just – Interesting. We'll still use steps. I still use steps in an abattoir. Because I've taught a lot of people how to do abattoirs. And so at the end of the abattoir, a lot of times they're like, what to do now? And I still do it. I'll say step one, go here. And then step two, a lot of the times I'll just some sort of urgency. Step two, make sure to order more.

make sure to order at least three because this is selling out fast and everything. Or we'll also do the reverse kind of like urgency where it's like limit five per household. So it's almost kind of like it's already selling out so fast we can only limit. And so a lot of times I'll still do the step one, step two, and then step three

And on the step three, click here now. But it's kind of like in a nice sneaky way of each one is a CTA to the same thing. Just keeps reinforcing the core call to action. Interesting. Do you ever get one of those ads that makes you go, why am I even seeing this?

Not long ago, I kept getting served ads for these super fancy chef-grade pots and pans, like premium artisan cookware. And I'm sitting here thinking, you guys, I barely even know how to boil water properly. I'm more of a protein bar and a podcast guy. Now, I'm not knocking the product. It just wasn't meant for me. And the real problem is that the company probably paid good money to show me that ad. And that's why I always tell marketers that relevance is everything. And that's where LinkedIn ads comes in.

This isn't your average ad platform. It's a network of over a billion professionals and targeting options are insane. You can target the exact buyers by job title, industry, company size, role, seniority, even skills and company revenue. That means your message gets in front of the right people, not someone who thinks that instant ramen is gourmet dining.

Now, if you're serious about B2B marketing and not just throwing spaghetti at the wall, hoping it'll stick, then you've got to be on LinkedIn. And here's the best part. LinkedIn will give you $100 credit on your next campaign, so you can see it in action. Just go to linkedin.com slash clicks. That's linkedin.com slash C-L-I-C-K-S. Terms and conditions apply. Only on LinkedIn ads.

If you've been following me for any amount of time, you know, I always talk about as you're growing and scaling your company, the most important thing is finding the who, not the how. Who is the person that can help you drive more traffic? Who is the person that could be your CEO? Who is the person that could build your funnels? Understanding the who will dramatically speed up the growing and the scaling of your company.

Now, the best place to find the who's who can help you with your vision is Indeed. When it comes to hiring the right who's, Indeed is all you need. Indeed gives you the ability to stop struggling to get your job posts seen on other sites because Indeed's got a sponsored job listing where you can stand out in front of your dream hires.

With these sponsored jobs, your post jumps to the top of the page for your relevant candidates. That means your funnel builder is going to see it. That means the person driving traffic to your funnels is going to see it. It means your new CEO or CMO or whatever you're looking for is going to see the exact ad for your business as soon as they open up Indeed. And that makes a huge difference. In fact, according to Indeed, data sponsored jobs posted directly on Indeed have 45% more applications than non-sponsored jobs.

One of the things I love about Indeed is it makes hiring so fast. You can post the job and within minutes, you're getting applications who are coming in looking to become the who inside of your business. Prior to that, I was often posting my help wanted ads on Facebook and Instagram and getting tons and tons of responses from unqualified people who had no idea what they were doing. Whereas Indeed, again, they're only being seen by the exact person I'm looking to hire. Now with Indeed sponsored jobs, there's no monthly subscriptions. There's no long-term contracts. You only pay for results.

They may be wondering how fast is Indeed? Well, in the minute I've been talking to you so far, 23 hires were made on Indeed across the Indeed network. So there's no longer need to wait any longer. You can speed up your hiring right now by going to Indeed. And listeners of the show get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your job more visible by going to Indeed.com slash clicks. Just go to Indeed.com slash C-L-I-C-K-S right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast.

Indeed.com slash clicks. Terms and conditions apply. Are you hiring? Indeed is all you need. So, okay, what are other elements that typically you would have in an advertorial? It's not like a sales letter. It's like headlines, story. It's different, right? The structure? It is. There's so many different types. I always – when I was doing them pretty hardcore and pretty consistently every week, I would start doing –

we would always test above the fold so i'd always give three the main body would always be the same so what i would always do is uh i would do three headlines and three top images and then three leads

And out of those three, we can get a good winner. And then the main body of the abattoir would be the same because it's always above the fold you want to test the most because that's where people are landing. That's where people are bouncing. So we want to see – and then we would do variations. So we'd always – yeah, always three different headlines, three different images, and then three different leads to go in. So a lead might be – I'd always do a story lead, something that –

that evokes that emotion, whatever that emotion may be, depending on the product. So if it's a survival product, there's a different emotion there for a survival product compared to a weight loss supplement, different kind of emotion. And then also the point of view of who's it coming from. And then for instance, for a gadget,

for a gadget avatorial a lot of times uh people love the underdogs so it's like this this small this uh you know startup company is disrupting the billion dollar watch industry people love that those those kind of leads always did really really well so that would be a different lead that i would use in there and then uh and then taking a look at the headlines i'd obviously do a lot of funnel hacking so i have a massive avatarial swipe folder that i keep um

and i keep adding to it so i'll save and i'll show different examples from

from all the different industries of what they're doing for their headlines. So I always jump in there, take a look. And not only that, but I'll also go to, I look at old advertorials as well. So my little thing, I've always mentioned this, is if you look at old magazines, I'll go to antique shops and find old magazines. You can find old Playboys. I did that. I have a whole stack of really, really old Playboys of like 70s and 80s. For the articles. For the articles. For the ads. It really is for the ads. What's so funny?

And I – no one believes me, but I'm trying to say it like it really is to be honest because they're pretty astounding. They're amazing. The artwork and everything is so cool. They're really fun to look at. And so you can look at what they did and you can see what still stands the test of time of what still works today when it comes to a headline and a lead and so on. Yeah.

He was nerdy. Last night I bought 15 ads on eBay from LaSalle University. Because LaSalle Extension University is where Napoleon Hill used to work for. Anyway, but I started finding their ads and their long form ads promoting them. Because you could do an extension school to become a lawyer or become a

uh, business operator, all these different ones, but I'll just show them to you. But like 15, each one's about 10 bucks, but it's the long form advertorial, all selling LaSalle university, but different hooks they had. And they were beautiful. All of them had like rock solid headlines, really cool imagery, cool call to action. Like they were just anyway. So this is what he and I do in our nerd time is we just buy old magazines and ads just to look at them. I think what's funny is I, when I talked to my other copywriting friends and other people in the marketing, uh,

People don't also – I'm like, you know Russell is probably one of the nerdiest when it comes to copywriting. People don't – they think he was a funnel guy, but I'm like, I've seen Russell's collection. I got more swipeouts than anybody. He has like some rare stuff that I'm like, holy smokes. You have just –

I couldn't believe some of the things that I've poked around back here, what your collection. And so people forget like you have your own copywriting chops too. You just don't want to do it all the time. That's why you have me. It's like you're excellent in your own right. Well, it's funny because like when I got in this business, I was learning all the pieces and copywriting was the one I was like, I don't want to do that. Like that was the worst. There's also the most expensive. I remember like the first time I tried to hire a copywriter.

It was Michael Fortin and he wanted 15 grand. I was like, what? I'm like, and that freaked me out. And then the first time I hired someone was Johan Mach. I paid him eight grand and we never launched the product, but it was like 8,000. It was like all money I had. And then finally I was like, I can't afford copyrights. I have to learn this. I like, I forced me to learn the skillset.

But it's funny because for me it's like copywriting isn't just the words on the page. Copywriting is everything. Eventually when you get better and better at copywriting, like the perfect webinar is just me copywriting. Like it's literally, it's a sales structure in place that I do off the top of my head. But I know the structure so well. You know, emails are copywriting. Like Facebook Live, like podcasts. Like every time you're speaking, like as you get better, you start weaving copywriting into it.

Um, and so yeah, like I've become a good copywriter cause I had to, but also it's like now it becomes like second nature where like you're always persuading somebody to do something right. Right now you guys are listening and we're entertaining you, but we're also trying to persuade you to listen to the next thing and hopefully go check out selling online.com because you're gonna learn how to sell more and whatever the next thing is. Right. But, but like,

That's why this is such an important skill to master. I think it's one of the tragedies that a lot of people have is now they're leveraging AI for copywriting, which I don't think necessarily bad. But by doing that, they're missing learning the skill set, which is the most –

I think of all the skill sets I've learned in the business world, it's the most important, the most... It is the most expensive to hire out because it's the most valuable. But they may get a good VSL done on ChatGBT that works, but then they're going to go on a podcast or a Facebook Live or whatever trying to promote the thing and they don't have any of the chops of how to do persuasion and copywriting because they had ChatGBT write a version for them. You know what I mean? Absolutely. I like that you brought that up. There's so many things that you touched on that I want to mention. I think what...

We lack in the AI. Don't get me wrong. I know a handful of these copywriting guys that I respect and are friends with, and they're doing masterful things with AI for sure. I don't have interest in that because I also – I think what people – copywriters, if they're just using AI –

just for the copywriting, you're missing out on their lived-in experience. It's that lived experience. Because when I think of copywriting, when you talk about persuading, it's getting to know people. It's getting to know their background, getting to know who they are. So you're just channeling their desire onto your offer, whatever it is. And so when you're writing, you're able to tap into your unconscious just by writing, even though you have a structure of what to do for the copywriting, but you also have your own unique lived-in experience that you can't

You can't just outsource that to an AI and try to dump your own childhood and everything. Your own story into AI for it then to conjure up. Because there's been a lot of times, even with you, we go back and forth. And then you have – that's why I always say I need a Russell rant. Because when I'm doing a new sales letter or whatever it is that we're doing, I always have you, wherever you're at in the world, send me over a Vox email.

Because I don't know where your brain is at. I know that you're lived and experienced. And all of a sudden, you had an experience that day that I didn't know about. But because of that experience, then there's that hook. There's the hook, the lead, the story, all the pieces. Yeah, and then that's why I say, okay, where's your brain at? And so we've done this for so many of our products, for so many of the offers with Dan Kennedy and our own products.

And so sure enough, I'll get a Russell rant, a good three-minute Russell rant, and it helps me tremendously because then I go, great. And then it also will trigger something. I'm like, you know what? That's awesome. That connection – I just now made a connection from what you said to what I just experienced at the gym or something like that that made me realize this can be a really good hook with this really good angle.

And so I, yeah, I think AI, obviously it's there, it's here and we're trying to figure out what's how to best utilize it. That works for us. But I, I also don't want it to take away the thing that I love. The thing that I know is Heath. That's what I am. I'm a writer. This is what I do. And so for it to outsource it, I, that's where you still need to be artistically satisfied and fulfilled and, or just fulfilled in what you're doing rather than,

Because then it just – how is it fun to just pull levers? That's what it comes down to with an AI. If I just get these cool prompts, it's just me pulling a lever, just putting in the right prompts for it. And it just – yeah. It just doesn't – You're a purist like me. I understand. Yeah. But I mean I still utilize it for sure. There's been a time where – how do they –

I'll ask it questions and help me. Honestly, it's the fastest when it comes to citing sources, when I'm just like, take this, take this, and now put it in an MLA format and give me a science source and things like that. Or it'll help me with research. Or also it'll help me with a springboard. I'm like, just give me 10 ideas based around this just to kind of get my brain moving.

rather than just to have, I don't have it right for me, none or no, or any of that, but it's more of a idea generator. For sure. That's like, I've been, I've never was big AI until just the last, man,

man, like two weeks I've been playing with a lot. And how do I say, like we were talking about idea generation. So like for me, I have a million swipe files on a thing like book funnels or webinar funnels or whatever, right? So what I've been doing, actually I started running a report off to get you a copy of it, but I have links to like every Agora front end I could find that are like free plus shipping books or things like that, right? So I was like, look at all these book funnels

that are gore is publishing and then like tell me like analyze them come back and tell me like what's the same about them what's different what are you noticing what are the headlines what are the you know and then it'll come back and it'll give you all that data where it's like okay they're using one of six different headline structures like oh

Cool. We should split test all six of those, you know? And Oh, the, all these led with a story about this or the, you know, three were this through the, but it gives you all the analytics and then at least know it gives, at least for me, it gives me an idea of like what I could write or where I should be able to write about things like that, which makes it more fun. A hundred percent. Cause I also like, obviously I'm a purist when it comes to the writing and bringing it unconscious, but I also know what marketing takes and we all love dead data. We're always going off data. We always want to know, we don't want to reinvent the wheel. We want to know what's working. That's why we funnel hack. And that's why, you know,

this, if this has worked, then let's continue to have a work. And then we work upon that and make the variations and all the split tests from there. But absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Springfest and Ego days are here at Lowe's. Right now, get a free select Ego 56-volt battery with purchase of a select trimmer, blower, or mower kit. Plus, shop today for new and exclusive items you need for your lawn. So get ready for spring with the latest in innovation from Ego, the number one rated brand in cordless outdoor power. Only at Lowe's. We help, you save. Offer valid through 4-2. Selection varies by location. While supplies last.

This is a message from sponsor Intuit TurboTax. Taxes was getting frustrated by your forms. Now, Taxes is uploading your forms with a snap and a TurboTax expert will do your taxes for you. One who's backed by the latest tech, which cross-checks millions of data points for absolute accuracy. All of which makes it easy for you to get the most money back, guaranteed.

Get an expert now at TurboTax.com. Only available with TurboTax Live Full Service. See guaranteed details at TurboTax.com slash guarantees. So I want to talk about the first project we did together because it's a lot of fun. And then we'll probably be at the end of the episode. So the very first project he came in on because he was doing a bunch of e-com stuff at the time. And I had just bought a green drink company called Zuma Juice. And it was the first time we had a chance to work together. And so anyway, it was probably the most fun I've had like –

Because usually either I copy my own or I outsource parts to copywriters and it's always... Anyway, there's been...

you know, good times and bad times with that. But it was the first time I just worked with you on a project and our styles were very similar, which I love. So the first thing we did, if you remember this, we set up a Trello board and the first thing was like, let's go funnel hack every single thing we can find around this. So we found every green drink product we could find and then went and bought every one and took screenshots of here. It's the first page, second, upsell, down, like down, every single green drink. And then we found other e-comm products that were similar, other supplements and that. We funnel hacked those and so we built a Trello board with, I don't even know, probably,

30, 40 of our funnels. We had funnel hacked along with like emails and ads and things like that. And then we'd bought the brand from somebody else. You remember we bought from Luke Jaden and we got a call with him and it was fun watching you because the questions you were asking were so interesting because I've only written a copy for myself. I've never done it for other people. So I always have a lens if I'm just writing

to the people I know how to write for, where you were coming into a whole different world and it was fascinating watching you, I don't know if you remember this, but you interviewed Luke for like an hour on the tone of the brand. Do you remember this? Like how do you talk, all that kind of stuff. And I want to go a little deeper there because number one, first off, step number one, guys, everyone funnel hack, but step number two, we were doing the funnel hacking, it's not just in copying, it's what most people do. What Heath did next that was interesting was figuring out the value

voice or not the voice, the tone of the brand. Like how does it communicate? How does it do stuff like that? Um, which I never thought of. I'd love you to talk about just your thought on that part of it. Oh yeah. I'm, I'm a big pro. I'm a big believer of getting closest to the person who is creating the product and

that understands the product that knows it in and out and has been working with it. So obviously Luke. And then I also did this, I worked closely also with Trey Llewellyn who, you know, friends and, uh, an e-com. And so I would get on the, when I would work with Trey, I would also call up his, uh, customers. I would, you know, talk to a few customers and why they buy so many of this and actually get to know them, understand why they're buying it for. And in

And so I always – I'm a big – that's part of the copywriting is the sales is just talking to people. And the biggest thing is I just ask questions and then I sit back and listen. So I just was just listening to what – how Luke – and he was – had so much passion behind it. He loved – I mean he loved this drink that he created. And so I wanted to know, yeah, how did he approach it because he was – and –

The tone was a really important thing because that is a – I mean that's part of the whole branding is how to stand out in the marketplace with that specific tone. And so when it comes to the tone and also who you're going for and how that tone is touching that person because when it comes to different groups of people, how you talk to them and how you're not going to talk to busy moms and say you're going to talk to a bunch of masculine, hardcore guys. Like there's a different way to approach –

And so I would just – my biggest thing is I would just ask Luke questions and then he would talk about it and I go, tell me more about that. And I would just – and then let him – and then I just listen and I take notes because a big thing is just copy –

I always say it comes from Kim. I'm going to ruin her name. I'm so sorry, Kim. Kim Schwamm. She's an amazing A-list copywriter, been around for a long, long time. And I love the phrase she used, copy collecting. And I really think about that. I don't think it's copywriting. I think it's copy collecting. So I'm just collecting the things that Luke is telling me. I'm like, oh, and I just make notes. And so there was a lot of fun tone work.

what I got from the greens genes, the, at the time, the Zuma juice was, it was a lot of fun. This was a greens juice. That was really, really fun. Cause at the time it was like hardcore, like the greens and you know, it's, it's for your health and everything was so just organic and everything. So based for your health, it felt very just, um,

a fun way approaching it. And so Luke wanted to do this, like, you know, the greens drinks that kicks your butt. And it's really, he used fun language around it about, you know, giving you a kick butt energy and he liked the fun part of it. So like, and that also went to show because in the video he first created was really, really fun. It had that early Harmon brothers feel that he really liked. And so there was obviously, um,

He wanted to approach a bigger market to show that green's drink doesn't have to be an expensive, just really high-priced and – Health food. Health food that is only for a very specific audience that only goes to Whole Foods. He wanted to make it be like, no, this is actually for everyone and it's good for you and it's so easy. He wanted that –

angle of it like you can put in your greens very easily. So that was... Yeah, my biggest secret is just asking more questions. I just interview the person and I just write down notes and then they kind of write the copy for me to be honest. It's if I remember Kaylin Poland asked her one day because when she ran Lady Boss she was...

writing all the copying stuff. And she said, I stopped writing copies. When I started, I'd go to my community on Facebook and I'd ask questions and I would just listen to what they'd respond. I'd literally use their phrases. The things they would say to respond to my messages, that was the copy. They said it the way that it sounded to them and so I just copied that and set it back. So in our company, you get a chance to write for me, sometimes for Dan Kennedy, sometimes for...

For barn and PT. Yeah. You're going to learn a whole bunch of different... Do you get schizophrenia ever switching from voice to voice? It's a little different. When I go from you to Dan Kennedy, I cut out all exclamation points. All exclamation points and then I structure it. Big blocky blocks. Big blocky blocks because he...

Older kind of traditional style writing, almost like journal kind of like style. A little different compared to how direct response marketing and copywriting has changed over the years. And with yours, yeah. And then with Barnum PT, I get to play with voice, of course, and then different ones. But I got used to that. Again, that's like the improv background and then what I first started with the e-comp company. One day, I remember I had to write this whole line of –

Was it baby? It was like baby products, like different soft. It was like lotions and different products for like a newborn up to like two years. And then after that was done, like the next thing was no kidding. There was this brand at the time called Enraged. It was Enraged Nutrition.

And it would have the most aggressive, like, scary names that you would... I don't think you can let fly today. Like, they're the most aggressive names. So I had to then change the tone and go from, like, just...

hardcore put on a different it's like putting on a different alter ego a different persona while you write um so awesome yeah yeah oh man all right last question for you and we'll wrap the podcast for today and thank you for doing this is a lot of fun yeah um for someone out there because a lot of people in our world are trying to learn this business game and there's so many pieces right there's copyright there's funnel building there's traffic there's

There's so many different things. Initially, the best way to make money at first, I think, is learning one skill set and then going and doing that as a service for other people. And I think if someone wants to learn copywriting, obviously there's work to learn it, but it's also one of the most valuable skills. You pay a good copywriter a lot of money. For someone who's just in that spot where they're not sure what their nip, they're thinking, maybe I should become a copywriter. What's the path? How does it look to go and actually start learning and getting a client? What's that first step?

beginning part look like? I would highly recommend, there's a couple ways to do it. I would recommend getting with a company. It's going to start off just learning, getting an in-house position with an e-com company and then starting off small perhaps, just starting with Facebook ads. Just getting with a company that's

you know you can work hard and they see that you're hungry and they want to get after it because then from there you're going to be able to learn the skills while also on their time be able to they're helping you they're training you while also getting up to speed with what you want to do i did

you know i that's kind of how i got started they wanted me because i had a degree in writing they knew i could write i could write a sentence i could write i'd be able to write a structure yeah a structured uh argument and everything and so they were like okay great now we can use that and then this is how we actually do things to make sure it sells

I would do that and then also – and then from there, if you want to start making more money and building your name, I was on Upwork at the time. I never was on Fiverr but I was on Upwork, man, and I took every position I could get. And then I started posting in groups and so different groups on Facebook about services and that's how I got connected with a lot of people that I was really surprised.

And also, and when you're doing these posts, being yourself, don't try to be another copywriter of how they structure things. Really understand who you are and your personality. If you're funny, if you're, uh, you have a certain style about you, use that in your copywriting because that really makes you stand out with your personality and, and, uh,

and business owners love that. They want to see that. So I would say, yeah. And then just, you're going to be putting in some grinding, but if you're enjoying it, then it's, it's fun. I mean, I, I mean, back in the day, this is crazy. I don't know if I ever told you this when I was like,

I was just wanting to get out of this certain position and wanting to make it out on my own. So when ClickFunnels was first, it was new, it's fairly new. And I remember one of my, the media buyer I was with at the time I was working with this company and I was doing, it was when probiotics was the rage and I wrote this massive VSL and it was, I got to really get nitty gritty and we printed off all the transcripts from all the Gundry VSLs and everything.

And then he was showing me, he's like, "Look at this new thing." And he showed me ClickFunnels. He was like showing me a site that he built and I saw, remember the buttons all wiggling and everything? I was like, "What is all this?"

And then sure enough, down the line, I eventually was able to work with someone who had a ClickFunnels account and I would log into their account and I would be in my closet. I had a little desk set up in my closet. I'd be up until 2 in the morning and I would build a funnel just to see how to structure it and drop things in, make a headline. I was like, oh, this is really easy. And then I would delete it because I didn't want him to find out that I was building funnels in this thing. And I was like, I don't want him to find out. So I'd build a whole funnel and be like, oh, this is really easy. I could do this. And then I'd delete it.

So I got really – so I would just find any opportunity. I mean I was doing descriptions for yarmulkes on Upwork at one point. I was taking any job I can get and just to stack up and just to – a lot of times in the early days, you're just wanting to feel more confident that you can do this, that you can get after it. And you're going to make a lot of mistakes and you're going to get clients that want to take advantage of you and you're going to have to figure things out and it's rough.

But it doesn't, I think if I were to do it again, I would definitely get with an in-house, get with someone in-house where you can know how to, some sort of, you're good at writing in some sort of capacity and then they wanna, and then you're hungry 'cause a lot of times, I mean, businesses just want someone that's hungry that stay with them and really know how they work and then build from there, yeah. - Yeah, that's cool. And if you're an entrepreneur who can't afford a copywriter yet,

then the process is kind of similar. You're not doing work for other people, but you've got to write a lot for yourself. I got a spot where I was writing emails every day and I was writing sales letter. I just kept writing and writing. For me, I wasn't good at writing, so what I would do is I would just – I'm very much a modeler, so I'd look at whoever. If I was launching – I remember launching my first software product. I went to Arm & More Insight and he was launching something similar. So I was funnel hacking. What did he do? He had a headline around my head. He had an intro story. I have an intro story. He had a – and I just like –

followed structure. I started VSL, so I would get the VSLs transcribed and then I would look at the

a whole thing and I would try to break it out. Okay, the first three lines, like this was a hook. Okay, boom, there's a hook, I need a hook. And the next five lines, they were leading with a story. And I just kind of like started, in fact, if you look at the Dotcom Secrets book, when I wrote that, all the scripts I showed in there literally came from me funnel hacking a dozen people with that same thing and then looking at similarities amongst all of them and then making my own videos based on that that would work. And like, oh, there's the formula. Like, I reversed engineered the formula from other people doing it. I didn't make it up. Just I kept singing it over and over and over again. And so it's like, okay,

I know the things I need to fill in to make a good VSL or to make a good webinar or make a good whatever the thing is you're trying to create. I did that with email. So when I've really cut my teeth in the direct response, when I started going out on my own was with email. So I got really good at email and I was on Ben Settle's list and I,

I started buying slowly or got on his list and then I've been following him for years and years. So then I would start to get on everyone's list just to get their emails and then I'd save them in different folders so I'd see what they're doing in email wise. So then I started slowly buying what you can afford. I was like, okay. And then I started buying. So I learned a lot also from Ben Settle was a lot of the early stuff I started buying and then really soaking it in. And then I was like, oh, I can do this. I can do this. And yeah, sure enough, once you started seeing the pattern –

That's when – yeah. Yeah. The pattern basically, the framework. The framework. You add your art on top of it and your personality and your – anyway. So Heath, that was fun, man. I appreciate you coming and hanging out in the office this weekend and jumping on the podcast. Any of you guys who are aspiring copywriters or want to learn copy, you got some great stuff from Heath today. Avatar – oh, one last question. Avatarials. Avatarials.

If someone wants to run an advertorial, do they need to go to Taboola or is there other platforms? Do you even know anything? Oh, yeah. There's a lot. I mean Taboola and Outbrain, it's been a bit since I've – like the actual inside of it when it comes to this part. But Taboola and Outbrain, you look at – those are the top ones because they're on the best kind of publications. You're going to get the better quality traffic. And then there's other ones that –

that will run more because also it depends on what your offer you're running. So sort of say for instance, like CBD gummies and stuff, things where they're a little iffy that maybe were a little bit difficult for different publishers. But I mean, there's so many. So to blue and outbrainer,

But yeah, I mean there's so many people also to follow for when it comes to native. Yeah. I say advertorials. I'd almost step back and not do an advertorial if you've got a niche-specific business, right? It's more for mass market because you're targeting like new sites where it's all the people, not like – Native definitely takes it from – it takes more of a skill. There's definitely – you're going to get –

A lot less clicks. The percentages are completely different compared to what you're used to on meta with Instagram and Facebook. So, you know, to start with Facebook and Instagram, much, much better because then you can – that one, they just like – it's all about creative and you just turn on the switch and they just keep pumping it with creative until the algorithm finds its way. When it comes to native, yeah, that's – you're –

Yeah, different type, but it's absolutely worth it. But also with the advertorials, that doesn't mean you just have to go for native. Advertorials are absolutely being used on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, wherever it is, Google. I see them all the time.

Because it's a great opportunity to bring in those cold traffic, give them information, and then send them on. And also, it helps you, too, to whittle down what's working. So a lot of times, we'll do split tests, multiple different abattorials, and then we see, okay, which one is actually getting the more clicks, then drop the other ones and focus on that one, and then do split. So it's also a way to find what the market is actually really, really interested in. Yeah. Yeah.

Very cool. Awesome. Thank you, Heath. Appreciate it. Hope you guys enjoyed this episode. First time talking about copywriting in a long, long time. And I hope you guys got some ideas and some cool ways to get your copy game up. So appreciate you. And we'll see you guys all on the next episode of The Russell Brunson Show.

Hey, this is Russell. I had a really cool offer for you right now. Shortly after we launched ClickFunnels, I remember asking some of our top two Comic Club Award winners, what would they do if they had everything taken away from it? They lost their name, their brand, their email list, their traffic, everything. All they had was a ClickFunnels account and internet connection for 30 days. What would they do over the next 30 days to get back on top?

I asked over 102 comic club winners, and from that, 30 people wrote me back and gave me very detailed step-by-step battle plans. Day number one, they would do this. Day number two, they would do this. And by the time the 30 days was done, they'd be back on top with a very successful business. Do you want to know what these people wrote? If so, I took all of these 30 battle plans and I put them inside of one book that you can get free at 30days.com.

All you gotta do is go to 30days.com and go get a free copy of this book. We'll ship it out to you, just cover the shipping handling. And when you get it in the mailbox, you have a chance to go through and look at all of these detailed step-by-step blueprints. All you gotta do is find one of these blueprints that you like, follow it step-by-step. And when you're done, you will have your own online business done and launched and live. So go get a free copy of one of my favorite books we've ever created at 30days.com. Again, that's 30days.com.