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Human is the Only Move Left
This is part 3 of a 3 part series. Click here to read part 1. Click here to read part 2. Want to listen to me read this to you while gazing at you fondly? Click here. So, we've got two trends that are all, at their core, about dehumanization. Work like you're a...
The third wave of masculine marketing is here. It’s smart. It’s woke. And it’s horrifying.
Want to hear me read this to you while gazing at you fondly? Click here. This is part 2 of a 3 part series. Read part 1 here. The term "softboy" came across my IG feed earlier this year. (Which probably means it's like, 7 years out of date now because I am old, so by...
The Big Lie
Want to listen to me read this to you while gazing at you fondly? Click here. I follow a bunch of online business and marketing people, which has my algorithms thinking that I am in constant and dire need of more business and marketing training, so chances are, if...
A call to courage
Want to listen to me read this to you? Click here. “We are on the edge of greatness. It's easy to feel that potential, in this moment, as we come to a transition point in a year, starting a whole new decade. But the truth is, we're always there. The difference between...
Please Don’t Stop. Please Do Pause.
Prefer to hear me read this to you? Listen here. I’ve been running this business for 10 years. In that time, there’s been a recession. Racist riots. A presidency so hated its start depressed online business for a quarter. And now a global pandemic that has...
Study Montage: 5 Concepts You Need to Know to Be an Effective Writer
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. 1. "You’re spam until you prove otherwise." Researchers have found that we see most people we encounter as objects, rather than full-on humans. This is one reason people are pre-disposed to tune you out. The fix: to write...
The Big, Smack-You-In-The-Face Clue About Your Audience That You Never Think About
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. It lumbers into your business, ugly and mishapen, takes your content strategy and crushes it into an amorphous, useless mess. Enter the Frankenavatar. This deadly bastard is what I call situations when you have several...
Why Doesn’t Anyone Care About What You’re Selling? Because You’re Not Teaching Them How. Here’s The Fix.
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. In 1991, a researcher put a bunch of people into pairs and gave one person in each pair a piece of paper with the title of a very well known song on it -- things like The Star Spangled Banner and Twinkle, Twinkle, Little...
Put the Merit Badges Down
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. Dig if you will, the picture: It’s 10-ish years ago. Kanye was gonna let Taylor finish at the MTV awards. Harem pants were making their brief resurgence. Shimmery vampires were driving teenyboppers and soccer moms alike...
The Key to Compelling Writing: Hijacking Elephants
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. There is sooooooo much written about how to get people’s attention online — from hacks and buzzwords to algorithms and popups and lions and tigers and bears, oh my! But what if you could somehow get somebody’s attention in...
How to be Vulnerable Online without Coming Across as an Attention-Seeking Jerk
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. Of all the online entrepreneur-y buzzwords, I find myself the most conflicted about “authentic”. It’s seen as one of the pillars of the community — we’re not like those corporate sell outs, we’re authentic. Our lives are...
Why Your Sales Emails Disappear Into a Black Hole of Nothingness (And How to Fix It.)
Want to hear me read this to you? Click here. There's nothing quite as dispiriting as taking the time to set up an email campaign, getting the little high five from the Mailchimp monkey, then getting ... absolutely nothing in return. And yet, it's pretty damn common....
The tiny tweak that makes your writing addictive and memorable.
A couple of days ago, in the middle of my morning coffee and reading time, I literally gasped and put down my book. I’d heard Running with Scissors was good, but this was exceptional: “As time went on, my parents' relationship became worse, not better. My father grew...
What is enough?
I’m writing this to you from the back of a taxi. Which is not how I normally like to do things. I henpeck at my phone b/c I am an old person, the autocorrect annoys me relentlessly, and, most importantly, I typically have really good boundaries around my work time and...
Your words are bottled lightning. Use them accordingly.
“Oh dear god, another fucking cacao ceremony!?” I muttered angrily to myself as I juggled plates and tried to hit the elevator button with my elbow, my office bag weighing down one arm and throwing precariously-balanced cutlery dangerously close to the edge my pile of...
Three ways to f*cking finish something
I thought I’d go with a more tactical, ripped from the headlines-style post for you this week, because I’ve had a bunch of clients come to me recently struggling to get things finished. (OK, so it’s not *the* headlines, but it’s the headlines of my work life. So...
Your enthusiasm is irrelevant
The first client I worked with outside a content mill, I closed for a 5 figure contract. What nobody else knew was that while I was on the sales call with them, I was Googling the name of the tasks they were asking me to do because I didn’t know what the fuck a...
The Second-Worst Pickup Line I’ve Ever Heard (And What You Can Learn From It.)
It was about five sentences into the conversation that I realized things were going really very wrong. I’m in a bar when this guy comes up to me and asks if he can buy me a drink. Pleasantly surprised, I agree. We trade names, and my pleasant surprise continues when...