I’m on the bus, on the way home, as I’m writing this. I’m writing in a tiny notebook, the one in the picture below.
Six-figure promotions in their infancy...
As a writer, it would be a crime not to carry a notebook with you at all times.
In fact, in my bag I have a notebook, a stack of index cards, an pen which is sort of like a calligraphy pen, as well as a full set of chinese sketching pencils… us entrepreneurial folk tend to be a tad OCD at times.
Writing Shitty Headlines In Coffee Shops
I met up with a friend at a cafe in town. She was running a bit late. I had about 30 minutes to myself, so I stopped by a nearby bookstore/coffee shop. I sat down, whipped out the ole’ notebook and started working on a sales letter for a client, which I got paid for a couple of days ago.
I started out with a basic “textbook” shitty headline to get the juices flowing… then I burned through four or five more before arriving at something half-decent.
Then I kept going. I find that most of my best stuff always lead somewhere logical. If you have a bad ass headline, there’s usually an obvious subhead that goes with it… and a logical lead that ties into that… and so on. I wrote a couple of paragraphs, then my friend showed up and we walked off to a nice, mellow cafe just as the rain started pouring.
I had coffee, she ate a veggie sandwich.
After a pleasant hour-ish long chat, I headed off to the bus stop to catch the 40-minute ride back home, where I started writing this post in my tiny notebook, using my pen that’s sort of like a calligraphy pen but not really.
Weird Haircuts and Bus-stop Fantasies
At the bus stop, a rebellious-looking dude in his late teens was heavily engrossed in a phone conversation with one of his… role playing buddies.
He was sporting an odd-looking mohawk-ish ponytail-and-bandana combo on his head, a scraggly white hoodie with extravagant flame-like patterns together with a beat-up old pair of green sneakers.
He was talking about how some trouble had manifested itself, and he didn’t have any weapons for the weekend “live”. (short for “live action role playing”, or LARP)
Live Action Role Playing is when folks who play RPGs such as Dungeons and Dragons meet up and act out their game in real life. They dress up as elven wizards and vicious barbarian killing-machines and fight their sworn enemies to the death…
Role-playing death, that is.
I was thinking of how great of an example this fella’ was, as part of an extremely passionate, rabid market. These folks will lay awake at night thinking about the wicked gear their level 14 dwarven fighter/barbarian might pick up at the raid this weekend.
Bizarre 4 AM Kitchen Copywriting Techniques
Being a copywriter is a lot like being a hardcore RPG fanatic.
Instead of acting out role playing fantasies of warriors and wizards, we’ll role play what it’s like to be Cindy, 25, with two little kids she barely has time to see anymore, because she’s working two full-time jobs to put food in their bellies, with just enough scrap change left over to make the rent.
Last night, at 4 am in the morning I was pacing in the kitchen. Walking back and forth, talking to myself out loud. I was putting myself in the shoes of the customers of this product I’m writing for. (the one I started writing on today, in the book store)
If you don’t know their innermost fears, desires, pleasures, pains and secret fantasies… you’ll have a tough time connecting with them, warping them into your world, and selling to them… which is precisely the job of the copywriter.
Pacing in the kitchen at four in the morning may not sound very normal. We’re a peculiar bunch, us copyslingers, and I’ve heard much weirder stories about what some of us wackjobs do to wrangle forth those million-dollar hooks and brilliant, order-pulling offers.
On The Bus, On The Hustle…
As I mentioned before, I’m writing this by hand in my tiny notebook using my pen that’s sort of like a calligraphy pen but not really.
Handwriting is great. I don’t do it nearly enough. Many of the legends in advertising wrote all their stuff by hand.
You can cross out stuff you don’t like, circle stuff you do, draw arrows and all kinds of fancy stuff you can’t do on a computer. When you do that, you leave a trail, a visible archive of an evolving thought process in motion… before you know it, you’ll have full pages that look a bit like really messy mindmaps that only you can read.
But it works, and it’s incredibly useful and practical. It’s also slower, which makes you consider your wordchoices more.
I think this very much exemplifies the lifestyle of an in-the-trenches entrepreneur.
The 168-Hour Workweek
I was recently joking with a marketing buddy (actually, the same guy I’m writing that ad for) how people think that being your own boss means working less. We both laughed at the absurdity of it.
But again, we’re a goddamn peculiar bunch, ain’t we? We’re ALWAYS working. The 168 hour workweek. I have a “rule” that I don’t work saturdays. But that’s kind of a lie, too… because in some way or another I’m always working, in my head our outside.
That’s how you turn something that most people would consider an average, friendly coffee shop meetup, into a rather long blog post littered with marketing lessons and useful ideas you might take to the bank this year.
(in turn, you might just like me for it, which in turn might make you consider buying more of my stuff, which makes me happy too… ah, the ever-elusive content marketing conundrum)
We’re ALWAYS working. But we love it, so we don’t care. I think most of us would sooner hack off our right legs with spoons than go to work for The Man.
Interesting times we live in. Even more exciting. And we’re right here, placed smack dab in the middle of the coolest shit that ever happened.
Aye, can’t help but fill up with gratitude just thinking about it. I hope you feel the same.
Until next time…
Signin’ out.
Linus
P.S. I felt an embedded YouTube video of “LARPing” would ruin the moment, but feel free to have a browse around yourself. Might get you a laugh, but these folks are dead serious, and they’re out there doing what they love… which is more than what most can say for themselves.
P.P.S. If you read this far, you owe me a comment. Have at it below…
