Selling The Golden Dream Part III

Before I get started, I want to share with you some of the great feedback on Parts I and II of my Selling the Golden Dream: How to Make It BIG as an A-List Financial Copywriter.

Kevin writes…

“Wow. This is great. I loved your metaphor about comparing the financial copywriting business with walking your reader down the Yellow Brick Road to meet the Wizard–that puts everything in perspective.”
Kim writes…

“I wish I had known about your copywriting formula years ago. With what you have revealed so far, I would not have struggled.”
Sean writes…
“I loved how you draw your readers in with your cookie-and-dog analogy. They just come running for it. That’s brilliant.”

If you missed either of these two parts, you’ll find them here.

As I mentioned, together these ideas form the core of my Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula system that not only has made me one of the world’s top financial copywriters for the past three decades, but also has paid me millions of dollars along the way.

In today’s Selling the Golden Dream, I will explain how you can avoid the three biggest copywriting problems most writers face and how you can use this knowledge to write more winning promotions and begin to rise to the top of the A-list.

I’ll also give you a sneak preview of my new coaching program, which will show you how to:

Take the world’s best, winningest ideas and bring them to your current project.
Layer on the benefits and the specifics.
Make your copy irresistible by adding the often-forgotten credibility elements.
Transition from one idea to another in a way that makes total sense to the reader.
Create a compelling offer that will have your readers diving for the order form.

In the meantime, I urge you to take to heart today’s Selling the Golden Dream.Because if you can take to heart my guidance here, you could stop struggling and write many more winning promotions.

How to Solve the Three Greatest Copywriting Problems Most Financial Writers Face

How to start a marketing campaign, video sales letter, or webinar
How to keep the reader reading (without taking them down the wrong path)
How to close the sale

If you’ve ever sat in front of a blank computer screen for hours, not knowing how to begin, continue, or finish a project, you’re not alone.

I have struggled with these problems in the past myself.

So please don’t think that you’re the only one who has curled up shaking in a fetal position in the corner with no idea how to get started, continue, or close out a financial sales promotion.

However, when you begin to apply my Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula, as I will show you here, you could breeze through your next promotion and write with a sense of confidence you’ve never had before.

Let’s begin at the beginning, with the questions you are always asking yourself: “Where the heck do I start? Is this really a good idea?”

How to start a marketing campaign, video sales letter, or webinar

First and foremost, you have to start with an unwavering belief in yourself. You’ll never come up with anything good if you don’t believe in yourself.

So that is a critical first step–you must believe. If you are always writing with self-doubt in the back of your mind, then you will never move beyond the blank screen.

That said, remember that our job as financial copywriters, as I pointed out in Parts I and II of Selling the Golden Dream, is to walk our reader down the Yellow Brick Road to meet the Wizard and then retrieve the pot of gold.

I don’t think I could make the road map any clearer. All you really need to do is plug in YOUR IDEA… and then let my cookie-and-dog metaphor do its work.

That is really the key that solves all three problems–coming up with your big idea that sells the golden dream.

That idea will come from your own brainstorming and from brainstorming with the marketing team you are working with. Out of that meeting you will get a few ideas to choose from.

Here’s my secret: Choose the idea the Wizard (the investment advisor) can prove.

The biggest rookie mistake you can make is to run with an idea from a marketing team before that idea has been fully fleshed out.

So you struggle, trying to make this work (as you bleed out in front of the computer!), but the problem is that their idea would never work. The marketing team doesn’t have the facts to back up their fantasy idea–or worse, they want you to find the facts.

Oh, my god.

I was working on one publication that sold commodities. Commodities were in the tank, and the editor couldn’t come up with a stock pick or a reason to buy commodities at that particular time. Seriously? If the editor of a publication can’t give you a reason to buy his service, how on earth can you come up with one?

That’s a big-time pass, my friend.

One of my favorite editors, who has since retired, can get full credit for three of my biggest winners over the years. He could prove each one of the ideas that came out of our meeting–and they were contrarian ideas.

He could prove that income stocks would outperform growth stocks due to the Bush tax cuts.
He could prove that stocks could collapse even though they were at all-time highs.
He could prove that oil stocks would rise even when they were at all-time lows.

That is how you start a winning financial promotion–with an idea that you can prove with facts!

Let’s move on to step two–the second area that writers struggle with.

How to keep the reader reading (without taking them down the wrong path)

Okay, now that you have your big idea–one you can prove– you’re one-third of the way home. Every single sentence, paragraph, and argument needs to support that idea.

Take this headline, for example: Four Mammoth Mergers That Will Double Your Money in 24 Months.

You don’t have to be the author of a Pulitzer Prize-winning piece to know what this promotion is all about. It’s about four mergers and how they will make the reader money.

This headline is the perfect example of the Yellow Brick Road and cookie-and-dog metaphors I shared with you in Parts I and II.

You have (1) the benefit the reader will come running for and (2) the pathway all rolled into one.

Your job is quite simple: to write about all four mergers and then prove that they could double your reader’s money in 24 months.

Could it be any easier than that!

Along the way, you will continue to drop information about your stock’s performance or trading advisor’s (the Wizard’s) background and track record to keep them reading and excited about all the money they will make.

Here’s another headline example that will keep the reader reading: The One Stock That Will Make You a Marijuana Millionaire.

This headline outlines what your promotion is all about. Your job is simply to continue to prove it over and over throughout your piece.

Here’s another: The Fast-Money 2020 $1 Million Giveaway.

Ka-ching! It’s a great example of a headline that simply sells the golden dream. In this case, that dream is the $1 million giveaway.

It is precisely this kind of organization and structure that allowed me to write twice as many million-dollar marketing campaigns as most writers, in a fraction of the time.

Please keep this in mind:

The faster you can knock out a profitable marketing campaign, the faster you can knock out a second and a third one. The more you have out there, the more money you will make.

I would know. During my tenure at InvestorPlace, I was called on time and again to turn around an idea at 6:00 am so they could email it out by 10:00 am.

In fact, there were some days that my marketing partners at Phillips/InvestorPlace called “Doug Days” because the only promotions the entire company sent out were ones that I had written.

The reason I was able to deliver again and again was that I have a formula that allows me to take any idea and quickly write a marketing promotion around it, or put a new lead on an old promo–giving it what I would call a “vitamin booster shot” to boost its response.

If you can make my Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula work for you, you may never again struggle with what to write and how to write it. I’ll tell you more about it and my coaching program in a moment.

But first, here are a few more of my winning headlines that, as you can see, give structure to your promotion so you don’t take the reader down the wrong path:

The Politically Incorrect Doubler
91 Powerful New Vitamin Cures That Work–Direct to You from the Doctors Who Prescribe Them
The Master Key to Marijuana Profits
Boom or Bust Ahead for Tech Stocks?
Will Wall Street Collapse Again… or Hand You the Greatest Profits of Your Investing Life?
The Shocking Truth About the New Bull Market
Why Stock Prices Could Collapse Without Warning

Again, each one offers a simple pathway to the order form that is easy to follow.

How to close the sale

If you have been writing financial promotions as long as I have, then you know that all financial newsletter promotions end the same way: with “click to buy now” or “click to join now.”

If you have done your job right, your readers will reach for their credit card like Jesse James reaches for his six-shooter–quickly and smoothly.

Ironically, that smoothness doesn’t come at the end of the promotion; instead, it is part of the whole promotion from beginning to end. And it comes in the way you talk to your reader.

Remember–as you write your promotion, you are the financial guide who is walking your readers down the Yellow Brick Road as you assure them that the stock or trading system you are promoting as a part of the Wizard’s expertise is the real deal.

If you have done your job right, they will believe you and will be primed and ready to buy.

However, you’ll find that there are two–and only two–things that happen when they get to the price/order page.

Your reader will:

See that what you are charging is a steal of a deal for what they are receiving in return, or
Think it’s just way too much money–no matter how many freebies you are including in the purchase.

That’s it.

So it’s not just about loading up the promotion with a bunch of freebies; it’s really about the promotion in its entirety–from the headline and body copy to the end. Making your reader feel the value you are offering with every word.

So when you present the price, the discount, and everything you are including, their purchase is simply a natural conclusion to the conversation.

Just as with any sales presentation, your copy ends with a reminder of the next step to be taken or a restatement of all the benefits.

A great example would be the close I wrote for one of my winningest promotions ever, The Great Retirement Betrayal.

It embodies what I have been talking about here: walking your reader down the Yellow Brick Road to meet the Wizard so that the reader can liven the golden dream.

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When I started The Retirement Letter 19 years ago, I promised myself that I would always make it available at the lowest price. Over the years, I have kept that commitment. Even with the recent postage rate hike, I’ve managed to keep costs in line and not raise subscription prices one penny. I’m doing my best to keep inflation from driving up your cost for The Retirement Letter.
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Again, what you are reading here is the natural conclusion to this conversation with the reader, where the writer is talking in a warm and friendly/folksy way that simply makes sense.

Which is one reason why Phillips Publishing (now InvestorPlace) mailed out 25 million pieces over three years… and I made a lot of money in royalties.

I’m hoping that you can take these three simple ideas I’ve been sharing with you and make them your own:

How to start a marketing campaign, video sales letter, or webinar 
How to keep the reader reading (without taking them down the wrong path)
How to close the sale

They have worked for me. I sincerely hope they work for you.

If you’ve read this far, then I’ve done my job correctly.

I’ve placed just the right amount of “cookies” in this article to keep you reading about the same system that I will be coaching as I walk you down the Yellow Brick Road that financial copywriting offers you.

These are the kind of skills you will want to acquire if you would like to get into the very lucrative copywriter niche–skills I can teach you in my Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula coaching program.

If you give me just one hour a week, one-on-one, I will show you how to:

Write with a style that flows effortlessly from page one to the order form, and do it over and over again.
Take the world’s best, winningest ideas and bring them to your current project.
Layer on the benefits and the specifics.
Make your copy irresistible by adding the often-forgotten credibility elements.
Transition from one idea to another in a way that makes total sense to the reader.
Create a compelling offer that will have your readers diving for the order form.

Plus, I will show you how to develop a solid, winning marketing partnership with your clients that can pay off like a series of No. 1 hit records—complete with hundreds of thousands of dollars in recurring royalties in your pocket.

The sad truth is, most copywriters work 60 hours (or more) a week and get paid only once every two weeks.

Forget that!

With my Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula guiding your career, you’ll be able to turn that concept upside down.

I will show you how to work once and then get paid over and over again, just like the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and your other favorite bands.

In fact, I have one former client who still sends me $800 – $1,200 a month for something that I wrote over 10 years ago!

You’ve got to love that… I certainly do!

Here’s the Kind of One-on-One Coaching

I’ll Bring You Every Week…

Radically simplify what you are selling. I’ll get you organized right from the start. I will show you that no matter what you are selling, it is all one thing. I will show you the many ways to support that one concept throughout your sales promotion.
No longer feel overwhelmed by so many confusing thoughts popping around in your head. In our weekly coaching sessions, we’ll spend a few minutes organizing all these thoughts in a completely logical way that continues to lead a reader to the order form.
Never have to worry about how to start or finish a promotion. I will show you numerous ways to start a promotion with a headline that will automatically organize your next direct mail, email, or video sales letter in a way that could cut your writing time in half.
Close out a promotion with an irresistible, rock-solid offer. If you continue to sell the same things in the same way, you will continue to get the same results. If you want to sell more, then you must try something new. I will show you a couple of repositioning efforts that worked like gangbusters for me.
Create your own “sixth sense” for copy that will lead you through a package. In fact, you are seeing my sixth sense in action as you read through this copy–moving from one section to another in a logical fashion. Once you learn how to tap into your own sixth sense, you will not only thank me 1,000 times over, but also make a whole lot of money along the way.
Be the kind of copywriter you naturally feel like. Be true to yourself… and deliver original copy that has been fused together by tapping into the best ideas from the best copywriters in the world.

If the idea of making it BIG as an A-list copywriter appeals to you, click here to learn about my copywriting coaching program.

I will go into more detail on the program, the time commitment, and the cost so that you can see if it is right for you.

All good wishes,

Doug D’Anna, Copywriter and Creator of

The Million-Dollar Copywriting Formula

P.S. To make sure you don't miss your invite, be sure to add your name to the list here.

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