This month I was able to once again be part of the faculty for my copywriting mentor, John Carlton. He held a Hot Seat Seminar in San Francisco with ‘civilians’ and other copywriters. As always, I came home with tons of notes for myself! (It’s kinda funny how watching other people’s hot seats can give you ideas about your own business…even MORE SO than when you’re on the actual hot seat!)

As usual, I was the only female on the faculty. Being ‘one of the guys’ while keeping my female perspective was incredibly empowering. I got the privilege of reinforcing exactly WHY *The She Factor* Marketing System exists. Yup…things are changing and guys DO THINK DIFFERENTLY.

1. Find 10 business models you like and adapt your model to that. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel.

2. Visit where your target market hangs out and see what language they type in to find each other. These words are priceless keywords you need to know.

3. Follow people in your industry on Twitter. Find out who is following them by visiting their profiles. Follow those people.

4. Become a merciless capitalist. (Yes, a dude thought pattern but since women still seem to be paid less in most marketplaces, something to consider.)

5. Non de plume. Take yourself out of the day-to-day details and focus on your gifts. In other words…DELEGATE and OUTSOURCE. www.AssistU.com, www.Guru.com, www.ELance.com, www.ODesk.com, www.MySunday.com, www.RentACoder.com

6. Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) is jungle-level psychology brought to current society.

7. No more free info. You deserve to be paid for your expertise.

8. Use www.itunesu.com to upload content.

9. Google has an external keyword tool that’s free and pretty good.

10. “When all else fails, give them what they want.” Gary Halbert

11. “If you can’t give it away you can’t sell it.” Mike Morgan

12. 1000 click throughs in a pay per click ad is a good sample of how well your ad is performing.

13. Applause equals money. If you’re doing it right, you’re getting paid or ‘applauded.’

14. Don’t worry about the words when you start writing copy. Just worry about the MESSAGE. How would you explain what you do to the average Joe in a bar? Your message should be an ‘urgent whisper in a crowded room’ not a hypey sales pitch.

15. Don’t worry about being too simple or basic. Always cover EVERYTHING in your copy, even if you think they know it. Nothing is worse than leaving something out because you think they know it…and then to be wrong.

16. Good marketing has enormous amounts of theatre.

17. Need to make $2,093 every day for a year to be a millionaire.

18. Social media is all about inappropriate sharing.

19. David Garfinkel, Harlan Kilstein, Kevin Rogers, Mike Morgan, Stan Dahl, Mark Landstrom, and Ben Hart are flat out geniuses. Thanks for letting me stay in the boys club.

20. Billy Bob Thornton said, “Some folks call it a Kaiser blade. I call it a sling blade” in the movie Sling Blade regardless of John Carlton’s misguided attempt to pin it on the other mental patient. Thanks for the $20!

My copywriting bro, David Garfinkel

Harlan Kilstein, the hat critiquer…

Stan Dahl’s shiny head and Carlton watching the Oscars

Kevin Rogers on his bday

Ben Mack, The Morganizer, Lisa Manyon

Ben Harte with his gorgeous wife, Wanda

At any rate it was an amazing ride complete with top-notch learning and hard-core fun! If you were there and have something TASTEFUL to add please comment. Or if you have other things to share and weren’t there, by all means let’s hear it!

Warmly,
Lorrie

P.S. I still can’t believe a ‘Real Doll’ is over $6,500 or that I now know more than I ever wanted to about one…