| ETR reader Kendra Pearsall is eager to find a mentor and/or business partner. But she works at home, alone. "How do I find someone to work with?" she asks. Kendra, there are plenty of ways to do it. The most important thing to know is this: Don't look for a "forever" business partner like you would look for a spouse. Look, instead, for people you can partner with for specific projects -- people who have expertise in areas where you are weak. If you are a writer, look for marketers, graphic artists, and technical people. If you are a numbers person, team up with creative talent. Go to chat rooms and chat. There are so many ways to connect with people via the Internet, there is absolutely no excuse for not doing so. Go to trade shows and seminars and smile a lot. Don't give out business cards. Take them. Make follow-up phone calls or e-mails. Ask, "What can I do for you?" Building business relationships begins with you. You have to demonstrate that you are someone who is willing to give, not just take. In all likelihood, you know how the people whose cards you take can help you. But they might not know what you can do to help them. As I said, the goal is not to find someone who will be your long-term business mate. It is to find people who can help you build your business in the short run. If you have a dozen such relationships, one or two of them are likely to have the potential for something longer-term and more rewarding. Brian Edmondson, Director of our Internet Money Club and Internet Power Coaching programs, was a budding online entrepreneur when he met the ETR team at an Info-Marketing Bootcamp. That informal meeting led to a valuable partnership that is mutually beneficial. Brian provides content and services. And we provide marketing expertise and an audience of buyers. Several years ago, Monica Day and Krista Jones met at the American Writers & Artists Inc. yearly conference in Florida. They became fast friends and did a few writing jobs together. Before long, they were partners in a business. My high school friend Eddie and I re-met in a bank lobby 25 years ago. He was a real estate attorney and I was buying real estate. He helped me close several deals. In return, I invested in a few of his limited partnerships. Gradually, we became full-fledged partners in several very substantial developments overseas. This has been a sideline business for me over the years, but it has made me millions and millions of dollars. These are just three stories -- three examples of how you can find great partners if you simply devote some time to meeting people and then starting some sort of relationship with them, even if it is to become a customer or client. ---------------------------------------------- Highly Recommended ---------------------------------------------------- Why Religion as You Know It Doesn't Have the Answers Most religions promise the keys to happiness, fulfillment, and purpose. The solutions are there. But over the years, these useful and life-changing tenets have become diluted... weak... and distorted. They have lost their original power. This frustrates people who simply want answers. But there's good news. Scholar and philosopher Srikumar Rao has translated dozens of the most powerful secrets from ancient traditions. He's made them useful... practical... easy to understand. And easy to apply to YOUR life. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "If you re-read your work, you can find on re-reading a great deal of repetition can be avoided by re-reading and editing." William Safire "Need to Tell" vs. "Want to Tell"
By John Forde In marketing copy, "need to know" info is the facts your prospect has to hear to help him make the decision to buy your product. But it's often the "want to know" info that has more pulling power. By that I'm talking about things your prospect has an emotional interest in. Put your finger on the latter and you've got an extra edge when formulating your pitch. On the copywriter's side of the fence, however, it occurs to me there's another dynamic to consider. It's the difference between "need to tell" and "want to tell" information. It goes like this... "Need to tell" describes what you can't leave out. Because without it, the sales message just ain't compelling enough to seal the deal. So what's "want to tell?" It's the stuff you WANT to jam into the copy somewhere... but might not need to. The jokes and puns, the clever subheads and lengthy anecdotes, the trivia -- the extras that satisfy the writer's ego, but don't do much for the reader. Dumping a gut full of "want to tell" copy onto the page can be cathartic. It can make you feel smart. It can make you sound funny or witty. But it's no way to sell. How do you know when you're "over-telling?" Grab a red pen (or put your finger on your delete key) and go back over the copy, reading it aloud. Study it visually on the page too. Are there places where you hear or see yourself making the same points over and over again? How about your proof? Usually, three strong proof sections will do the trick. Much more than that and you're just showing off. And take a look at what you're promising. Offers that give the prospect lots of things can be fine. Just make sure you're not over-compensating by throwing in the kitchen sink. At some point, it can make your product seem cheap rather than valuable. Look, too, for personal anecdotes, inside jokes, and passages jammed full of exclamation points or florid, hyped-up descriptions. Copy can be aggressive and exciting and still work well. Sometimes extremely well. But not when there's nothing substantial under the fluff. The bottom line is this: You know when you're working hard to get something into the copy because you "just like it" instead of knowing the copy will fail if that particular bit isn't included. Arm yourself with Hemingway's principle: "When in doubt, cut it out." P.S. Writing a sales letter is a creative process -- to a point. But, the letters that bring in the best results must have certain elements. And they must follow a certain structure to keep the reader engaged. The good news is that writing sales letters is a skill anybody can learn. Find out just how easy it is here. And be sure to sign up for my weekly "Copywriter's Roundtable" e-letter. It's one of the longest running letters for marketers and copywriters (online since 2001)... one of the best, according to top copywriter Bob Bly. And it's free. You can sign up here, where you'll also get a free report: http://copywritersroundtable.com ----------------------------------------------Highly Recommended --------------------------------------------------- You Won't Get "Lost in the Crowd" at Bootcamp - When you attend Early to Rise's Info-Marketing conference in November (it's just a couple of weeks away!) you won't just hear from speakers on the stage. All the speakers and our crackerjack in-house Internet experts will be there to answer your questions and help you customize a plan to rapidly grow your online revenues. Find out more here… ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Retailers aren't looking forward to the holidays. Analysts predict sales will be flat, about the same as last year. Last year was bad -- the biggest decline in Christmas shopping since 1970. But, once again, I think the analysts are going to be wrong. I think sales will be worse this year. The major retailers are trying to stay in the game by appealing to thrifty consumers. Walmart says it will offer 100 toys at just $10. They had only 10 at that price last year. "It's a badge [for consumers] not to spend as much as they used to," says The Limited's CEO, Linda Heasley, in The New York Times. And that's where I see opportunity for the small-time entrepreneur. We can do things the big guys can't, because we don't need to buy our products in bulk. Look for super-inexpensive Chinese imports. Then test those products in flea markets. If they sell briskly, order more and start raking in the dough. Some former athletes (including you if you used to work out regularly) consider themselves "bulletproof." Since they were in superb shape for so many years, they assume their health will always be better than average. They eat and drink like they have a free pass to longevity. But studies show that too much food and too little exercise -- after years of intense activity -- can quickly erase a history of perfect fitness. Greek researchers, for example, found that overweight ex-athletes have no better protection against heart disease than anyone else. As their waistlines increased, two factors associated with heart disease -- C-reactive protein and triglycerides -- increased. And that means their risk also increased. Here's the deal. When it comes to your health today, your body doesn't care how fit you used to be. If you want to stay healthy, stay active. There are dozens of tricks you can learn about business writing and, in particular, about writing a good memo. Here's the one that I believe is the most important: Before you begin to write, ask yourself, "What is the single most important idea I want my reader to walk away with?" Don't let yourself come up with three or four (or a dozen) ideas. Just stick with that one. Write only what you need to convey that idea, and discard everything else. If all the other things you want to say are important, you can save them for other memos. By sticking to one idea, your message will be much more powerful. People can't usually remember more than one big idea at a time, anyway. So anything extra you put in will be lost. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Latest News --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "This really works." "Here's my response to "Eat More ... and Lose Weight?" "This really works! I eat three eggs (organic, cage-free, omega-3) every morning. I put them in a paper cup to go, with a wedge of lo-fat cheese on top. This is so good. And if you eat it, you are not hungry at all or tempted by donuts or Halloween candy or any other nonsense. It's awesome! "I believe this has contributed to my recent loss of 22 pounds!
"Thank you! Love the newsletter!" Ann-Marie Longanecker ---------------------------------------------- Highly Recommended --------------------------------------------------- 4 Gurus For The Price of One We have created what we believe is the greatest value in financial publishing. Four of the hottest advisors we have ever worked with have agreed to combine their forces in a single, comprehensive investment newsletter. It's called Sound Profits and will focus on today's five hottest sectors: stocks, bonds, options, ETF's, and natural resources. And the most astonishing thing: you can get all the advice, a value of more than $800 a year – for only 27¢ a day! Charter members will get a discount on the already low price. Click here to reserve your spot. Your satisfaction is 100% guaranteed. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Language Perfectionist: Let's Split this Scene
By Don Hauptman
A contentious issue among language enthusiasts is the use of the split infinitive. Before reviewing the arguments of the two sides, let's look at a few examples: -
"It is even possible to legally download textbooks free, thanks to some new sites and services." -
"This is a chance to constructively harness the idealism of thousands of Americans..." -
"In New York, if a lethal agent is detected, the city plans to immediately distribute drugs to counter the bug." -
"On several occasions, Israelis have managed to temporarily suppress violence." For centuries, language purists insisted that an infinitive must never be split. Then came the reaction: Permissivists denounced the prohibition as a "superstition." A few writers on language take a middle position. I'm in this camp. The split-infinitive taboo is a convention of the language, so let's respect it -- unless the result sounds awkward. All the above examples could be rephrased to avoid the splits. On the other hand, rephrasing would be difficult or impossible with this sort of sentence: "Analysts expect the stock price to more than triple next year." But clumsy sentences can also be created by splitting the infinitive. I found this example in a concert program: "Sousa marches often seem to not particularly relate to their titles." Recently, an eloquent case for nonsplitting was made by a reader (Richard Palumbo) in a letter to The New York Times Book Review: "Split infinitives are like putting an insurmountable obstacle in the way of a speeding train that must stop to clear the tracks before picking up speed again. We lose the thrust and impact when we separate preposition and verb..." That makes sense to me. So my advice is simple. Follow the rule unless a good reason exists to break it. I sometimes wonder if anything would have been lost if the Star Trek mission had been "to go boldly where no man has gone before." [Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was an award-winning independent direct-response copywriter and creative consultant. He is author of The Versatile Freelancer, an e-book published by AWAI that shows writers and other creative professionals how to diversify their careers into speaking, consulting, training, and critiquing.] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We want your feedback! Let us know your thoughts on today's issue. Email us at: AskETR@ETRFeedback.com | 
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