
The profound idiocy of seeing customer service as an expense
Issue #138—August 27, 2021 Yesterday as I was driving to Baltimore to help my daughter with her move, I spent nearly a half hour on the phone with U-Haul in order to get a few last-minute questions answered. Most of that time I spent on hold, forced to listen to an...
The “one night stand” approach to sales
Yesterday I wrote about how to upsell and cross-sell from a place of service... And not as if the initial sales transaction was a "one night stand" where you tried to milk as much sales out of that first interaction as possible...potentially poisoning the customer...
How to upsell and cross-sell from a place of service
In this funnel-crazed era, people often forget the basics behind upselling and cross-selling. Let's face it. Acquiring a customer is hard. It's expensive, too. But the lifetime value of that customer could be hundreds if not thousands of dollars…if you do things right...
Niching down…WAY down (with help from the Partridge Family)
Issue #137—August 25, 2021 I've been taking some time away from work to focus on a number of family-related matters. At the forefront of them is my 95-year-old father-in-law, who as of Monday, was given a 72-hour window to live. However, we are now near the end of...
Why everyone thinks they can write copy
Issue #136—August 17, 2021 If you ever wanted to look for a J-O-B, now is one of the best times in years. According to the latest reports, there are more than 10 million job openings in the U.S., more than ever before...about 1 million more than there are people...
The new old media that can bring you more sales
What's in Kim's Mailbox? Newspaper advertorial ads are about as "old school" as they come. Yet for years some of the most savvy direct marketers have been using them successfully to sell products like supplements and skin creams. Each weekend when my Sunday paper...
How one of my worst jobs made me a better copywriter
Issue #135—July 31, 2021 It's been quite the week...it's felt like the first time in over a month that I've been getting back into my regular work rhythm. And I hope you've enjoyed the stories and lessons I've shared over the past week from my latest adventures in...
Coffee with Parris
Last week I decided to check out the Affiliate Summit East event at the Marriott Marquis hotel near Times Square in New York City. The first day it opened last Monday (after wasting way too much time standing in line to get my badge thanks to what seemed like a dated...
Fete(-ing) with Dan
When I was in O'ahu a few weeks ago, my husband and I had dinner with Dan Ferrari (known as the "Bearded Genius", or is that Jesus?) and his girlfriend. This dinner wasn't some spontaneous meet-up between two veteran copywriter pals. No, it was the result of an epic...
Justin and me
The first time I met Justin Goff, it was about 3 years ago in Cleveland, Ohio at one of Brian Kurtz's mastermind events. Justin was one of the speakers, and he gave a great presentation about sales-boosting funnel tactics. Things like simple order page tweaks that...
Dinner with Gary
I'm baaaaaaaaaack!!! And I have stories. Over the next week or two, you'll be hearing them...along with some valuable copywriting and marketing lessons, too. I'm going to share with you the stories and lessons gleaned from my dinner in New York city with Gary...
What all successful controls have in common…
Issue #134—June 18, 2021 It's a sunny, almost cool Spring-like day here where I am--so I've got my office window open. And something seems a bit off. It's actually quiet and peaceful outside. Something is missing. Oh, now I know what it is... No cicadas! That constant...
Using celebrity to rev up your copy
Issue #133—June 11, 2021 It's a rainy Friday afternoon here outside Washington, DC...a good day to stay inside and catch up on all the "to do's" on my list before the weekend. And seeing how I recently wrote to you about how to leverage "star power" in your copy to...
What to do about the slew of copywriter wanna-bes
Issue #132—June 4, 2021 FACT: There are more copywriters now than ever before. It used to be that once you racked up a few wins as a copywriter, you could easily collect hefty advances and book your calendar out a year or longer. You could also charge more for your...
The Classic M*ney Package
What's in Kim's Mailbox? Well, this week is off to a roaring start. It's already Wednesday yet it feels like Monday. I found myself nonstop busy yesterday making up for one day off. Yes, even us freelancers get waaaay behind when we take a simple holiday. In any case,...
“Old school” is cool again
Issue #131—May 28, 2021 In recent months, I've seen a surge of "online to offline to online" campaigns landing in my mailbox. I've written about some of them, like in this past issue here (scroll down for the "What's in Kim's Mailbox" breakdown). But within the past...
Where to find “hidden gold”
Convos with Kim Over the past few decades as a freelance copywriter, the vast majority of projects I've taken on have been acquisition promos: sales pages, magalogs, VSLs, etc. Acquiring new customers is the lifeblood of any business. It's a formidable challenge to...
How is great copy really made?
Issue #130—May 21, 2021 Over the past week or so, I've been talking about how some companies (and even so-called "goo roos") seem to think copywriters can be replaced by artificial intelligence (AI) software. I've shared some real-life nightmare stories from some of...
The Wolf of Weed Street
What's in Kim's Mailbox? Well over a decade ago, stock-pumping direct mail promos ostensibly selling a financial newsletter subscription were constantly stuffing my mailbox. Yes, I was "seeded" on many direct mail lists, including financial, which is probably why I...
The great AI scam?
Convos with Kim In last Friday's issue of Copy Insiders, I shared in detail my own experience in testing out a new AI (artificial intelligence) copywriting tool called "Conversion.AI". (If you missed it, you can read it on my blog here. It's called "Does this 'magic...
Does this “magic push button” AI tool live up to the hype?
Everyone's talking about artificial intelligence (AI) copywriting tools these days. To be honest, I've mostly shrugged off all the hype and haven't spent a single minute worried they're going to take my livelihood away. But over the past month or so, I've seen some...
Avoiding clients with “personality defects”
Convos with Kim In recent months I've been having some fantastic conversations with top marketers and copywriters on various podcasts. But chances are you're not always hearing about them! So I thought I'd start a regular feature where I share one of my latest "convos...
Sales-multiplying lessons to energize your results
"NASA"... "Nobel Prize-winning"... "Harvard doctors... "Stanford discovery"... "MIT scientists..." What do all of these have in common? They've earned me and many other copywriters a pretty penny in royalties when we've used these words and phrases in our promo...
Where to find headline fodder that calls out your prospect
Issue #128—April 28, 2021 These days I'm making an effort to waste less time on Facebook, but now and then I'll while away some time doing so. And it sometimes leads to a valuable idea. Case in point: the other day someone shared a post that asked you to name the #1...