I’ve mentioned this magnificent Robert Greene book before:
“The 33 Strategies of War”
Most people I know in business talk up Greene’s 48 Laws of Power.
But in my opinion 33 Strategies of War is far more useful.
It’s simply chock-full of great business advice.
Including advice about copywriting, marketing, selling, influence, persuasion, customer service, negotiation, dealing with (and profiting from) trolls, building out email campaigns, hiring employees or team members, building a company, outselling your competition, seizing market share, list curation, acquiring new clients, making more sales, and the list goes on.
None of these lessons are checklist “do this, this, and this…” style.
And you have to be looking for the lessons.
But they are all throughout the book.
Take this part about content creation:
(Context: Publisher Samuel Adams’ campaign to turn the colonists against the English)
“The colonists had had a high opinion of the English, but not after Adams’s relentless campaign. To succeed, Adams had to resort to exaggeration, picking out and emphasizing the cases in which the English were heavy-handed. His was not a balanced picture; he ignored the ways in which the English had treated the colonies rather well. His goal was not to be fair but to spark a war, and he knew that the colonists would not fight unless they saw the war as just and the British as evil. In working to spoil your enemy’s moral reputation, do not be subtle. Make your language and distinctions of good and evil as strong as possible; speak in terms of black and white. It is hard to get people to fight for a gray area.”
There is literally centuries of wisdom in that for the content creator.
Literally nobody cares about much less remembers “fair & balanced.”
Yes, they may emotionally respond to the term.
(i.e., Fox News, which like all news is neither fair or balanced.)
But fair & balanced content = boring content.
Boring content = little or no engagement with your content.
Little or no engagement with your content = little Tommy can’t get that Playstation for Christmas.
Something else to think about:
There’s no passion in fair & balanced.
And, I would argue such content is inherently dishonest anyway.
At the very best you’ll be ignored.
At the worst your enemies will simply use it against you.
Whatever the case:
A lot of content creation comes down to something one of my favorite marketing teachers Sean D’Souza has been teaching for years about consumption. Everyone teaches attraction & conversion. Hardly anyone teaches — much less practices — the importance of consumption of content. Without that consumption you get a sale which I suppose is nice. But without consumption — and eager consumption at that — you’re not really building a relationship. You’re not making the next sale in advance. And you’re not really adding anything to anyone’s life, including your own, as that one-time sales will be pissed away before you know it.
All of this is especially true when it comes to high ticket content.
i.e., the kind of content people pay you hundreds or even thousands for.
Enter the December “Email Players” issue.
It’s all about some ways I use to create high-ticket content.
There’s a reason I “get away” with selling books that range from $188 to $1001.00.
Many of them not even that thick in page count.
And that reason is understanding how to create content in a way that has impact, that sticks in the mind, that makes people more likely to apply & use (and therefore benefit from) the content… which can potentially lead to great testimonials, great word-of-mouth, and great long term sales & high quality leads that swim “upstream” to find you, buy from you, and become a lifelong customer who spreads the “gospel” of your business to everyone they know in the same market.
This isn’t something you can always track with a spreadsheet.
But you can track sales trends and feedback.
It simply takes time, patience, and a willingness to learn.
To subscribe in time for the December issue, go here immediately: