I quickly drove out of a parking lot thinking there was a driveway there but, oops, there wasn’t. Clunk went the front tires. I hate it when that happens.

To make matters more fun, the street I proceeded to drive on had broken glass all over it.

I was already in a nervous state because I was lost in the bad part of town, as they say, and the scenery was, um, not very inviting. I hoped my front tires weren’t damaged, as I didn’t want to get stranded there.

Well, I was in a big city, actually, not a town. One I had never driven around in much before all by myself so I was relying on my Blackberry’s GPS.

Of course the GPS sent me to the bad part of town instead of my actual destination.

I should have trusted my instincts and taken the exit that I was actually familiar with, and figured out my way from there, instead of trusting stupid GPS, but I thought GPS would be more efficient. Ha!

I picked up my Blackberry and tried to find a different address to plug into the GPS, but I didn’t have my reading glasses with me and I was feeling too panicked anyway to have the patience to type on a tiny keyboard, so I tried calling my daughter so she could Google a different address for me from her computer.

Of course she didn’t answer, so I threw my phone on the floor and decided to use my wits to get out of the bad part of town.

Well, what do you know. Using my wits actually worked! Funny how that happens.

Sometimes when running a business we end up in the “bad part of town” too.

You know, those panicky moments that happen when, say, a marketing campaign didn’t have the results you wanted.

Or a piece of software that was critical to a particular task didn’t work the way it was supposed to.

Or a member of your team wasn’t there when you needed them.

It can be scary in the bad part of town, but your fears must be your agenda every day, even in business, so those trips to the bad part of town are a good thing.

As Tim Ferriss says, “What we fear doing is usually what we most need to do…Resolve to do one thing each day that you fear.”

“Believability is far and away the most important requirement of advertising,” said the late great copywriter Bernice Fitz-Gibbon.

Here are four ways to write believable copy (quotes below are from Bernice):

1. Love people.

2. “Sharpen your powers of observation. Learn to look at a thing as if you’ve never really seen it before in your life.”

3. Be inquisitive and acquisitive. Good copywriters are “curious about people, curious about new products, curious about everything.”

4. Write what you hear. This means writing the way people in your market talk.

It’s been said Hemingway looked at everything around him as if it was his last day of being alive. A copywriter – especially an email copywriter who has to come up with multiple stories for email copy on a regular basis – should do the same.

Early in my copywriting career someone in a copywriting forum mentioned how copywriter legend Eugene Schwartz recommended setting an egg timer and writing in 33 minute chunks.

He wrote in six 33 minute blocks of time every morning and took 5 minute breaks in between.

In my case, it also works when I do 2-3 blocks in the morning and the remaining in the afternoon or evening.

I’ve since learned that the six 33 minute segments should be done in their order of priority.

Do the most difficult task first,  or the thing that will most move forward your business today, whether it’s writing bullets for a sales letter, writing a blog post, prepping for an important phone call, etc.

I reply to emails and dabble in social media and Google Reader outside of those 33 minute segments.

33 minutes of concentrating solely on one particular task with pure concentration is always more productive for me than, say, three hours of writing a little, checking Facebook, writing a little more, checking email, doing some research, etc.

It helps if you choose the 6 tasks the evening before and list them in their order of priority. I list mine in Gmail’s handy little task list.

I use this free online egg timer when timing my 33 minute segments. It doesn’t have a pause button so it really keeps me on track. The buzzer is nice and loud.

I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to stand up and take at least a 5 minute break doing something completely different when the buzzer goes off.

Anyway, that’s my tip for the day.

Copywriters put a lot of effort into subject lines, but there’s a field that’s even more important… the from field.

Get that wrong and your subject line and email won’t get read at all.

Let’s take this email I got from the Netflix CEO today as an example:

Like most people, I quickly glance at the from column in my inbox first.

I noticed “Reed Hastings, Co-Founder” and didn’t know who the heck that was. I almost trashed it but gave it a second chance because of the subject line.

It turns out Reed Hastings is the CEO of Netflix. Who knew? I didn’t, even though I’ve been a customer for several years. I probably don’t know the names of the CEOs of any of the companies I pay bills to every month.

The from field should have read, “Reed Hastings, Netflix CEO & Co-Founder.” Then “Reed Hastings, Netflix” would have appeared in the from field of my inbox and I would have opened it without almost accidentally deleting it.

If you’re a copywriter, always ask a client what they intend to put in the from field and advise them accordingly. It might seem like a trivial detail but it’s not.

By the way, I like the rest of the Netflix email. I always admire it when someone has the courage to open an email with “I messed up. I owe everyone an explanation.” Plus, I’m a happy instant streaming customer, and hate messing with DVDs, so I’m not in a snit over their new biz model.

Last night I emailed a friend this video of Madonna dissing some flowers a fan gave her:

So I recently found myself standing at a busy intersection, whistling like a mad woman.

I drew WTF looks from drivers but I didn’t care.

There was a cockatiel in a tree and I was determined to rescue it.

I knew I had my work cut out for me, however, because I was a stranger to the bird and didn’t know his name.

Cockatiels are friendly birds but won’t fly to the shoulder of just anyone.

He was cheeping the way cockatiels cheep when they are anxious or calling out to a cockatiel buddy.

I imitated that cheep as best as I could and made eye contact with him. He calmed down.

He wasn’t budging, though, so I walked to the other side of the tree and started whistling songs cockatiels usually know: the wolf whistle, the Adams Family and Andy Griffith theme songs.

He kept staring at me and gradually felt safe enough to fly to a lower branch.

I wanted to close the deal, however, especially when the waiter at a nearby Mexican restaurant… the guy who made me aware of the cockatiel’s presence in the first place… said sadly, “If you don’t rescue him, he’ll die, won’t he.”

Pressure.

Stress.

Plus, cockatiels are nomadic creatures when in the wild, so I knew I had to close the deal now or never.

This anxiety was making it hard for me to continue to whistle, so I switched tactics and started saying words a cockatiel might know:

“Food.” “Water.” “Step up.” “Pretty bird.”

I used a sing song-y voice in a higher register than my normal speaking voice because cockatiels like higher pitches.

Those words really got his attention and he kept dropping down to lower branches one at a time until he was on the lowest branch.

Suddenly there was a flurry of feathers but I remained still.

He landed on my head.

I ever so carefully walked to my car and slid into the front seat.

He insisted on remaining on my shoulder so I let him stay there during the drive home so as to maintain my bond of trust with him.

Sometimes he hopped onto my head, which probably drew more WTF looks from drivers, but I didn’t care.

The moment I put him into the bird cage at home (we have a small aviary of parakeets and cockatiels at home) he wagged his tail from side to side vigorously, the way cockatiels do when they are happy.

Then he ate and drank for 30 minutes straight.

Which brings us to the “La-Di-Frickin’-Da, what does this have to do with my business” part of the post.

First, there isn’t any one thing that closes the deal when selling to a customer.

Sure, I could conclude that my using words like “food” were what closed the deal, and that I should just launch straight into that if I ever happen upon a cockatiel in the wild again.

Just like some marketers think their fancy-pants sales page is what closes the deal and they fixate on that and neglect their email list.

But it was a large sales funnel, so to speak, beginning with his previous owner, who, based on what I now know of his temperament, clearly had a loving bond with this bird, enabling him to give me the time of day in the first place.

She probably cried and kicked herself for days afterwards when he escaped during a half second of inattention, but her care for him the years beforehand played a huge role in my being able to save him.

The other parts of the funnel:

I spoke/whistled in his language.

I very clearly communicated I had something he desperately needed – food.

I focused completely on him and drew upon the very specific knowledge I have about cockatiels so I could build trust. I didn’t focus on myself at all.

I didn’t rush or push for the sale.

See?

Marketing really is for the birds.

Talk soon.

P. S.  Bottom line: send out a variety of emails to your list. Use a combination of stories and how-to info to gradually build trust.

Eventually one of those emails will finally hit the right hot button and snag the sale, thanks to the funnel that came before it.

It’s a tough thing to do on your own, however, so have a copywriter do it for you.

Lately I’ve been yapping about the importance of becoming more visible to your customers through email.

But how exactly do you accomplish that?

I think of it as the difference between being naked and being nekkid.

When you’re naked, you don’t have any clothes on.

When you’re nekkid, you don’t have any clothes on AND you’re
up to something.

The emails you send to your customers and prospects should be naked emails.

This means emails that are not dry, stuffy, and boring.

It’s OK to be yourself.

Tell a story.

Let your sense of humor show.

Be vulnerable and open up a vein and bleed once in a while.

Don’t agonize over unsubscribes and offending people.

You should also avoid sending nekkid emails.

Nekkid emails are the ones where you can tell they are up to something right away. You can spot the nekkid emails right away in the first sentence or two.

The email just goes on and on and on about whatever the business is selling.

You know that all they want is the sale. They have no interest in truly helping you or building a long term relationship with you.

So get naked, but not nekkid.

If you need helping getting naked in your emails, I’m more than happy to oblige.

In the Harry Potter books there’s something called an invisibility cloak.

Harry uses it to sneak around and spy or just to hide.

In the Harry Potter world, invisibility cloaks are pretty cool.

In the real world, not so much.

The problem is, in the real world, the invisibility cloak is always there when you don’t want it.

And it’s never there when you want it.

Just ask any introvert you know.

In a large group setting, sometimes it’s like we’re wearing an invisibility cloak and no one notices us.

Or else we’re cornered by a talkaholic and wish we had an invisibility cloak.

Or ask any parent.

When you want your kid to pay close attention to what you’re saying, his mind is on the latest free game app he’s just downloaded on his iPod Touch, so it’s like you’re wearing an invsibility cloak.

But when you lie down to take a nap, all of a sudden you’re the most fascinating person on earth to the child. She wakes you up to ask you when dinner will be ready and you wish your blanket was an invisibility cloak.

Every business has their invisibility cloak moments too.

Let’s face it, no matter how successful you are, there are times there aren’t a lot of orders. Your email is deathly quiet and you wish you could shed the invisibility cloak.

Other times you’re working hell for leather around the clock and wish you could put on your invisibility cloak for a while.

The best way to ditch your invisibility cloak and be consistently visible to your customers is through email.

Using email in this way requires a certain touch, however. So contact me today and see if we can work together to build an email campaign that turns your prospects into customers.