Entrepreneur Days Photos Shows Many Of the Top Internet Marketers Before They Became Famous

In a few hours, my new friend Mike Lamb will interview me for his Moneyroom Internet radio show. Mike comes from the world of “real radio” — he was a major-market DJ in several cities — and I’m excited about the whole thing!

As I prepared for the interview, I dug deep into my memory and thought about what led me to where I am today. The most amazing thing I discovered was the powerful effect of the creative process has had across the broad span of my life.

Everything builds on everything else. What I’m doing today, and why I’m particularly suited for it, for example, traces back to age five when I created “The C&D Company” with my best friend Chris Soulen. I don’t know what we were selling, but, it does let me say I’ve been a business owner for 46 years!

In writing copy, not only does everything build on everything else, but, you can ethically and profitably use simple creativity to shortcut the time and effort needed to come up with the words that sell.

Am I saying you build your life the same way you write your copy? Well… a life has far more to it than even the best piece of killer copy… but… in a sense, I am.

Because…

… one thing builds on another in copy, and when you get the right combination, 1 + 1 = 3.

At least.

For instance, if you are as “seasoned” as I am, you may remember the old ad campaign (I think it was in the 1960s) for Avis Car rentals:

We’re Number Two… We Try Harder

From what I remember, those six words wrung a lot of money out of the market for Avis. Even to the point (and this is just a rumor I’ve heard, but it’s very probable), Avis continued to use the “We’re Number Two… ” slogan after it overtook Hertz and was in fact Number One in its marketplace…

… just because those words worked so well.

I’m indebted to Gene Schwartz, author of Breakthrough Advertising, for explaining how this particular bit of creativity worked. He called it “emotional math.”

The idea is that when you have two phrases that together leave a lot unsaid between them, you get people thinking… and if you can get them thinking in the right direction, that can turn into a lot of business.

You see, there’s brilliance in that phrase, because it would make sense that the number-two player in a business would try harder, since they need to in order to reach the top spot.

And wouldn’t you rather rent your car from someone who’s trying harder? Don’t you expect you’d be treated better? Given extra accommodations when you needed it?

In fact, wouldn’t you expect the rates to be more competitive, the cars to be cleaner, the selection to be wider?

All of those are things a customer might think, just from those six words.

Now, here are two important points for you to consider as you begin to expand your own creativity:

Creativity doesn’t need to be exotic or unique. In fact, the best creativity comes from the unusual combination of fairly mundane or familiar elements. “We’re number two” is hardly a stroke of genius; “we try harder” doesn’t sound like that much, either. But put together in the way that they were, those words were an oil gusher for Avis.

It’s all under your nose or behind it (in your brain). Creativity doesn’t need to take place anywhere else, although it can. But it doesn’t have to. You can find things right on your desk, or in your car, or from your car radio, or in your newspaper, or in a conversation with a loved on, or in your memory bank… and put them together in different combinations.
A lot of your potential for using your creativity to write better copy is shifting from the view that the world is a fixed place, set in its ways, with limited opportunities…

… to the more proactive view that the world is a treasure chest of ingredients, and you have the right and the power to recombine those ingredients so as to make money!

It sounds so simple.

It is.

Go ahead. Try it. You’ll see.

David Garfinkel is one of the best copywriters on the internet and was a speaker at Armand Morin’s Big Seminar Series and Carl Galletti’s Internet Marketing Super Conference. You can learn more about his books and training courses by clicking the links below.

David Garfinkel is founder of the World Copywriting institute and is considered by many people to be the best teacher of copywriting in the world. The stated mission of the World Copywriting Institute is to “eradicate copywriting illiteracy in the world.” Jay Conrad Levinson, author of the world’s best selling series of marketing books, Guerrilla Marketing, says, “David Garfinkel is the best copywriter I know.” Sign up for David’s free World Copywriting Newsletter. and you get a free one-hour downloadable teleseminar on copywriting. Also visit David’s World Copywriting Blog:

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