Episode 36: Talking About The Copywriter Framework with Todd Jones

Show Notes

00:11

This special episode is with my good friend Tom Jones. Todd is a copywriter at copy fight calm. Todd has developed an amazing framework for developing copy for your website. Please sit back relax as we discuss this new product. Also be sure to listen to the entire episode, as there’s a special offer for you. That is available only till tomorrow. Without further ado, my friend, Todd Jones. Okay, I’m here with Todd Jones today and we’re gonna talk copywriting How are you?

00:49

Well, it’s not quite as hot today. So maybe I’ll do okay. I don’t have me whether unfortunately.

00:56

Yeah, it’s it’s getting to be fallen, fallen more follow up here. So down here, you can have it. So one of the things that Todd’s done recently is he’s put together a copy writers framework. So I wanted to start to ask you, why did you develop it? And who’s it geared at? And what’s the benefit of it?

01:20

Wow. Okay, that’s three questions. Um, basically, as I was doing copywriting projects, I needed to have a process for myself, that was repeatable, that I could use for every project. And I put all that together. And in the process of these little worksheets that were kind of meant to be lead magnets. And Paul Lacey said, Hey, man, these are good, you should sell them. Really? Okay. So I started putting those together and, and just kept adding things to the package. And but I think one of the problems was website content website copy, especially when a lot of developers are trying to get it from their client who, who chooses to do the content themselves, the client is a little unsure about what to do that, you know, the blank screen syndrome, what am I writing here? Why am I writing this? And so the framework is to help with that. So you have a little bit of a skeleton framework for what to include, on your homepage, your about page and your service page. And I’ll give a the copyright framework I use for those is very simple. One that a lot of copywriters use, not certainly not unique to me. And it’s pa SS stands for problem agitate solution. So we use that in there. I developed my about page from some resources that I actually refer to in the framework. And I’ve built worksheets to help fill in some details. So if you go through the framework, you will at least have thought about what’s your one line, your benefit phrase, your one line benefit. copywriters, and marketers call it a value proposition. But basically, it’s a one line or one sentence one or two sentence long benefits statement about your business. And then you’ll also think about the benefits and of the pain points. To write effective copy. For those pages, you need to know what problems are solving and what those benefits are. And then it’s like I liken it to building a building with Legos or something, you’re, you’re playing together individual parts, and you’re building the building. And so that’s kind of how that’s laid out. So you have a number of worksheets, you have blog posts that turn into ebooks that are in there to kind of give you more context for the about page and homepage. And just pretty much everything maybe if you hired me to do a these three pages for you. I will be walking you through this. So basically you’re getting the worksheets and the process that I would use to write your website copy.

04:28

And isn’t one of the biggest problems we all know is we talked about you talked about the blank syndrome page. It’s also its own, there’s time you, you know web developer, an agency goes to them. He says we can hire a copywriter, not a copywriter and they say no. I don’t want to spend the cost, right? That’s an issue. And so and they sit down and then they sit on the copy for three weeks. And the poor web agency saying well where’s my stuff?

04:56

Yeah, you know, I understand because a good copywriter you cost you as much as the builder, the website. And so not every business has that in their budget. I remember one time when I was working with agency, I got a colleague on a project, that I pretty much did everything except for the design that was handed to me from the girl in the office. And it was for a local company in the state where I live. And they had two or three locations. And so I’d project manage the project, I built the I develop the design, the website, and I was supposed to input the content from the client, I believe the guy had said that I will have my wife to do she has an English degree. A year later, we finally launched the website. People underestimate the, the how hard it is to do copy, business, and also under estimate the value of that copy. So you say oh, well, it costs, you know, several $1,000 to build the site. But the truth is, if you launch a site with nothing in it, it’s not going to do any good. So, you know, it is it’s, uh, you know, it’s I, I’ve had developers to tell me, he will say, we’ll just put something in there, I don’t really think you want your developer to put lorem ipsum in there, you’re not going to go very far with that. So you’ve got to have copy there is got to be reasonable, make sense. And the goal of the site usually, is to get someone to take action. So your copy needs to be able to do that, you’re not going to take this and write, copy on par with the best copywriters. But I do introduce you to some very basic copywriting principles that you can implement, you’re still going to need to write the content. So if you go through all this framework, you think about some stuff that a lot of marketers would have to think about. At the end of the day, somebody’s still gonna have to write the content, they’re gonna have to put two words together, sentences together, paragraphs, and so forth, is still gonna have to be done, but you have the information you have built, you know that part out, you should be able to hand it to a writer, and you like him take that and build. Now, ideally, it could be me, but either way, if you have somebody you’re not, so people, just miss Missa, or underestimate the amount of time it takes to do a project like that. And they think they’re going to come home at night at the end of the day, and sit down with their computer and write some stuff. And, and you might be able to do that, if you’re not too tired, or don’t have other things pressing, but it’s certainly not gonna be very effective. So this way, you can at least write something somewhat effective with some structure to it. And, you know, again, like I said, You’re still probably gonna need a writer. It can be somebody in your town or somebody on your staff, they would have the information to put it together. And you might want an extra set of eyes for you to edit. You know, just to make sure things are cleaned out. You know, I’ve made this quote many times, and I can remember it while I’m on the on the spot, but, you know, the, the cure for writer’s block, is research. That is something that Joanna Wiebe from copy hackers likes to say, yeah. And that’s basically what you’re doing here, you know, your writer’s block, you’re not sure what’s going to be written? Well, in this case, you will, because you’ll have done the work. So

08:51

I think that’s the key to any block to be honest with it, whether it’s regice, Bach, design, Bach is to is to research and I think the other key is sometimes if you’re having a tough time with it, just honestly, put it down and go for a walk.

09:07

Yeah, yeah, what I like to do is because I sometimes my articles is that the writer, written in blocks, literally blocks all open up Notepad, write that section, but you know, you just write in the use of more crude word, but your crappy first draft is write it, get it out, you can always go back and clean up, you can go back and find resources. You can go back and add examples. All that stuff needs to be done, but if you don’t just write it, get it on the page. You know, it’ll be stuck in your head. If you’re worried about all this stuff. As you go. You’ll never get out of your head. You know, Brendan Hufford says and on the right things just to get out of my head. And you know, that’s the truth, but you got to write it. You know, no matter how bad it is, because if you don’t start by writing it, it stays stuck in your head. We get better Realize that Oh, it’s got to be perfect. And oh, Scott, I’ve got to have this. I got to have that. And often, that’s what I do I just write it write that terrible first draft. And then I may let it sit for a day, or go for a walk or go. Yeah, yeah. You know, play with the cat or something. So,

10:17

yeah, yeah, those cat gifts. You know, we know all about those

10:22

vendors, the king of the cat. Yes.

10:23

Yeah, it did shout out to the vendor. There’s no question. I’ve already gotten three this morning. So there you go, including ones with a cat with a crown. But that’s another story. So this is the first product you’ve launched. It had its challenges we know that. Do you want to talk about a little bit about the process about how you launch the product? Well,

10:51

you know, a lot of things were already put together the terms of some of the worksheets and stuff I had done. And I mean, I had offered the majority of that pack earlier this year to the agency trailblazers conference, and a few people download it. One of those persons was Paul Lacey, and he’s the one and this is gold, turn into product. And so so some of that stuff was already done. When I decided to go, so I decided that maybe some of it needed to not be so crude looking. So we did some designing, or even the worksheets, I tried to design a cover page and make it look a little bit prettier use designer for a lot of that the SI g in our our i o or.co, whatever, it was a good product. I think that’s one of those lockdown drills I got, we talked about ltds earlier, I think that’s one of those Ltd is a good one too. And I use it for that, too. Some of those sheets, and then a graphic designer friend of mine took the the core part of it, it centers around and did the brand name and the graphics for it did that for me, you know, for complimentary. And so it turned out really nice. And then the vendor, I wrote the copy for the page, actually build a page. But I wrote the copy and the vendor took it and made it look like it is now. So using the information, the graphic design from friends looks pretty nice.

12:28

And then you’re using gumroad right to distribute Yeah,

12:32

I am, I’ve played around with different ideas of early on, the vendor recommended that to me, because he’s used it to sell things in the past is pretty straightforward, you know, they take their cut out of it, every everything you use is going to take a cut out of it. So that happens, it would have been nice maybe to have had a setup where I’m just using stripe, it would have been a little bit of a cut, but it may be in the future, we’ll we’ll use that. But gumroad was a great way to go start off, you know, they host the files. And all you have to do is to go in there and download the files. But I foresee maybe in the future uses something a little bit more personal. We’re cut out some of the fees, but certainly getting it out the door. gumroad was absolutely the best way to go. And I think you know, I’ve seen people put other service products or services in gumroad. So, you know, it’s just real simple. They have a good platform. I got my first payout today. Best I can tell with that. Good in your bank account this morning to do it. Yeah, it was enough to go get a an online of biscuits gravy this morning. So yeah, that’s pretty, pretty pleased with that. And I don’t know my stick with it. But, you know, you think down the road, maybe I can host it a little bit more, maybe use a easy digital downloads or something like that. And stripe, you know, I could probably cut back on some of that. But you know what it was still, I’m still pretty pleased with the amount that came down this morning. So, I mean, the only way would have been better if it had been twice as much. I don’t think those fees really wouldn’t make that much of a difference in how I felt about it.

14:15

Yep. And, and then you did some promotion in some groups and to some friends and you know, somebody was asking

14:23

me how I promoted it. And I said, well, it’s really very organic. You know, I had some friends that volunteered to share it for me. Some I wouldn’t expect him to whenever I thought well I could probably get the vendor to not so he told me he was gonna NASA degree. I could probably only I’m not gonna get this person or that person but I have to be able to step up and say, Hey, let me share this for you and one was there and plan. She’s got a really nice following. She’s a real real nice lady and just you know, and then some other friends that volunteered to share it on Twitter or whatnot and give me some really nice you know, a really nice Motion about it. And yeah, it’s been, I’ve been able to share a few groups here and there. And so there’s not been, I’ve told some other friends by especially the copywriting world that I’ve done what I’ve done without spending a dime. And they’re, they’re really amazed that I sold 24 in two weeks with without spending any money. And I guess that is pretty good. There’s certainly some more things I can do. The vendor talks about, and it’s a good idea, I’ve had a chance to do it, but doing some videos, you know, shows and stuff that I can put out, I’ll probably do that try to do that when I get more time. I could still write some articles on the coffee flat blog, and maybe some more, you know, I have somebody who’s interviewing me a q&a article. And once I get that done, that’ll probably help a little bit, I’ve had other people to offer to sell it and on their platform. So most of this right here is just relational. You know,

16:01

Bill, back to the whole relationship marketing discussion, and yeah, you know, you and I have talked about how marketing is, is a lot about the relationships you’ve built over the years. And that’s where the friends and the articles and the platforms all come into place.

16:19

I think that’s why a lot of people, you know, I used to think that, and I think this is still the case, you know, you you wait to sell something when you when you after you’ve been doing stuff for a while, right? You know, you don’t sell stuff to first year in business because you know, you know exactly, but that is partly that, you know, you spent you gain some experience and some knowledge that you can share it. So that comes with time. But I think another reason people maybe do that is because you build up relationships over a period of time. That that can really help you when you launch something like this. So a good example of this is Joe Becky’s a conversion copywriter.

16:59

We both know Joe

17:02

runs a product service business and he still does his copywriting conversion copywriting consulting. But earlier this year, he launched the training and the there just two videos and the slide deck for each one that I got in the first round, and cost me 99 bucks for both of them. I don’t know what it costs sales now things more. And he started by getting a list. He started list like last year, and he had pretty good, it was basically Hey, I’m helping freelance copywriter freelancers. And so people signed up. But he also had this fast network from his time when he did SEO before he ever did copyright. So he had SEO connections. And he had he did a lot of content log in when he first started writing and switch to conversion copywriting. He’s been on stage speaking at conferences and and he’s got all this, you know, exposure. And that was just him doing what he does. Then he launched this, this thing. And I think these two videos are great for anybody who is freelancing and has to sell themselves, because the first one he calls fishing with dynamite, and it’s about how to build the authority to get people to come to you. The second one is about closing sell, which I met if I ever get back to where I’m selling something, I need to go back and re watch that video really good video. But the bottom line is Joe, I don’t think he spent any money on promoting that either. He had people promoting it for him, because he is a super helpful person to eat freelancer. And he drops. hate to say so cliche, but he drops knowledge bombs in the copywriter club, Facebook group all the time. But that’s what relationships do. Yes. He and I, like I said, I don’t think he spent any money promoting that. And if I remember right, he said he made enough to help put a down payment on the house, his first house for him, his wife and his little boy. So pretty good deal. And yeah, relationships can make a huge difference.

19:07

Yeah, you know, you’ve heard me say this, I, I attribute marketing stuff that kind of like dating, it takes time to build that relationship and get to get to the end point. And then when you get there, you know what you’ve kind of got and, and anything worth working, worth worth? It takes time to get there. Like it’s not like let’s go from A to A million in one day. It’s it’s all about that build, right? So.

19:37

Yeah. And, you know, I guess the lessons you learn when you beat your head against the wall because things aren’t working too well, until you get to that point. But, you know, I mean, I definitely felt a little bit of, you know, I told I think it was Joel was telling us, like, you know, I felt a little posture syndrome right before I watched it because I thought, What do people think I’m done? What do people don’t want Via, you know, and into. So to get that kind of response out of the day gate was pretty good. Now we’ve gotten stagnant last couple of days to figure out how to reignite that.

20:14

So, Todd, if somebody really wants to get your framework, I think I think they should, first of all, they should go out and get it. You have a special running right now, I

20:24

think, until next week for 47. Some Yeah, we’re gonna cut that off on Tuesday. Looks like working with the vendor on that he’s not the change on the website. But yeah, right now it’s 47 of us launch price. And it’s going to go back tonight, it’s going to go up to 97, which will be the regular price, as of Tuesday or Wednesday, we’ll get that change. So if you get there Tuesday, and we haven’t changed it, Lucky you, it’s gonna, we’re gonna change it somewhat Tuesday, back to $97. And I’ve had multiple people tell me, including Kindle, that it definitely should be $97. So

21:04

I felt I think it should be 197. But that’s,

21:07

well, it probably should be and maybe we’ll do something down the road where you can buy three different versions, you know, just just the framework, and then a framework and a session with me and framework. And I don’t know, maybe we’ll figure that out down the road. But it was submitted to me as kind of a proof of concept. Okay. once people start saying, hey, yeah, uses with client, which Paul Lacey did do that, by the way. He took all the frame, took all those worksheets backwards. From agency trailblazers, and he did that use it. Yeah, did a consulting gig with one of his clients to do walking through content. So it’s something I would like to see a few more people do that. But you know, that I feel like it’s a proof of concept really opportunity for me to say, Yeah, it really worked out of these many customers who have used it with their clients, or I foresee it didn’t even have to be a web consultant using it, or even a digital consultant using it with their clients. Business owners who are very much do it yourselfers, I could see them buying and we have a lot of people that are do it yourselfers and understandable maybe they’ve learned how to build a WordPress website or whatever. It doesn’t matter if you’re building WordPress website or Wix website or Squarespace website, it doesn’t matter what you’re building with, you still got to have the copy, you still don’t have the framework. So I can foresee it being used by do it yourself, you know, business owners as well. So we’ll probably eventually do a landing page just for that in the future. So

22:44

yeah, and and how does somebody buy your product?

22:48

Well, a copy fly.com slash WTF, I’m sure you’ll put them. Put that link in your notes, but I will. That is the landing page. I tried to keep it pretty, pretty simple. And you can buy it from there, you click the button, it’s basically a pop up for gumroad. But you can buy it there. And that’s where I have it now.

23:11

So and if they have any questions has the best way to get ahold of you.

23:15

Tell them to call rough Karen’s questions for you? Uh, well, Ty at coffee flat.com is my email so you can email me there and, and I’ll try to answer your questions for you. Tell me what you think about the rafters. Go ahead and

23:32

email me. Yeah, thanks. For those since we’re doing audio, I am wearing the Raptors hat again this morning. And it’s almost that time. So thanks, Todd. Good luck with the product and have a great day.

23:47

Thank you sir.

23:48

Thank you for listening to the SDM business marketing WordPress podcast. The show is hosted by Robert Cairns the CEO and Chief Creative mazing idea stunning digital marketing.com. This podcast comes out every week. It’s available on all podcast platforms. If you’d like to be a guest on this podcast, please email us at podcast at stunning digital marketing comm if you’d like to find out more about traditional marketing services we provide please go to stunning digital marketing.com This podcast is dedicated to Bruce Cairns. Have an amazing week. Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars. Make your business succeed.