I just used a sneaky, manipulative marketing tactic to get you to read this.
Let me tell you what it is. Then, let me tell you why you should absolutely hate me for doing this to you.
The tactic: I click-baited you!
Just in case you’ve been living under a rock, click-bait is writing a headline in such a way that the reader can’t help themselves but to click. (Usually with a lame pay-off for doing so.)
In my case, I actually used a tool to give me a bunch of click-bait headline ideas until I had one I could work with. (Side note, if you’re a fan of Cards Against Humanity, you can have hours of fun doing some rather inhumane things with the click-bait tool. My kids can’t figure out why I keep laughing out loud — and won’t let them see my phone!)
I knew I wanted to write about marketing tactics. And specifically, to deliver a very useful lesson. (Still below, I promise!) So I entered “marketing tactics” into the generator.
It gave me some gems like these:
— 7 things about marketing tactics that science can’t explain
— The marketing tactics at ClickBank will melt your heart into a happy puddle
— 8 ways men try to use marketing tactics to get laid
— Popular ways of exploiting marketing tactics pioneered by Gary Vaynerchuk
— The 5 most surprising marketing tactics of all time
All of which could have easily turned into an article. Another day, perhaps…
Then finally, it gave me this:
— 8 reasons to hate marketing tactics
Now, I’m too lazy to come up with 8 reasons in an hour and write about them, and really, I just wanted to talk about one thing, so I edited it down to…
One big reason to hate this marketing tactic!
Which actually plays to the “1 weird trick” and “One thing” formula…
With the same kind of read-it-to-find-out specificity of “Do you make these mistakes in English?”
In fact, I kinda like it as a headline! Enough so, I guess to use it for this article.
So…
Why should you hate it?
Well, aside from the fact that I might get penalized by Facebook and others for using headlines that follow an explicit click-bait formula… (You DO know they do that, right?)
The bigger problem with it is the same problem that exists in ALL marketing tactics…
Specifically, tactics are VERY situation-specific.
I’ve written before, and I’ll write again, about my architecture of a skill model.
Specifically, tactics are built on techniques, which are built on strategies, which are built on principles.
A great marketer starts from principles. (Like the 17 principles in my Think Like an A-List Copywriter program now available at BTMSinsiders.)
With the right principles, you can decide on the right strategy for the situation, then apply the best techniques, and use specific tactics at the implementation level.
So in this essay, modeling a click-bait headline for a marketing essay that actually talks about click-bait might work…
But, if you are, for example, selling home heating systems, taking that same template and saying, “One big reason to hate this winter weather” could fly, or it might not.
This is the same problem with all swiping and copying. If you start at the tactical level and try to copy that, you’ll most often end up with something that falls flat.
I actually have a really good story about this, the one about the copywriter whose epic fail almost cost him his career…
Okay that’s maybe a little too much click-bait. But then again, maybe not.
For a client a few years back, I was recruiting copywriters. I set it up as a spec challenge, just because I was going out to the unwashed masses trying to find talent.
There was a lot of variation in the talent, but it was clear that everybody was trying to be original, except this one guy…
I read this one guy’s copy, and it just felt odd. Like, there were moments of brilliance. But the underlying message was kind of messy. And some of the copy seemed a little familiar.
Copy… Paste… Google…
And I figured out that there were large blocks of blatantly-swiped copy in there. Like, he pretended like copy from various top copywriters acted as puzzle pieces he could piece together into his own masterpiece.
But here’s a little hint about doing that. Even if you can get a bunch of pieces from different puzzles to fit together, you’re going to end up with an ugly result.
I called the guy on it, and he blew up. Not just at me, he went through the client’s customer service channels.
Needless to say, he didn’t get a project from us.
If you’re using the tactics alone, swiping leads to crap. If you understand the principles of effective direct response, the strategy of using strong emotional copy, the techniques involved in writing a good promotion, and then decide to swipe a few words here and there…
Well, great copywriters do that all the time.
But when you start at the tactics, you invariably end up with that ugly result.
The same applies with any marketing lesson you might learn…
You see this all the time in the guru biz.
Some guru comes up with a tactic that works for them, in their guru business. They package it up and put a shiny label on it, and sell it for $2,000 or more.
Because their followers and conditioned to buy, buy, buy, they do…
They learn the tactic…
They try it…
And it doesn’t work.
As humans, we’re wired to blame ourselves in this situation. Guru XYZ said this works. And they wouldn’t be a guru if they didn’t know what worked. So it’s probably my fault that I couldn’t make it work.
And trust me, the easiest thing to do from the guru’s perspective is to agree with you.
Sure, it’s your fault.
Sure, you did it wrong.
When really, you were destined for failure in the first place.
Because their guru tactic for selling more guru shiny object tactics doesn’t work when you are selling HVAC systems, or financial newsletters, or welcome appointments in a professional practice, or…
There are PRINCIPLES that are universal. The TACTICS are not.
But they sell you the tactics like they are, and let you believe yourself when your first reaction to it not working is that it was your fault.
So, why should you hate me?
Because I demonstrated and even taught a tactic without laying a principle-based groundwork first.
So, what is the principle to writing a real, from-the-heart headline that will get clicks WITHOUT being forced into a click-bait-generator’s template claptrap?
Well, it doesn’t hurt to have studied 10,000 headlines to see the universalities. Such as the word WITHOUT that I used above. Get what you want WITHOUT what you don’t want.
But ultimately it comes down to three things.
— Is there a benefit?
— Does it provoke curiosity?
— Does it promise value by reading further?
Then, in your body copy, fulfill on all that.
Do that, and you’ve done a pretty good job.
Do that, and you might just create some breakthroughs…
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
PS: If you find yourself really compelled by click-bait headlines, don’t read what comes next:
11 things you think you understand about customer lifetime value but you really don’t… Click here.
(Sorry, couldn’t help myself!)
