Wizard of Ads Monday Morning Memo

Step 1: Become extremely good at something. Anything.“Do you see a man skilled in his work? He will stand before kings; He will not stand before obscure men.” – from the book of Proverbs, chapter 22Step 2: Push beyond the boundaries of what’s known.Investigate the unknown. Speculate. Theorize. Experiment. Learn from your mistakes. If you can say only what you’ve read in books, you’re a parrot. Polly want a cracker?Step 3: Speak plainly. Use examples.Clients don’t want theories, they want pragmatic, tested, what-to-do-now advice. The business of a consultant isn’t merely to have opinions, but to sell them. Tell your client what you know and how you know it. Tell them what you’ve seen.Step 4: Consult without pay until someone offers to pay.You’re going to need a day job until folks figure out how good you are. Experience – deep and wide – is essential. If you work really hard and are lucky it'll still be at least 2 years before you begin to gain some traction. Be committed. Don’t worry; just keep getting better. The kings will find you.Step 5: Avoid Fools.Lazy people, dishonest people and impatient people will always find a path to catastrophe. Don’t let them take you down it. Some people are going to fail regardless of what you tell them. Learn to spot them early. Don’t take their money.Step 6: Keep showing up.A consultant is supposed to be a problem solver. Seek out problems and stare into their eyes. Figure out how to defeat them. Be the soldier who runs toward the sound of the guns.Step 7: Don’t become an insider.Only an outsider can be objective. Get too close and you’ll no longer see the big picture, only the details. You lose credibility the moment you begin to look, think and act like an employee.Step 8: Give credit where it’s due.Your client will sometimes have a great idea. Affirm it quickly. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you always have to be the one with the plan.Step 9: Maintain at least 12 clientsYour value as a consultant is that you see more successes and failures than your client. This is why you must consult a lot of different people. If one client ever represents more than 10 percent of your annual income, you no longer have a client, you’ve got a boss.Step 10: Don’t let your alligator mouth overload your mockingbird butt.Clients will occasionally insist that you give them unreasonable assurances. “What can you promise will happen if I do as you say?” Or worse, they’ll frame a problem in such a way that it has no solution and demand that you provide one. These are the moments when you’ve got to speak the truth… and be glad you’ve still got all those other clients.That's all you need to know. Now go do it, and prosper.Roy H. Williams

How is it that you and I interpret art the same way?We agree that the musical score to Star Wars feels adventurous and triumphant. But what within the music tells us so?And there’s something about slow music in a minor key that seems sad. Don’t you agree?Firelight is romantic, but why?Add a trace of black to any color and you’ll make it richer, moodier, classier. But do you understand the mechanics of it?The answers to these questions are rooted in the 12 Languages of the Mind. Learn the 12 Languages and you’ll have a finger on the bright white power button of persuasion.Art is usually created through joyous intuition, an egg of talent fertilized by wiggling inspiration. But when it’s the product of cognitive calculation it has the same effect.Wizard Academy teaches you how to do consciously what talented people do unconsciously when they’re feeling inspired.Advertising, interior decorating, military strategies, musical composition, chemical interaction, fine arts painting, effective online layouts and the award-winning recipes of a 5-star chef are merely dialects of the same 12 Languages of the mind.Wizard Academy is a School of Human Communication. If you want to connect more powerfully to other human beings, you need to become a student.The 12 Languages of the Mind will be taught for the first time July 23-25, 2007, to the 14 lucky alumni who contributed $3900 apiece to furnish the 14 rooms in Engelbrecht House, Wizard Academy’s amazing student mansion.The next time the 12 Languages will be unveiled is in September, as part of the newly updated and expanded Advanced Thought Particles class. This September session of ATP will be unique in that it will immediately follow a 3-day Magical Worlds class.My suggestion is that you register for both classes.And if you’re one of the first 14 to register, you’ll get a room and all your meals provided at no charge in Engelbrecht House. (Don’t worry, we’ll alert you if you’re number 15 and give you a chance to reschedule for the next session if you so desire.)Are you going to register now and be one of the first 14? Or are you going to put it off and then try to cajole your way in later? Trust me, it won’t work. First come will be first served. Wouldn’t be fair any other way.Just as a lump of coal becomes a diamond and a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, human persuasion is undergoing its own strange metamorphosis.Are you curious to see what it will become?Roy H. Williams

When an ad campaign is producing big results, there will usually be complaints from the public.When an ad campaign is getting poor results, the public rarely complains.What makes people hate an ad?1.   It’s hard to ignore.Any ad that makes its point sharply will be an irritant.But sharp-pointed ads are also the most effective.2.   It presents a tightly focused perspective.Any ad that makes assumptions about the experiences of the customer will be judged as presumptive. Persons whose experiences are otherwise usually hate these ads.But presumptive ads connect powerfully to customers whose personal experiences are accurately mirrored in the ad.3.   It’s given a lot of repetition.There is such a thing as too much repetition. And the sharper the ad’s point, the less repetition will be required. But “too much repetition” is often the charge that’s leveled against an ad that’s annoying for reasons 1 or 2.“Hello, I’m a Mac.”“And I’m a PC.”Very few people are ambiguous about the “Get a Mac” TV campaign:“Apple's mean-spirited new ad campaign… Ad Report Card Grade: C+… And isn't smug superiority, no matter how affable and casually dressed, a bit off-putting as a brand strategy?” – Seth Stevenson “I don’t know about you but I have had about enough of those Mac TV commercials that consistently rip on Microsoft and the PC. Any company that needs to badmouth the competition in an effort to sell their product is a company I don’t want anything to do with.” – ElectroGeek“The Los Angeles Times has a big article for you about Justin Long, aka the Mac from the 'Get a Mac' ads… [The article goes on to explain that Justin Long is a 'smug little twit.'] Also of note: There are apparently 20 more of these ads in the can, ensuring that everyone will be sick of them eventually.”– Tim Nudd“Reporting a $546 million profit on Wednesday, Apple also said that it shipped over 1.6 million Macs representing over 30 percent growth from the year-ago quarter. According to Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer, this represents the strongest quarter in the company’s history.” – Jim Dalrymple, reporterComplain about me all you want. Just leave the 546 million with my butler at the front door.Are your ads getting complaints? If not, why not?A:  Do you have no sharp points to make?B:  Or are you just afraid to make them?Turn the poles of a magnet North to South and CLICK, they connect. Turn the poles North to North and they'll repel each other just as powerfully. Advertising, like a magnet, is subject to the Law of Polarity: Your ad’s ability to attract customers cannot exceed its potential to repel.Most ads aren’t written to make a point sharply. They’re written not to offend.How are your ads written?Roy H. Williams

1. Hidden Profit Centers are the new MarkupLow-cost providers such as Sam’s Club and Best Buy are selling “in-store exchange” policies at the cash register to supplement the manufacturer’s warranties they don’t honor. In other words, you can’t take a faulty purchase back to the retailer if there’s a problem – you have to contact the manufacturer directly – unless you bought their “in-store exchange” policy.2. “Hard-to-find” items are no longer hard to find.Just Google it.3. A huge in-store selection can be counterproductive.When buying locally, a shopper confronted with too many choices can go into analysis paralysis. Successful stores stock only those items that represent the best value for the money. And they make sure never to run out of those items. The best stores stock only what’s hot. They may offer just one vacuum cleaner, but it’s the one that everyone is buying.4. Traffic is in declinebecause comparison-shopping is in decline. A customer who used to go to 3 or 4 stores to gather information is now going to just 1 or 2. When a customer goes to just one store, second place is the first loser. Don’t be number two on their list.5. Intrusive visibility is more important than ever.Intrusively-visible locations are destined to become even more important as media fragmentation continues. But don’t confuse visibility with mere traffic count. Seeing you is altogether different than driving past you.6. Hype doesn’t sell anymore.The effectiveness of artificial urgency is in sharp decline. People are no longer naive. Companies that were built on high-impact ads are finding their dwindling, traditional customer base won’t respond to anything but high-impact offers and new customers won’t take them seriously. These stores are closing their doors and no one is noticing.7. Attention spans are shrinking.Too much to do, too little time.8. Clarity is more important that creativity.Web surfing has taught us to quickly appraise whether information is relevant to us. The most effective ads are short and clear.9. Details matter.Quirky and cute ads were effective in the 90’s because they made corporate America warm and approachable. People still like these ads and may even compliment you on them, but they’re no longer driving traffic. Buying decisions are increasingly based on logic. Give customers a no-loopholes warranty and a story that rings true and they’ll respond.10. Speed is essential.Customers don’t complain when you waste their time. They just don’t come back.Yo. Wake up. It’s a brand new day.Roy H. Williams

The old assumption in advertising was that the customer didn't know, and wouldn't know unless you told them.This is no longer a valid assumption. Today's customer enjoys access to information far beyond what any of us saw coming.You're aware of how quickly and easily you gather information online each day, but has it occurred to you that your customers expect information about you and your products to be found just as quickly and easily?What do your customers find when they enter your category and town into a search engine? Do they find the answers to their questions?What do they assume when you provide minimal information and someone else provides much more?Better Question: What do you assume when minimal information is provided by a company you're researching online?What about those times when you're researching a purchase and the seller chooses not to put prices online? How does that make you feel? What do you assume about the seller?Are you likely to:1. call them,2. email them, or just3. search for that product from a different provider?The first time we designed a promotional plan for a website was in June, 2000. I'll never forget it. We put together a great product, a catchy name and a media plan we knew would drive traffic to the site. That was where it all fell apart.The client decided it would be best to “capture all the contact information” before revealing the price of the item. In essence, a customer had to commit to purchase the item before the price was revealed. That website had hundreds of thousands of visitors but made very few sales. The company is now defunct, even though their product was excellent and their prices were great.The best websites answer all your questions.Does your website answer all your customer's questions, or is your plan to “make them” contact you so you can “get more detailed information” about their budget, their preferences and their requirements?The customer is far more likely to contact you after they've found the answers to all the questions you didn't have to have their personal details to provide.The hardest part about crafting a website is anticipating the unspoken questions of your customers.The most successful of the Wizard Academy websites is FreeWeddingChapel.org. Miraculously, it took us only about 6 months to bring that website to its current level of seamlessness. Our advantage was a daily telephone-parade of anxious brides calling with nervous questions. Few decisions are accompanied by the degree of anxiety as the decisions that accompany a wedding. These daily questions allowed us to quickly refine our info-stream. Any time we answered a new question by telephone, we'd instantly add the answer to the ones we provided online.That website now functions like a well-oiled machine. Brides comment the website “felt like it was reading my mind.”This is what happens when you diligently:1. harvest the questions of your customers, and then2. insert all the answers into your web copy.Now get to work on that website.Need some help?Roy H. Williams

“I'm in the furniture business. Which media should I use?”“I'd like to target people who are afraid of the dentist. Can you recommend a good mailing list company?”“My uncle uses television ads to attract new customers and they work really well for him. Television ads have made him rich. What's your opinion of TV?”“No one in my town listens to the radio anymore. Everyone has satellite or an iPod.”“I tried advertising. It doesn't work for my kind of business.”People say things like this and expect me to have an intelligent response. What usually happens is that I stand there, dull-eyed, with my mouth hanging open. These are not my favorite moments.When my brain finally recovers and I tell them the truth they need to hear, they act as though I've sidestepped their question.Here's the truth they needed to hear. Maybe you need to hear it, too:Relevance is what determines whether an ad works or not.Every media fails when it delivers a message no one cares about.Have you ever run an ad that failed?Let's pull aside the curtain and look backstage to see what really happened:1. The ad was so predictable that few people even noticed it.SOLUTION: Get a new ad writer or remove the handcuffs from the one you've got.2. Prospective customers noticed the ad, received the message and understood it perfectly. They just didn't care.SOLUTION: Dump the irrelevant subject matter. Discover what people actually care about and talk about that instead.3. The ad's message would have been relevant, but it was unclear.SOLUTION: Remind your writer that creativity often gets in the way of clarity. Remind your layout artist that the prettiest ad is rarely the most effective. You're running a business, not a magazine. Make sure the dynamic duo understands that their continued employment depends on creating ads that sell the product.4. You committed to an ad campaign that was shorter than your product selling cycle. If people buy your product once a week, don't expect your ads to return a profit during the first week. If people buy once a month, don't expect to break even on your advertising during the first 30 days. If your product selling cycle is longer than 2 years, you can expect to lose money on your ads – even if they're good – the first 4 to 6 months. You'll start pulling ahead during the second six months. Your real growth won't happen until you begin reaching that same group of people for a second year.SOLUTION: Commit to an ad campaign that's longer than your product selling cycle.5. The listener failed to be engaged because the ad was written from a cultural perspective other than the customer's own. (This is why Anglo-conceived Hispanic campaigns usually fail. Translating language is easy. Transferring cultural perspective is nearly impossible.)SOLUTION: Hire a different ad writer to create the second campaign. Make sure the writer is from the cultural background he or she is trying to reach.Bottom Lines:Ads that fail in one media would usually have failed in any other.The media is not the message.The message is the message.And the message is what matters most.To deliver a pointless message powerfully is the definition of hype.To deliver a powerful message pointlessly is the result of weak creative.To deliver a powerful message powerfully is the first step in making a fortune.Now go do it. And good luck.Roy H. Williams

If I were to ask you what's limiting your growth, you'd likely tell me, “Traffic. If we had more traffic, we'd make more sales. What we need is more traffic.”But traffic is rarely the problem. It's simply the byproduct of a problem you haven't been able to see.These are the Four Most Common invisible problems that limit your selling opportunities:Problem 1: Your ads aren't convincing.SOLUTION: Write better ads.Do your ads speak to what the customer actually cares about, or do they speak only to what the customer ought to care about? Let's face it: you're an expert in your business category. You can't think like your customer thinks because frankly, you know too much.Have you given your ad writer explicit permission to push you beyond your comfort zone? A good ad writer will always ask questions that you feel are irrelevant. “You don't understand,” you'll say, “That's not what matters. THIS is what matters.” And thus you'll steer your ad writer into writing irrelevant ads.When it comes to ad writing, naiveté is a virtue. The best ad writers don't know any more than the customer knows.Problem 2: Your ads aren't reaching your prospects with sufficient repetition.SOLUTION: Focus your ad budget.Most business owners sprinkle their ad budgets across a wide variety of opportunities because they “don't want to leave anyone out.” The result of this strategy is that they reach too many people with too little repetition.Bill Bernbach said it best: “Would you rather reach 100 percent of the people and convince them 10 percent of the way, or 10 percent of the people and convince them 100 percent of the way?”The longer your product purchase cycle, the more repetition is required to drive traffic. How often does the public buy what you sell? An ad for groceries will generate traffic with less repetition than an ad for refrigerators because we buy groceries more often than we buy refrigerators. Do you sell jewelry, appliances, dentistry, or provide an in-home service? Focus relentlessly on a smaller group of people and make yours the name that pops into their head when they finally need what you sell.Problem 3: You're already selling everyone who likes to buy what you sell in the way you like to sell it.SOLUTION: Expand your business model to appeal to a new category of customers, or begin selling your current customers an additional product or service.It's often the most successful businesses that complain the loudest about low traffic because they're no longer growing like they used to grow. If you focused your business on a niche market, has the same focus that created your initial success now got you bumping your head against a glass ceiling? You know there are more customers in your product category; you just can't seem to get them in your door.You're going to have to expand your definition of “your customer.” There's not an infinite supply of the customer profile you've been targeting. It's likely that you're going to have to sell products – or customer profiles – you would have preferred not to sell.4. Your reputation has slipped, or your product is no longer in demand.SOLUTION: Reinvent yourself. Become relevant to the customer again.Would better advertising have saved 8-track tapes, or was it simply a technology whose time had passed?The marriage rate is declining in America. So why are jewelers surprised that engagement ring sales have declined by a similar percentage?Customized online news aggregators gather only those stories that each of us likes to read. So is anyone surprised that newspaper readership is waning?Now let's talk about your business: Is your marketplace changing beneath your feet? Move with it.Or risk falling down.Roy H. Williams

I owe my optimism to my mother, a single parent whose ironclad confidence kept my sister and I from ever suspecting how poor we really were. We felt like Mom could do anything. She made us feel like everything was going to be okay.And amazingly, it was.I owe my business to my wife, Pennie, who never worried or complained or suggested that I get a real job, even when the cut-off notices began to arrive from the utility companies. My prayer for our sons throughout their lives has been that they would each marry a wife who would give them the same freedom and support I've gotten from Princess Pennie since we were both 18.The older son has been married for 2 years now and I'm delighted to report that God answers prayer.I owe my love of literature to an Oklahoma public school teacher named Linn Ball in whose English class I was privileged to sit as a junior and senior in high school.These are three of the women who shaped my life. Who were the sculptresses of yours?Keith Miller reminded me of Linn Ball recently when he said, “Roy, we've got to preserve the almost-forgotten wisdom.”That conversation ended with Wizard Academy agreeing to host an important event this summer, but we can't do it without your input. Here's what we need from you:1. Think of a teacher that is truly gifted. “This world would be a different place if every teacher was like (who?).”2. Contact that teacher and tell them you'd like to submit their name as a possible candidate to be invited to a national summit on education.3. Send us – with their permission – the teacher's contact information along with the reasons why their name is the one you'd use to finish that sentence. Tell us exactly what this teacher did that rocked your world. A simple name and recommendation isn't enough. We need you to remember a specific incident that illustrates how this teacher does things differently.The result of this conference is going to be a book filled with innovative teaching techniques and true-life stories that will be shared with educators across America.This is not a money-making proposition. It's a focused effort to rescue a generation in need of teachers who can fan the flames of flickering intellect until it blazes into a conflagration of knowledge.Teachers who light fires do things differently. We're going to extract the fiery sparks from these gifted teachers and put them into a book other teachers will use like a box of matches.Right now you're thinking of a teacher, aren't you? Please contact him or her. Do it now.This can turn out 2 ways:1. You can plan to do it, mean to do it, promise to do it and then get ambushed by the urgencies of daily life and say, “Oh well, I'm sure they got lots of names and stories from other people.” The result will be no conference, no preservation of the almost-forgotten wisdom, no rescue of a generation that is fading fast.2. Or you can track down the teacher, explain to them that Wizard Academy is a credible think-tank and that yes, this conference will be chaired by Keith Miller himself, that legendary author of bestselling books that rocked America throughout the 70s and 80s. (I'll be there, too, but your teacher is a lot less likely to have heard of me. Just ask them if they remember The Taste of New Wine or Habitation of Dragons or any of the other bestsellers by Keith Miller.)Our promise of a book emerging from this conference isn't just a daydream. If the conference happens, the book will happen. And your teacher will be part of it.You gonna call your teacher? We really need you to do it.Email your 500 to 1,000-word narrative and teacher contact information before midnight, April 30, 2007, to Tamara@WizardAcademy.orgRight now I'm going to put Jodie Gateman's name on the list along with Dr. B.C. DeSpain and then find out whatever happened to Linn Ball. We haven't spoken in 30 years.But we're about to.Roy H. Williams

Filippo Beccari is an Italian dance teacher a long way from home. Hoping to enrich the lives of 62 orphans, he visits the orphans daily and encourages them to move to the music as he hums or plays. The year is 1773.Three years later Paul Revere rides through Boston shouting “The British are coming! The British are coming!” just as Beccari's orphans glide onto stage and stun a crowd of dignitaries with their debut performance. Each of the 62 children has become a magnificent dancer and 24 of them are world-class soloists.And thus the Bolshoi Ballet was born in Moscow during the reign of Catherine the Great.Bolshoi, in Russian, means “big” or “grand.” And indeed it is.I wonder, would the Bolshoi have come into existence had a man been in charge of Russia at the time?Pulitzer-winning novelist James Michener challenged aspiring writers to move to the rhythm of spoken words. He said they “might develop a sense of freedom that way.”Two weeks ago I ignited a firestorm of controversy by suggesting that we embrace Michener's strange advice and post our efforts on youtube.Judging from some of the reactions I received, you'd have thought I had suggested we overthrow the government, outlaw church-going and encourage young children to smoke pot.Men were worried1. that the effort would serve no purpose, and2. that it might become a gateway to “other deviations.”Yes, some people use play as an excuse to lose their minds. “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” But the Cognoscenti will recall a 7-minute session called Feynman's Pendulum in which I explain, “The object of play isn't to lose your morals, it's to lose your cares and inhibitions.”People often ask me to help them turn their hobby into a business.But does that make the hobby more fun?Hosea Frank mentions this phenomenon in one of his witty and offbeat Zefrank videos: “And then they started saying that if you put focused energy into something without knowing how it would lead to getting money, you were participating in a hobby. [witheringly] Ohhh… it's your hobby.” – zefrank.comZe made a new video each weekday for a year in the hope of being accepted into the LOA, or League Of Awesomeness. That year ended on March 17, 2007.My son Rex brought Zefrank to my attention a few days ago. Having now viewed a couple dozen of his 260 videos, I think Ze may be our brand of crazy. But before you go clicking these links, be warned: Zefrank is offbeat, irreverent and unrestrained. Which is a fancy way of saying that he is occasionally vulgar.But he is also insightful and fun.Pass or play. The choice is yours.But remember what happened to Jack.Roy H. Williams

About 10 months ago Mike Metzger flew from Clapham Institute in Annapolis to spend a day with us in Austin.“You meet 4 kinds of people on the ocean of life,” Mike said.“Those who drift just go with the flow. The wind and the waves control their speed and direction. The drifter quietly floats along and says, ‘Whatever.'”“Those who surf are always riding a wave, the next big thing. They stay excited until the wave fades away, then they scan the horizon for something new. Surfers don’t usually get anywhere, but they make a lot of noise and put on a good show.”“Those who drown seem to stay in the center of a storm. It doesn’t matter how often you rescue them, they’ll soon be in another crisis, crying, ‘Help me, save me, it’s been the worst week of my life. I don’t know what I’m going to do.'”“Those who sail are navigating toward a fixed point. They counteract the wind and waves by adjusting the rudder and shifting the sails to stay on course. But without an immovable, fixed point in your life, there can be no sailing. There’s nothing for you but drift, surf or drown.”Can you name the fixed point in your life, your immovable object?Metzger’s metaphor reminded me of something Ray Bard once taught me. Bard, that legendary publisher of business books, speaks of 4 kinds of opportunities:“When you’re thinking about writing a book on a subject or considering a business to go into, it’s essential that you find out 2 things:1. How widespread is the public’s interest in it?2. How deep is that interest?”“If interest is not widespread and not very deep, you’re looking at a puddle. Never invest time or money in a puddle.”“If interest is widespread but not very deep, you’re looking at a swamp. Be careful of swamps. They look like oceans at first because everyone is interested. But that interest is shallow, not deep enough to drive action. Investors go broke when they see a swamp and think it’s an ocean.”“If public interest is wide and deep, you’re looking at an ocean. But you’re going to need a platform on which to navigate your ocean. If you don’t have a platform, you’ll drown. And you’re going to need a plan or you’ll drift.”“If public interest is narrow but deep, you’ve got a well. Don’t underestimate it. You can draw a lot of water from a well. I once knew a writer who wrote a book called The Care and Feeding of Quarter Horses. The book held no interest for readers who didn’t own a quarter horse, but those who did had deep enough interest to buy the book. It was extremely successful.”Are you in a puddle, a swamp, an ocean or a well?Are you drifting, surfing, drowning or sailing?Fifteen months ago I taught a student and her daughter how to go sailing in a well. They wrote me recently to say that their family business has since “exploded.”You may recall that I mentioned Dixie Huthmaker as a “doer” in the PS of last week’s Monday Morning Memo. Those who clicked that link were told they could join the Ocean’s 11 and experience a 3-day brainstorming session with the Wizard of Ads.All 11 seats were filled in just a few hours, so we scheduled a second class for October 2-4, 2007.You coming?Yours,Roy H. Williams