E31: Glenn Fisher

Richard Hill:
Hi and welcome to another episode of eComOne and today's guest is Glenn Fisher, founder of All Good Copy and author of The Art of the Click. How are you doing, Glenn?
Glenn Fisher:
I'm doing okay. Thanks for having me.
Richard Hill:
Fantastic. Now, me and Glenn we were just having a little chat and it seems that Glenn is literally about, I don't know, 40 minutes away. So not too far away, which is quite a surprise for both of us, I think, because it's not very often we get somebody from the Shire on the podcast. Although we've had a few. So, welcome to the podcast, Glenn.
Glenn Fisher:
Thank you. I used to, when I was younger and slightly less haggard-looking, I used to look a lot like Frodo from things. So when you say the Shire, there it was quite triggering for me. But yeah, no, it's rare. I speak to people all over the world, so it's nice to... Normally when I say where I'm from, it's like, just silence. It kind of just falls.
Richard Hill:
Next question, yeah.
Glenn Fisher:
But yeah, no to hear someone in Lincoln, it's good.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, good to have you on the podcast and it'll be good to kick off on letting us know a little bit about your background, Glenn, and bring us up to date with what you're doing at the moment.
Glenn Fisher:
So, the long story, relatively short is, I was born... No, I basically wanted to be an accountant and work in business and finance and all the things that you have real A-levels for. Did that, and I ended up working in the council, North East Links Council, for a while. I was training as an accountant, doing all that stuff.
Glenn Fisher:
Then somewhere, probably like two or three years in, I've lost all track of time. None of the chronology makes sense with how old I am. But, I was there for about five years, I think. Then something broke in my mind where I just didn't like it anymore and was like, "I don't want to be doing this."
Glenn Fisher:
In that time, I'm still trying to figure out, one day for the memoirs we'll work out an official version. But I had started writing and I liked the act of writing, I liked the creative nature of it. And it just so happened that they were launching a great writing course at the local college in Grimsby, which is where I'm from.
Glenn Fisher:
And, because I'd got so far in life and was kind of mildly professional, I didn't fully want to kind of stop that and all this kind of story. I didn't want to move away and become a uni student. But because it was in Grimsby, for some reason I ended up quitting the job and became a mature student.
Glenn Fisher:
I think I was about 25, 23, or something like that and did this creative writing course. Three years of that and then realized that if I wanted to write, at the time I knew nothing about the industries that we work in now, certainly didn't know anything about copywriting. Really just wanted to write book reviews for The Guardian and that kind of... And then write novels in an ivory tower.
Glenn Fisher:
That wasn't happening. In Grimsby, the only writing job that I was aware of was for the Grimsby Telegraph so I started looking outside of the Shire. And was going to look to Manchester, actually.
Richard Hill:
Ooh.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, okay. What's going on here? Thankfully, my Mum was a sensible person and understood that I was about to get a rude awakening, that it is quite hard out there in the world. But I ended up moving to London and by pure chance, this is where it all accelerates very quickly, I ended up getting a job as a junior writer for a company called The Agora, who are a financial publisher.
Glenn Fisher:
They're a lot of things, but we'll say they're a financial publisher who happened to use direct response marketing as their main way of getting new leads and new customers. So I went down there, was a junior writer. I was very lucky to be employed by a madman, who was utterly insane and crazy and a lot of fun and inspiring. And very also, lax.
Glenn Fisher:
Was I meant to be a copywriter or an editor or how do you?... Was I meant to be doing the sales writing or writing the actual content? And he said, "Well, try them all and see how you get on and then we can decide." Now, I ultimately never decided but I managed to learn all of those different things.
Glenn Fisher:
So I ended up in this company and discovered this world. And through that company, and it was owned and run by a chap called Bill Bonner and his partner in business, Michael Mark Ford who happen to be two of the best direct response copywriters in the world. It's a giant company that has offices in-
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah. I see it's got US.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, it's predominantly US, so I was very lucky that at the time, just as I started, they happened to be in the UK to focus on that business and I managed to get taught directly by them. And was one of the last new people to the company to have that direct thing with them, which was great. And I discovered writing to sell, I would say. Obviously, I was doing editorial but I leaned towards the copy. It's a long story, and I'm sure we'll get on the debate of... We touched on it before we started recording, about where does copy lie and what is copy, really? The elements of persuasion in writing are universal when you're writing a novel or a sale or a Facebook ad. You need to persuade and convince people, and engage them.
Glenn Fisher:
So I worked there for a decade, let's round it up. And then I went freelance, still write for Agora but also now write for companies all over the world. Big, multinational brands, writing tone of voice documents but also write the long sales letters and Facebook adverts, BBC, all this kind of stuff. I basically do whatever I get asked.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, well you do the work you fancy, and the whole mixture, whether that's direct response, whether that's, as you're saying, a smaller form, long form, sales pages, the whole shebang, by the sound of it. So many things buzzing through my mind with what you've said there, so I think how you got to you know yourself was... We're big believers in always be learning as a company and our team. And one of the books we got was Art of the Click for a couple of the team a while ago. And they're, "Oh my God, this book's so good, so good." And here we are, a few months later, on the podcast. So I think for the listeners, maybe tell us about The Art of the Click.
Glenn Fisher:
Sure, so the end of my time with Agora, I also got a deal to write this book and publish The Art of the Click which is, unfortunately, named after Trump's, the Art of the Deal. It was never meant to be. It was a joke title. I had Clickable in my mind, or something like that. But I wrote that down because we were watching a documentary about Trump and the publisher came back and said, "We really like this." And I was like, "Then my book's based on Trump's book." Anyway, the less said about that, the better.
Glenn Fisher:
I basically put this book together. The best way to think about it is, it's my 10 years of studying and learning direct response copy. Everything I learnt during my time at Agora, and all of the many sales letters I wrote which generated millions and... I was going to say trillions, but that's probably a lie. But certainly a few million dollars and pounds for that company.
Glenn Fisher:
I've been writing bits and doing blogs and brought it all together, put a theme around it and figured it out. And then at the time, I also was very aware, as I started working outside of Agora as well, and working for different companies, I'd always been very much a direct response man. I kind of believed in that world and thought there was this or that and what have you, and I realized at the time that everything I'd learned about direct response copywriting was helping enormously with companies who were looking to market, not necessarily with what is traditional direct response.
Glenn Fisher:
Even indirect response stuff and branding, as I say, tone of voice stuff and all that kind of... The principles all applied. So I brought that book together and gave it that overall arch of suggesting that the lessons you can learn from studying direct response copywriting can help you with all elements of marketing.
Richard Hill:
Some of the guys there listening might be like, obviously we mentioned direct response. What is the quick version of what is direct response copywriting?
Glenn Fisher:
Sure. The easiest way to think about it is there's two types of advertising: there's either direct or indirect. Let's start with indirect. That's where you see a poster in the shop or on the tube or on market raising station, shall we say, to be appropriate. See a poster there, and it's got a nice naked man drinking a diet coke, looking quite hot and sexy and you think, "Oh, that looks good. Nice one." You don't do anything.
Glenn Fisher:
And you need to. But you don't do anything, but they're hoping that next time you're in the shop, you have an indirect response to the advert and think, "Oh actually, I am thirsty. I'll have that coke."
Glenn Fisher:
Direct response would be seeing the same advert possibly, but in a magazine and at the bottom it says, "If you want to buy a Coke or Diet Coke, you'll need to fill in this coupon and send it-"
Richard Hill:
Go here. There's an action-
Glenn Fisher:
Direct response, yes. So it's any form of advertising that has a direct call to action. Though as I say, I would put that disclaimer in that increasingly, as I think about persuasion copy and get older and more obtuse. I think everything has that direct response.
Richard Hill:
I think that's the takeaway there, is the guys that are listening to this episode, the guys that listen to our podcast, the majority of you are thinking or are selling a product online and you are trying to persuade in a different way. Different ways for them to buy from you that particular product from your particular site, store or brand. And obviously the key word you dropped in there a few times is persuading them.
Richard Hill:
So how can a marketer use copy to persuade and to increase sales? What are some sort of tips we can give the guys?
Glenn Fisher:
Sure. Another great advantage I had when I worked with Agora was learning the craft of copy, was that I happened to work with some very good marketers as well. We had that thing where I'm the writer, you're the marketer and all this kind of stuff. But I remember, I think it was a Steven Pinker book I once read, but he described a T shape. Everybody uses T shape and you have across the top of the T, you have sales, and then down the T you have either copy or marketing or what have you. So you're all the same and you've got to learn all of those things.
Glenn Fisher:
So in the same way a good copywriter will understand marketing and the principles thereof. For a marketer, if you can understand more about copy, about the language that's being used, then you're going to be a lot more effective in your job when you do those things. So I think when it comes to how a marketer can use copy, (a) is to remember that to be always be testing and that you will find that the words have an effect. We all know that. If I say, "Come here," you're going to have a very different reaction to that if I say, "Go away." Literally, it's fundamental, but that's how it works. Words, language, changes what people do.
Glenn Fisher:
So as a marketer, if you can change the words you're using in the marketing, so it might be that on a very granular scale. So if you're looking at a Facebook advert, for instance, you might have a proven image that's winning, but just by changing the button to say, "Click here," or, "Go here," might make a difference. Always be looking to change the copy, test it. No one ultimately knows.
Glenn Fisher:
Now, I get paid loads of money to write copy these days because I've kind of proven that I'm quite good at it. But at the same time, I'll openly admit, you don't fully know what's going to happen. You've got to test. You can have instincts and you can know where to test. But you never know, so always be testing and always be-
Richard Hill:
You can almost probably get... When we're doing anything in this business, "Well, that's was an eight out of 10. Do you know what? We can get a nine out of 10, that was a four out of 10." I think probably what you're saying there is, you can probably straight out of the gate, get a nine out of 10, eight out of 10, but trying to get that 10 out of 10, you just don't know.
Glenn Fisher:
Imagine a story. I was in a writing retreat in France once with Bill Bonner, the owner of Agora. He sat there and someone got up and said, "Oh, here's may sales copy. It did really well." Everybody was, "Well done, you've done this really good sales copy. You've written this letter to encourage people to buy this thing," and everyone was clapping except for Bill. He turned around and said, "Right, okay. So you think you have written the very best version, the most effective piece of copy in the world ever? Just that you, here, now have done that? Of course, you haven't. There's always an opportunity to improve it." So always be testing.
Richard Hill:
Yeah. I think we talk about mindset a lot in the business. In the book, Mindset, it would always be taking that feedback, always be open to that feedback, whereas I guess, to be a good copywriter, you've got to be open and not be, "Well, no, there's nothing needs changing."
Glenn Fisher:
Well, yeah-
Richard Hill:
There's always something you can work on and getting that feedback, listen to your users, your buyers, your customers, and tweaking, checking, there's some simple things there, I think. So obviously, you worked on a lot. I mean, I've lost count of how many years that was. But I think it was 10 years at Agora-
Richard Hill:
Five, six years, seven, eight years doing your own thing.
Glenn Fisher:
I'm only 15, so I don't know how it works.
Richard Hill:
At least a couple of 15, 20 years or something. So in terms of... You, no doubt you're writing copy from scratch, you're writing copy that you've been given rework. Obviously there's different styles of projects where no doubt, it's like starting from scratch, or you're just looking at... It's like me saying, "Right. Can you go through my site, eComOne? Go there and rewrite or help us and advise us, what would you say are some of the things that you see regularly?
Richard Hill:
I don't know if you can be specific around product, trying to sell a product, a physical product. That's a lot of our podcast listeners.
Glenn Fisher:
Sure.
Richard Hill:
And products. What are some of the things you see time and time again, that maybe help them-
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah. I think it's hard to be specific and obviously, actually ironic because one of the best things you can do about writing copy is be specific. But it is hard to be specific, but I think there are frameworks that you can follow, which will always help you. I think one of the things, it almost seems trite and I hate talking about it really, but it is useful. I think it's helpful, especially when you're in this kind of world of giving tips and what have you. My tips as I get older become increasingly boring and generally, I guess to read and write, which are just the fundamental kind of go-tos. But one thing that I was taught which was really interesting was the four U's. Now again, I hate acronyms. I hate all these things because everybody invents their own and what have you. But it's just the one I've been taught, I've found useful and if people haven't come across it, it might help them.
Glenn Fisher:
So if you go into a website, a product website, and you're trying to understand why aren't people clicking on that particular page? Why aren't they reacting to that product? Why aren't they doing that? The copy itself, whether it be the headline or whether it be the product copy or what have you, obviously it gets a bit vague and you can't produce this in a book. You need to look at the copy using the four U's. And they are useful, so is the copy useful? Does it have any urgency to it? Does it have a uniqueness to it? And, does it have specificity? Now because it obviously doesn't begin with a U, I think the American inventors of it turned it to ultra-specificity.
Glenn Fisher:
So, you have got urgency, usefulness, uniqueness and ultra-specificity, which I can't say, annoying when I'm talking about a four U's presentation and why we... But if you look at things, if you look at your copy and say, "Well, why isn't this working?" It doesn't need to have all of those. And again, a disclaimer, some of the greatest company in the world doesn't have any of them, but when you're looking for ways to improve stuff, you can't just kind of go, "Improve it," and go, "Oh, what about this?"
Glenn Fisher:
So you look for these frameworks and if you go through it, is it useful? What is it? Is there an implicit use to the reader? Do you need to make it more explicit, what the use is? Obviously, if it's just not useful, if there's no reason to read it, then why are they going to read it? So they're going to turn off.
Glenn Fisher:
Is it unique? This is obviously the big one. This is where you start going to the actual... You can look at it two ways: in the message, is the message that you're making unique or is the actual product unique and it's boring. And it's not going-
Richard Hill:
People also got that from an agency point of view, you've got the SEO element there, as well. If it's unique copy, it's fresh and new, rather than copied, or-
Glenn Fisher:
Rather than just the million same lines that you're trying to fight with, it's not going to work. So look is unique. One way of making it unique and helping to make it unique is to be able to be ultra-specific. The example is always rather than just talking about a gun, you talk about a Walther PPK, because when you go specific, you start to connect on different levels. And you're ultimately... All of this is trying to get an emotional response, and trying to get there.
Glenn Fisher:
So if I say there's a gun, you go, "All right, there's a gun." If I say, "There's a Walther PPK," you're probably going to think of James Bond. You're going to start having these things and emotional connections. And then, I can't remember... oh, urgency. Again, this is always a dangerous one. You shouldn't do it if there's no urgency, don't create false scarcity or anything like that. But is there a reason they have to do something now, and react to that copy now?
Glenn Fisher:
So those four things are always useful to help transform existing copy, especially when you're looking at a website. And I imagine what some of your listeners are looking at those specific things. The other big thing, for the longer bits of copy, but if you've not come across it, I won't try and explain here because it's an incredibly boring thing to listen to. But something called the FK score. And it's just in word. So it's free and easy to get. There's a few apps and then there's like Hemingway app and all this kind of stuff these days that tell me I'm writing badly.
Glenn Fisher:
But I use this old thing called the FK score, it's the Flesch-Kincaid score. It was invented in America for during the war, they were trying to like figure out levels of how old people were to read stuff or what have you, you can read it on online. But if you just have a search for the FK score, if you go on my website, you'll find articles about it.
Glenn Fisher:
But that basically, if you run that test and you see that your FK score is too high on that piece of copy, it is proven and I'll just, as I say, rather than giving you loads of evidence for it, "Trust me," listen to a copywriter.
Richard Hill:
Trust me, I'm a copywriter.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, trust me. There's loads of evidence that suggest that the chances are that the reason the score is high is because you don't quite know what you're saying. You're using longer words, more complicated sentences. There's all this stuff. So if you can get that down, that will invariably make the copy more focused and easier to read for the reader. So I think using the four U's, using that FK score,
Glenn Fisher:
... will help anybody assess existing copy.
Richard Hill:
Make it more readable, easier to consume. Maybe rather than a lot of, I have to admit, it's a topic I'm fascinated with, but at the same respect, I actually think I'm quite bad at, but when I actually get into it, I'm not too bad, but it's getting into it.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, sure. There's all different things. I mean, when you talk about SEO content and stuff like that, we think of a blog post or like an article or something like that. The other thing to do... Largely, it seems to me these days that increasingly, as Google and what have you become more aware and more effective at delivering their aim of getting you to the most valuable content where you're going to spend the longest looking at, you need to engage people on the page.
Glenn Fisher:
One of the ways you can do that with copy invariably, is just delete the first few lines. Most people, when they sit down to write something, especially if they're not writers, especially if you're tasked maybe as a marketer or a product creator or something or someone who's got to just write that blurb, you think as you start to write. So you're thinking in your writing and you're getting your thoughts down on the page first, which invariably is boring.
Glenn Fisher:
So if, when you get into it, and you know what you're writing about, then you start kind of getting a bit more exciting. So invariably, if you do the thumb test of just getting rid of the first paragraph, you'll find that you drop in, that kind of Quentin Tarantino thing where you drop into it.
Richard Hill:
I think it's a bit like doing a speech, isn't it, in a way? Well, I think it is. I do quite a lot of various talks on this there and it's like, "Well, what are we going to talk about?"
Richard Hill:
"Well, I've got a feel for it and I've done some slides, but I don't really know exactly." And then I sort of introduce myself and then I'm like, "Ooh, ah, right." And then it's actually, nobody ends up all right, I think.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah. There is the side thing where if you've got a good personality, you can get away with it on speeches, which is-
Richard Hill:
I guess that's like my framework.
Glenn Fisher:
Right. I always open with, for me, I imagine it was probably Aristotle or something who said it, but starting in the middle, doing that thing, just to start somewhere in the middle so it's exciting.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, you've already gone up a notch or two with the enthusiasm and the-
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, a free hit if you do that. Do the boring stuff in later.
Richard Hill:
So eCommerce store, you've got a lot of products, obviously a lot of product pages and that type of thing. Obviously what you've got on every eCom store, like you have every website really is, is what I would refer to more like brochure pages, About Us, Our Story and I personally think those pages are so key, getting that personality across, the history of the company. Any sort of ideas, tips around what people can do for that?
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah. Ignore any of my websites because I don't practice what I preach. My About page is terrible. But I agree with you and I think they should be. One thing I would say, for me, and in the experience I've had with various different clients, the biggest problem with About pages is that they are about the company and it's a crushing blow to the founder who's really excited about his product and what have you, but no one really cares about your company.
Glenn Fisher:
No one cares that in 1951, you were planted on the field in Laos and what have you. No one cares. They will care about it eventually. And you will have of your opportunity to do that when they're fully engaged. But in the world of a website where you're landing on it, you've got three minutes and you've got to try and figure out what's going on, because all of a sudden there's 20 other emails, Instagram, all this stuff. You need to be quick.
Glenn Fisher:
So you need to turn, for me is base level stuff or like the easiest thing to do straightaway, is just turn everything to the reader. It's a cliché and we did talks about it, but copywriting is ultimately about you. Every opportunity needs to be you saying, "You, the reader, how can we help you?" Your About Us page, really should be about how we can help you.
Glenn Fisher:
You can still talk about yourself and all what have you, but direct it to the reader. And look at that in every page. Every page of your website, what is it in it for the reader?
Glenn Fisher:
Also, I realized that working on a few websites a little while back, actually, that very few and this is a new thing, actually to be fair. I certainly didn't have any input, but the whole movement towards UX and user design and what have you, user experiences, as a copywriter, as a marketer, as anyone involved in that decision of what you're going to publish and show online and how you're going to get people engaged with you, you need to be thinking, "What is that user, what is that customer, what is that reader, what are they experiencing in that every moment and what are they doing?"
Glenn Fisher:
And if you think about it, if you just... And this is the ultimate disclaimer with every piece of advice I always give is, the advice is really easy. It's just having the discipline to actually do it. If you sit down and go, "How does this person feel and think?" You will suddenly realize that a lot of the suggestions and what have you on the website, what you think you're saying are, "They're definitely going to click this thing."
Glenn Fisher:
It's not actually framed like that. It's leading them away to something else, or it's saying something else, or it's actually just talking about you. You need to think, "Where are they? What would they do if they were to follow what I want them to do and guide them in that way?" So it really is just trying to look at your website, not as a way to advertise yourself, but as a way to provide the solution. That's one solution, I hate using the word solution, but I'll allow myself one in this conversation. Provide-
Richard Hill:
One next step sort of thing-
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah. Just how does it benefit the reader. Ultimately, everything about copywriting and ultimately about marketing and selling is, how does it benefit the reader? And if you can turn every page on your website to that, you will see increased conversion.
Richard Hill:
I agree. Great. There's a right snippet there for promoting the podcast there, that's epic. So, what would you say is the difference, so I'm probably going back a little step, but what would you say is the difference between copywriting and content marketing?
Glenn Fisher:
I've got some very vague notes here, which you could see here if you're watching this, and I've just written, "There isn't one." But that's me again, becoming obtuse and old and worn down by the industry all these years. I don't believe there is a difference between copywriting and content marketing in the sense that I feel like they're wrong definitions in the sense that, no one really knows what copyright is. There's copywriters who go around saying they're copywriters who write content, there are copywriters who go around saying all they do is have ideas and throughout house advertising and all this kind of stuff.
Glenn Fisher:
So copywriting is just writing to sell. So content marketing, what is the aim of content marketing, it is to sell. Let's make no bones about it, you're pointing content out there so that people will go, "Hey, I found that quite valuable and useful, I might buy this"-
Richard Hill:
Maybe it's just another way to say-
Glenn Fisher:
Sure. And it comes back to that definition thing where it's like, is it direct response marketing or an indirect marketing? Am I this kind of marketer or this kind of marketer? Ultimately, you're there to try and convince someone to do something. How you do that? One way is content marketing and that is providing value to the reader.
Glenn Fisher:
How do you provide value to the reader? You have to do it, you can't just go... Living in COVID times at the moment where people are being told, "You are going to get ill if you don't do this thing. I'll go and do this thing." How do you do that? How do you get people to act in their best interests sometimes? You need to engage them, you need to do it in a nice way. In an engaging and intelligent way. So for me, good copywriting is essential for good content marketing. You can't do good content marketing unless you have an understanding of copy and how to better persuade and provide value and engage people.
Glenn Fisher:
So I don't think there's a difference between... I think my words like the definitions, someone will make a lot of money one day or write a book, I've got to many others to write at the moment, but that figures out how to properly define these terms.
Richard Hill:
Would you say then that you've seen... I've been doing this almost as long as you. Not copywriting but in the kind of thing. I've probably been on the other side of the fence more as in buying the thing you've been writing to sell stuff and I've been buying stuff in your copy. Buying, I think, I cleaned my office out at home this last few weeks, we're having a go at a few jobs at home and my office is like a dumping ground, but it's a dumping ground for all the information products I've bought over the-
Glenn Fisher:
Sure.
Richard Hill:
Alman was one of the guys.
Glenn Fisher:
Wow, I saw him. This is going to sound like I'm some kind of jet-setter, but I saw him in Las Vegas.
Richard Hill:
Hey.
Glenn Fisher:
He used to do a big seminar. Was it called The Big Seminar, or something?
Richard Hill:
It was, yeah.
Glenn Fisher:
It was the last one he did.
Richard Hill:
I went to Vegas myself, to hear Vegas, yay.
Glenn Fisher:
Oh, good. You should have had the-
Richard Hill:
Went out to see a few of the other guys that in that group, if you like, this is probably about 10 years ago. I was well into it by then, but what I'm driving at or getting to is obviously there's sort of sales, long form sales, very text heavy long form sales copy selling information products which were on CD back in those days. I've got those piles of CDs. I've had to chuck the box sets away because there's no room in the house. So that's what I was doing last week, I've got all these Alman Moran CDs, Butterfly Marketing from Mike Filsaime and all these guys.
Richard Hill:
But I think the question would be is have you seen quite a change over the last five years? And more recently because there's a way to dissuade, quite frankly. It's like, "Wow, what is all that about?" And I think, no disrespect to any nationality, but there seems to be a certain pivot in the US... I read some of the copy like, "What?"
Glenn Fisher:
Well, has it changed? Yes. It's changed and it hasn't changed. I've literally just got off a call where I'm writing another one of those letters for someone I've just for an American company. So you can still do that and what have you and all that stuff is there, for time immemorial, people will love information products and want to know, "Do you know something I don't? What's your secret?" That's what ultimately is under all of that.
Glenn Fisher:
The one pickle of that, the American versus English kind of thing, there's some differences there. I'm less inclined, having written for America so much, spent so much time there at things like that, seeing the Tony Robbins and what have you. I always tell a story when I do a talk of the time I saw Tony Robbins in the UK and I thought, "This man is going to struggle, because British people are all very, upper tea and what have you." He was not. He absolutely killed it.
Glenn Fisher:
And people loved it and I was like, "Wow, okay. The Brits can kind of go crazy as well." So I think persuasion and stuff, it's fundamental as a human thing. There are different nuances there because the changes though that I think I've seen, it links back to what we talk about content marketing and my trouble with content marketing, as a phrase, was when it blew up a bit recently in the last couple of years, maybe five years more.
Glenn Fisher:
But for me, that was just more direct response marketing, was that you talk to people constantly. So that's how you do it. There was long letters that were referring to, and I still write today, they work because people like reading and they like reading stuff. They like finding out more information. Now, if you're not interested in that particular thing, then it will be hell to read that letter. In the same way that I don't like Harry Potter. So I'm not going to read seven books of Harry Potter, just nonsense.
Glenn Fisher:
But a lot of people love Harry Potter and they read all of that. They don't complain going, "I wish they were a lot less." They want more. They want more Harry Potter. People only complain at bad copy or copy that doesn't relate. So the principle, what I'm trying to say, in the same way that it has changed. I think you've seen it broken up a bit. You'll see longer copy letters now broken up as a piece of content marketing. So you might get part one, part two, part three. You could actually just put that together and it's-
Richard Hill:
A lot more imagery, a lot more graphic UX.
Glenn Fisher:
Exactly. Ultimately, it's just trying to find different ways to engage people. And as I say and I think if I wanted to be a little bit stood on the pillar on the high mountain kind of thing, I think it might be because the longer copy isn't as good as it used to be, because people don't study it anymore because it takes ages.
Glenn Fisher:
But I'm fully aware that I sound like some kind of old grump going, "Well, I did 10 years in the thing..." But I don't think people put the effort into it anymore and they're-
Richard Hill:
It is a work of art when I sit and see some of these new information products that come out, or just in general, the bigger marketers that I know are no doubt paying for people like yourself and what not. I love reading them, reading the stuff-
Glenn Fisher:
Well, they are an art form in themselves.
Richard Hill:
Try my darnedest not to buy anything. I'm pretty good now. I think I'm slightly cured on my habits of the older days.
Glenn Fisher:
Read it backwards. That's the best way. The first six pages, they're the emotional hook. If they've got you emotionally, you're dead. So just read it backwards. See what the product is first.
Richard Hill:
So last few questions then, Glenn.
Glenn Fisher:
Sure.
Richard Hill:
What advice would you give to an aspiring writer, someone that's looking to get into the industry.
Glenn Fisher:
Again, this is where I increasingly realize, I always try and be really practical with my advice, but I've just kind of, at the same time, boiling stuff down, where you've got to read. I feel like it's a public service thing. You've just got to read loads. If you want to be a writer, you have to read more than you write.
Glenn Fisher:
The flip side of that is another boring piece of advice, but try and write something every day. Whatever it might be, just write a little crazy idea or story, something, even if it's 500 words. But if you want to be a writer, you need to write that. Writing's horrible. I hate writing, the actual process of writing is horrible. The brain thinks faster than my hands can type, so it's like
Richard Hill:
That is so me. What I've written on the keyboard, it's like that doesn't even make sense because my brain's.
Glenn Fisher:
So no one likes to do that. You like the stuff around it, you like the ideas before. If you're an aspiring writer in the copy sense, spend more time thinking about the idea and this goes back to me being a bit curmudgeonly about people not putting the time in these days, but the best long copy letters work because underneath there is a really good idea that you just want to know about. That inherently makes sense. So I encourage people. The book is structured in such a way, that I think the first 100 pages is before you even write a single word.
Glenn Fisher:
I get trapped myself, sometimes because we all work in the business world where you've got to get stuff done by this day, what have you. I'm very lucky and I'm grateful for it that people have figured out that if you let me not write and think, then you'll get better writing eventually. So I'm looking and I realize people are often crushed for time, or have you, just try, even if you've only got two hours to write a piece. At least try and give yourself at least 15 minutes just to think about it. Don't sit there in front of a blank screen. That's just murder. That's just self-harm. It's ridiculous.
Glenn Fisher:
Figure out what you're going to write and then I literally do advise physically running at the machine or the notepad and get energetic on it. Once it's in your head, run and that-
Richard Hill:
Yeah, stepping back initially, finding some time, finding out-
Glenn Fisher:
So I would say that. And as I say, just read. There's so much advice out there, people looking at it... I would probably say, these will come as well, I think with the right question, but don't get stuck reading about stuff in your industry. Don't get me wrong. Read all the books on copywriting, read mine if you like. But whatever industry, read all the marketing books, read all the books on your particular niche. Fine, but don't just read those. Read as widely as possible.
Glenn Fisher:
If you want interesting ideas and you want to figure out how to engage people, you need to be able to talk about other stuff. Because everybody knows your stuff, so talk about other stuff.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, good. So, in terms of other resources and other training courses, any sort of things that jump out at you that you'd recommend? Obviously, you've got your own things, let's talk about those.
Glenn Fisher:
No, no. Ignore mine. The training course, I've written Life, because I'm annoyed. When I first started at Agora, I was actually part of something that got a side company called the American Light Art Institute or something. They do an accelerated course. But that's the only course I've ever taken in terms of copywriting, because it was the firm's course. So I did it and followed it. And I found it useful. Ultimately, it was copying out long copy sales letters and learning by rote and then trying to do it yourself.
Glenn Fisher:
So I've got to be, I don't know any courses really that I've come across that I've thought, "Oh yeah, that's actually really good." To me, it's just been a case of (a) learning on the job. I've always been a big fan of that, just try it, nothing's going to break. You can't break things and what have you, so just experiment. But also, as I say, read as widely as possible, but outside of the industries-
Richard Hill:
I think that's a great one.
Glenn Fisher:
And also, as far as resources for copywriting and marketing go, your biggest resource... I say this as a kind of standout thing, I'm not sure if I can back it up, but I think it might be right, your biggest resource is your customer. They have all of the answers to all of your questions, because they are... The only person you're interested in is trying to figure out how they're going to buy your thing. So if you can get to the customer service department, if you've got an email inbox full of questions, "This is crap because of this," read them. Figure out why. You've got to read all that stuff.
Glenn Fisher:
Framing-wise, don't bother reading, "This is how you could learn to do this thing," just go and see what the customer's saying.
Richard Hill:
The mean game and find the real nitty-gritty of their problems, what their concerns are.
Glenn Fisher:
It will accelerate your understanding a lot.
Richard Hill:
Fantastic. So I always like to end every episode on a book recommendation. You have to choose one book for our readers. It can be anything, it doesn't have to be on copywriting. It doesn't have to be on, anything whatsoever. What is your one book, then?
Glenn Fisher:
I do this on my own podcast where I always say, "You've got to pick the one." I always precis with, "You're not allowed to just... you've got to say what's straight on your mind, without trying to be cool." So I will say what's straight on my mind and because it's most recently I've read it. I just read, it's Rashomon and Other Stories. It's a collection of short stories by a Japanese writer called, Ryunosuke Akutagawa. I think that's how you say it.
Glenn Fisher:
And it sounds like I'm being... "Oh my God, he said like a cool Japanese writer thing. I'd not read this for ages. It's Rashomon, it's a famous film by Akira Kurosawa, so I should have done, but I hadn't. But I read a thing where one of the stories called the Bamboo Grove is taken from all different perspectives. I was interested about something I'm working on at the moment in a creative sense, not copy book.
Glenn Fisher:
Anyway, I read this book and it's written by this Akutagawa guy and the reason I picked it out and the reason I would encourage everybody to go, some people are like, "Hmm, go and try that and go, 'What the hell is this?'"
Glenn Fisher:
The reason I like it is it was written end of 1800s into early 1900s. But it feels so incredibly modern and it feels like it was written yesterday. And what that does and why I think that's important is because you can engage with it and it's universal. I read, I don't know, Jane Austen or even Dostoevsky or something like everybody's meant to read this stuff. I read it and I'm like, "I can't engage with this." There's something wrong with me and I realize that, but I just don't get... where I read this and I was like, "Hang on a minute, can engage with you when it's written in this style."
Glenn Fisher:
So I think it's really important to analyse that kind of writing. Why is it? And you'll see. I imagine if you ran the FK score through it, it'd be really low, because it's clipped sentences. It's little short things, simple language. All of that stuff that your classics like Orwell that everybody talks about. I just really enjoyed it. It kind of touched all of my novelist ambitions and all that kind of stuff. Don't get me wrong, creatively, but then just the form was really good.
Glenn Fisher:
I think, as I say, I think you can see it on the video, but half of these books here are all business books. So I've got this big bookcase full of business books, but the rest in my entire house are all absolutely nothing to do with copywriting. We build the books on copy. Go and do it, but read other stuff. I've realized that more and more, because people as you know, when you're looking at articles out there. When you're looking at tips and advice. They're all the same and it's because everybody's reading the same thing.
Richard Hill:
And the same-
Glenn Fisher:
The lesson come from elsewhere. Lessons come from your kitchen bin and your partner and the fact that you're doing this and it's behavioural. So look around for other stuff.
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, read Akutagawa.
Richard Hill:
We'll link that up in the show notes, so everyone can-
Glenn Fisher:
Yeah, good luck.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, I was thinking I might have to press play a few times on the replay just to catch that one. So for the guys that are listening, want to find out more about you, Glenn, what's the best place to connect with you and find out more about what you do?
Glenn Fisher:
You can go to allgoodcopy.com, which is not being updated because I'm working on a novel at the moment. And I've got lost in that. But there is loads of stuff on there. That's got my email on it and what have you. I think I use Twitter quite a lot, @allgoodcopy, which you can find me on there. You can email me. You can find me on the internet. You could probably find me at home, but you're not coming to my house because that's my house, but normally you might be able to come and have a point. I don't mind can come. But you can find me there, obviously you can find the book on Amazon and what have you and that has my contact details in it as well.
Glenn Fisher:
I'm a strong believer in advertising, copywriting and marketing being an ongoing conversation. It changes all the time in many regards. A lot of stuff stays the same, but you've got to keep learning, as you said earlier on. If you stop learning, you're going to get taken over by-
Richard Hill:
Absolutely. Well thank you, Glenn. It's been an absolute, pleasure. Thanks for being on eComOne.
Glenn Fisher:
No problem.
Richard Hill:
Thank you.