I was on my way back from the airport, when I struck up a conversation with a taxi driver. He was originally a landscaper, but was now driving taxis (as part of his retirement plan) and he did like the job a lot. But he did have some regrets. He wanted to write. It had [...]
In the year 2003, I got on a cruise ship from New Zealand to Australia. And those cruise ships are so big, that you’d never believe you’d get seasick on one of them. And yet it’s quite easy to get seasick when the sea is churning and monstrous waves keeping battering the ship time and [...]
Let’s say you’re writing an article. And let’s also assume that you’re writing a pretty good article when suddenly you manage to slip in a ‘throwaway line’. So what’s a throwaway line? A throwaway line is a line that’s often not related to the article. It’s probably just a thought that popped up in your [...]
How to use article writing techniques to produce a book Have you heard of the story of the ‘Goose that laid the Golden Eggs’? What about ‘The Tortoise and the Hare’? And surely you must have heard of ‘The Fox and the Grapes’. And what do those stories have in common? All of these stories [...]
How to write a series of articles to make up a book Imagine you wanted to write a book in December. And right now it’s January. When do you begin to write the book? Should you start in August? Or is July a more auspicious month? And wouldn’t it be better to outline the whole [...]
Speeding up your articles writing: Is that really possible? Do you want to write articles and write them faster? Do you want to write outstanding articles and write them faster? Do you want to avoid slogging over one darned article for three hours? Let’s answer that question by looking at piano lessons. If you started [...]
How To Know If Your Article Is Exciting Enough For The Reader When you complete an article, you always have one of two reactions You think it rocks. Or you think it sucks. And you may be wrong on both fronts. You may think your article rocks, when in fact it sucks. And vice versa. [...]
What To Do When Sub-Plots’ Take Over Your Article Writing Have you heard of the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears? Well as you know, Goldilocks found the Three Bears’ house, broke in, and systematically ate their porridge, sat in their chairs, and then slept on their beds. And as the story is told [...]
If you’re like most folks you’ll have run into the price vs. value dilemma. No, not in your marketing strategy, but just lazing over coffee and looking at real estate. There in front of you is this great looking house in the real estate section of your newspaper, and you notice that there’s no price [...]
Most of us never know why our headlines aren’t working like they should. And we listen to all those fruitcakes who tell us how to write ‘better’ headlines. Hey, you don’t need to listen to anyone. You just need to focus on one thing. If you tell me one thing in your headline, I’ll listen. [...]
Early in the year 2002, Psychotactics didn’t exist. We weren’t selling any products. Barely even managing to get any consulting. And selling workshops or training to clients was just a dream. Then an amazing little book came to our rescue. Well, technically it wasn’t even a book. It was a presentation I’d made about ‘how [...]
You may think that marketing is all about getting your message in front of clients. Or you may think marketing is about relationships. Yeah, yeah, it’s all that but there’s a starting point. And that’s to choose a winning marketing strategy in the first place. And no one demonstrates this technique better than Will Smith. [...]