The episode of “How I Write” podcast is here - Sam Parr: Copywriting… What You Need to Know
I heard this episode while biking 10.7 miles on my bike.
People mentioned:
- Dharmesh Shah
- Scott Galloway
- Robert Caro
- Felix Dennis
- Gregory David Roberts
- Ben Franklin
- Hunter S. Thompson
- Neil Gaiman
- Neil Armstrong
- James Madison
- Thomas Jefferson
- Harry Dry — Learn Great Copywriting in 76 minutes
- Kaplan’s law of words — any words that aren’t working for you, are working against you.
Books mentioned:
- American Kingpin
- How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis
- The Elements of Eloquence by
- Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
- The Great Gatsby
Websites and Products mentioned:
Concepts and Ideas:
- AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action)
- Copy work
- Merism
- Antithesis
Key takeaways:
- The headline is VERY important. It should be attention grabbing, and the hook should be the beginning of a slope that keeps the attention of the user going down the length of the piece - advert, article, book, … If you nail the headline, you will nail the rest of it.
The following summary was generated by Clade from the text transcript of the video
Key topics discussed:
- Writing viral articles and effective copy
- Building email newsletters and media businesses
- Reading habits and favorite books
- Techniques for memorable writing and phrasing
- Company vision and branding
- The importance of speed and boldness in business
Key insights:
- Focus on email subscribers as a core metric for media businesses
- Use “forgotten text” like thank you pages to enhance branding
- Study early versions of successful company websites for inspiration
- Employ techniques like antithesis and merism for memorable phrasing
- Read history books for entertainment and business books for enrichment
- Define what your company stands for and against in your vision
- Move fast and create stakes to build momentum in new projects
- Written words have power to shape institutions and societies