Interview Reveals Inside Tips

Last week, after return­ing from the hos­pi­tal fol­low­ing my wife’s mas­tec­tomy, some­thing really cool hap­pened. I was inter­viewed by Dale King, copy­writer and owner of Guru​Knowl​edge​.org.

Why cool? Because I was a bit of a ner­vous wreck, think­ing of my beau­ti­ful Sylvie and her bat­tle with breast can­cer. And being inter­viewed is some­what ther­a­peu­tic. It made me remem­ber the things that are impor­tant to me, even though the inter­view was business-​​related.

That said, a lot of peo­ple said they loved the inter­view, so I decided to reprint it here, on my blog, for you. It also offers a few tips about how I write copy, how I think and how I view mar­ket­ing in gen­eral. I also reveal what I believe is the sin­gle great­est secret to marketing.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed doing it.

Dale King: Today I’m inter­view­ing Mas­ter Copy­writ­ing guru, Michel Fortin. Good morn­ing Michel, how are you?

Michel Fortin: I’m good, thanks. And thank you for giv­ing me this opportunity.

Dale King: Michel, tell my lis­ten­ers how and when you got started mar­ket­ing on the Internet.

Michel Fortin: Well, I started in about 1992 as an employee. I didn’t have a per­sonal web­site, I was actu­ally a copy­writer for a cos­metic sur­geon where one of my tasks included cre­at­ing a web­site for the firm for this new thing called “the Internet.”

When I left the firm and started free­lanc­ing, I was pri­mar­ily an offline copy­writer (since 1995), which is over a decade now, and the Inter­net was first used purely as an exten­sion of my exposure-​​seeking activities.

In other words, my web­site was not a saleslet­ter, a cor­po­rate web­site, an ecom­merce store­front, or any­thing of that sort.

It was merely a sim­ple, 3– to 4-​​page dig­i­tal resume (a bill­board, in other words). No fluff. No links. No con­tent. No calls to action. Noth­ing fancy. Just a few pages anounc­ing “me” to the world. Just another place to hang my shingle.

At first, my web site was (naively, I should add) hosted on a free server using free tools. But hav­ing had some expo­sure offline already, this enabled me to get some traf­fic. How­ever, it could have been much harder if I were a new­bie with no pre­vi­ous mar­ket­ing expe­ri­ence whatsoever.

That said, I didn’t use some of the tech­niques that I now use (and teach) — tech­niques that, if I had imple­mented them ear­lier, would have saved me a few years.

For exam­ple, in late 1997, I reg­is­tered “Suc​cess​Doc​tor​.com,” since my com­pany focused pri­mar­ily on mar­ket­ing and copy­writ­ing for cos­metic sur­geons — I helped doc­tors become suc­cess­ful, hence the name “The Suc­cess Doctor.”

(In fact, many of the late night infomer­cials you see on TV, par­tic­u­larly in hair trans­plan­ta­tion, are likely some of my many brain­chil­dren. I’ve noticed that some of them still air late at night, even to this day!)

But my traf­fic really soared when I started to do two things: 1) I decided to put my free book, “The 10 Com­mand­ments of Power Posi­tion­ing,” online (a lead gen­er­a­tor that I’ve been using suc­cess­fully offline for a while).

And 2) I also started to write arti­cles for ezines in order to pro­mote the book (usu­ally in the author’s byline at the end of each arti­cle), which I’ve been doing for some time as well in the offline world.

Both strate­gies came about almost instinc­tively. There was no prompt­ing from some­one, although I stud­ied many mar­keters in my early career. In fact, mar­ket­ing and espe­cially sell­ing (and copy­writ­ing, by the way, is just a writ­ten form of sell­ing) were fas­ci­nat­ing to me.

You see, sell­ing was my first job. When I turned 19, I became the youngest licensed insur­ance sales­per­son in a large, multi­na­tional insur­ance com­pany (and I think in its his­tory too).

But in the begin­ning how­ever, I failed mis­er­ably. So when I began to imple­ment many of the tech­niques that I teach today (such as writ­ing lead gen­er­a­tion saleslet­ters rather than the more tra­di­tional door-​​to-​​door prospect­ing), one thing led to another until I became the top sales­man for most of the com­pa­nies that employed me. I won awards, con­tests, you name it.

Today, I own sev­eral web­sites. My wife Sylvie and I now own sev­eral online and infor­ma­tion prod­ucts, as well as soft­ware, web­sites and pro­grams. I still write copy for cer­tain clients but have switched the bulk of my copy­writ­ing busi­ness from writ­ing copy for clients to writ­ing copy for our own products.

Dale King: Michel, tell my lis­ten­ers what a typ­i­cal day is like for Michel Fortin.

Michel Fortin: My day is divided into three chunks. Late morn­ing, after­noon and evening. The morn­ing is my admin time. After wak­ing up and sip­ping on a cup of cof­fee, I down­load my email, answer cus­tomer queries and man­age projects.

In the after­noon, though, I pri­mar­ily surf the web for research, espe­cially to gather tid­bits I can use in my copy. Depend­ing on the saleslet­ter and type of client I’m writ­ing for, I will browse the web for impor­tant infor­ma­tion about the client, their clients (the mar­ket I’m writ­ing to) and the prod­uct in question.

If it’s an info­prod­uct for exam­ple, I’ll spend the after­noon going through it, tak­ing a lot of notes, and writ­ing down bul­let ideas, head­lines, “hooks” and fac­toids to sup­port my claims.

While most of the research is con­nected with a par­tic­u­lar project, some of it is just brows­ing for new ideas and top­ics I can use either in my arti­cles, my prod­uct devel­op­ment, my own copy or my web­sites — such as my blog. It’s “fish­ing for fuel,” so to speak, where I sim­ply and aim­lessly browse around, gath­er­ing ideas to feed my creativity.

And in the evening, I write. I write and write and write.

Most of the time, I write copy. But I also respond to posts in my forum, write arti­cles for my blog, add con­tent to my web­sites, and plan busi­ness strate­gies by writ­ing them down in detail (along with my lovely wife, Sylvie).

I also take some time to write in per­sonal jour­nal. This is one of the most lib­er­at­ing, pow­er­ful and edu­ca­tional activ­i­ties I do. It helps me to deal with chal­lenges, peo­ple and events. And it’s also an incred­i­bly cre­ative process, from which many of my new prod­uct ideas or copy “hooks” come from, espe­cially after spend­ing an after­noon “fish­ing for fuel.”

Dale King: How impor­tant has goal-​​setting been to your over­all success?

Michel Fortin: Not as impor­tant as some peo­ple pro­fess. I pre­fer not to set spe­cific goals because my life is not run by goals but by pri­or­i­ties. Val­ues. Actu­ally, I pre­fer to call them “guides” rather than “goals,” mean­ing end-​​results and not nec­es­sar­ily achievements.

That is, things that mean some­thing to me and the peo­ple I love. Things that are impor­tant and rel­e­vant to my per­sonal set of values.

In fact, I wrote an entire book on the sub­ject. It’s called “Drop Your Goals And Man­age Your Life!” (Rather than set your goals and man­age your time.) If you don’t mind, Dale, the web­site they can get it is at: http://​www​.dropy​our​goals​.com/ (and it’s free).

To explain why I pre­fer this method would require more time and energy to explain. They can read the book I men­tioned ear­lier to under­stand my phi­los­o­phy. But to sum it up, the process is sim­ply this: goals are lim­it­ing and are based on exter­nal processes. Guides, or value-​​based pri­or­i­ties, are inter­nal and based on how you want to feel once any goal is achieved.

To say it dif­fer­ently, let me quote Lao-​​Tsu who said it best:

“Many peo­ple have climbed the lad­der only to dis­cover once at the top that the lad­der was lean­ing against the wrong wall.”

Dale King: How impor­tant has read­ing been to your over­all success?

Michel Fortin: Immensely impor­tant. There’s a French say­ing (I’m Cana­dian, and French is my native tongue) that goes: “Lire éclaire l’esprit.” It means, “Read­ing illu­mi­nates the mind.”

And this is not lim­ited to books. I love read­ing forum posts, arti­cles and blogs because they pro­vide me with a lot of insight. Not only in how other peo­ple per­ceive things, but also, by their ques­tions for exam­ple, what they want, what makes them tick, what kind of prod­ucts to cre­ate, what kind of copy “hooks” will work best and what will improve my cur­rent business.

That’s why brows­ing the web and even read­ing entries in your jour­nal are incred­i­bly pro­duc­tive activ­i­ties — for me, anyway.

Sure, I read books. But I also lis­ten to audios and tele­sem­i­nars, watch videos and DVDs, and sub­scribe to many newslet­ters and mail­ing lists — not nec­es­sar­ily to read the con­tent per se but to grab new ideas, watch what goes on “between the lines” or “behind the scenes,” and see how peo­ple react to it.

Dale King: What was the last good book you read?

Michel Fortin: “The Dhamma­pada” (The Say­ings of The Bud­dha) and “Reflec­tions on the Art of Liv­ing: A Joseph Camp­bell Com­pan­ion” by Dian Osborn.

But if you want me to be more busi­ness– or marketing-​​specific, I love The Robert Col­lier Let­ter Book (I’ve read it sev­eral times), “Super­heroes And Phi­los­o­phy: Truth, Jus­tice, And The Socratic Way” by Thomas and Matt Mor­ris, and “Blink: The Power of Think­ing With­out Think­ing” by Mal­colm Gladwell.

Dale King: If you could rec­om­mend one book that all Inter­net mar­keters should read, what would it be?

Michel Fortin: “Think And Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill. With­out a doubt.

Dale King: In your opin­ion, what tech­nol­ogy has changed Inter­net Mar­ket­ing the most over the last 5 years?

Michel Fortin: Other than blogs and activity-​​based mar­ket­ing (i.e., mar­ket­ing strate­gies that engage the reader, whether it’s web-​​based, blog-​​based or email-​​based), I also believe video has made a mas­sive pen­e­tra­tion into the Inter­net mar­ket­ing sphere, and will soon grow even more.

It’s all part of engag­ing the reader more. As reported by a Uni­ver­sity study 20 years ago, it stated that “the more senses you engage, the more peo­ple are will­ing and apt to buy from you.” This was refer­ring to sales pro­fes­sion­als using mul­ti­me­dia in their sales presentations.

But with the Inter­net, it’s just as true — and important.

There­fore, I truly believe that video and its use not only has grown dra­mat­i­cally but will grow expo­nen­tially in the near future. New uses, new for­mats, new mar­ket­ing approaches, as well as new types of copy (since I’m pri­mar­ily a copy­writer) have already been intro­duced and will be intro­duced over time.

Dale King: What new tech­nol­ogy do you see chang­ing Inter­net Mar­ket­ing over the next 5 years?

Michel Fortin: More and more video. The days of long scrolling copy saleslet­ters are slow­ing shrink­ing, and the incor­po­ra­tion of videos, audio and flash ani­ma­tion in web saleslet­ters (not fancy graph­ics to “wow” and enter­tain, but to edu­cate, inform and per­suade the audi­ence, as well as to grab their atten­tion and retain their inter­est) are going to be more and more preva­lent in the com­ing years if not months.

Dale King: What per­son has influ­enced you the most in your life­time, and how?

Michel Fortin: Jim Rohn. He’s the men­tor that I’ve fol­lowed for many years, and whose teach­ings have deeply influ­enced my life and my busi­ness. Some of my favorite quotes from Jim include:

“Brevity has a lot of power in it.” “With­out a sense of urgency, desire loses its value.” “If some­one is going down the wrong road, he doesn’t need moti­va­tion to speed him up; he needs edu­ca­tion to turn him around!”

These teach­ings (and many more) have deeply influ­enced my think­ing, whether it’s in my copy or in my busi­ness. I’m always grav­it­ing to his books when I need an extra kick in the anatomy, par­tic­u­larly when I’m con­fronted with a chal­lenge or when things seem to go downhill.

But here’s my favorite quote from Jim Rohn — and it’s my favorite quote of all time. It’s been hang­ing on my wall, in front of me (above my desk), for over a decade now (since I’ve been in busi­ness). It goes like this:

“There are some things in life that you don’t have to know how it works. The main thing is that it works. While some are study­ing the roots, oth­ers are pick­ing the fruits. Suc­cess just depends on which end of this you want to be.”

Dale King: If you could give my lis­ten­ers one piece of advice, what would it be?

Michel Fortin: If there is some­thing about which I am pretty adamant, it’s the con­cept of attract­ing clients that are pre-​​qualified and will­ing to do busi­ness. And this involves many dif­fer­ent things, from niche mar­ket­ing to tar­get mar­ket­ing to lead generation.

How­ever, this fun­da­men­tal “mag­net­ism,” if you will, is not only based on pure mar­ket­ing prac­tices or strate­gies. It also involves some­thing at a much deeper level that is far more effec­tive than any other mar­ket­ing tool or process.

This “thing” to which I am refer­ring is, I believe, the most impor­tant mar­ket­ing secret that I can ever teach — and it’s far from being a secret at all.

It is con­sid­ered as one to a cer­tain degree sim­ply because it is often neglected or ignored by many busi­ness­peo­ple and marketers.

I’m not refer­ring to mar­ket­ing or pro­mo­tional activ­i­ties, too. If peo­ple per­ceive that doing busi­ness with you has an implicit added value, espe­cially when com­pared to your com­peti­tors that are fiercely fight­ing for your market’s atten­tion, you will often end up with their atten­tion, their con­fi­dence, and their repeat and refer­ral busi­ness as a result.

Sure, you can apply all the direct response, mar­ket­ing and copy­writ­ing strate­gies to your busi­ness to achieve this. But the most effec­tive way to com­mu­ni­cate this added value is through the gen­uine, sin­cere, and pas­sion­ate zest you have for what you do.

Peo­ple have a ten­dency to grav­i­tate toward other peo­ple who love what they do — their enthu­si­asm, charisma, and authen­tic desire to serve oth­ers are instantly com­mu­ni­cated through their actions and par­tic­u­larly their mar­ket­ing efforts.

Sadly, how­ever, the mar­ket­place is filled with so many peo­ple who jump into busi­ness for one sole pur­pose: Money. They work for a pen­sion instead of a pas­sion. They are so profit-​​minded that they fail to enjoy the process.

The great anthro­pol­o­gist, Joseph Camp­bell, said it best when he said that old cliché: “Fol­low your bliss” a few decades ago.

Actu­ally, that say­ing is older than you think. Chi­nese sage Con­fu­cius, in 500 B.C., said: “Do what you love and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” Author Mar­sha Sine­tar wrote a book, enti­tled: “Do what you love and the money will fol­low.” Peter McWilliams, author of “Life 101,” claimed: “Do what you love and the nec­es­sary resources will follow.”

But to me, it all boils down to this:

“Do what you love and the busi­ness will follow.”

That, to me, is the great­est mar­ket­ing secret of all time. It’s to do what you love or to love what you do. And if you don’t love what you do, then find it. Make *that* your bliss. As Jim Rohn once said, “If you don’t like where you are, then change it! You’re not a tree.”

Ulti­mately, if you do what you love or love what you do, you will nat­u­rally attract more busi­ness by the sheer fact that your pas­sion is also com­mu­ni­cat­ing to oth­ers that you are offer­ing the best solu­tion to their prob­lems. Why? Because you are offer­ing them the best…

YOU!

Dale King: Thank you for tak­ing the time to do this inter­view, Michel.

Michel Fortin: My plea­sure. Thanks, Dale.

About the Author

Last 5 Posts By Michel Fortin

• How to Capture and Captivate Attention
• The Real Problem With The Flaw of Attraction
• Two Shining Stars in an Age of Darkness
• Changes, Relaunches, and Extreme Makeovers
• Superior Value Equals Superior Sales

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