Dramatic Sales Writing

I did at some point see articles about copywriting
in writers magazines by one Robert Bly. For some
reason, I seem to recall reading them even back in
the 1970s, even though I know now he started his
copywriting career in 1982. Maybe it's just that
he's such a successful self-promoter that I feel
as though I've always known his name, even though
I didn't.

Somewhere along the line I got the idea that
copywriters made decent money but nothing
spectacular. I was already doing in my day job at
Social Security.

I didn't want writing to be just another job.

I mean, I had a secure job making what in St Louis
is a decent middle middle-class income. Not real
great but decent.

I wanted to make a LOT of money and write novels.

I was willing to do a lot of things to make a LOT of
money -- I went through a lot of stuff and have
wound up in Internet marketing.

When I had a lot of money, I could devote myself to
my true love of writing fiction.

Except for bestsellers for such few authors at Stephen
King etc, I did not know anybody making a LOT of money
from writing.

I did not think it could be done.

So while full-time copywriting might equal or
slightly exceed what I make at my day job, it
wouldn't exceed it enough to justify the extra
risk of cash flow problems.

I still would not be rich, so what would the point be?

I didn't think that through consciously. It was the
logic that proceeded from my erroneous assumption
that copywriters could not make big time money.

And big time money is what I want to make!

I'm not sure when I first became aware of
copywriting. I guess, in the general sense of it
being the writing of ads and commercials, I knew
of it a long time ago.

And I absolutely rejected the idea of me
doing that kind of writing. I hated commercials -
they're what interrupted movies I was watching
on TV. I just could not see myself sitting down
and writing some crazy stuff about a woman comparing
detergents.

In my very early youth, I was of course against the
rich. I did want to make a lot of money from my
writing, but I wanted to do so by writing
bestselling novels.

Eventually, circumstances forced me to change my
attitude toward money, prosperity and the economy.

I actually took a low-level telemarketing job to
pay bills back in 1984. From there I switched to
selling cable TV door to door. I decided I better
know what I was doing, and so bought my first book
on sales -- Secrets of Closing the Sale by Zig
Ziglar.

I've worked on my attitude since and have read a
lot more about sales and marketing.

But even as I progressed in this way through the
1990s, through trying out home businesses, writing
ads for my 900 number and flyers for products in
my network marketing business, it still did not
occur to me to make money by writing marketing
materials.