Some were humorous.

Some were eh.

And some were quite questionable.

My favorite commercial?

Kmart’s “Ship my pants” commercial.

One of my most hilarious commercials I ever watched with their clever play on words. If you haven’t watched it, I highly recommend you do if you want a good laugh.

But recently, I saw one that really caught my interest. Not because it was funny or outrageous, but because it was in a format I haven’t seen before.

This particular commercial promoted a window repair company in an interview format.

The interviewer was talking to the president of the company asking him questions like…

What makes your company different?

What’s the biggest complaint people have with their windows?

Tell me what makes your windows special.

What makes your warranty different?

What’s interesting is that the commercial didn’t feel salesy. It felt more like an educational video. For example, I learned some disadvantages of having aluminum window frames.

I also learned how crazy expensive they are based on other people’s reviews.

But adding on top of the perks of doing an interview style commercial.

Selling from an educational standpoint increases your credibility and authority as well.

People are more likely to do business with you when they see that you know your stuff and have built trust with you.

And you can do the same thing for yourself and your own business by getting featured on podcasts. There are tons of resources out there that’ll help connect you with podcast hosts.

One I recommend is Matchmaker.fm. It’s a free service that I used to get myself booked on a couple of shows.

You can sign up using the link below.

https://Matchmaker.fm

So what’s the topic, you ask?

80’s fashion

This topic came up because we had an 80’s themed summer party yesterday (Which is why I didn’t send out an email then).

I personally didn’t dress up. I didn’t know what 80’s clothing looked like, and when I looked it up, they were clothing that I just didn’t have in my wardrobe.

I mostly saw neon colored clothing, but there were other trends that defined 80’s fashion too like:

1. Crazy hair (Perms, mullets, side ponytails)

2. Ripped jeans

3. Leg warmers

4. High-waist jeans

5. Spandex

Some trends have died as time went on, and rightfully so.

(If you’re still rocking with a mullet or wearing spandex outfits in public, you need help)

But there are glimpses of 80’s-inspired fashion that I still see ‘til this day, at least in my experience.

I find it even more fascinating how there are some trends that don’t seem to die.

And a lot of them are pretty basic, or if you want to see it another way, foundational clothing.

You have the jeans, watches, high heels, button up shirts, and pretty much any clothing that’s black.

To be more specific:

You have different types of jeans. Baggy, skinny, ripped, bootcut, straight, etc.

Some will be popular for a while, some will die. But one thing’s for sure, you’re always going to see jeans.

Similarly in marketing:

It seems like marketing trends differ every year. Influencer marketing exists now, anything artificial intelligence related is now a thing, and there are webinars and other virtual events.

But one thing about marketing that’s never going to change is the art of persuasion. Whether it’s text or video, you have to learn how to be persuasive in order to get people interested in whatever product or service you’re promoting.

It’s especially useful when it comes to writing emails, which you can learn more about here:

https://EllisenWang.com/email-titan-sample

And being the naive student that I was back then, I accepted it as truth and didn’t question it once.

Now?

I believe the people who say advertisements are done wrong are the ones who are wrong.

Let me explain why.

For the past six months, there are certain brands that have been stuck in my head.

For example:

Oatly, an oat milk brand

Keeps, a men’s hair loss treatment company

Titan, an investment management company

I remember these brands because I’ve seen advertisements of these companies in public transportation multiple times and/or their ads are super unique.

(If there was an award for the most unique ad, I’d definitely nominate Oatly. Plus, I’m still hoping I get to meet the copywriter behind Oatly’s ads one day)

And this is where I think these marketing experts I mentioned earlier misunderstand.

You see, the purpose of these advertisements is not to get the viewers to purchase something as soon as they see the ad, but more so to introduce the brand to them.

The goal is to get them so familiar with the brand that when the viewer is dealing with a certain problem, he or she will immediately think of that particular brand.

i.e. The brand is playing an extreme long-term game.

Email marketing is too a long-term game, and I’ll give a timely example.

Not too long ago, I joined Daniel Throssell’s email list (Another email copywriter who writes very unique emails. Highly suggest you check him out) and he shared how many emails his average buyer reads before buying a product of his.

The answer: 103

Which is why you shouldn’t get discouraged when you don’t see any sales come in after emailing a few times here and there (I was one of those people once upon a time).

And the only thing you should focus on is to just continuously write.

If you want to learn more about email copywriting, go to the link below:

https://EllisenWang.com/email-titan-sample

And most of the time, it goes like this:

1. Their motivation is fueled to the max for the first two weeks and they’re consistently going to the gym and eating healthy.

2. They break their gym streak because their days were too busy or they weren’t in the mood to go.

3. They become miserable with their diet.

4. They give up and go back to their usual routine.

Whether it’s a physical health goal or not, most people fail to achieve their resolutions, and there could be a number of reasons why. Lack of discipline, not setting specific goals, having unrealistic expectations, etc.

But yesterday, I watched a video where this guy talked about his weight loss journey, and how he lost 30 pounds in 10 months.

He went into things like his eating habits, his exercise routine, and how he kept himself motivated throughout his journey.

The last part is what I want to talk about because the advice he gave was so simple and so obvious, but you don’t see most people doing it.

It worked for him, and his appearance showed it. If I compare how the guy looked one year ago to what he looks like now, the difference is incredible.

What he said was this:

Instead of telling yourself, “This year, I want to eat healthier and exercise more,” you say, “I want to lose X amount of pounds by Y date.”

Of course, this isn’t anything revolutionary. It follows the principles of SMART goals, which, if you don’t know, stands for goals that are:

Specific – Set real numbers

Measurable – The goal is trackable

Achievable – The goal is realistic

Relevant – Whether or not the goal aligns with your overall objective and life goals

Time-based – Setting a deadline

This is something that was taught to us at some point during our dreaded schooling days, yet people tend to forget to set deadlines for themselves.

Like I mentioned before, us humans procrastinate, and if we don’t have deadlines to meet, then nothing will get done.

It’s pretty much psychology 101.

Plus it’s not less daunting to think about maintaining an exercise and diet routine for 10 months versus doing it for the rest of your life. And by the time you push through those 10 months, that new routine will become a habit.

Hopefully, this’ll be a good refresher for you and will help if, or when, you’re setting your 2022 goals.

And don’t think this principle isn’t applicable to your marketing efforts too.

In unrelated news:

Click the link below to check out my email copywriting book.

https://EllisenWang.com/email-titan-sample

First off, I don’t know anything about Texas. I haven’t even stepped foot into their land.

But from what I’ve read online, they had a serious littering problem back then. If it got to the point where they had to launch an entire public campaign about it, then I can only imagine how dirty the streets were. It was so bad that the state had to spend $20 million every year to clean up their roads. That’s equal to over $51 million today.

And most of the litter was caused by the younger people.

Meddling kids, as every Scooby-Doo villain would say.

So Texas’ Department of Transportation hired an ad agency, GSD&M, to develop an anti-littering campaign that targets the younger people, and the co-founder, Tim McClure, was tasked with creating the campaign.

At first, he thought about how he could create a new campaign while incorporating the word ‘litter,’ which he got stuck on.

Then while he was out on a walk, he thought back to the times when his mom would yell at him about how his room was always a mess.

He thought the word ‘mess’ would better describe garbage rather than ‘litter,’ which was more commonly used to describe cat litter.

That’s when his idea hit, and he went off and created the slogan, “Don’t Mess With Texas.”

When they pitched it to the Department of Transportation, they shot it down at first. But they eventually gave the OK in 1985 and launched it.

After running for a few years, the results?

Littering was reduced by 71% in four years.

But of course, it’s good to know why it worked.

From my brief research, I never found an analysis of why it worked. So I’m just going to briefly tell you why I think it worked.

When you see “Don’t Mess With Texas,” there’s a sense of comradery, a sense of belonging amongst the Texas residents. It’s as if they’re telling everyone,

“Yes, don’t mess with our land! Don’t mess with our state!”

Not to mention, a lot of celebrities jumped on the campaign bandwagon, which spread awareness even further.

And whatever celebrities do or get behind, it becomes a cool trend, which young people always love to follow.

But when it comes to learning the psychological factors, one of my favorite resources to turn to is Joseph Sugarman’s The Adweek Copywriting Handbook.

If you don’t know, Joseph Sugarman was one of the best copywriters in his time, and he put up live copywriting seminars that had four figure price tags on them.

Lucky for you and me, he condensed his seminar materials into this book at a very affordable and generous price.

And even though the focus of the book is on print ads, a lot of the principles can be applied to emails (And even sales letters) as well.

You can learn more about it using my affiliate link below.

https://EllisenWang.com/adweek