I have recently come to suspect there is a monster in my house.
Let me tell you why:
A few weeks ago I began noticing something strange.
My front room has four light switches in a square panel.
The bottom two of them switch on the downlights in the room itself.
The top two switch on the lights inside and outside the front door.
Normally, I only ever use the bottom two, and sparingly at that.
But recently, I’ve been finding all four of them turned on, at random times.
Every time I see this I turn them off.
Firstly, it costs me money to leave those inefficient lights on.
But even worse, the last sparky (sorry, ‘electrician’, you non-Australians) who worked on my lights gave me a confidence-inspiring warning: “Yeah mate, when ya get some cash ya might wanna switch those downlights out so they don’t burn your house down.”
Anyway, I was puzzled by this invisible ‘light monster’ who kept turning the lights on, until recently …
… when I noticed a little step beneath the light switch.
So, I moved it away.
And the next morning, I retreated into my office, where I could see the switch.
And I watched.
And … I found the light monster.
For not ten minutes later, my three-year-old toddled out, picked up the step, put it underneath the lights, and climbed up and turned them all on.
And then he walked away, pleased with himself.
Thankfully, I now know where my ‘light monster’ is (and I have instructed him in the proper etiquette of why we do not need lights when the sun is up).
But most businesses never find their ‘light monster’.
It hides in their copy.
And it rears its ugly head to throw on the switch at the most inopportune times, and blare lights into their readers’ eyes … and scare them away from buying.
Sometimes, it can be a subtle but annoying downlight — as much as one line that just hits the wrong ‘beat’ in an email and leaves people bored instead of excited to buy.
Other times, it’s a helicopter floodlight — a sales page that totally misjudges the reader’s state of awareness and doesn’t connect.
But until they find this ‘light monster’, they’re just burning money, never realising why their copy doesn’t really seem to work.
So, how do you catch these light monsters?
Lean in close and I’ll tell you:
Rumour has it there is a man by the name of Daniel Throssell.
They call him the Monster Hunter Extraordinaire.
Little is known about him except that he makes a living out of catching these monsters for people.
He lurks in his office, and catches that sucker … and makes sure your lights stay off, and your copy stays engaging.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of monsters in the world, and he’s not going to be able to help for a while.
And when he is, he doesn’t come cheap.
(Some of these light monsters are nasty creatures.)
For many businesses, the cost of hiring him may not even make sense compared to the little nibbles their fuzzy monster is making into their business. Those people may have to get by by using his free emails to exorcise their copy.
But if you have a bigger business, with larger revenue and nastier beasties, you can’t afford NOT to seek Daniel’s services.
Want to know when he can purge out YOUR light monster?
Daniel
Monster Hunter Extraordinaire