The pesky red button vanishes … revealing an item box!
Stuffing the item into your pocket…
You notice a pile of baskets at the entrance of the maze.
You pick one up.
It has a bunch of very neatly divided sections in it:
‘Hopes and dreams’ … ‘frustrations and fears’ … ‘other things they’ve tried’ … and so on.
“Nice,” you think. “It’ll be super easy to organise my gold research nuggets with this!”
I just roll my eyes.
(You’ll see.)
And so, swinging the neatly-divided basket in your arm…
You set off into Market Research Maze.
After a few minutes’ trudging, we come to a junction signposted as:
“Internet Search Intersection”
Several roads branch out.
“All right,” you exclaim. “I’m gonna find some research nuggets!”
And one by one … you try the various roads.
- The Subreddit Snake Den seems promising … but after a bit of poking around, you discover there’s no subreddit for your niche … and you leave, covered in bites from u/venomoussnake.
- Next up you visit the Amazon Jungle in search of some juicy reviews … but it turns out the thing you’re selling doesn’t even exist on Amazon. (Instead, you return with a basket full of cheaply-made gadgets. Oops.)
- You try the path leading to the Quora Quagmires … and come back, covered in mud, and shaking your head as to why anyone thought reading a bunch of questions would help your research.
- One glimpse at the mere name of the Hall of Calls gets a big fat “NOPE” from you. (How would you even do a phone call with some random customer of your client’s anyway?!?)
- In desperation, you follow the road to the Forum Firepits … and return an hour later with minor burns, but without having found a single forum dedicated to this niche.
Yet worst of all…
Your neatly organised “research basket” — with the little dedicated sections for each thing you wanted to know — isn’t neat anymore.
It’s now overflowing with … junk.
You’re struggling to tell what’s a nugget and what’s just an old rock … so you copy-paste everything you see into your basket…
…and in spite of your nice, theoretical divisions … 99% of what you’ve found has just gone into the “miscellaneous” division.
Dragging your bloated research basket behind you, you round a corner…
…and stop in horror.
You … recognise this place.
With a gasp, you say:
“Are we back … where we started?!?”
I shrug casually. “Yep.”
“I’M JUST GOING IN CIRCLES!!!” you wail. “WHEN CAN I STOP THIS OGILVY-FORSAKEN PROCESS?!?”
“Well, according to most copywriting experts, never,” I say, folding my arms. “But not according to me. If you’d only asked for my help, I would have shown you my dedicated weapon just for Market Research Maze…”
I reach into my pocket, smiling at you…
And then I freeze.
My face turns deathly white.
I’m looking at something … over your shoulder?
“Hey,” I whisper.
“What?”
“Don’t … move … a … muscle.”
You blink. “Huh? Why not?!?”
And spinning around…
You come face-to-face…
with a gigasaur.
Gulp.
It stares at you…
You stare at it…
And then…
It grins…
And opens a mouth…
…of razor-sharp teeth.
…
…
…