“What do you reckon … not bad, eh?”
My client looked at me.
And was that … a hint of smug satisfaction in his voice?
He’d just shown me some new copywriting software he’d found.
You might have seen this kind of software. It asks you a bunch of questions like:
- “What is your market’s #1 pain?”
- “What kind of thing would your customer say when they’re having this pain?”
- “What are three adjectives your customer would use to describe what he wants?”
And so on. And then the digital ‘robots’ assemble a sales letter using your answers.
My client was impressed, and he wanted to know what I thought.
Now, my client was a lovely guy. One of the nicest I’ve ever worked with.
But he was also paying me a lot of money …
… and let’s face it, this program was nowhere near as expensive as me.
And sales letters (like this program wrote) were a lot of the work I was doing for him at the time.
My client was too nice to say it outright … but I knew the implication.
“What do I think?” I replied.
He stared at me. He was just waiting to see what excuse I would come up with for trashing this thing.
I paused, then told him:
“I think it’s cool, and you should start using it!”
He nodded slowly and looked away. “Ah, I figured you’d say—“
His head snapped back.
“Wait, what did you just say?!?”
But, it’s true.
I had zero problem with him using that software.
So, why would I recommend a copywriting robot that could put me out of a job?
Three reasons:
#1 I always want the best result for my clients.
As a copywriter and marketing consultant, I don’t just write words. I’m my client’s trusted advisor.
If something is bad for them, I tell them right away.
And if something is good for them, I tell them too — even if it’s bad for me.
That’s a part of my job that robots will NEVER replace.
#2 Sales letters are getting less important.
The Internet is not like the old direct mail days, where you could send a cold lead a good sales letter and people would buy in droves.
(When was the last time YOU clicked an online ad, read a long-form sales letter, and bought?)
Nowadays most sales are made by people spending enough time with your brand to get to know you and trust you.
So if my client needed a bunch of sales letters and didn’t want to pay me for them … fine. Honestly, it’s not the biggest needle-mover for his business.
But really, this one was the biggie …
#3 Robots will never replace copywriters.
Sure, tons of jobs have sneered at the thought of robots doing ‘their’ job — then 10 years later watched in horror as robots got smart enough to replace them.
Factory workers, couriers, proofreaders, telemarketers, even lawyers are in the firing line.
So let’s not be stupid. Robots will get good. And heck, they’re writing sales letters!
But here’s the problem:
Robots can never have PERSONALITY.
And personality is what sells today.
Not just the sales letter, either — but the ongoing regular communications your customers get from you that make them trust you.
This email is an example. No robot could have sat down this morning, thought about something interesting to write about, and written it in a way that makes you read. And they never will.
So, I’m not threatened by any robots, because I have that skill.
No.
I’ll be worried the day that robots pass the copywriting Turing Test …
i.e. they actually start coming up with clever daily emails that are so good, you THINK a real person wrote them.
Till then, you can hire a trusted advisor — who writes much better copy than a robot — by clicking here:
01101001 10010110 10000111 10010001 00000011 10101010 00111011
Uh … oops … that was a, uh, typo. Heh. Yeah. A typo!
This is the ACTUAL waitlist link for a REAL copywriter who isn’t secretly a robot AT ALL:
Daniel Thr0sse11