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Welcome to the 63rd issue of Write On!
The newsletter that eats fruit by the foot by the yard.
In today’s issue I’ll be covering:
The easiest way to start your business
How to use humor in your copy
Free 3-day email storytelling course
Estimated read time: 2 minute 59 seconds
In partnership with ClickFunnels:
The easiest way to start your online business!
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A quick poll so I can write better newsletters for you:
What is your average email open rate? |
How to use humor in your copy:
For months, a “how to use humor” newsletter was pinned in my calendar.
So far, I’ve postponed, micro-edited, and restarted this newsletter a dozen times.
Because a newsletter about using humor in copywriting couldn’t be about boring facts. It had to have a good story. It had to be funny.
You see, telling stories can be uncomfortable — especially if you can’t see your audience.
You can’t sense if they’re still with you.
Luckily, one of my friends taught me this one-liner storytelling tactic that will save you from even the worst storytelling flops.
Does this sound familiar? You’re telling a story to your friends. A minute or two goes by, and you realize you’re losing steam. Your friends are checking their phones, and nobody is laughing or smiling along… you’re bombing.
That’s a tough pill to swallow.
All you can do at that point is try to land the plane with some grace.
Whenever my friend found himself in this situation, he’d finish his story, pause…….. and shout:
“And then I found 20 bucks!”
Gets a laugh every single time.
So why am I telling you this? Because this is just like using humor in your copy.
Your humor is NOT going to resonate every time for every reader.
So get over it, be able to laugh at yourself, and press send anyway.
Now that we’re over the mental barrier of being nervous about using humor in our copy let’s discuss why it could be the secret hack you’ve been looking for.
Most marketing today works like this:
Grab attention → Makes you emotional → Turn emotion into action
For example:
Fear convinces you to pay for your insurance, install a robbery detector, and pay double the price for almost the same food.
Hope sells weight-loss pills and “AI-powered solutions” that promise to solve every company's problem.
Curiosity turns click-bait headlines into watching a 20-minute video that explains the “#1 secret to making $1 million online.”
But the sophistication levels are rising, and marketing is evolving.
These days, it’s not enough to just catch attention; you have to be engaging.
Your audience has to trust, like, and relate to you.
To accomplish this, humor is your shortcut.
We feel a connection to people with the same sense of humor.
For example, if I quote a funny movie in this newsletter and you love that movie, you’ll instantly be more likely to think: “this guy is just like me.”
The thing is, most companies aren’t funny. They use the stuffy, traditional way of marketing.
Why? Because being stuffy and boring is safe. Being funny requires risk, polarity, and vulnerability.
You never know if a joke will land or flop until you try it out for the first time.
This is something most companies don’t have the stomach for.
But when you dare to take the risk, you’ll have a massive advantage over your boring competitors.
3 ways you can add humor to your copy (with some real-life marketing examples):
(1) Make fun of yourself:
You can’t help but smile when you first see this ad.
The way Ikea makes fun of their assembly service by assembling the ad completely wrong is bold, fun and makes us trust in their assembly service even more.
Because it addresses one of the biggest objections to their business head-on.
(2) Make analogies:
Compare having your product to how your life would look without your product.
This Durex example speaks for itself:
(3) Polarize with examples:
Look at your industry.
Take something you see that you don’t agree with.
Show visual proof that it doesn’t make sense and that your company has the opposite solution.
Using humor in your copy is a risk most businesses don’t dare to take.
But when you do, you’ll rise above your competitors and enter a new marketing terrain that most haven’t even considered.
💥 How to take action: Brainstorm all the problems you’re solving with your product. Then, brainstorm all the small, funny, relatable details about your prospect’s life and how it would look without your service. Connect the dots for them.
One more FREE copywriting resource for you:
I’m creating a free 3-day email course on how to create a compelling story that moves people.
Click below to register your interest, and I’ll send it to you as soon as it’s ready.
I won’t be sharing it anywhere else except with people who join the list below.
That’s all for this week! See you next Wednesday.
Cheers,
