Copywriting is taken for granted. Period. It's taken for granted in the Fortune 500 world, where marketing departments view it as a cheap commodity. And it's taken for granted at a lot of tech companies (Apple's being a notable exception).<p>But it shouldn't be. And a project like this one -- not to mention the founder/author's innovation and tenacity -- will help turn the tide.<p>There's certainly a fair amount of dark art to quality writing, but there's also science. And it's refreshing to see a results-focused approach that seeks to separate the merely mellifluous from the legitimately effective.<p>Big kudos on this one!
Immediately went to go buy the bundle of 4 books (good copywriting!)<p>But, some friendly startup advice:<p>1. There should be no reason to ask for my address and phone number and such for a digital purchase with PayPal as the purchase option. Your close rate would go up if you just let people go straight to PayPal -- and ask for those details <i>after</i> the purchase is done (eCommerce companies learned this a while ago).<p>2. You shouldn't have PayPal as the purchase option. It sucks for a number of well documented reasons, and there are better options now.<p>3. Once I tried to complete the PayPal transaction, got this error message: <a href="http://screencast.com/t/c5crNpyDg" rel="nofollow">http://screencast.com/t/c5crNpyDg</a><p>Happy to try again when you're ready. Just ping me.
What's very cool about this is that the page itself is actually a sample that will sell you on the book.<p>Best marketing of the year award.<p>Really awesome.
I suggest (um...plead?) spitting them out as Kindle books, or at least making the pdf less Kindle-hostile. I bought the bundle (great offer, thank you :) and dragged it onto my Kindle. Font tiny, most prominent thing is the bottom bar.
I find it interesting how the HN post title isn't something like "Check out these Copywriting books I wrote", but rather something that sounds like a simple blog post but is instead a landing page for some ebooks.<p>Worked for me! I'm considering buying now...
Can we stop calling it "copy" outside of our niches? For most readers they will infer the meaning you ascribe to the word from reading this article or look it up... there are ample other, non-ambiguous, commonplace methods to refer to text (that is one).<p>Its easy to slip on stuff like this when you are immersed in your speciality and don't often talk to people outside of it... although as a programmer at least I have the excuse of there not already being multiple unambiguous ways to describe my subject matter. :)<p>However, I will not be surprised if this usage of copy becomes more popular - both times I've seen it were on Hacker News in the last week.
Joanna, you really are a pro. Your generosity and your talent shine through. I have no doubt this will be huge success.<p>Just bought the bundle. What a deal!
<i>This</i> is what HN, as an extension of the startup community, is about. Awesome product and awesome back story. [Sorry, I know this isn't a particularly "productive" post...]
This itself is a compelling example. The bundle discount + the 50% off further hacker news discount makes it a very attractive purchase, and that itself is a compelling demonstration of his knowledge and reason to buy the books :) He knows how to sell
Congratulations!<p>I'm sure there is a market for companies who would rather pay to have it written for them -- I know I'd certainly be interested. Any thoughts on launching a startup that does copywriting for companies/people? Perhaps charge by the word or page?
I think the site is buckling under the HN stress lol, especially the checkout cart. I doubt that this would be an issue under normal circumstances, but I just wanted to let you know that the site is getting tons of attention. Congrats! =D
I'm curious, there is a "money back guarantee" line on the site. How does this work for ebooks? I buy it and I can ask for my money back? How do I "return" the ebook?<p>Is this usual for other electronic goods? (ie. software)
I bought a copy. Very happy to support a fellow HN reader.<p>A couple of humble suggestion for you:<p>$$$: You may want to sell this as lifetime subscription to each mini-book/magazine. Have each buyer opt-in to receive a life-time update once every quarter. People lose digital assets all the time so it is nice to get an updated one regularly. Also every 4 months you get change to nudge people to read it or re-read it to see what is new. If someone forwards it along you will end up capturing a percentage of people that got the pirated version because people don’t want to read stale content. By a putting an issue/version number on it you make people feel left out and upgrade to the latest version. ( ☺ hehe. I have worked for Microsoft for too long.)<p>Every time I get a new email from you I would not thing it spam if you attach a updated version of the book to it. ☺<p>Then you can sell additional book chapters to your subscriber base over time. Or bundle in other services that people would find interesting.<p>Branding: Copy is a very specific term. To increase your audience I would suggest re-branding your content and call it text or something to that effect.<p>Domain name: You have a great domain name. You can rebrand your content as “copy from the best hackers” meaning copy ideas from the best hackers.<p>Looking forward to reading your book.
I bought it - but why do you need my billing address/phone number for an ebook. I was glad to see the PayPal option, but I was slightly put off by giving you all that info.<p>I can see wanting my name for doing a watermark and my email so you can send me an update when the next book in the series comes out, but the rest seemed unnecessary so you might want to consider removing them as "Required Fields".
the problem with writing copy is that a lot of companies that do it suck at it. I wrote my own copy, ran with it. Then decided to do it "right" and hire a professional to do it for me. Well the copy I got was pretty average, to a point where I felt my own copy was better.<p>I think part of it, is that when you do the job yourself, you can revisit it time and time again to polish it. Hiring someone just gets you that first rough draft, that might be better than your own rough draft, but is subpar, since the person didn't spend the time to perfect it.
Thanks for offering the discount to HN - I just purchased the collection and look forward to diving in.<p>I think it was a fantastic idea to scrap the 300-page book and focus on more bite-sized readings. Tackling a 300-page book can be a lot to ask of a reader, especially if they are spending a lot of their time producing products. A 50-page book makes more sense to me. I can work through 50 pages in a short period of time, feel like I've just learned a complete concept, and start implementing it right away.<p>Best of luck and great work!
I browsed it at work and it looked great!<p>Unfortunately, I came home to order and found this:
Database Error - Error establishing a database connection
Thanks, just downloaded and it's on my reading list. I already powered through the first few pages of book 1 to check it out and you've made me want to go and rewrite all our copy immediately! Brilliant stuff that will really, really help us. Thank you!
Great deal and one of the things I have been needing for my start up (www.flyinghighcoffee.com). I saw a few load issues when checking out but I stuck with it and got it done.<p>Safari won't download the file, though when I try to get it from my iPad.
Hate to be a bother, but as someone curious about getting into copywriting I wonder if you'd mind trading a few emails with me? No pressure, obviously. And I know you've got a lot going on right now, just, if you get the time.
I want to buy this, but the checkout fails for me (bad merchant address?) and there's no email address to contact you in either your HN profile or the site. How do I seek help?
Love it, great read - only half way through the first book, but so much useful stuff!<p>Any chance of an epub version though? Would then be easier to read on my phone and ebook reader.
From your site:<p>Eack book is dedicated to one topic you can master, like writing headlines<p>"extended acknowledgement book", advanced subliminal typo marketing :)