Breakthrough advertising

What Hacker News says

1. austinpenaSep 2022
   “Breakthrough Advertising” by Eugene Schwartz.

   The relevance for any marketer is incredible. Much of what I read from “gurus” is essentially just rewording this book.

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2. austinpenaJul 2022
   How I've marketed to devs successfully (former YC head of growth, currently work in paid media):

   1. Paid search.

   If someone is searching, give them a good product and good reason to sign up. Be relevant, be clear, and offer a no-risk way for someone to get started with your product.

   2. Reddit

   If there is a subreddit _already_ talking about the problem your products solves, you've got a goldmine. Keep your ad simple. Keep comments on. Respond to comments.

   3. Organic Search

   Have the best content on a specific topic related to your product. Add in CTA's in your content while being respectful.

   4. Follow trends

   Monitor keywords on Hacker News/Reddit and see what's going on. I hit the top of HN twice in a row doing this.

   --

   General notes:

   1. Understand your customer's problems. Lead with benefits then explain with features. Read books like "Breakthrough Advertising" by Eugene Schwartz or "Reality in Advertising by Rosser Reeves.

   2. Talk to people who make it work. The more people you can talk to, the better.

   3. Focus on testing messages. Find what resonates and scale that

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3. PaulMontrealNov 2019
   duckduckgo is riding the growing wave of concern over privacy. So they get to chip in on every press story about privacy issues and google.

   google at the time was riding the wave of the web itself taking off, an also it was an order of magnitude better than the alternatives, which a new google would need to be to compete.

   People don't change habits for a little benefit, when the existing solution is already good. the new benefit has to be 10x better.

   they might change for ideological reasons, or social reasons. if you have a world view about privacy it's easy to buy into an alternative because of that. as we've seen, most people don't care about privacy. maybe that changes in 10 years, maybe not.

   But any strategy for a new product needs a target, and a story before you think about which media to use.

   For example, you target teens now, who over the next 10 years will be the ones showing their parents how to use, and what to use on the next set of devices.

   Or, you focus on a new niche kind of search, image search and video search and social media search and map search all came after website text (and likely were invented by other companies google acquired) maybe the next kind of search with come out of the VR world or whatever.

   Either way, you start with some niche of people who will be the ones naturally motivated to spread the message. You never try to directly convince the general public of something.

   That usually means starting with the group who is suffering the most pain, and wants the most urgent solution.

   One thing DDGo do well on their homepage is deliver their message in long meaningful headlines... - We don’t store your personal information. Ever. - We don’t follow you around with ads. - We don’t track you in or out of private browsing mode. - Switch to DuckDuckGo and take back your privacy!

   They use 4 full screens to deliver 4 headlines, that's super easy to consume, but it feels like a full message. The rest of those screens get to tell a hero's journey story visually with friendly cartoons, and a likable color palette. This feels the opposite of corporate and tech.

   If you want to compete with those two, with a search engine, find another wave to ride. Another big story that people feel strongly about.

   Breakthrough Advertising is one of the best ad books ever written, it explains really well how society creates these waves of feeling, the conversation of the day, the worries of the day, the hopes of the day. And how to direct that energy into your product.

   Dove soap is an obvious example, a wave of emotion about the number of perfect photoshopped women selling cosmetics in magazines. Dove rode it by creating campaigns around "real women". Its a story, riding a wave, but it has sold a lot of otherwise ordinary soap. (they don't even call it dove soap anymore its a beauty cream bar lol)

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4. jkuriaJan 2018
   Sales: The very best books/resources on the subject are:

   1. The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes 2. Zig Ziglar's The Secrets of Closing the Sale 3. Brian Tracy's The Psychology of Selling

   Copywriting: The 3 Best Books (All out of print):

   1. Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples 2. Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins 3. Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz

   If I could add a fourth it would be: 4. The Ultimate Sales Letter by Dan Kennedy

   If you want to get even deeper, here is a longer list:

   https://capitalandgrowth.org/questions/627/what-are-some-goo...

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5. craigbellotJun 2009
   Breakthrough Advertising - Eugene Shwartz

   Advertising Secrets of the Written Word - Claude Hopkins

   Anything by Seth Godin

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6. supersrdjanDec 2020
   I was hoping the link would be for Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz, which is actually on Gary Halbert's (the author of the linked book) list of essential reads. The more advertising/copywriting books I read, the more I discover how much out there is derivative of Eugene Schwartz, who wrote Breakthrough Advertising in the sixties. Although you might not want to get it from Amazon.
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