Chris "Mr. Moneyfingers" Haddad... Jeff Walker-Trained Product Launch Manager, Results-based marketing consultant, frankly-awesome direct response copywriter, strangely good dancer, capitalist hippie and all around great guy. On this site he shares all sorts of tips and tricks on how to make good money in bad times... opines fiercely on things that matter to him and occasionally goes a tad bit nuts. Plus he can do that thing with his eyebrow.
Let me be your Cyrano. (I really wanted to put a pic of Steve Martin from "Roxanne" but couldn't find a good one.
(Update: Check out the comments from this post for the love notes I wrote and responses.)
OK, THIS should be fun (and more than a little scary.)
As a special “Valentine’s Day Gift” I’m doing something WEIRD . . .
In fact, I’m giving you the chance to have Chris “Mr. Moneyfingers” Haddad himself (that’s me!) “be your virtual Cyrano.”
What’s that mean?
It means that if you’re fast and lucky and smart and brave you can get ME to ghost-write a love note/poem/rap song/short play/video whatever I really feel like in your stead . . .
Basically you get to put my LOVE FINGERS into action on your behalf . . .
Here’s all you have to do to enter:
1. Put a comment under this post telling me:
The name of your Valentine/wanna be Valentine. (Pet names or nicknames are also acceptable.)
Your relationship with them (Lover/Spouse/SO/NSO/Stalker)
3 Things you ADORE about them.
1 Thing about them that kind of drives you NUTS (your interpretation).
The place you first met.
The basic idea of what you REALLY want to say to them on Valentine’s day. (Don’t work too hard. Let the pro writer do the heavy lifting.)
The RESULT you’re looking for on Valentine’s day. I’m a marketer, dammit. What’s my conversion metric?
2. PROMISE that WHATEVER I write for you you will actually GIVE to your Valentine. You can email it to them, print it up and deliver it or even copy the whole thing out by hand. But you can’t change a word.
3. PROMISE to report back to the Moneyfingersinc.com readership on what kind of reaction you get.
4. PROMISE to let me SHARE what we come up with right here on the Moneyfingersinc.com blog, probably in about a week or so after the Valentine’s hooplah has died down. If you’d like we can “anonymize” the whole thing before it goes up. But it’s more fun if we don’t.
Got it?
Great.
This is an awesome opportunity, but you’ve got to be FAST . . .
Valentine’s day is only a couple days away. I’m going to be selecting the “winners” tomorrow (probably 3 but maybe 5) morning and holing up in a coffee shop in the AM in order to crank these suckers out so you can have them ready for my favorite corporate holiday.
Happy VD =-0
P.S. What qualifies me to do this? I’m a high fallutin professional copywriter, dammit. Plus I’m renowned the world over for my sense of WEIRD romance, ability to make women quiver with a text message alone and general badassery.
You don’t get this kind of shiz for FREE very often.
P.P.S. My own Valentine is in CANADA right now so I gotta get my romance jollies off somehow.
What is my purpose? The Last Thing I Want To Do Is Hurt People
This is Part 3 in my “I Quit” Series of Blog Posts. You can find the previous two entries (“I Quit, Part 1″ and “Death of the Infoslut” by clicking here.
In my last post (the tantalizingly named “Death of The Info Slut”) I laid out the drastic steps I’ve been taking to cut down my nasty addiction to useless information (did you know Cher had $145,000.00 in plastic surgery? I DID. How messed up is that?)
Now that I’ve (mostly) got my crazy info addiction and “chicken with no head” tendencies under control, it’s time to really focus on what I want to be doing, who I want to be doing it with and what I ultimately want to be known for.
If you’ve read my “Death of the Info Slut” article (and according to my blog stats a lot of you have) then you know I’m doing some major changes to the way I structure my day and live my life.
My good friend Kim says that I’m “Living with a startling amount of intention.”
Currently I’m working on a new “Mantra” . . . something I can mumble to myself or speak clearly in my mind anytime I feel overwhelmed, like I need to rush or otherwise stressed. (I hate that feeling.)
Here are the options. Tell me which one you like best and why:
1. “There are plenty of hours in the day.”
Pretty straightforward. Nice counterpoint to the standard “there aren’t enough hours in the day” bit.
2. “There are more than enough hours in the day.”
My gut tells me this might be the better option. It’s a more literal reaction to the “Not enough” line and somehow feels more “abundant” and “calm” than the “plenty” line.
3. There are too manyhours in the day. Heh. Probably not. But it sounds pretty amazing to have that problem.
4-6. Basically the same as 1-3 but append “(To do what’s important)” on the end.
So “There are plenty of hours in the day (to do what’s important.),” “There are more than enough hours in the day (to do what’s important)” and (strangely) “There are too many hours in the day (to do what’s important.)”
There’s a certain strange brilliance to that last one, but I don’t think it’s what I’m going for.
I put this video together for the “PLM” section of my site.
See, ever since I hung out my shingle as a “Product Launch Manager” I’ve been getting a LOT of inquiries/quote requests/marriage proposals.
So I put this video together to “Turn down the flow” a bit and keep folks that I just can’t take the time to work with from getting in touch with me in the first place.
There’s a few “mumbles” in the vid, but overall it’s a good example of how you can use Keynote and a cheap mic to put something relatively “pro” together really quickly.
In fact, the techniques I use here are a large part of what Andy Jenkins is talking about in his “Video Boss” launch.
You can find the “real” version of this video on the PLM section of this site. Enjoy.
I'm too lazy to edit this. But just pretend it says "Info Slut."
This is part 2 in my “I Quit” series of blog posts. You can see the first post here. In today’s post I go into my RIDICULOUS addiction to information and how I’ve started putting systems into place to deal with it.
My name is Chris Haddad and I’m an info addict . . .
Actually, that’s wrong. I’m not an info “addict.” I’m an info SLUT . . .
Ask my friends, (ex) girlfriends, family members, enemies and even some of my clients and they’ll tell you that I’ll give my attention away to ANYTHING . . .
Latest news about Brad and Angelina and how they’re relationship is being SHATTERED by Brad’s secret affair with his ex-wife Jennifer Aniston?
I’m in.
80 page Wikpedia entries on the development, translation and ratings of the classic 1980’s cartoon series “The Smurfs?”
I’m in the middle of testing a Video Sales letter versus the more traditional long copy sales letter for one of my niche sites. My gut is telling me that the video version is going to kick the long copy version’s ass.
Anyway, here’s my “rough cut” after a couple hours work on thursday afternoon.
Couple notes:
* This came out a bit longer than I was expecting. I don’t think it being a half hour long is a total dealbreaker since there’s good content in there, but I’ll most likely try to do a shorter version as soon as I get the chance and run a split test.
* When I do do the shorter version I’ll most likely cut down the description of what’s in the bonuses, cut or move the “stop freaking out” slide and go through my notes to find places I can slice out content during the 7 deadly sins section.
* I also am going to think about how to position the 7 Deadly sins better, possibly putting more juice on the idea that you WILL commit these sins if you don’t have this product.
* Originally I was planning on “reading” a bunch of notes I’d typed up as I went through the letter. By my third time stopping and starting the VO though it became apparent that just doing some prep work and “knowing what I wanted to say” before getting to the slides was a better option.
* Yes, I talk really fast. Wanted to have a nice mix of energy and clarity in this vid. Definitely have the energy but there are places where I swallow my words too much. Then again, perfect is the enemy of good. That’s for v 2.
Quick little language hack today . . . let me know what you think:
Are you a “can’t” person?
I know I am (or at least I used to be . . . I’ve gotten a lot better over the last few years.)
Faced with challenging, unpleasant or “Scary” tasks or even opportunities I’d often find myself saying or thinking “Oh, I *can’t* do that. I’ve got to much to do/I don’t have time/etc.”
Which is really, uh, bullshit.
Because generally when I say I “can’t” do something (whether it be helping a friend move or dropping everything to go on a crazy, stripper-filled trip to Vegas) I don’t mean I “can’t” do it at all . . .
I mean that I won’t do it . . .
Or I don’t WANT to do it . . .
Or I’m SCARED to do it . . .
Or I don’t know HOW to do it . . .
Or, heck, I just have something else already on my calendar that I’d RATHER do.
But I just don’t want to take the actual responsibility of saying so.
(OK, there are certainly things in this world that I’m physically, mentally or emotionally completely incapable of actually doing. I will never dunk a basketball. I will never seduce a goat. OK, I probably COULD seduce a goat but I DON’T WANT TO . . ugh. What am I talking about again?)
If you think about it, you’ll probably realize that saying “I can’t do that” is a bit of a get out of jail free card (and a dangerous one at that.)
It’s a way of deflecting an ambition or a request without taking any personal responsibility at all . . .
(Heck, I’ve got an Aunt who holds onto the word “Can’t” like a particularly fuzzy and warm teddy bear, keeping her safe and free from actually having to break out of her comfort zone and really do something with her life. Harsh but true.)
So how about instead of saying you “Can’t” do something, you ditch the BS and just say what you actually MEAN . . .
So “I can’t help you move on Sunday” becomes “I don’t want to help you move on Sunday.”
“I can’t quit my job and start my business” becomes “I’m SCARED of what will happen if I quit my job and PETRIFIED to find out that I’m not actually good enough to make my crazy idea work.”
And “I can’t take 2 weeks off to go do yoga in Thailand because I have too much work to do” becomes “I’M REALLY LAME.”
Anyway, you get the idea.
I’ve been playing this game for a few weeks now and, honestly, it’s scared the bejeezus out of me. I’ve suddenly started noticing a LOT more areas of my life where I’m limiting myself or taking the “easy route” instead of going after what I actually want.
And I’ve started, inch by inch, to eliminate those areas, take some responsibility and live a bit more.
So, can YOU eliminate “can’t” from your vocabulary?
My Grandmother, Violet Fiore, passed away around 7AM EST last Monday. I was lucky enough to be there when she went . . . and had the honor and the frightening responsibility of writing and delivering her eulogy.
Easily some of the hardest writing I ever had to do (though I managed to crank out my speech in about 25 minutes the day of the funeral. Speed is your friend.) And let me tell you, as a-religious as I am it was downright surreal to be standing in a Catholic Church talking about this stuff.
Still, I’m proud of what I wrote and everybody there seemed to really enjoy it. Plus it’s definitely written in a “Copy” style with lots of white space, rhythm, pauses etc.
You can see the whole Eulogy after the jump (about 800 words.)
(Having some trouble adding pictures to this post. Will go back and do so later.)
As I write this I’m sitting in a crowded hospital room in Worcester, Massachusetts listening to the slow, labored breathing of Violet Fiore, my Grandmother.
Gram’s never going to leave this room.
At least not the way she did when she got here.
Every breath she takes is a mile on the road to the end of her life.
And sometime in the next day or so she’s going to come to the end of that road.
As I told my Aunt this afternoon, this is “Sad” but not “Tragic.”
Gram is 80 years old. And she’s lived a good life.
