Pricing and Other Mistakes. Direct Response Copywriting Email Archive November 2019 3.

Lessons from the Ice Cream Vendor

Several years ago, I was with a friend at an event. There was a vendor selling ice cream. The vendor served some ice cream to a customer. The vendor said, “that’s four dollars, please.” The customer said, “I’ve only got three dollars.” The vendor said, “that’s OK … you can have the ice cream for three dollars.”

My friend turned to me and said, “that’s a bad businessman.”

This story has stuck with me for a long time and I think about it still.

The story applies to a recent situation with a potential client.

I received an email from an executive with a well-known publishing and information company. He was surprised he hadn’t heard of me as he thought he knew all the experienced, practicing copywriters. I keep a low profile. However, I’ve had significant success selling subscriptions to newsletters so he the potential client was interested in hiring me.

We talked about a couple of projects and I agreed to write a long-form promotion plus a VSL for this client. The fee was a couple of thousand dollars plus a royalty. I won’t detail the exact amount and details.

I started working on the project and quickly realized I didn’t have the information I needed to write the promotion. I needed to spend 2-3 weeks really digging into what was being sold, the audience, the “star” of the promotion, what had worked in the past, etc.

So I sent an email to the client explaining the above. I also wanted to know how much traffic he would send to the promotion. I like working on a royalty basis provided the offer is good and there’s traffic.

Here’s where the client got weird. He said he would tell me about the traffic once he saw the initial copy.

I wasn’t about to spend 4 weeks working for a few thousand dollars. The client didn’t understand my reasoning and ended the project. Fine with me. I pushed back. I called his bluff. He didn’t like it.

What can I take from this? What can you take?

If the ice cream sells for $4 and the customer only has $3, don’t sell the ice cream. Make them find that extra dollar.
With “speculative” projects, check the traffic … get actual numbers …
Next time with this client, if there’s a next time, I’ll ask for a much higher fee.
This client should have known better. He used to work for a publishing company that hired the world’s top copywriters … and paid them really well.
This client expected great work … for very little money. Not bright.
What was the client hiding? Why wouldn’t he tell me about the traffic?

I know many of you are looking for clients. I’m always looking for great clients. But I don’t like being pushed around. The client I just mentioned is going to have a really hard time selling his products if he treats copywriters like he treated me.

Scott Martin