Classroom to Copy #20: Joshua Lee Henry on Becoming a Financial Copywriter (Instead of a College Professor)

10:18AM Jan 16, 2024

Speakers:

Tania Yeo

Joshua Lee Henry

Keywords:

copywriting

copy

write

teacher

day

clients

call

college

paid

classroom

teaching

chief

phd

banyan

career

mentoring

talk

marketing

business

financial

Hey everyone, its Tania Yeo welcome back to another episode classroom to coffee. I know I always say I have someone very special with me. But this person is really very special to me. Because he is probably the first person I met on coffee chief or who like reached out to me directly on copy chief and he told me to keep going, like, whatever I was doing. This was like, just maybe it was two months into studying copywriting. And he told me that I was doing everything I needed to be doing. And then he's kept me on track ever since. And he is none other than Joshua Lee Henry, who heads our wonderful world of financial copywriting club in the coffee chi forum. He is also the coffee chief at money and markets, which is part of Banyan Hill. And he's worn so many hats here, I think like, transitioning between careers is probably like a, you know, something he's very experienced that it has lots of stories to tell, I'm not even sure of the chronology of his story. So I'm gonna leave it to tell that story. I just showed you want to, you know, share of us like your all your past career lives that have led today.

absolutely tiny. And I just want to thank you so much for having me on. I love what you're doing with classroom to copy, you know, I You inspire me so much. And, you know, if insecure version of me from 20 years ago, probably would feel very threatened by your success, because you are just a phenomenal Rockstar in the world of financial copywriting. I can't believe all that you've achieved already, in just such a short amount of time, and you yourself have had a very accomplished, you know, career before getting into copy yourself. And so I think that, you know, high achievers, people like you, you know, people like so many other guests that you've had on the show, and maybe some of what I've done in my career, high achievers have a way of pushing through resistance, managing change in effective way, overcoming obstacles, and they have the ability to pivot in my pivot. I mean, you know, take in new information, observe the situation, and make it a distinctive change, to be able to head in a new direction as fast as possible. And you have done that you are such a success already. And like I said, I know you're gonna go far. And it might not be a few years from now that I'm asking you for a job. So you might be my coffee chief, you know, not too far off future. And so thank you for having me on.

Thank you for those very kind words. And for completely dodging the question I asked. Oh, seriously, thank you. Thank you. I'm so red right now. That's why I don't record the video for these things. Yeah,

I have always seen myself as a teacher, I always wanted to be a teacher, I remember when I was in middle school, and they had like, as an eighth grader, you could sign up to be a teacher for a day. And you basically manage the classroom of a subject for the entire day, you and another student. And so you had to apply for this and be approved. And I remember as an eighth grader, you know, science of all of all subjects, I was approved to teach science for a day. And me and my partner, we had to come up with a plan a lesson plan for the day. And in the school system that I grew up in, in the States, it was like, you know, 45 minute modules. And so every 45 minutes, a new group of students would come in, and you had, you know, five or six for the day, or whatever the case was. And so we had to give that same lesson over again and over again and over again throughout that day, and I was even able to teach my sister who was two years younger than me. As eighth graders, we taught sixth graders sixth grade science. And I laugh because I social science. I love hard science, I hate you. But I knew even as you know, 12 year old that, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to teach, you know, fast forward, I went to, you know, high school, college in college, I was a liberal arts major, which is funny because you can't do anything with these degrees unless you get a masters or a doctorate. You know, and so, I double majored in sociology and Religious Studies, and I was six credits shy from a triple major with philosophy. Again, who the heck gets a degree in philosophy like nobody made yourself last? Do you want to be a professor and so I wanted to be a professor. And I did some graduate work in a couple of different places. I ended up getting my master's I got an MBA certificate, I joined one Ph. D. program, and at that point, I had met my wife I was in ministry at the time, vocational instead Serving as a pastor at a mega church, working with nonprofits and doing things like that, and my wife and I decided to have kids right away. And so I dropped out at first Ph. D program, because, you know, balancing work, new family, you know, the activities I was a part of this would have been in 2012 2013. I just, I couldn't do it, it was it didn't make sense for where I was my situation. So I dropped out of that Ph. D. program, I didn't get very far and I take like two classes, you know, but you know, still, the joke is, by the way, for a PhD, then all you have to do is read like 50 books on the same subject, and then synthesize all that material into some new research. And Bam, you got a PhD, that's all a PhD does, okay. You know, they get very knowledgeable in a very specific small subject. And then they write about it. And then they don't do anything with that thesis anymore. You know, they move on and become a professor. But a couple years later, in 2016 15, or 16, I joined another PhD program, it had been a few years, I thought, you know, a little bit further along in my career, I was still doing some military stuff. But that didn't work either. And at that point, I had transitioned out a full time ministry, I was still serving as a volunteer, but I had transitioned into essentially, wholesale life insurance and annuity brokerage. And what that means was, I was working with independent financial planners, financial planners, and advisors and banks and credit unions in different financial institutions. And I was the internal sales rep to supply them with investment products like life insurance, and annuities. I eventually became an external wholesaler and got in the world of sales, and figure it out that as I was entering the second PhD program, that I was making more money in sales, than I would be, even as a graduate through this PhD, most professors don't make a whole lot of money most, you know, if you're in business, if you're in sales, if you're in marketing, copywriting, you know, sales is where the money is. And so I thought, wait a second, I'm already making more money than I would with a PhD. So why am I getting the PhD? Secondly, the PhD, even though it was in leadership, and it was an international leadership. That's so broad and vague and not really like super practical, I mean, like, leadership by itself is practical. But when you have like, it was in it was called, intercultural. In our culture, it was the school of intercultural studies. So it was like a god. I don't even know the name for it, but it was like, basically, a geopolitical slash, international slash intercultural Leadership Program. And, you know, it would have been great if I was going to become a CEO of like a nonprofit, like a major, you know, international nonprofit. But nonprofits are called nonprofits for a reason. They don't have any profit, they don't have any money. Unlike professors don't make the money. Now that it's all about money, most people that are called the teachers want to help people, they want to serve people, they want to educate, they want to impart knowledge. They're not doing it for the money, you know, but as with family, you know, that's, that's a key part of life is you got to have you got to have that financial means. And so I knew teaching wasn't where the money was, I knew being a professor wasn't where the money was. And I knew being a CEO of a nonprofit wasn't where the money was, again, nothing was all about money, but I had already began to discover copywriting and copywriting checked off many of the boxes that I felt called to with teaching in copywriting is, you know, it's all about communication. Number one, number two, it's all about research. Number three, it's all about writing. You know, again, I was a liberal arts major. So philosophy, all I do is write papers, I had roommates that would tease me in my undergrad, like all you do is write papers, that's all you do is write research papers. Well, in copywriting, so much of what we do is writing research, you know, it's persuasive research, that we communicate in a way that drives people to take action. And so, you know, I went from being a professor want to be a Ph. D. program to becoming a Vice President of Marketing at that brokerage business. I went from internal wholesaler to external wholesaler to VP of marketing. And then I became the you know, full time copywriter, freelance copywriter and started my own business. And so that's that progression, but you are totally right, Tiny. There's like three different careers. Dan, you know, I basically, by the time I was 30, I had three different careers, totally different industries. But I love what I do now and in writing financial copy.

I'm curious what originally drew you to that second PhD, or even like the first one? And like, Did you do any like, when you call it like a Graduate Teaching while you're in those programs, I

did. I did a lot of research assistantship, I did a few graduate teaching things for different like, like modules, or they were they call them like, lectures where they seminars, whatever. Like when they do like, like a one off course on on on a topic, you know what I mean? So I did that. And I did a lot of research and publishing to even I wrote some articles that were published. It was funny, I wrote an article for a book to a couple different books that were published in the books and and one of the books they mistake. I mean, I was in the Ph. D. program, but they like called me Dr. Joshua, bring Henry like, they already had the doctor. I was like, Well, I'm not I'm not, you know, in PhD world, what's ABB? It's all but dissertation. So you're all but like, your dissertation is not complete yet. So you're you're a PhD candidate, ABB all but district, you know, all but done all their dissertation, basically. But they had a couple, at least in one book, and two of the books I did they had Dr. John, I was like, Well, I'm not really I had to call him like, I don't know if you guys want to recant that or what but I'm not really a doctor yet. But to be honest with you telling you a lot of it was approval. And it was, um, you know, ego, I wanted those letters after my name to signify how smart I was. I mean, that's, that's honestly what it is just being brutally honest. I'm at a point now myself, and my egos in check where I wanted like alphabet soup after my last name. I had the beaten, you know, the BS, the MA, the NBA, I was, like, well done, but a PhD over there. You know, it's round out the alphabet. And that was all ego. It was all just an approval of me seeking approval from others, validating that I'm score unquote, smart, you know? Again, you know, there's Go ahead, yeah,

no, I definitely felt that pressure after I left teaching, I was like, should I go do my Masters now? Should I? Like, how do I validate my worth? Because I'm in this period of time between careers? Like do I need to add those letters to to validate who I was even, you know, and I think there's also that temptation after leaving teaching to accumulate more qualifications. And that's the special thing about copywriting. It isn't so much about qualifications, right? And I remember you had this really great story about how you promoted yourself as a copywriter, like door to door, do you want to share that?

Yeah, absolutely. And I want to circle back to education and the changing world of education, if you'd like to, because there's, you know, I had somebody here recently asked me a financial copywriter was asked me if I thought college was worth it. And you know, that whole career path. And so if that's something that you think might be of value or of interest to your audience, we can circle back to that. But when I was starting out, you know, the VP of marketing job that I was in, was very good for a couple, you know, I was there for three years, and the first like, the first year and a half, it was very good. The second year and a half, not so much. This was around the 2016 election, the 2018 midterms, there was a lot of appeal in the country at the time, different laws for changing stocks, by and large, are doing good. But a lot of the banks had some changes in regulation that were constraining how sales commissions were paid out, which impacted my sales commission that I got. And so the last year and a half was, was a very much a financial struggle for my wife and I, we were, you know, getting by scraping by the skin of our teeth. And then my dad passed away, and he did not have any life insurance. Ironically enough, you're I was working in a life insurance role, and he didn't have life insurance. And so my wife and I paid for the cost of his funeral, which if you've never seen is so sad when somebody passes away. But the cost associated with funerals here in the West in America, anyway, they're astronomical, it's insane how much this stuff costs. So we paid for that. And that pretty much drained our savings. I mean, we had zero left in savings. In fact, we had less than $300 When I started my my freelance career, and even that was a necessity because in the marketing business, I ended up having I won't put I had 17 People that reported to me directly, and I had to fire every single one of them until it was just me. And then the CEO fired me because there's no money coming in. And we didn't have any, you know, much of our savings after paying for dad's funeral. So we had $201 our bank account, and I needed a way to generate income fast. I needed money that day, and I'll never forget, it was June 1 2018. And I knew that in my arsenal of money skills, copywriting would be the one I can deploy the greatest use of and so I went door to door Tonya downtown, walking door to door calling on businesses. In the downtown business sector of my city, and I went to the advertising agencies first and then I went to the insurance companies and like real estate agents and chiropractors, and it really just kind of went down the line knocking on doors, and I would go into these buildings, you know, I would talk to the person at the front desk and put on a big smile, I'd be as enthusiastic as I could and shake their hand, I introduce myself, and I'd say, Hi, I'm here. And what I was doing was I was texting my wife in between, you know, in between going into these different businesses, and I'd say, Hey, I'm at, you know, so and so Insurance Agency, go on, because of my internet access without working on my phone. So I would call her or text her say, Hey, can you look, look at this company's website, see who the CEO is, see if they've got like an About Us section, see if they have a team page, find out who the CEO and the President is, give me their name. That way I can have that information when I walked in. And I would just walk in, I'd say, Hi, my name is Joshua Lee Henry, I'm the founder of activate advertising, where freelance copywriter is, you know, the President is name and the CEOs name? Are they available? Right now? I've got some ideas to improve their marketing. And they'd be like, do you have an appointment? I was like, No, but I've got some really great ideas that I think would help boost more sales, bring in more customers, and increase the conversion rates and some of the marketing that you're doing right now. And I like to share those free of cost. Well, who's gonna say no to here in a minute, give your business owner especially like Mom and Pop, local brick and mortar type businesses, you know, they hear somebody wants to help them make more sales, if they've got a moment, they'll come out at least talk to you. And that's how I got my first clients. Telling me that's how I got my first clients.

Yeah, and I think that that story always inspired me, especially, you know, at that point in my career while still prospecting, and like, doing freelance and looking for financial copywriting clients, and just be like, you know, what Joshua did this on foot. By thing, that's also a great because, um, another person I interviewed on the podcast, Elizabeth, Bitsy, she, she didn't do it on foot, but she started with her community, just talking to people closest to her. And, you know, if even if you don't have a portfolio, you're not ready to charge, you can at least like try and show someone results right and, and build out from there. Like, the opportunities are a lot closer than we realize, most of the time. And I was wondering, you know, you, you said that you paid off like the funeral. And, you know, you had $300 left in your bank account, what gave you the conviction to to choose freelancing, instead of going back to another full time looking for another full time job.

I mean, I was like, don't, don't get confused, like I was looking for a job. You know what I mean? Like, I did not have this fresh revelation that like freelancing was where the money was at, believe me. I think sometimes people think like, how did you have that courage? How did you I was like, I had to do it, like, I was going on interviews. But I mean, 300 bucks does not go very far. When you've got a family of four, you know what I mean? I had our mortgage payment that time was $861, you know, and so I had to make money. And I even if I got a job, there's, you know, one or two weeks of interviews, then you've got, you know, you've got to wait a couple of weeks before your first paycheck comes in. Nobody was hiring me. For whatever reason, I believe it was because my fate was lying in being a freelancer, you know, and I just didn't know yet. But I was trying to get a job. And so I encourage people when they're in those situations, to try to find work, but if you can't get hired, I had to take I had to take the responsibility, you know, that I had for my family and do something with that. I had to take my destiny and put it in my hands. And so I mean, that's that's really what it was. Tanya, I needed to come away with money that day. And I knew that if I could go to a business, they had checkbooks, they could write me a check. Okay, here, here's a $500, check. Here's a $300, check. Here's $1,000. Check, go write me some new website copy. I knew that was something I could sell.

And what were those first jobs like? The ones that you got?

Oh, my goodness. Yeah. So the very, the very, very first thing that I got was I had a buddy that has a still I still talk to him, a tree trimming business. And so because I was doing a lot of stuff on foot, but I also knew, like I had gotten a chiropractic client early on, this wasn't my first one. So there's sort of my first one, but the chiropractic client I got I wrote some flyers for him. So then I thought, Oh, how many other chiropractors are in Fort Wayne, Indiana where I live, and I just started phone calling everybody and I just basically I bought with my sales message that I was doing door to door to door and I just use that one chiropractic client is a success story. And I started selling that to chiropractors. But my very first project was a my buddy that owns a tree trimming business. And I told him I was like, Yeah, I'm doing marketing. I write copy. He's like, Well, what does that mean? I was like, It will do your right for your business, what I would do is I would write these flyers for you, I would write the flyer, you go print them out. And then you can go around the neighborhood and put them in their mailboxes or on the door kind of soliciting, you know, business for him. And I wrote three flyers for a tree trimming business, I remember one of them was all about like, tree limbs falling down in a thunderstorm and how that can cause damage to your property, or your injury to your kids or your loved ones and how you don't want that to happen. The second big idea for the second one was about you know, it was appealing to vanity about like, you don't want your neighbors to think you're that crazy guy that doesn't keep their lawn up. And you know, you've got the wild bushes growing everywhere. And like, it was kind of like a vanity keeping up the Joneses like, you don't want to have the ugliest yard in town, your neighbor, you know. And then the third one, I don't remember the third one was, but it was something it was something along those lines. It was like a fear based one, vanity based one. And then again, I don't I think the third one might have been like how how trimming your trees can increase the property values of your home. I think that's what the third one was. And so I wrote these fires, and I charged him 75 bucks a flier. And he did not want to pay me. And I had to chase the payment down every day until he paid me which thank God came within a couple of weeks. But that was the very first project that I sold. The second project that I sold, I think was the chiropractor, and that was basically rewriting website copy. I had a couple of like accountants in there where I did some rewrites of website Gaby. And then I called on the advertising agencies because this is a great tip that I've not heard more copywriters do. But if you're a freelance copywriter trying to get clients, my suggestion would be to call up every advertising agency in your town and ask if they hire freelancers, because one of the rules of copywriting prospecting is you don't want to have to convince people that they need copy, you only want to smell the copy services that people that already know the value of it. Well, who's going to know the value of it, advertising agencies. And so I called every online advertising agency, every marketing company in my town, and a couple of them hired me for freelance stuff. It was like random stuff, it was like rewrite this brochure or write this website, write a flyer, you know, do something for a trade booth. But you know what? They were writing the checks, and that's all I cared about.

And so at which point, yeah, I know you've shared with me the steps you took to get better at copy work, therefore refer and then you've also joined copy chief was this like, at around the same time or like after,

this was all at the exact same time. And so this was also I, it was crazy, because I kind of forgot about this. So I had we had like we had like, we I want to say we had like $2,500 left in our bank account. And there's another copywriting teacher named Ray Edwards, who was like my very, very, very first copywriting teacher. And he was doing a course for $2,000. And I bought that. And that's why we only had 500 bucks. And then we had to pay some things we because I went to his copywriting course this was an in person event. And I went there that day, I'm not kidding time, the day I got home, I got fired. So and I kept thinking, like, if I would have gotten if I would have known, I would have gotten fired, I wouldn't have spent $2,000 to learn this copywriting course. But I was like, the only thing I can do is take what I learned over this, this two day course with him, I flew out to Washington, everything, it was crazy. And I can apply that now. Because I mean, because I couldn't get hired anywhere. So I went through Ray's program, and he's been on copy chief radio, you know, he's been around the game a long time. And that was in in June. In September, I had already made some money, and I went to Roy for and I paid him another $2,000 to teach me how to run financial. So that was pretty good. You know, I had made enough money to live and invest another two grand into ROI within six months, you know, or three months, whatever it was. So I knew something right. Then that was in September, then in December, Paris Dimopoulos, who I've now talked to multiple times spend time with, you know, you met him before. He was doing a birthday special for his cousin taki that you can maybe find some old sales letters on this on the internet. This is in December 2018. I bought that for $800 I think or whatever it was. And then I joined a copy chief on a payment plan as well. So between June to December those those six months, I went through training with Ray Edwards and with your training with wafer and with your training with person propolis. And then I joined cabbage soup with Kevin. So what is the secret? Get a mentor? Get multiple mentors. They're going to help you accelerate your career faster than anything. It's six parts. I had already replaced my income from my full time job. Now I was writing a lot I was this was certificate. I had a bunch of clients are doing a bunch of random projects. But we were we were making a living with copywriting.

Yeah. Do you think it would have been possible at all without like just DIY studying copy on your own?

I don't think so. I think I think it could have, it would have been longer, it would have been harder. And I don't think I would have gotten gotten this as far as I did as fast as I did. Because here's the deal. Roy referred me to a client. Even though Ray didn't refer me to clients, I learned I had pitched myself to a client, a few clients that he introduced me to. And then Paris, I did get a client through Paris, we were on those calls with Paris. And he had business owners on these calls as well. And one of them was looking for a copywriter. And there's like, you know, 100 people on these calls, nobody volunteered except me. Volunteer, and I told he called me from coffee cheap. I said, you know, Shai, applying for this? And she's like, yes, absolutely. Go apply, you know, Paris will introduce you do it. I thought, there's 100 people on the call, she's like, Just do it. Come to find out Paris told me I was the only one that applied. So of course, the client hired me. And that was multiple months of work, you know? Well, I think it was, you know, I think it all maybe 3000 or $5,000, you know, spaced out over three or four months, which again, like, that's pretty good. When you're starting out, you know, you've got a bunch of different clients paying you 300 500 $1,000, that all adds up. And so I think you get to a point, even if you read a bunch of books, even if you watch a bunch of YouTube videos, you need somebody else that can help open a door for you, that can help give you prospecting tips that can help give you negotiation tips. That's the kind of stuff you don't read in a book, you know? Yep.

I remember, like the first lead I got after I start prospecting, you know, so Josh was the first person told me like, you need to stop, like, messing around and start like applying. So I did that. But the first email I got back, I had no idea how to respond. And you were right there, like on cockatoos, like, you know, here's what you say is when you do, there are just so many pieces to it. And it's really hard doing it alone. Yes, yeah. I'm curious when, because you talked about how much you love teaching as a kid, and then you're also a pastor? And imagine that, you know, there's a lot of teaching involved in that I'm not too familiar. Do you see yourself like transferring any of those skills over to copywriting?

Absolutely. I mean, for for people, you know, regardless of their religious context, you know, I think this is true. You know, in different religions, they have teachers, they have people that are kind of more knowledgeable in that particular religion or faith. And, you know, for me, as a pastor in a Christian church, I was teaching 45 minutes to an hour every Sunday, you know, what I mean? And weekly groups, Wednesdays and stuff. And so it wasn't, it wasn't necessarily there. It was every Sunday for seasons. And other times, it was every other Sunday or Saturday night, but I had to plan a lesson I had to plan a sermon. And you know, that's a 45, you know, basically now, the context that I opened it in, it's a 45 minute VSL, I had to plan all those times, you

know, or tell the audience what a VSL This Just In Case VSL would be.

And my sermons would have been, or VL is a video sales letter. And it's basically, you know, for lack of a better word, make basically a speech, basically a presentation, you know, you're planning a presentation, which is where the lesson is in the classroom. And so the parallels between teaching, preaching and writing copy, you know, the things that are similar, are your communicating, and you're communicating persuasively, you have to convey information and emotion that will drive people to take action.

Yeah, exactly. So it's something that I've discussed with my previous guests on the show is just how much the act of teaching is actually not a single skill. It's so many different skills, which is why teachers are great at transitioning into new careers for anyone who's listening and is, you know, afraid to hop off the fence, right? To the extent that I'm inviting the former pastor on the show, even though he wasn't formally a teacher, because there's so many skill overlaps here. Yeah, this just told me about before we talk about like the copy cheating, I know you wanted to talk a bit more about college. Yeah,

it's so and I've got some really kind of strongly held beliefs about this and Maybe you agree or disagree, or maybe others will disagree. But I'll just say one quick thing about teachers, one of the most valuable skills that you have as a teacher, I'm assuming that you have this is your ability to read the motions of others, because not all 30 students or 20 students in your classroom are going to have the same personality, they're all going to respond to the same subject the same way. If you announce, hey, now it's recess, or now it's math time right now is whatever, you know, you have all those different emotions from all those different people at one time that you have to navigate and manage. And when you're writing a sales letter, you know, or when you are writing copy to an audience that you can't see, you have to anticipate what those emotional reactions are going to be without that person in front of you. Yeah, and I feel like the more presentation experience you have to large groups or classrooms, where you've got a wide range of personalities and emotions, the better equipped you are to envision how different people will respond to certain parts in the sales letter.

Yeah, actually, there's a weird thing. I don't know if you've heard of the mind palace. It's like just picturing what's going on in your mind. Well, when I write an email, because it's such a short message, like, I picture the audience in the classroom, and it just that's what pops up in my head, because then I remember when I was like, as a teacher, like, let's go and get these 16 year olds to like, sit up and pay attention. I think you said something about that. When you were doing your carrot top copywriting? Yeah. Yeah, sure. Like, as a pastor that you had to do some pattern interrupts or something like that? Oh, yeah. Am I playing? Do you want to talk more?

You're no, you're exactly right. And back then in sermons, and in even in college classes, my favorite teachers and in high school, things that I would incorporate into my lessons. Were always props, I love props, because I feel like when you like, if you're a teacher, like I had one teacher, that he would, you would walk across the US scale the perimeter, he was a math teacher, he would scale the perimeter of the classroom without touching the floor. So he would walk across the chalkboard jump from desk to desk, jump, you know, sit like back then we said like overhead projector machines, and they would have a card, he would like sit on that car, like push himself with, like the wheels in the car and like take him to the next place in the room. And then he would do like the circle thing where he would draw like a perfect circle on the chalkboard because of like your shoulder like, you'd be like a perfect giant, you know, circle. So he did that kind of stuff. My favorite teachers in college always did that. And so when I started teaching, anytime there was an opportunity for me to bring a prop and it didn't matter what it was. And that's where I give the character copywriting lesson is incorporating props into your sales message. Because those can they can serve as pattern interrupts. And so a lot of times in sales messages, you'll say, look at this new patent, you know, it'd be a patent of a new technology that you know, you might be teasing and a front end, or, you know, one of my best selling promos at Banyan Hill, it opened up but the whole thing inside this briefcase is $100,000. Now that was the pattern interrupt. That's you know, it was a prop and it was a pattern interrupt. And we had these lights shining down on this like very, you know, stainless steel briefcase looked like a you know, spy movie thing with $100,000 in it, Chris, they were all banded together, you know, with the bank bands, you know? And it's like, wow, that you know, that's gonna get some attention. And so absolutely, props are key because they serve as that Pattern Interrupt A they hold attention there's this there's a tactic in screenwriting called Check logs gun and what it is is like check lock was this Russians, you know, playwright and he would be like, you know, if you're telling a mystery thriller play, and you've got, you know, the killers in the room. And there's that before the killer X there's that gun on the nightstand. And you can see it like people are like, oh my goodness, who's gonna grab that gun? Like there's like a gun there you know? And so anyway, so yes, prompts are invaluable for both teaching communicating information is serving as a pattern interrupt. But to go back to your question about does that is that helpful is that yeah,

I just wanted people to see more of the parallels between like, teaching and copywriting so like Pattern Interrupt would be something that I mean, in teaching we call it like the hook and we still call it we call the hook also copywriting right the thing that captures attention right at the beginning. Yeah,

when I was that I told you about me that eighth grade science teacher for my sister's sixth grade science class A we had beakers like test tubes and beakers because even back then I knew like, how am I going to hold the attention because I knew the teachers that I loved listening to the most was somebody that could look at doing something so we had beakers and test tubes on the desk that we put like, I think baking soda and vinegar and or something. So like bubble up, you know, but having that pattern and having that hook even was so key. So my thoughts on college, I had this guy, young guy, I liked him a lot, he is a very good copywriter, he needs some more mentoring and coaching, and I'm helping him, you know, with that he is at the copy chief community, and he's very good at writing financial copy, but he's, he's still very, like, he's young, he's only 21 years old. So he doesn't have a whole lot of life experience yet. And he doesn't have a whole lot of experience in the markets or general finance and, you know, in general, and so I'm helping him with things because sometimes they'll say stuff and copy, but it doesn't really make sense. And, and we've talked about this, you know, you don't have to be your demographic, you just have to understand your demographic, like you obviously don't fit the demographic of a typical financial publishing, you know, customer, but you understand that market, same with me. And he asked me, though, he's Asian, and he asked me, you know, whether I thought college was worth it for him that his parents were really pushing college, you know, that's a, that's a big thing, and a lot of Asian families is, is pushing college pushing that degree. But his parents were not able to help him pay for it. And so he would have to pay for it himself. And he said, You know, I've got, my parents are pushing this. And you know, it's very important for my family. At the same time, I have to pay for it. And I just feel like I can make more money with marketing. And I told them, I absolutely agreed with him. I said, you know, I believe personally, again, this might be controversial. But you know, I'm 37. And I believe that college is the biggest hoax of my lifetime. We grew up in a generation, you know, like the generation before us, like not everybody went to college and a lot of Gen Xers and like people their 40s and 50s. Like, it was still good to get a trade. But millennials, we grew up where it's like pushed college, college, college or your degree, get your degree. And what happened was, is we've got however many trillion dollars in student loan debt, and you've got all these millions of millennials, 70 million millennials, most of which don't have any real world market valuable skills. They have a piece of paper hanging on a wall that shows that they went $100,000 and dead, and they can't get a job. And so my big thing would be, you know, I've got a sister who did not go to none of my my other sisters went to college. But what they did, they either learned a skill, or they're learning marketing. And so if you're, you know, obviously listen to this podcast, there's such a low bar of entry to get into copywriting. You said it yourself earlier. It's not about qualifications. It's about results. And you get results. Can you make sales? Nobody care? None of my clients have ever hired me because I was a PhD dropout. And I had an MBA and I had nobody cared. What do they care about? Can I make sales? Can I get them results? can I increase their lead flow? can I increase their conversions, and you don't need to, you don't need a college degree for that, you can learn a lot of that on YouTube, you can learn a lot in free communities on Facebook, I do think that it'll take you to a point where you need that mentoring, as we talked about, you know, earlier, to get you to that next level, you'll you'll hit a ceiling of actually where you need that coaching and mentoring from somebody. But you don't need like, you could go by you know, Russell Brunson his books and Dan Kennedy's books and Jay Abraham's books online and spend $100 Max and have more valuable of an education in that reading material, then you will get an A for your degree, you know, now if you want to be a doctor, or you want to be an architect, you know, something where you have to be licensed, like an architect or a lawyer. Yeah, unique college. But if you're just looking general business major, or you're, you know, going like me, a liberal arts degree, like, you can't do anything with that.

I mean, you're talking to an arts graduate. Yeah. I mean, I have to say, if you have the financial resources to enjoy the four years then like, go for it. Right. Sure. Like I I didn't like yeah, my parents couldn't pay for it, either. That's why I ended up in that 10 year contract. But I had a lot of fun. Because it was art. I mean, it's probably very different from other experiences. But I think for me, I'm not sure. I'm not sure if if it's the same pool, I shouldn't be messing with my mic. Sorry, hang on. I'm not sure if it's the same in America but it in Singapore. I think college is a major status symbol. Also like to validate where you are in your life. Which is why it might be inconceivable for some families For some people to not go to college, I don't know if that shift is, but there's a shift happening. I'm seeing like more kids like choosing different routes when I was a teacher, you know, they were choosing to learn skills like you described. I don't know, if you see a shift like that happening in America.

There is there's a shift right now back to blue collar skills. Things like Plumbing, pipe fitting, welding, electrical driving truck, there's a big shift back to that, because again, you can get a job right away with no degree and make 3040 50 bucks an hour. You can make, you know, 6075 bucks an hour as a welder, but no degree, you know, you have to get a skill, you learn it, you got to get get licensed or certified or whatever, you know, flip bottom, so you can become a phlebotomist for $1,000 a week and go through 1000 hours a week long course. And I can draw blood and get paid 3040 bucks an hour, as a phlebotomist, you know. And so there absolutely is a trend of of not going to college anymore. In fact, a lot of these universities, if you read, they're worried about how they're going to continue their multibillion dollar endowments, because they don't have enough students enrolling. But there's also the shift towards marketing. I've got a nephew, this guy is 20. He's probably 22. Now 2322. He, his dad wanted him to go to college, he didn't want to he asked what I thought I said, Don't do it. You know, I mean, because he's an artist, too. He does a video and social media stuff. And pictures. He's a great photographer, great artists graphics. This was a couple of years ago, he was he just graduated from high school, his dad is wanting him to go for graphic design, he didn't want to, he opted not to because he was gonna have to pay for himself or go in debt. He ended up as an 1819 year old high school graduate, ended up landing a client with a a major, major deal with the NFL, doing photography and stuff, make it $50,000 on retainer, plus all these upside commissions and stuff. He's now been making over six figures for a few years. Now he's in his early 20s. Most college, I don't know what the average, like the average and all fields of an of a college graduate is. But coming out of a four year degree my first job enterprise rent a car only made $30,000 a year to me. So I don't the average, I'd say the average income in America for a household like 54,000 people aren't getting a four year degree and making 100 grand out of the gate. That's just not happening. But you get good at copywriting. You can make 5060 70,000 Just with clients, you can hit $100,000 in 18 months, you know, and you get these deals, you get royalties, all these different bonus structures. And it's it's definitely possible. So I do think college is a scam. Again, for most people out there writing instead. And if you're a teacher on the fence about leaving the classroom know this, if I may be so bold, you can help people I'll say you can help more people. By writing copy, the influence that you will have on your audience in the copy that you write will far exceed the influence you can have teaching kids in the classroom, I mean that as with as much respect as I can, because you know, in the classroom, you're gonna teach 20 kids a year, 30 years, you know, whatever the case is, you do the math on that. You can write, you know, tiny, you know, I've written sales letters that have been mailed to hundreds of 1000s of people.

Yeah. Especially if you're getting products that are going to solve huge problems in your life into like so many people's hands with one piece of copy. Yes.

And people they get into teachings, they want to help others. They want to serve others and they're they're doing it one life at a time and copy it salesmanship multiplied, you have that impact to help others it's multiplied through your copies. So that's all I got. Tanya, hopefully that's helpful.

Yes, it is. I was wondering if you could share what it is that you do now as a copy chief for those who are curious, you know, what, what's a day in the life of a copy chief like and you know, what, what else are you currently working on? On the side? Because I know you're not just copy chief at Banyan.

Yep, so I am a full time retired Benny Hill, but I'm a contractor. And that is not the only thing that I do. I also lead the world of financial copywriting with Kevin Rogers instead of copy chief, you know, that you mentioned earlier, but that's just one of the things you know, I have really mixed myself into this area of I just on the phone with Kevin yesterday, financial publishing copywriting for financial publishers, copywriting for FinTech companies, and copywriting for trader education based businesses. Okay. The fourth area that I'm going to start doing more in it's much more niche, but it's the topic of cryptocurrencies in the church. And again, that's very niche but I am using my pastoral background and my knowledge of fine Financial Markets and cryptocurrencies, because nobody's talking about that. And that is an area that I think I can bring a lot of expertise and authority to, is how does church and I mean, again, nonprofits, you know, massive nonprofits, international nonprofits, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars, they don't know how to deal with cryptocurrency. So I want to become that guy that teaches them out. Again, nonprofits, you know, ministries, that COVID. So, you know, so I've got a couple of things up my sleeve, where I combine, you know, if any, if you have a business or an interest in money, in your marketing, I'm your guy. And then if you have a overlap between nonprofits or ministry, and money and marketing, I'm really your guy. So everything will be up on my new website, Joshua Lee henry.com, I'm doing a complete rebrand. No, articulate this, you have inspired me Your website is incredible. your lead magnet is incredible. Your emails, because you are actually, you know, pretty regular with your email correspondence, and I'm not, I haven't been. And so again, I'm looking at time, you're like, Man, I gotta keep up, I gotta keep up. She's keeping. She's putting the heat on. So I'm doing a massive website rebrand, where I will have these different areas listed, and ways that people can contact me through that. Awesome,

I guess. Sorry. Oh, and there was one question that I talked before that. What's your day to day, like, that's so complicated.

So day to day I get up and I do I try to best case scenario, I try to block my days where I do all of my writing in the morning, and all my phone calls in the afternoon. That doesn't always happen. I know for me creatively, I can only write for a few hours at a time, then I take a few hours of a break. And so what I try to do is I try to write copy from nine to 11 or 12, as much as I can, the biggest most important piece of copy I have to write that day I try to do in those those three hour windows. In the afternoon, I take an hour lunch, I usually you know, we'll watch some videos or go hang out with my kids or workout, you know, half an hour lunch to just unwind. And then I come back, I reply to emails, I usually do my afternoon phone calls. And so that's a perfect day. Fridays are made for catch up. I do the Dan Sullivan model of having focus days, buffer days and catch up days, Friday is a buffer day for me. So that's where I like to record podcasts like this, where I'm doing things that I'm passionate about, but aren't directly related to, you know, making money for myself or making money for my clients. And then my focus days are really Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursdays my buffer day, you know, Wednesday afternoon, Thursday, that's where I catch up on everything that I couldn't get done on Monday and Tuesday. And that's where I do a lot of my personal you know, because when you're spending all your time reading clients, you know, there's things on the personal side, I need to do I need to make updates on my website, I need to write my email from my list, I need to, you know, call the bank or whatever the case is, you know, for my family. And so I tend to do this stuff Wednesday afternoon Thursdays, but Monday and Tuesday are very, very focused on writing in the morning, phone calls in the afternoon.

So do you mind sharing with those in the audience who don't know, like, what's the difference between a copy chief and a copywriter?

So a copy chief is somebody that is going to mentor supervise, instruct and give guidance to other copywriters and so I have right now, three other copywriters who are very, very good that I am chiefing them now that doesn't mean that I am like, better than them necessarily, although I have been in roles where I was clearly the more senior copywriter that I was helping them get to that next level. But the model that we have right now Banyan Hill is that everybody gets a mentor. And so right now, there's a gentleman that you know, it's endearing. He's mentoring me on a problem. So everybody gets a partner. It's like an kabhi cheat. We have the saying nobody writes alone. We have now changed the model and Banyan hill where nobody writes alone. Everybody has a partner. Before we used to just like the senior writers like myself and Tim, you know, we were achieved. So we didn't really have anybody giving us feedback. But what we've learned is that you have to have feedback. You have to have somebody giving you feedback. Somebody the best copywriters in the world I know still get feedback. I believe Mike Palmer still gets feedback from Kelly. Right. Yeah, I mean, it says like you always get feedback from somebody. Again, that's it, that person is better, but it's just somebody else that can see those blind spots in your copy that you might not be aware of, that you can bounce ideas off of. That might give you a new tip for a headline or a special, unique hook for the close. We talked about pattern interrupts earlier, I like to talk through pattern interrupts to somebody else, because when you add more minds together, you expand the creative output and so you can usually come up with better ideas in A small intimate group that you can trust and share those ideas with and improve them. So that's what a copy chief does. And so I've got four other guys that I read their promos, I make line edits in Word, I make comments on ways that they can strengthen the copy, improve the copy, make some line edits with word changes. Sometimes they accept my edits, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they might, it might give them an idea for a better edit that they have. But that's really what it isn't. So I read a lot of copy, I edit a lot of copy. And I write a lot of commentary.

Awesome, thank you, because I think I've interviewed Melanie, but then I didn't clarify what a coffee tube was. So that's where everyone's wondering, you know, what are the opportunities when you become a copywriter being compensated was one of them. And thank you so much for spending the last 50 minutes with me can I will drop all the links for this will probably be January, I think so. I'll drop all the links to Joshua's brand new website. Do you have any last words for the audience?

No, I just want to encourage you, if you if you are thinking that copywriting might be you know, right for you, if you're thinking about making a career change, if you're thinking about just even dipping your toe in the water of freelance copywriting, I would encourage you to do so. You know, there's always the fear of the unknown. But what I want to do is give you hope and encouragement that if you dip your toe and if you keep learning from Tanya and others, there is a proven path to get on the fast track of copywriting where you can get clients get paid, and have just as much joy and satisfaction fulfillment as you might get from teaching. But doing it in a way that applies your skills for research, for communication, for writing, and for instruction, through copywriting. And I can tell you, you can get paid very, very, very well. You can manage your own schedule, you can be your own boss, and you can have the life of your dreams through copywriting and I'm living proof

oh my god I haven't even talked about so he Joshua has this amazing house in the middle of nowhere Indiana with like your own like your woods and gym and this. Okay, maybe I should do video in the future, this room that he writes in and all that. Yeah. So that's what I'm working towards. You know, so yeah, I hope that Josh's story inspires you and thank you so much for joining us. See you on the next episode of classroom your copy