Grumpy old marketing genius revels his secret for being called a ‘genius’

I discovered something unexpected about AIDA today.

Did you know that AIDA - the copywriting framework - came from face-to-face selling? I didn’t.

But it makes hell of a sense.

It explains why this fudger works like a charm… Because copywriting is just salesmanship in print. A 2 sided conversation driven from one side, where you need to take hold of the wheel or your client will bounce.

Anyway, back to the fact about AIDA…

This reminds me of something I heard the marketing genius Dan Kennedy say in one of his interviews.

Basically Dan said he isn’t a ‘genius’.

That all he did throughout these years working with different clients in different markets was observe. He would notice the things that worked and the things that didn’t.

Then he would shamelessly ‘steal’ the things that worked.

And try to apply them to a different market on a different project to see what sticks to the wall for him.

He basically ‘ripped off’ other markets.

But did it in a way probably no one ever noticed and much less judge or disapprove of his genius because he “swiped” from other markets.

And it’s very similar to the AIDA thing in one aspect:

AIDA came to copywriting because some madman decided to shamelessly ‘swipe’ it from face to face.

Dan’s bag ‘o tricks came from ‘swiping’ other markets from their tricks and tactics.

And yes, he did technically ‘swipe’.

But he also did something most people forget to do, or just plain don’t want to do:

He always applied those ideas to his own markets and never copied mindlessly like most people do when they swipe.

Maybe a better word for it would be… learning on steroids.

Because really that’s what it was, learning. He was learning and figuring out what works and what doesn’t.

Most people do that on their own, learning only from their failure's.

But there’s another way if there’s a will:

To shamelessly steal(don’t steal shit you are not supposed too) other people’s ideas, tactics, lessons, advice, whatever. And apply them to your own situation.

That’s how you will truly understand them and make them your own.

By using them.