The Anti Marketing Manifesto

How to Sell Without
Being a Sellout
MICHELLE LOPEZ BOGGS

Suite 300 - 990 Fort St
Victoria, BC, V8V 3K2
Canada
www.friesenpress.com
Copyright © 2020 by Michelle Lopez Boggs

First Edition — 2020
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ISBN
978-1-5255-8043-7 (Hardcover)
978-1-5255-8044-4 (Paperback)
978-1-5255-8045-1 (eBook)
1. Business & Economics, Sales & Selling
Distributed to the trade by The Ingram Book Company

Contents
F*ck Marketing, Or Why I Became an Anti-Marketer 1

How Predatory Marketing is Harming Humanity 5
We Can (and We Will) Do Better: The Anti-Marketing Manifesto 15
Chapter 1: Treat People as People, Not as Targets 17
Chapter 2: Motivate, Educate, Inspire . . . and SELL! 29
Chapter 3: Stop “Getting” Customers, Start Giving 41
Chapter 4: Measure the Right Things (Spoiler Alert: It’s Your Sales) 53
Chapter 5: Ditch the Vanity Metrics 63
Chapter 6: Share Insight Often 79
Chapter 7: Write How You Talk 93
Chapter 8: Build Your Email List Like Your Life Depends On It! 111
Chapter 9: Grow Your List with a Funnel You Love 129
Chapter 10: Don’t Outsource Your Essentials 139
Chapter 11: Build a Premium Brand 155
Chapter 12: Your Only Competition is Your Former Self 173
Chapter 13: Be Congruent AF—Stick to Your Values 187
Chapter 14: Grow, and Be a Rebel for a Good Cause 199
Now Get to Work! 209
The Anti-Sales Pitch: Should I Take You on as My Next Client? 213
Bulk Orders, Resources, and More 215
Glossary of Anti-Marketing Manifesto Terms & Acronyms 217
Acknowledgments 221
About the Author 223
To my former self: I wish you’d known all of this the day you started your business.
To my future self: I am so proud of you!

F*ck Marketing, Or Why I
Became an Anti-Marketer
“We live in the most marketed-to culture in the history of

the world. Marketing in and of itself is not evil. But the very
essence of marketing . . . is to plant some level of dissatisfac-
tion, discontentment, until I get that item.”
— Dave Ramsey
Predatory marketing is a plague on society. It drives us into debt, depletes our

bank accounts, gets us addicted to shitty products, makes us fat and sick, ruins
the environment, causes us to doubt and question ourselves, scams us out of our
individuality, and robs us of our freedom, hopes, dreams, and humanity.
And that’s just for starters.
Predatory marketing also strips away our dignity with condescending ads
and commercials. It stalks us with intrusive target marketing, usually without
our consent.1 With its lame scripts, tired formulas and templates, and huge
marketing budgets, predatory marketing constantly urges us to be brainless
consumers, miserable and stewing in our own discontent, until we cave in and
buy someone’s toxic product.
1 VPRO. “Shoshana Zuboff on surveillance capitalism | VPRO Documentary.”

YouTube video. 49:59. Posted Dec. 20, 2019.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIXhnWUmMvw.
1
THE ANTI-MARKETING MANIFESTO
Billions of dollars are spent on consumer research, as if we’re nothing more

than specimens behind a glass, for the sole purpose of manipulating our buying
behavior. Predatory marketing is about finding smooth, clever ways to con us
out of our life while enriching the wallets of those who use it. I’m so sick of this
BS, and I want something better for humanity—and my fellow business owners.
#FuckMarketing.
As an ethical, kind-hearted, forward-thinking business owner with a posi-
tive, beneficial product or service that you likely poured your heart and soul
into creating, you’re probably just as disgusted by predatory marketing as I am.
And you’re determined to do things in a better way.
There is a better way to grow your business: anti-marketing.
GROW YOUR BUSINESS WITH ANTI-MARKETING
Anti-marketing is the art of selling without being a sellout. It’s about bringing
your true self into all aspects of your business while being 100 percent real with
people. That’s it. That’s why we’re here.
In a world where predatory marketing creates billions in revenue by bullshit-
ting everyone, you, as an anti-marketer, will make bank by telling people the
truth, sticking to your values, and doing everything in service to your customers.
You’ll grow your business by being a giver, not a taker. You’ll increase your profits
by motivating, educating, and inspiring (MEI’ing) people, not manipulating
them. I know it sounds simple, and it is. Not only that, it’s worth it. Predatory
marketing makes everything complicated, but an anti-marketer lives and dies by
the rule of keeping shit simple. I wrote this book to give business owners a new
way to think about how they grow their business and why they should do it in a
way that honors their true self and their values, no matter what.
I have a unique background that helped me write this book. This includes
a BA in English/Creative Writing, which was focused mostly on beautiful
prose and story structure. I also have a professional background in copywriting,
which is focused on making sales. I combined these two skill sets—sales writing
and creative writing—and forged my own path in “anti-marketing.” In 2006,
I quit my day job in customer service to start my writing and editing business.
The word “anti-marketing” didn’t enter my awareness until years later, after
I’d begun working with a client who was unlike all the rest. He embodied the
principle of being your true self in business no matter what. Other clients I’d
2
F * ck M arketing , O r W hy I B ecame an A nti - M arketer
worked with had done a lot of hiding, apologizing, and modifying themselves
to fit the fleeting whims of the marketplace.
The past fourteen years have taught me the value of being true to myself in
life and business. I’ve had plenty of experiences not being true to myself, which I
share throughout this book. And let me tell you, it was never worth it.
I’ve helped my clients make sales online by writing and producing engaging
content that reflects their true voice. I’ve helped them build their email lists
and write directly to their customers, all while weaving my creative writing
and editing skills into the final product. Customers find this kind of writing
fun and enjoyable to read, and they buy out of a sense of genuine inspiration.
Some of my clients have used the Anti-Marketing Manifesto to build seven-
digit profits—all ethically earned. I’ve used it to craft a part-time copywriting
business that brings me a full-time income while serving clients whose work I
believe in.
My goal for this book is not to create sweeping systemic change in the world
or to delete all predatory marketing overnight (that’s God’s job). Rather, I want
to help you change your world by showing you how to use the Anti-Marketing
Manifesto to grow your business. I want to teach you how to motivate, educate,
and inspire your “perfect-fit customers” (PFCs) to choose better for themselves,
so they can live healthier, happier, more productive, and/or more successful
lives—while giving predatory marketing the middle finger. This will be fun!
This book will show you that you don’t have to do gross, questionable things
to grow your business. You don’t have to target anyone with stupid ads (which
people hate!), nor do you have to worship vanity metrics, kiss the ass of fake
influencers on social media, or write in a stuffy, corporate, “professional” tone
of voice because you think that’s the way it should be done. All you have to do
is write and speak as your true self, in your real voice, with pure motives—and
keep giving, serving, under-promising, and over-delivering at the forefront of
your mind.
In life and in business, your results depend on your choices. You can choose
to grow your business ethically, sustainably, and in ways that you love, or you
can choose to be a predatory marketer who will do anything to make a buck.
Growing your business is your responsibility. No one else can do it for you. How
you grow your business is your choice. I suggest growing it in a way that honors
your true self, gifts, passion, and purpose.
3
How Predatory Marketing
is Harming Humanity
“If anyone here is in advertising or marketing . . . kill yourself.

You are Satan’s little helpers.”
— Bill Hicks, comedian
Before we dive into the Anti-Marketing Manifesto and get to the exciting,
refreshing solutions, we need to know exactly what we’re up against. We all have
a common enemy: predatory marketing. Even if it isn’t harming you person-
ally, predatory marketing is probably harming many of your customers in some
form, either directly or indirectly. This should piss you off and deeply offend
you. It should make you want to become as successful as you can be, so you can
help as many people as possible free themselves from the clutches of BS within
your industry.
Here’s some proof of how badly predatory marketing sucks and why human-
ity as a whole needs to fire these clowns.
PREDATORY MARKETING USES PROPAGANDA TO SLOWLY KILL
We all start off as kids with a childlike spirit that can sometimes get buried
by society.
Kids are trained by predatory marketing to prefer junk food over real,
healthy food starting from a young age. Why? So marketers can lock in a cus-
tomer for life. The addiction is the point.
5
The brainwashing starts early. In 2004, researchers published a paper, “Food

Advertising and Marketing Directed at Children and Adolescents in the US.”2
In it, they highlighted how junk food companies go after toddlers.
While multiple factors influence eating behaviors and food

choices of youth, one potent force is food advertising. Today’s
youth live in a media-saturated environment. Over the past
10 years, US children and adolescents have increasingly been
targeted with intensive and aggressive forms of food mar-
keting and advertising practices through a range of channels.
Note the words targeted, intensive, and aggressive.

Junk food manufacturers pay grocery stores to have their products placed in
areas where kids are most likely to see them, so kids will beg their parents to buy
them or else throw a tantrum if they don’t.
All of this plays a role in why we’ve seen childhood obesity skyrocketing.
By the time these kids are adults, eating junk will have become a way of life,
ingrained into their thinking and behavior. They won’t hesitate to shovel three
platefuls of artificially flavored, artificially colored, artificially sweetened “food”
down their throats in one sitting (with ingredients designed to promote over-
eating and addiction).3 This destructive eating habit becomes the norm—a way
of life, a way of being, a form of self-abuse that’s rarely questioned.
As adults, these “targeted consumers” will experience serious consequences,
such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, pre-maturing aging, achy
joints (due to being overweight or having inflammation), depression, and more.
The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) named the first two—
heart disease and cancer—as the number one and number two leading causes of
death in the US in 2016.4 Who profits off making people sick? You guessed it:
predatory marketers.
2 Mary Story and Simone French, “Food Advertising and Marketing Directed at
Children and Adolescents in the US,” International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physi-
cal Activity. (Feb 2004), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC416565/.
3 Shane Ellison, “Chemical Conspiracy: It’s Not The Food, It’s The Drugs In The
Food!” The People’s Chemist, last visited April 3, 2020, https://thepeopleschemist.com/
pharmafood-conspiracy-drugs-in-food/.
4 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Leading Causes of Death,” CDC.
6
H ow P redatory M arketing is H arming H umanity
So, when I say marketing is killing us, it’s no exaggeration! If it’s not killing
you outright, it’s slowly poisoning you and making you lose your mind.
The products of the same junk food makers mentioned above destroy kids’
ability to think. An Ohio State University study found that the more fast food
kids eat during fifth grade, the worse they perform on math, reading, and science
tests in eighth grade.5 This makes sense. As an adult, if I eat junk food for too
many days in a row, I feel my brain power and mood plummeting—courtesy of
the brain fog induced by fake food.
Most parents don’t pay attention to marketing messages, let alone teach
their kids how to assess such messages. They just give their kids an iPad or a cell
phone where they can roam the wilderness of predatory ads online. “Go play.
Your mom needs a nap.”
Fuck marketing.
PREDATORY MARKETING WILL DRIVE YOU INTO DEBT
Do you want your customers to be able to afford buying your high-quality

product or service? If so, then I hope they’re not buried in debt.
Dave Ramsey, financial author and radio host, says debt is “the most aggres-
sively marketed product in America.”6 Millions of people are inundated with
credit card ads offering 0 percent interest, free T-shirts, points, and other bribes
that lure them into the trap. As a result, they get hooked on—and addicted
to—debt for life.
College students are encouraged to get credit cards and take on massive
student loan debt before they even have a job or a source of income. Because
of this intense predatory marketing push, most people today are carrying some
form of debt. Worse, many are in denial about how this is crippling their lives.
gov, last visited April 3, 2020,

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/leading-causes-of-death.htm.
5 “Fast-food consumption in children linked to poorer academic outcomes.” Medi-
cal News Today, last visited April 3, 2020,
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/287414.php. (Study was published in Clini-
cal Pediatrics in December 2014.)
6 Dave Ramsey. “Mankind’s Most Aggressively Advertised Product of All Time.”
YouTube video. 6:25. Posted Feb. 27, 2018.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_FARgXrRYM.
7
Ramsey calls credit cards a “toxic financial product” that ruins lives. In his
book, The Total Money Makeover, he writes about two college students who
couldn’t pay their debts, so they ended up taking their own lives. The burden of
debt was too great for them to bear.
Yet borrowing money has become the American way of life. Predatory
lenders have conditioned us to see debt as a tool and a resource rather than what
it really is—a hundred-pound ball strapped to your ankle for most (if not all) of
your life. Nearly everyone has bought into this ideology. Financing everything
is the new normal. Payments out the ass are socially accepted and tolerated.
“Everyone’s in debt, so I should be too. Gotta build that credit score.” The result
is mass hypnotism and financial enslavement.
In a blog post, Ramsey pointed out: “Over the past several decades, debt has
been marketed so heavily that many people feel like they can’t survive without
it! In fact, eight in 10 Americans have debt, and seven in 10 believe it’s necessary.
Debt has also . . . caused bankruptcy, divorce and all kinds of other messes.”7
This is no accident. We have predatory marketing and those who use it
(banks, credit card companies, payday lenders)—and even the government and
our own stupid, complacent behavior—to thank.
The main reason why so many people get into financial slavery in the first
place is because they’re targeted by predatory marketing, which trains them to
believe debt is good.
Fuck marketing.
PREDATORY MARKETING WILL GET YOU HOOKED ON DRUGS
With large chunks of the population obese, sick, and depressed over their debt
problems, it’s time to get everyone medicated.
Enter Big Pharma. They’re masters of predatory marketing! Whatever your
problem is, there’s a drug that aims to erase the symptoms while ignoring the
cause and giving you tons of negative side effects—for which you’ll need, guess
what? More drugs!
Pharmaceutical ads and commercials are everywhere. After warning us that
their products may harm or kill us, the ads conclude with, “Talk to your doctor
7 Dave Ramsey, “God’s Ways of Managing Money,” last visited April 3, 2020,
https://www.daveramsey.com/blog/managing-money-gods-way.
8
to see if XYZ drug is right for you.” This phrase is a direct command, a form of
hypnotism that trains your brain to think doctors have all the answers and that
meds are normal and desirable for everyone to use. By repeating this mantra,
the drug industry has normalized healthy people getting medicated for every-
thing imaginable.
This is propaganda to the extreme.
Today a record numbers of Americans are on prescription drugs,8 yet we’re
the unhealthiest nation in the world. In fact, the US has done something
unprecedented in the developed world—reduce its average life expectancy.9
That’s proof that these products aren’t helping; they’re making things worse.
As a multibillion-dollar industry, Big Pharma somehow gets away with
legally killing and harming people. Patients who take doctor-prescribed meds
are often riddled with side effects. According to WebMD, “In 2014, nearly
1.3 million people sought emergency room treatment for adverse drug effects,
and about 124,000 people died, according to U.S. government data cited by
Consumer Reports.”10
Dr. Peter Gøtzsche, MD,11 a prominent medical researcher, calls the pre-
scription drug industry “worse than the mob.” The title of one of his papers says
it all: “Our prescription drugs kill us in large numbers.”12 He says drug com-
panies are “punished” for their reckless behavior with “settlements and fines,
which do not have any effect on corporate behavior but are merely seen as a
marketing expense. As long as no top executives go to prison, this lucrative
crime industry will continue.”13
8 Robert Preidt, “Americans Taking More Prescription Drugs Than Ever,” WebMD,
last modified Aug. 3, 2017, https://www.webmd.com/drug-medication/news/20170803/
americans-taking-more-prescription-drugs-than-ever-survey.
9 Steven H. Woolf and Heidi Schoomaker, “Life Expectancy and Mortality Rates
in the United States, 1959-2017,” JAMA, November 2019,
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2756187/.
10 Robert Preidt, “Americans Taking More Prescription Drugs Than Ever,” WebMD,
last modified Aug. 3, 2017, https://www.webmd.com/drug-medication/news/20170803/
americans-taking-more-prescription-drugs-than-ever-survey.
11 Dr. Peter Gøtzsche is a Danish physician, professor, medical researcher,
and former leader of the Nordic Cochrane Centre in Copenhagen, Denmark.
See https://www.deadlymedicines.dk/about/.
12 Peter Gøtzsche, “Our prescription drugs kill us in large numbers,” Polish Archives
of Internal Medicine (Oct. 30, 2014), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25355584.
13 Shane Ellison, “Medical Doctor Speaks on Big Pharma: ‘When Crime Pays, We
9
Note the key term: marketing expense.

Even just walking into a doctor’s office puts your health at risk due to fre-
quent medical errors. “A recent Johns Hopkins study claims more than 250,000
people in the U.S. die every year from medical errors. Other reports claim the
numbers to be as high as 440,000,” wrote CNBC.14 I can imagine many medical
professionals are overworked, stressed out, and deeply in debt (from all their
medical school expenses), so of course they’re going to make errors. And yet
we trust them blindly with our health? Shane Ellison, a former pharmaceutical
drug chemist, says that outside of a life-threatening emergency, taking doctor-
prescribed meds is butchering people’s health.15
Oh, but don’t forget to talk to your doctor to see if this harmful drug is right
for you.
Fuck marketing.
SMALL BUSINESSES DO IT TOO
Large corporations and billion-dollar industries aren’t the only ones using
predatory marketing that preys on the masses. Some entrepreneurs and “solo-
preneurs” also engage in predatory marketing by putting their six- and seven-
figure incomes above their clients’ well-being.
Think of the personal development guru who uses seduction, persuasion,
neurolinguistic programming (NLP), or high-pressure selling tactics to put
you in an emotionally vulnerable, unsettled state of mind. After listening to a
slick sales pitch, you find yourself pulling out your wallet, taking out a second
mortgage on your house, depleting your retirement fund (or “dignity fund”),
or going into debt to pay for a high-priced personal development program—
without doing any real thinking about whether it’s something you truly want
or need to do. They use FOMO (fear of missing out) and YOLO (you only
Will See More Crime,’” last visited April 3, 2020,

https://thepeopleschemist.com/medical-doctor-speaks-on-big-pharma/.
14 Ray Sipherd, “The third-leading cause of death in US most doctors don’t want
you to know about,” CNBC (Feb. 22, 2018), https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/medi-
cal-errors-third-leading-cause-of-death-in-america.html.
15 Shane Ellison, “One Nation Under Drugs – Why I Abandoned The Pharmaceu-
tical Industry,” last visited April 3, 2020. https://thepeopleschemist.com/one-nation-un-
der-drugs-why-i-abandoned-the-pharmaceutical-industry/.
10
live once) to make you think if you don’t buy their program now, you’re setting
yourself up for failure. They justify this by saying, “You’re investing in yourself.”
Gimme a fuckin’ break! It’s just more predatory marketing disguised
as self-development.
The high-pressure selling environment is designed to make you feel like a
loser if don’t sign up, as if you’re saying “no” to your own success. This artificial
pressure puts you on the spot. You end up making a life-altering decision in five
minutes. With one purchase, you demolish your life savings, cash out your Roth
IRA, and destroy your cushion or security net. That money is transferred out of
your bank account and moved directly into the guru’s account.
But it’s OK that you’re broke because you’re “investing in yourself.”
I can speak to all of this because I’ve done it! I’ve fallen for the myth of
investing in myself at the expense of having financial peace. I justified it as
“good business debt.” Looking back, most of my spur-of-the-moment purchases
didn’t help me grow my business. All they did was leave me feeling burdened by
monthly payments to a coach, so I could “improve” myself.
Fuck predatory marketing.
GET RICH QUICK . . . NOT
I’ll always remember “Shushanna,” a “money coach” who used NLP techniques
to convince me I should enroll in her $8,000 Bali retreat. She promised it would
help me get rich fast.
I know, I know, cue the gasps. “Michelle, you should know better than to
fall for that crap.” This was way before I was wise. I was gullible and fell for her
pitch. (So did many other women.)
At the time I was making $22,000 a year in my business, living with my
parents, and wasting a good chunk of my life on forums and Twitter. Back
then my business was all about me, my bank account, and my upcoming bills.
I was broke and not at all focused on serving anyone. Instead I was looking to
get clients, so I could get more money, and get my life in order. (Notice all the
“gets.”) Those self-centered years were my stupid years. I had no business enroll-
ing in an $8,000 retreat. None.
But Shushanna was happy to tell me otherwise. She gladly charmed her way
into collecting a $1,000 deposit from me (money that should have gone toward
paying other bills that I was late on). As I failed to come up with the rest by her
11
deadline, she said, “Welp, you’re outta luck. We don’t give refunds. Plus, you
were already shipped a DVD that’s worth $1,000.”
Gee, thanks, Shushanna, for truly helping me change my life and my finances
from the inside out. I owe you! Not.
She had seemed so nice. She had a hypnotic voice and a pretty smile. A well-
designed website too. But she was actually a predatory marketer.
Did that “sale” serve me? No. Did Shushanna give me anything of value?
No. Did she teach me anything? No. Did she motivate, educate, or inspire me
on how to change my situation? No. All she did was earn a permanent spot in
my “Jackass Predatory Marketing” file. (Of course, it was a hard lesson on the
value of saying “no” to an offer that wasn’t right for me.)
Are all self-help gurus and coaches guilty of using predatory marketing? No.
But you know the ones I’m talking about. They make you feel unsettled, and
not in a good way. They go for your weak spots. They make you pull a Britney
Spears, where you say, “Oops, I did it again. I signed up for another seminar/
joined another program, and I didn’t really want to.”
They’re the ones who feed and profit off you perpetually questioning your-
self. Their confidence-booster package or their ninety-day “Love yourself ”
program promises to be the answer to all your ongoing self-esteem problems.
But those products never seem to get you where you want to go, so you have to
keep buying more.
Guess what? Their predatory marketing is designed to make you keep ques-
tioning yourself ! It’s structured to make you think something’s always missing
in your life.
The personal development industry is like the Big Pharma of the soul—
skilled at making you think you’re deficient and that you should depend on
their expertise, product, or program to survive.
It takes a strong, self-aware person to resist this shit.
I GOT SICK OF THE BS
Not a single predatory marketing message has ever enriched or improved my

life. But in the heat of the moment, I was 1,000 percent convinced that I wanted
to buy whatever product was being pushed and that it would be good for me.
Like a toxic relationship, each sales pitch encouraged me to make choices I
would later regret.
12
Confession time: I struggled (and still struggle) with eating too much junk
food (designed to be addictive). I wasted (and still waste) too much money on
said food. I’ve had a debt problem, and I’ve gone broke several times. Oh, and
I’ve spent too much on coaching programs, seminars, and courses under the
guise of growing my business. Some of these “investments” were spurred by my
desire to travel (I love traveling), and some of them were a glorified form of
escapism. Most of them were a way to avoid dealing with my real issues—that
I’m easily distracted and have a bad habit of putting off doing meaningful work
first thing in the morning.
These are all character flaws that I’ve worked hard to correct and change
within myself. Even with my level of awareness, it’s still challenging at times
because I’m up against billion-dollar industries that devote significant resources
to knowing my weaknesses better than I do and then exploiting them.
Becoming an anti-marketer is my greatest hope to make positive changes.
The most valuable thing I ever did for my life and business was to identify
bullshit and learn how to say “no” to it. In a world where marketers groom us to
say “yes” to everything without question, more value comes from using discern-
ment and saying “no.”
Say no to debt. Say no to fake food. Say no to meds with bad side effects.
Say no to letting someone tell you how to live your life. Say no to anything that
imprisons your body, mind, or spirit. Say no to marketers who try to “prescribe”
your life to you.
One of my biggest breakthroughs came after I fired all the gurus, coaches,
and anyone else using predatory marketing tactics. “No more!” I said. Then I
buckled down and started doing actual work to bring money into my business
while trusting my own internal voice of wisdom to lead the way. Now whenever
I get paid, I manage that money with care and diligence instead of auto-siphon-
ing it to a coach’s bank account.
After years of spending too much on self-help that wasn’t helping, I swore
off all of it and gave predatory marketing my middle finger.
“You know what?” I said. “For the first time in my life, I’m going to start
taking my business seriously. I’m going to carve my own path to success. Where
I lack in skills, I will hire. Where I hate doing an activity, I will outsource to
someone who loves it. Everything else can fuck off.”
13
Hence, the Anti-Marketing Manifesto was born. I started working with

clients who had values similar to mine and who were free to be themselves in
their business. Life became more fun, business became more profitable and
enjoyable, and I’ve never looked back.
If you hate marketing, and if the thought of being a predatory jackass
doesn’t appeal to you, then keep reading. The Anti-Marketing Manifesto will
be a breath of fresh air for your business. I’ll show you how to tap into your best
asset: the real you. Not the fake you. Not the canned you who ran your content
through the filter of some lame marketing playbook. The real you! Flaws, emo-
tions, personality, and all. The one who gladly shits on scripts!
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto will help you leverage everything that makes
you unique, so you can bring your true self and values to every facet of your busi-
ness. You’ll maximize the essence of who you really are—your personality, your
energy, your perspectives, your voice, your skill set, and your awesome product
or service—so you can deliver all of that, unapologetically, to your perfect-fit
customers (PFCs) for as long as you care to remain in business.
Instead of hiding behind your product and creating a faceless corporation
(like so many predatory marketers do), you’ll stand in front of your work. You’ll
show your pride, dedication, and passion for your business with real emotions.
Your true self, for better or worse, is worth more than millions. You can’t put a
price on it. Some people will love you, and some will hate you. Regardless, you
will once and for all reach your PFCs with laser focus and continue to grow
your profits. You’ll also learn to say, “Fuck marketing.” It’s a great phrase. Try it!
Being your real self in business isn’t just a nice thing to do; it’s a moral imper-
ative, a human imperative. The future of humanity is literally at stake. Plus, it’s
pretty damn gratifying to be the real you compared to the drudgery of doing
soulless, scammy, shitbird predatory marketing. Not only is it gratifying, being
true to yourself also opens the floodgates to more profits.
Get ready to develop a strong, positive mindset that lets you take actions
that actually pay off—like creating great content, delivering valuable products
and services that your fans will love, and bringing in tons of ethically earned
profits—without ever having to sell your soul.
14
We Can (and We Will) Do Better:
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto
“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man;

true nobility is being superior to your former self.”
— Ernest Hemingway
At its essence, being an anti-marketer is about following the golden rule in

your business: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Equally
as important, do unto yourself as your “best self ” would do unto you.
#RespectHumanity. #RespectYourself.
Don’t be like the Big Chemical douche who claims his product is safe yet
refuses to be anywhere near it without wearing a hazmat suit. Show people
your product is great by being a living embodiment of everything your business
preaches. Meanwhile, bring your true self and values into everything you do.
The following chapters outline the fourteen principles that make up the
Anti-Marketing Manifesto (AMM). The AMM is based on over a decade of
experience in writing and editing content for entrepreneurs and business
owners in various industries. The clients who’ve followed AMM principles
most consistently have also been the healthiest, happiest, most successful, most
profitable, and the most fun to work with.
15
CHAPTER 1:
Treat People as People,

Not as Targets
“Money is worth nothing to the man who has more

than enough.”
— George Bernard Shaw
Traditional marketers view us as targets, hence the predatory term “target

market.” People like you and I are seen as nothing more than a bullseye, an
object, a means to an end—profits.
Through the lens of predatory marketing, we’re stripped of our unique
human identity. “Joe from Alabama who loves playing with his grandkids”
becomes a view. “Amy from New York City who aspires to open an art business”
becomes a click. “Mindy from Alberta who’s trying to teach her dachshund
how to roll over” becomes an impression. No longer are people seen as living,
breathing human beings with desires, personalities, goals, quirks, struggles,
families, burdens, and viewpoints. They are now eyeballs, clicks, open rates,
conversion rates, follows, and likes. They’re lumped together as an anonymous,
faceless demographic or audience where even a 0.001 percent conversion rate is
seen as a victory by the company pursuing them.
17
There’s something degrading, condescending, and sterilizing about the way

predatory marketing views people. It’s dehumanizing, similar to random body
parts in a lewd magazine trying to seduce us into buying some garbage product.
The whole picture isn’t being shown or even considered.
As targets, our only use is to provide revenue for the marketer. We are to
be “captured,” “persuaded,” or “influenced.” The marketer’s goal is to convert us
into sales through whatever means necessary: brainwashing, deception, high-
pressure sales tactics, over-promising, under-delivering.
When you start seeing everyone as targets, you stop seeing them as people.
And from there it becomes a lot easier to do some pretty shitty things.
EVERYONE IS DOING IT, SO I SHOULD TOO
Typical marketing books teach business owners to pick a target market and
blast them with targeted ad campaigns. The idea of targeting is so pervasive
throughout the business landscape that most entrepreneurs never question it.
But they should.
The phrase “target market” has a negative connotation, and people can feel
it based on your intent. Many marketers hunt for bragging rights or to meet
quotas. They aim to close more sales, beat the other guy’s numbers, or boost
their own ego-based metrics. (Note the total lack of humanity in every one of
these terms.) It’s not about serving the customer; it’s about satisfying an insa-
tiable need for bigger and more careless numbers.
Persuading, influencing, and converting are designed to get people to do
something they wouldn’t otherwise do. It’s invasive, forceful, and manipula-
tive—hallmarks of predatory marketing.
Right off the bat, the act of targeting a market sets up a dysfunctional, imbal-
anced relationship between the customer and the company—one in which the
company has the power, and the lowly customer is conned into buying their
stuff. It’s a lopsided dynamic, where the company’s profits increase, and the
customer’s quality of life decreases by using the product. One does the hunting,
and the other is hunted, the latter usually not by choice but because they were
hypnotized by repetitive ads or misled by propaganda that gradually embed-
ded itself in the person’s psyche. One gets rich while the other is left with a
damaged life.
18
T reat P eople as P eople , N ot as Targets
This is traditional, old-school marketing, and it’s growing worse each day. It’s
becoming even more shameless, and it’s gross.
THE DYSFUNCTIONAL LANGUAGE OF MARKETING
Part of the problem lies in the bizarre vocabulary businesses have traditionally
used to describe their potential customers. It’s as if Jeffrey Dahmer invented the
language of marketing. Readers have morphed into eyeballs, views, and clicks.
Why not call your customers hands, legs, or spleens? “How can we blast our
target market’s prefrontal cortexes to get a higher conversion rate?” Who came
up with this shit?
Marketing vernacular has been messed up for a long time, but it’s slipped
under the radar. A popular business book, for example, has a chapter called
“Guerrilla Marketing Attack.” Really? We’re attacking people with our com-
munication? Why? Another book has a chapter called “How to Control
the ‘Command Center’ in Your Prospect’s Mind.” Seriously? Is this Nazi
Germany? What customer would benefit from having their mind controlled by
someone else?
On its website, Marchex, a call analytics company, says to financial firms:
“Connect with your target audience . . . Learn how Marchex helps you capture
more leads and convert them to borrowers.”16 This kind of language is every-
where. No one notices it except you and I, who feel squeamish about the idea of
capturing or converting anyone.
Nearly every marketing agency, digital ad agency, marketing guru, and con-
sultant has used these exact words or something similar to them. It’s gotten to
the point where almost everyone thinks they should be using these words to
promote their business.
Although the word “target” is intended to be a focusing concept—i.e.,
narrowing your focus to reach a specific group of people, a segment of the
population, or a type of customer you wish to serve—it ends up being a silent
directive: destroy the customer. The word implies you’re on a seek-and-destroy
mission: hunt, shoot, capture, maim, kill.
Even the word “campaign” is creepy, as in “marketing campaign” or “advertis-
ing campaign.” It implies violence. In a military campaign, the goal is to destroy
16 https://www.marchex.com/industries/financial/, last visited April 3, 2020.
19
the target until body parts are scattered and bomb residue is all that’s left. Good
luck to anyone on the receiving end of that!
Think about the clusterfucks that are America’s political campaigns. They’re
often full of lies and unfulfilled promises. Dreams not materialized. They’re
shit shows.
Given all these weird linguistic associations, why are we using the word
“campaign” to describe our noble, entrepreneurial act of communicating with
people? Why are we using seek-and-destroy language when we think of reach-
ing more customers? Why are we taking an aggressive, hostile approach toward
our fellow humans beings, whether symbolically or literally? You would only do
this if you were a sociopathic predatory marketer forcing your agenda upon the
population at large.
For business owners who disagree with this treachery, how about we scratch
these asinine terms altogether and go for something more humane?
YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO GROSS THINGS TO GROW YOUR BIZ
Instead of treating people as bullseyes and focusing solely on profits, you, as an

anti-marketer, are going to do something radically different:
Prioritize serving perfect-fit customers (PFCs) above all else—a.k.a. those
living, breathing humans on the other end of the transaction who are checking
their email, reading your newsletter, and thinking, “Damn, I’m excited to work
with this person/company.” They weren’t targeted; they came to you willingly
because you did something to motivate, educate, and inspire them. They sold
themselves on buying your product or service. No manipulation or cheesy mind
tricks required.
Profits are important, yes, but not at the expense of anyone’s health, sanity,
or life. You will not sell something that harms people. You will not make any
sale that goes against basic human dignity or liberty. You will not do anything
that hurts another person even if it’s lucrative or it only inflicts a “slight” hurt.
This means you tell the truth, always.
You stay true to yourself no matter what.
You stick to your values, even if it means losing potential profits. That’s
OK because it means you have a backbone and a conscience. (A heart and a
spleen too!)
20
You know that eyeballs aren’t just a fancy digital term. They’re lodged into
the actual eye sockets of real human beings who may have crust or an eyelash
stuck in their eye or tears dripping down their cheeks because their life is full
of challenging stuff. Anti-marketers get this and respect it. In fact, they love it.
They build their business around honoring all of this.
POP QUIZ: WHAT WOULD AN ANTI-MARKETER DO?
Say you’re a copywriter. You help people sharpen and clarify their message
and voice while selling more products through their writing. Donald Jones,
founder of “Destroy-the-Duck, Inc.,” asks you for help with his website copy.
His business makes a one-of-a-kind product that kills unwanted ducks and
similar winged creatures that have accidentally found their way into humans’
backyards. Somehow, it’s legal.
“My site’s not converting,” he complains. “I don’t get it. Don’t people want
to get rid of the unwanted ducks quacking in their yard? By using my product,
they can slowly kill the ducks.”
He asks you to work your copywriting magic on his website and get his
poison product flying off the shelves. He’s willing to pay you a lot of money to
do it, like three months’ rent up front. What do you do?
If you’re a soulless predatory marketer, you say: “Sure, Donald. I can take
on this project starting next week.” You don’t feel good about it, but you need
the money.
If you’re an anti-marketer, you say, “No.”
If you’re inclined to explain further, you say: “I don’t believe in what you’re
doing. If you want to help people humanely remove the ducks and bring them
back to their natural environment, then sure. But I won’t partake in project RIP
Duck #5,000.”
As an anti-marketer, living by your values is more important than accepting
a paycheck that kills your soul or boosting your conversion rate in meaningless
ways. It doesn’t matter how big the check is. You’re driven by what matters to
you. You keep it real. You pour your values, your true self, and your perspectives
into every aspect of your business—everything from the product you deliver to
the way you deliver it to all the sales copy that describes it. You always keep the
customers’ best interests at heart, even if it means turning away customers who
aren’t a good fit for what you offer. (In the example above, Donald McDuck
21
Killer needs to find a new career. You’re helping him by refusing to enable him
in his insane ways.)
In doing the right thing, you carve out a beautiful path to growing your
business full of perfect-fit customers who also share your values. You can sleep
at night. Upon death you can face the heavenly gates (or the gates of reincarna-
tion) full of confidence, knowing you won’t be cast into eternal hell or brought
back as a Hitler-esque worm in the next life. Even better, you can create “heaven
on earth” because your business satisfies your soul.
Whatever your background, beliefs, or values, always do you. (If your values
harm other people, then develop some character and change them.) Through
your content—and through every action you take in your business—take a
stand for what matters to you personally. Refuse to be a sellout. Be honest with
people, focus on serving them, and by virtue of those things, you’ll sell more.
You’ll sell in a way that feels amazing, not slimy. People will begin to trust you
for the right reasons because you’ve shown them you’re real, you’re solid, and
you have a spine.
TREAT PEOPLE AS PEOPLE, NOT AS TARGETS
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto is about empowerment, free will, and individual

choice. It’s about respecting humanity and helping individuals make clear,
informed decisions that improve the quality of their lives, not guiding them to
make the decision you think they should make. (Big difference.)
You’re not out to target anyone. You’re out to serve your fellow human
beings while growing your business. Service feels much lighter, and it’s more
beneficial for all involved. There’s no lopsided dynamic going on.
Your main goal is to serve your perfect-fit customers (PFCs)—i.e., the spe-
cific people whom you’re passionate about helping in this lifetime—and nobody
else. You’re here to provide a high level of service to people who are willing to
pay you good money for it in exchange for your healthy product or service.
If the word “healthy” doesn’t apply to your industry, niche, or field, sub-
stitute it for another positive term, such as forward-thinking, truth-based,
progressive, fit, strong, energetically clean, service-oriented, life-enhancing,
effective, non-toxic, etc.
For example, Dave Ramsey’s business provides content and services that
help people go from being in debt, scared, and out of control in their finances
22
to being debt-free, wealthy, and financially free. One of his main products is his
Financial Peace University program. The name says it all. His teachings inspire
people to ditch the credit cards, debt, and loans and to use the actual money
that’s in their bank account. He teaches people to stockpile money over time,
so they can do good with it. Dave weaves the biblical concept “The borrower
is a slave to the lender” throughout many of his teachings. He happens to be a
Christian, for which he makes no apologies. At the same time, he’s not trying
to convert anyone to Christianity or to anything else. Because he’s 100 percent
true to himself and his values in everything he does, Dave Ramsey’s fans totally
trust him. (And it doesn’t matter what his haters or critics think.)
What positive adjectives (or nouns) is your business working to bring more
of into the world? More peace, more simplicity, more ease, more clarity, living
young, living healthy, more cleanliness? Don’t turn these words into a cliché or
an empty buzzword. Instead, turn them into a damn good reason to connect
with more of your PFCs! (In my business, I aim to help my clients write razor-
sharp content that motivates, educates, and inspires people! All three, not just
one or two.)
What pivotal shift are you helping your customers make that ends up trans-
forming their life in a really cool way? (Not fake, cigarette-smoking cool but
eye-opening and inspiring us to be our best?)
This shift is powerful. When you treat people as people, not as targets, you
#PutHumanityFirst. You prioritize human beings above all else.
IF YOU TARGET ANYTHING, TARGET “BS”
Anti-marketers adopt a strict no-bullshit policy. They write and speak candidly
about their own life, good and bad. They aren’t afraid to show humility and
pride (the good kind of pride). They call out stupid and toxic practices in their
industry, where necessary. They challenge the status quo in a way that inspires
people to be their best. They model a cleaner, saner, freer way of living and doing
things by walking their talk and practicing what they preach. They do this even
if it makes them unpopular with people who don’t get it.
Anti-marketers genuinely care about the lives of their customers and show
they care with real communication via speaking on the phone and sending mail
23
as well as email. (Not canned communication in fake-happy voices with paid

actors or celebrities endorsing products that harm users.17)
Anti-marketers share their raw emotions and personal stories, knowing this
is what makes them relatable and interesting. It’s like writing to a close friend.
You wouldn’t use sterile marketing terms when communicating with a friend;
otherwise, what kind of friendship is that? You keep it raw and real.
Rather than targeting, focus on giving, serving, under-promising, and over-
delivering. Listen to what customers truly want and need (not what they think
they need because some marketer told them so). Pay attention to what’s deeply
important to people. Then aim to create and deliver your product or service in a
way that actually helps them! Do this in conjunction with your natural talents,
abilities, and desire to do so.
Be upfront, and don’t treat people like they’re nothing but cash cows (i.e., a
quick suck on the “converted” tit, and you’re out.)
PUT PEOPLE BEFORE PROFITS
As modern-day humans, we have a very real need for money—lots of it—to

meet basic needs and to thrive. In The Science of Getting Rich, Wallace Wattles
writes, “It is not possible to live a really complete or a successful life unless one is
rich.”18 Clearly, money is important. It helps us live a successful life while being
generous to others. But it should never be worshipped. Money isn’t a god; it’s a
tool that God gives us to manage wisely.
Serving shareholders before customers is treachery against humanity; it’s an
act of worshipping money above all else.
WHAT SHOULD YOU CALL YOUR CUSTOMERS? IT’S UP TO YOU
Now that we’ve thrown “target market” out the window, what should you call
your existing and potential customers? Call them whatever you want, but pretty
please, make sure it acknowledges their value as human beings.
17 Example: Shane Ellison, “‘Bone Building’ Drugs Shatter Bone: Sally Field Gets
Stinky Sulfur Award,” The People’s Chemist, last visited April 3, 2020, https://thepeople-
schemist.com/bone-building-drugs-shatter-bone-sally-field-gets-stinky-sulfur-award/.
18 Wallace Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich (Virginia: Thrifty Books, 2009), 6.
24
Ironically, PFC (perfect-fit customer) can also stand for “Private First Class,”
a military term. Oops. I only know that because I Googled it. So maybe scratch
that, and find your own term.
I call my email newsletter readers “fellow anti-marketers.” You can call customers
your fans or whatever works for you. Hip-hop dance choreographer Phil Wright
calls his young dance students his “chicken nuggets.” They’re kids under the age of
ten who have mastered insanely complex dance combos. (I died laughing when I
heard him calling his older dance students his “old rotisserie chickens.”)
Have fun with it. There is great power in words. But beware: there’s also
drudgery in certain words. You’re not obligated to use words that suck. Choose
terms that light you up. Hell, make up your own words and phrases. After all,
it’s your business.
What’s most important is the way you treat people and the imprint you leave
on their hearts. Think of your future customers as real people with palpable
needs, desires, and preferences.
Paul from North Carolina who’s trying to get himself to quit scarfing a pint
of Ben & Jerry’s every night. He’s not obese (yet), but he knows the sugar is
rotting his insides, and he needs to stop.
Emily from North Platte who wants to move to Vegas and needs to find a
trustworthy mover to help her, so her belongings don’t get destroyed en route.
Skyler who is four years old and becoming the spitting image of his positive
hell-raising dad.
They’re all human—flesh-and-blood, erratic, and emotional creatures who
eat, shit, cry, worry, yell, fight, nurture dreams in their hearts, provide for their
families, and so much more.
Never strip them of their individual identities.
In my business I refer to each of my clients by name. Shane is Shane. Steph
is Steph. Amy is Amy. Steve is Steve. They’re all unique and different—worlds
apart and yet similar in some ways. They’re each a category of one.
Instead of capturing market share, think of your work as cultivating a base
of rock star customers or building your own underground society of badasses
or army of saints. Whatever works for you. This approach feels more fun, more
liberating, and more respectful of all parties involved.
At the end of the day, your fans are those who love reading your info, love
buying your products, love hiring you over and over again, and love telling their
25
friends and family about you, free of charge. They don’t feel like you manipu-
lated them in any way. They gladly pay you money out of their own free will
without a shred of resentment. Your customers are seeking you, your skills, your
craftswomanship, your product, and your talent just as much as you’re seeking
them. Therefore, the seeking is mutual. The relationship is healthy and bal-
anced, consensual and conscious. What you’re really seeking is an opportunity
to serve these people in some way, not target them.
It doesn’t matter how you describe your perfect-fit customers. Just don’t use
the term “target market” for gawd’s sake!
BE ENERGETICALLY CLEAN
As an anti-marketer, you want to meet people on their turf. Have a conversation,

a collaboration, and show up as an equal who happens to have unique gifts, ideas,
and specialties. (You know, instead of clubbing the target over the head and drag-
ging her back to your cave.) Yes, equals—not the know-it-all “expert” versus the
lowly “clueless consumer” who has to be prescribed a solution and told what to do.
There’s no pushing or persuading in the Anti-Marketing Manifesto. Unlike
the cult-like “convert everyone” mentality of predatory marketing, anti-mar-
keters don’t care if someone becomes their customer or not. You’re out to serve
your top clients—the people who are sincerely requesting your help—and that’s
it. You have a healthy sense of emotional detachment, knowing that people are
free to choose what’s best for them, whether you make a sale or not. You don’t
try to force anyone to buy anything that’s not in their best interest.
You’re respectful of people’s human-ness but also gung ho on getting your
amazing product or service into the hands of the right customers (because
hiding your great product doesn’t help anyone).
You communicate openly about your business in as many formats and
mediums as you want without being a sellout.
A FINAL WORD IN THIS LONG BUT HELPFUL FIRST CHAPTER . . .
Using aggressive predatory marketing is not the same as doing everything in

your power to get your product or service into the hands of the right people
who could benefit from it. So don’t confuse this chapter as an excuse to hide, to
26
be weak in spreading your message, or to be a wimp in selling. Don’t hold back

in sharing your content with the world.
Don’t merely seek to get in front of “eyeballs.” Make yourself known to
whole human beings—hearts, minds, and souls.
You can spread your message far and wide without destroying or disempow-
ering anyone, including you.
27
CHAPTER 2:
Motivate, Educate,
Inspire . . . and SELL!
“You will never influence the world by trying to be like it.”
— Unknown
Some of the worst advice being doled out to business owners today has to do
with the idea of “influencers.” We’re told we need to be an influencer (or expert,
authority, or guru) in our field or industry. We’re also told we should seek other
influencers and gurus to help us grow our business. These ideas have led to a
deluge of self-proclaimed know-it-alls who are doing more harm than good.
While some gurus are making a positive difference, many are steering people
in the wrong fucking direction. With everyone “successorizing” their lives on
social media, it can be difficult to discern who’s worth listening to and who we
should question or ignore.
For the anti-marketer, words like “influencer” and “expert” are vacuous and
have lost their meaning. They represent hubris on the part of whoever is calling
themselves these things. Anyone can call themselves an expert. Anyone can buy
10,000 fake social media followers and portray themselves as an influencer.
That doesn’t mean they have any real skills or insights that can help you move
your business forward.
29
EVERYONE IS TAUGHT TO LOOK ELSEWHERE FOR THEIR TRUTH
Due to this artificial rise of influencers, business owners are being bombarded
with nonsense advice while being taught to look elsewhere for their truth
instead of looking inward and using their God-given talents, strength, power,
and capabilities.
Everywhere you look, experts are standing by, waiting to tell you how to
think, breathe, shit, act, and run and grow your business. And people are falling
for it. They’re emptying their life savings or going into massive debt to enroll in
$50,000 seminars and programs on “how to wipe your own ass.”
People like you and me are slowly being conditioned to look outside of
ourselves for guidance. We’re taught to believe our answers are in the external
world. We’re encouraged to think we have no authority over our lives, busi-
nesses, health, or wealth, so we must look to a “real” authority for confirmation.
As if their title, credentials, uniform, white lab coat, seven-figure business, or
letters after their name have more merit, significance, or weight than our own
heart, mind, and soul.
Ridiculous.
Why do we think other people have our answers?
Like a colony of ants raiding a fallen sandwich, this sea of experts has led to
more people doubting themselves. We doubt our ability to figure shit out on
our own. Not that there’s anything wrong with getting help, but many business
owners take it to an unhealthy extreme where they can’t even cross the street
without hiring an expert to help them tie their shoes. They act as if they’re help-
less and clueless on how to grow their business, so they look to others to figure
it out for them.
Most adults are able to figure out a massive amount of things throughout
their lives, but for some strange reason, growing their business baffles them.
They stop looking inward and start looking at what other people are doing.
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto recognizes that there’s only one true author-
ity, and that’s God (or whatever your preferred word is for that concept). God
is in every one of us, so we must dig deep inside ourselves to access that infinite
wisdom. Few actually do it.
It’s very empowering to figure things out for yourself—through having
real-world experiences, reading books, hiring skilled people (i.e., not bullshit
“experts”), and extracting wisdom to apply to your daily life.
30
M otivate , E ducate , I nspire . . . and S E L L !
Gurus scoff at us figuring things out for ourselves. They’d prefer it if we

subscribed to their high-priced “mentorship” on an ongoing basis. Whether
it’s consultants, social media mavens, Instagram wizards, Facebook marketers,
coaches, healers, you name it, all of them are working 24/7 to position them-
selves not as your equal but as someone above you (hence the hubris). They sit
perched on their imaginary throne, ready to prescribe advice.
And God help you if you question their motives or suggestions or if you
don’t submit to the almighty, all-knowing experts who think they know better
than you do.
MENTORSHIP HAS BECOME A JOKE
We’re told we need countless mentors (many of whom profit off us because we
believe we’re stuck), as if we’re incapable of navigating life for ourselves.
We’re encouraged to give up on things we love—quit our jobs, get a divorce,
abandon our families, seek out something greater, “want more” if things aren’t
perfect right now, seek out an “easier” solution, etc.
All of this BS is designed to make us feel discontent and to see the influ-
encer’s product or program as the only possible way out of our stuckness.
If we’re not discerning—if we blindly follow whatever the so-called gurus
tell us—it can have damaging effects on our lives.
“NEVER TAKE ADVICE FROM ANYONE”
Following the wrong advice can not only fuck up your business; it can rob you
of joy in your personal life. They’re deeply intertwined. I’ll illustrate this with a
personal story.
Awhile back, I almost let a relationship coach named “Lisa” convince me I
should break up with Dan, the love of my life.
After Lisa heard my twenty-minute litany of complaints about how Dan
and I were arguing over text, she insisted “He’s not the dude for you” and
advised me to leave him. (Never mind that Dan wasn’t even present on the call,
so Lisa didn’t have the full picture of what was going on.) She quickly followed
this up by pitching me her $30,000 coaching package for help with exiting
the relationship.
31
Uncertain and doubting myself—because this expert had a seven-figure

business, so clearly that meant she knew more about my life than I did—I tried
breaking up with Dan that same night.
But it was too sad. We couldn’t do it. We both cried. I wasn’t ready to end
something that was so beautiful and precious to me. In fact, it made no sense.
Deep in my heart, I knew Dan was right for me; I was just having trouble
accepting it. I’d been reading too many articles written by experts asking,
“Is he really the right one for you?”—articles designed to create doubt
and discontentment.
We’d been together for two years. It was the healthiest, best relationship we’d
ever been in. I believed he was “hand-picked just for me.” A perfect fit. We had
great compatibility and got along well. Plus, we were healing each other (and
our difficult childhoods) through our various experiences together. We traveled
to Mexico (twice), jet-skied on the Caribbean sea, hiked ancient pyramids, rode
bikes through humid forests, did cannonballs into sacred underground cenotes,
traversed through humane zoos, played with dogs, and so much more.
Wait, why were we supposed to break up?
Before any of that unfolded, Dan had asked me on our fourth date, “Can I
keep you forever?” It was sweet.
I didn’t need fast, prescriptive advice from a (divorced) relationship expert
who didn’t know me or my partner. What Dan and I both needed was to develop
communication skills that would lead to a deeper, more fulfilling relationship. I
needed to face the truth of my life: that I was happy with Dan, and his character
was solid. His words and actions matched over time. We were both becoming
better people as a result of being together.
To think I almost threw away something so meaningful and right for me just
because an expert told me I should!
BEWARE OF “EXPERTS”
Why do our brains shut off when an expert starts talking?

Why do we assume other people have our answers?
Lisa wasn’t a licensed therapist or counselor. She was a self-identified rela-
tionship coach. Big fucking deal. That didn’t apply to me or my unique situa-
tion. Dump him? Really? That’s your solution?
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Having wasted money on plenty of gurus in the past, I “womaned” up and

realized I needed to stop pretending I couldn’t figure my life out for myself.
Two days later, I told Lisa, “No.” Best decision I ever made.
Dan and I scheduled our first couples’ counseling session with a licensed
therapist, “Holly,” who was amazing at her craft. Over the next few months, she
helped us go much deeper, beyond the surface.
During our first session, I tearily recounted my conversation with Lisa. Holly
was floored. “OMG, Michelle, never take advice from anyone, not even an
expert! I almost want to punch that relationship coach in the face!” she joked.
In person, Holly could see the genuine love between Dan and me. Most
troubled couples in her office stared at the floor, avoided eye contact, or spent
the entire session screaming at each other. Holly could see we had something
special, a deep bond, and we just needed to work through our individual
hang-ups and strengthen our ability to communicate. (Not something that can
happen in a shallow twenty-minute phone conversation.)
We worked with Holly over several months until she moved out of state. By
then Dan and I were a strong couple of two plus years and ready to figure things
out on our own. Since then we’ve committed to a ban on all gurus and experts
from trying to insert their advice into our lives.
I applied this same philosophy to my business. I vowed I would only hire
people who had tangible skills—people who could help me achieve positive,
measurable, repeatable results.
We don’t really learn anything in life unless we do something and then figure
out what works and what doesn’t work based on our actions. Anything worth
doing and mastering takes time, dedication, and passion. That includes your
business. Band-Aid solutions are never the answer.
FORGET BEING AN INFLUENCER
The world doesn’t need more experts. Instead, each of us needs to realize we
already have a wealth of knowledge and wisdom inside. We already have the
power to make decisions and carve out our own path in life and in business. We
don’t need anyone’s permission, blessing, or two cents to do so.
Most people look to the external world for guidance, and that’s why they’re
getting lost. Ancient spiritual texts that have stood the test of time tell us to
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“renounce the ways of the world.” This means “Fire all of your coaches and
gurus because you know what’s best for you better than they do.”
As business owners, we don’t need to influence or convince people of any-
thing. That’s hubris to the max. Instead, we can motivate, educate, and inspire
people to look inward for their own answers. I call this the MEI principle.
MEI’ing is the foundation for growing a business you love without being a
sellout or wrecking anyone else’s life.
When we MEI people, we let them decide—out of their own free will and
internal sense of inspiration—whether they want to try our product or service.
MOTIVATE, EDUCATE, AND INSPIRE
The MEI principle is based on the three pillars of the Anti-Marketing Manifesto:
• Motivate
• Educate
• Inspire
When you do all three, it naturally leads to a fourth pillar:

• SELL!
MEI then becomes MEI(S): motivate, educate, inspire, and sell.
Why MEI? When you motivate, educate, and inspire someone, it feels
way better than if you try to influence, convince, or persuade them. (Ugh. My
stomach feels heavy as I type those last three words.) MEI has a much different
feeling. It’s cleaner, simpler, and healthier than trying to convert someone into
a sale.
When you MEI, you tap into the deep and complete essence of who you
really are:
• Body (Motivate)
• Mind (Educate)
• Soul (Inspire)
This is some spiritual shit! It’s like the “holy trinity” of you!
By MEI’ing, you’re acting like a whole person, not a fragmented person
who’s trying to deny certain parts of his or her self. You humbly acknowledge
that on some level you’re an animal (a mammal) with a body. At the same time,
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you refuse to engage in false humility, so you fully use and embrace the gifts of
your soul, intellect, passion, and skills.
Many business owners hide behind their companies. Following the MEI
principle will make you seen and heard because you’ll stand out due to your
“alive-ness.” This will yield you tangible results, such as increased profits, repeat
customers, raving fans, and overall positive feedback.
It also goes far beyond that. By bringing your whole self into your business,
you give other people permission to show up as their whole selves. (Although
they certainly don’t need your permission!) This will inspire people. Some will
become your perfect-fit customers.
The MEI principle is about inciting others to create their own positive
agenda for their own unique lives while benefiting from your skills, talents,
knowledge, product, or service, if they so choose! It’s not about forcing your
agenda onto anyone.
ALL THREE PILLARS ARE ESSENTIAL—

MOTIVATE, EDUCATE, INSPIRE
The first three pillars are essential for carving out a strong, clear voice and brand
that communicates your value to people in a clean, unforgettable way. One
without the other two is usually missing something.
Education without inspiration can be dry and boring. Like a dull textbook
that puts you to sleep, there’s no personality, voice, or liveliness in intellectual
material that isn’t infused with some kind of inspiration.
Inspiration without education is vacuous and short-lived. An Instagram
post can be inspiring, but if it doesn’t lead to a meaningful action taken, a life
changed, or a positive, tangible outcome (for either you or the reader), it’s pretty
much worthless. The inspiration has no substance behind it; it doesn’t stick. It’s
not tied to a solution or positive outcome.
Motivation without inspiration is joyless pressure—e.g., a person can be
motivated to work 24/7 just to pay his bills, but if he hates his work and sees it
as pure drudgery that drains his soul, he’s way off track.
So we need all three. Doing all three to grow your business (motivating,
educating, and inspiring) is what leads to selling without being a sellout.
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SELLING IS IMPORTANT TOO—DUH!
Selling is vital because if your business isn’t bringing in plenty of money, it’ll
cripple you and put a strain on everything you do.
Money is an important tool in our modern-day lives. We need it to pay for
everything, including basic necessities and everything beyond that. Unless you
plan to kill or grow your own dinner, sew your own clothes, build your own
house, collect your own rainwater, and make your own Nikes, Mac laptop, and
car from scratch, you need money, and lots of it.
Making money via sales is what distinguishes a business from all other
activities, including hobbies, social activism, art for art’s sake, entertainment for
entertainment’s sake, charities, and government handouts.
It’s important that you have a quality product or service that you can tie your
MEI’ing efforts to. You can motivate, educate, and inspire, but if you have no
product or service to sell, you won’t make any money.
WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE TO MEI?
Content that MEIs has a fun, lively, visceral, memorable quality to it. It makes
us feel alive when we read, hear, or see it. We might even cry or have another
strong emotional reaction as we recognize the truth in it. It lights us up from
the inside out. It makes us want to take immediate positive action in some area
of life.
Content that MEIs is based on principles that stand the test of time. When
these principles are stress tested, they hold up. Not everyone can MEI an audi-
ence; only people who’ve mastered a certain skill or topic and who, therefore,
have real expertise and are willing to bring their whole self into their business.
Different people find different things inspiring, and that’s OK. Your goal
is not to MEI everyone. Instead, focus your efforts on people who are strongly
resonating with what you’re doing and saying—your perfect-fit customers.
On a personal level, I find Dave Ramsey’s radio show and YouTube clips
inspiring, so much so that now I see my life as “before getting on Ramsey’s
plan” and “after getting on his plan.” Yet there was a long period during which I
didn’t care about his work. I wasn’t ready to hear it. The moment I was ready, his
content motivated me to create a budget, inspired me to get my spending under
control, and educated me on how to pay my debts off as fast as humanly possible.
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Dave Ramsey uses all elements of the MEI principle in his business, Ramsey
Solutions. He motivates by telling his personal story of how he went bankrupt
due to dumb financial decisions. He educates people on the principles of how
to get out of debt and build a solid financial future. He inspires by bringing
everyday listeners onto his show who have used his plan to pay off boatloads
of debt. They scream, “We’re debt-free!” which is very inspiring to anyone
who’s listening.
He also brings his full personality to each radio segment. Some people love
him; others hate him. Either way, he’s impacting millions of lives for the better.
As for the selling part, Dave has sold millions of books, and his company’s
events often sell out—in a good way!
MEI PEOPLE WITH YOUR SKILLS
Out of everything that makes you uniquely you, your tangible skills are often
what translates into the most value for the marketplace. Your skills are what you
can charge the most money for. Your skills (coupled with your unique back-
ground and personality) are what your PFCs value most in you, as proven by
their repeat orders.
What are you skilled at? What is your background? What subjects were you
trained in that you still love today? What experiences shaped and defined you?
How did they strengthen your character? Which life lessons challenged you but
didn’t define you?
Write and speak about all of it. Then put your content onto platforms where
perfect-fit customers will see and hear it.
Let your skills inspire people. A skill represents artful work and craftsman-
ship. In some cases, it shows mastery. It’s clear when someone is skilled at some-
thing. You can see it, feel it, hear it, smell it, or taste it. It’s tangible (versus the
cloudy, sometimes murky intangibles of “coaching”). It’s easy to discern high
skill from low skill. Tapping into your skills, mastering them, and showcasing
them is the first step in MEI’ing people.
What have you done or created? What have you mastered? Showcase it
to the world in a clear, organized format. Use the MEI principle to motivate,
educate, and inspire the right people around your skills. Your PFCs will be very
interested in your background and skills. (If they aren’t, then they’re probably
not ideal customers.) Plus, mastery is fascinating because it’s rare. Few people
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have the patience, discipline, or desire to master anything. Those who do are
compelling. All of this translates into the raw material from which you can
produce content that MEIs.
Skills combined with principles are even better. What are the core principles
(or values) by which you live your life and operate your business? Get those
down on paper.
Experts are a dime a dozen, but truly skilled people are rare. Most influenc-
ers aren’t skilled at anything other than chasing attention and likes on social
media. An influencer who posts a video of herself crying on Instagram (under
the guise of “transparency” and “authenticity”) followed by a sales pitch for her
self-help program isn’t going to help you get your work done or improve your
skills at anything.
Ultimately, we’re all human, and no one is better or worse than anyone else.
But it’s a fact that some people are more skilled at certain things than others
due to the hours, years, and decades of practice and implementation they’ve put
into their craft. Skills are a great differentiator.
A HIP-HOP DANCER WHO MEIs
Phil Wright is a hip-hop dancer and choreographer who is skilled at creating

fun, intense, fast-paced choreographies. His wild dancing style is partly inspired
by 1990s rapper MC Hammer. Over a two-year period, I saw Phil churning out
new choreos on Instagram and YouTube faster than I could watch them.
Because he brings his high energy and personality to each class he teaches,
Phil’s students are inspired to bring their best to class too. It’s common to see
screaming, smiling kids (and adults) dancing full out in each of his videos. His
classes are often packed with dozens or hundreds of excited dancers ready to
learn his latest routine.
Phil tells his students, “It’s not just about memorizing and doing the moves.
It’s about how you make people feel when they watch you dance!” He’s a natural
anti-marketer, tapping into the body, mind, and spirit of himself and others.
Google “Phil Wright Humble,” and you’ll find his choreography to the
song “Humble” by Kendrick Lamar.19 That video has over 20 million views.
19 Tim Milgram. “Kendrick Lamar - HUMBLE. Choreography by Phil Wright.”

YouTube video. 3:23. Posted April 13, 2017.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkJX4fC0w68.
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Watching it inspired me to learn that routine back in 2017, when I was still
mostly a beginner at dancing. I hired a friend with far superior dancing skills to
learn Phil’s routine off YouTube and then teach me how to do it. (I was not yet
skilled at learning choreographies from a video, but today I am.) You can see
our rendition of “Humble” on my YouTube channel.20
Often when I see a cool dance video with a song I like, I say, “Hell yeah!
I’m going to learn that!” That’s the MEI principle in action. The choreographer
doesn’t have to manipulate me into a sale; I sell myself on learning their routine.
Skilled choreographers like Phil Wright don’t have to do any predatory mar-
keting to get me or thousands of other dancers interested in enrolling in their
classes. Because they put out so much great (free) content that MEIs, they easily
fill their classes and have waiting lists. These skilled individuals spent years and
maybe decades honing and refining their craft and sharing content online. The
ones who combine their MEI’ing efforts with paid products or services make a
lot of money doing it.
CAN YOU MEI IF YOU HAVEN’T MASTERED A SKILL YET?
If you have yet to master a skill, work on that before you do anything else. The
last thing a skill-less person needs is to be wasting time on social media trying
to promote their amateur “business.” Instead, work on refining and honing your
skills. If you need to, offer your services for free or cheap until you’ve proven
that you can create value for paying customers. Then increase your rates and
focus on delivering value.
Even if you’re using your skills imperfectly, you can still MEI people by
telling your story, teaching what you know, and making an offer. As long as
you’re learning and growing, you’ll keep moving forward.
IT ALL STARTS WITH YOU—THE REAL YOU
I cannot and will not give you a cookie-cutter formula for how to MEI people
because that’s unique to you. You need to figure that out through inspired trial
and error.
20 Michelle Lopez. “Humble (Kendrick Lamar) – Choreo by Phil Wright.” You-

Tube video. 0:45. Posted May 28, 2017, https://youtu.be/sl_-o0WAIco.
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Your material (i.e., your content) has to come from the depths of you: your
body, mind, heart, and soul.
Sometimes it takes years or even decades to hone your true voice or master
your skill set. I hope you love your business because these years of work should
be something you enjoy doing and look forward to. If you genuinely love your
work, you’ll love this process of learning, growing, and getting better.
Mine your memories, cull your life lessons (including any hard lessons),
collect everything you know, assimilate what you’ve mastered, summarize all
that you’ve overcome, studied, survived, and conquered, and write or speak
about it. Broadcast it in whatever formats you choose—wherever your perfect-
fit customers will see it. Bring your background, voice, passion, and perspectives
into your content. Keep most of your content super related to your product or
service, with occasional fun, off-topic deviations, as desired.
And no matter what, be relentless in facing the truth of who you are.
STAY HUMBLE
Like Kendrick Lamar says, “Bitch, sit down. Be humble. Holla . . . holla . . .
holla . . . holla . . . lil . . . bitch.” (Yep, I’m quoting rap lyrics.)
The wisest, smartest business owners never refer to themselves as experts
or influencers ’cause that’s hubris to the max. Instead, they’re humble and
working constantly to better themselves and improve their skills and craft. They
understand the truth: everyone has authority over their own lives, and people
are responsible for influencing themselves through self-education and a change
of heart.
When you embrace the MEI principle, there’s no need to influence others
or be an influencer. A decision is far more meaningful and empowering when
people make it on their own, out of their own free will, not because some mar-
keter advised or persuaded them to make it.
Start using the MEI principle today. Grow your business by motivating,
educating, inspiring, and selling!
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CHAPTER 3:
Stop “Getting” Customers,

Start Giving
“Give and it shall be given unto you, good measure

running over.”
— Luke 6:38
It’s ironic that I’m using a biblical quote for this chapter because for most of my
life, I rejected anything and everything to do with the Bible. Although I had a
vague sense of God, biblical language did not resonate with me (nor did eleven
years of Catholic school). For decades my mind was closed off to any wisdom
available from that particular spiritual text. My brain refused to hear it, so I
built my reality around ignoring and denying it.
And yet here I am, freely quoting the Bible without feeling squeamish. I
credit this to a gift that was given to me by a fellow business owner years ago.
As you read this story, understand that giving in the right ways will help you
grow your business—and giving in the wrong ways will stress you out.
A GIFT THAT CHANGED MY LIFE
In 2011, “Tricia,” a business owner, hosted a contest. To participate, all

people had to do was comment on one of her blog posts. I loved reading her
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articles, so I posted a comment. Soon after, Tricia told me I was a winner and
would receive a gift in the mail: a copy of the book Working with the Law by
Raymond Holliwell.
“Cool!” I thought.
It was a dense read. It took five readings and several years for the material to
sink in. Nonetheless, that book (i.e., gift) became a seed for me changing my life
and business for the better. Tricia’s gift, among other things, led me to open my
mind to truths I had previously rejected. It educated me on the basic principles
of how the universe works.
One of those principles is the law of giving and receiving. It states that in
order for you to receive, you must first give. Whatever you give (whether posi-
tive or negative) will come back to you tenfold. Some people call this “karma.”
Others see it as the “mirror principle,” i.e., whatever you are deep down is what
you’ll see reflected back in your world on a daily basis. If you’re a generous
person, life will be generous to you. If you’re an angry person, life will bring you
more experiences to be angry about.
The law of giving and receiving works everywhere, all the time, even if
the timing or specific ways it works might not be to your liking. If you want
a certain vegetable to pop out of the ground, you must first give the soil the
right seeds, tend to those seeds with water and fertilizer, and then wait for the
harvest. Vegetables won’t just show up for you to snack on without you (or
someone) giving the proper effort to grow them.
The same is true in business. Clients and customers won’t just show up and
pay you for no reason. First, you’ve got to give something to the universe that
will MEI those people to work with you.
What’s the caveat? You must give without expecting anything in return.
Give with a generous heart for the pure joy of giving, not because you hope to
get something back. That’s not real giving. That’s manipulation. That’s giving
with strings attached.
Tricia’s act of sending me a free book not only benefitted me in the long run;
it benefited her. It opened my mind, allowing me to study God from a new per-
spective. I could finally wrap my brain around God, courtesy of non-religious
yet spiritual language that made sense to me. Her gift prompted me to undergo
deep reflection, years of building my character, and changing my behavior for
the better (all of which were residual gifts).
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S top “ G etting ” C ustomers , S tart G iving
Because I studied Working with the Law, my attitude improved. I started pri-
oritizing serving clients above all else. I became a giver in my business. I started
attracting better-quality clients. My income more than doubled, my client base
increased, and I enjoyed my work more.
I also became aware of the energy I was putting out into the world and the
people around me. Was I giving them a mood swing? Inconsistency? Negative
attitudes? Or was I giving them my best effort, my passion and productivity,
my dedication, my happiest mood? I became hyper aware of everything I was
giving, when previously I had been asleep at the wheel.
Now I use the giving principle consciously and regularly, and it’s paid off in
big and small ways.
Tricia’s generous gift benefitted her business because in the years that fol-
lowed, I purchased several thousand dollars’ worth of educational training
from her. Her twenty-dollar investment in that gift netted her big profits.
Giving away Raymond Holliwell’s book was congruent with her values, her
brand, her message, and her mission. (Her business educates people about
the “universal laws” and how to put them into practice in their daily lives and
businesses.) Through giving, Tricia has grown her business to over $500,000 in
annual revenue.
If you want to serve people and improve their lives (not harm them), giving
must become a non-negotiable part of your anti-marketing endeavors. Before
I delve more into giving and how it can help you grow, let’s look at its polar
opposite: getting.
PREDATORY MARKETING IS ALL ABOUT GETTING
Entire books, courses, and seminars have been created on how to get clients
and customers. Hell, you’ve probably enrolled in a few of them, thinking you
were helping yourself by doing so. But once again, the messed-up language of
marketing rears its ugly head. Get customers?
Unscrupulous marketers aim to get you and me hooked on their products,
no matter the cost. They seek to acquire more market share, obtain new pros-
pects, and retarget or reengage inactive customers. They launch initiatives to
improve customer retention, as if you and I are just excess water bloating their
fat bellies. These sterile words turn people into objects to be acted upon.
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Predatory marketers are obsessed with getting new customers in order to

meet their insane sales quotas—not because they genuinely care about improv-
ing people’s lives but because they want to boost their revenue by 15 fucking
percent each quarter. They do it to brag, to please their shareholders, or to
maintain their status or image. Yet behind the scenes, they’re usually stressed
out, unhealthy, their personal lives falling apart because they’re not available
to nurture other areas of their imbalanced lives. Either way, they’re taking,
not giving.
Regardless of their true motive, if a marketer comes from a getting mindset,
they’re leaving destruction in their path. Subtle or overt, it doesn’t matter.
Destruction is destruction.
Like an entity plagued by discontent itself, predatory marketing isn’t sat-
isfied until it has made you discontent—by making you believe you have a
problem, for which the only possible solution is someone’s product. It won’t
stop until your bank account is drained or you’ve been put into an early grave.
Once you and I, as a collective target market, are tapped out and left for dead,
predatory marketing—like a manmade virus—goes in search of a new market.
The worst of the worst are destroying and butchering the earth with their
chemicals, their GMOs, their toxic products, and pollution. They’re killing off
the bees and putting our food supply at risk.21 If the bees go, we go. The “fruits”
of predatory marketing are making people sick or outright killing them.22 This
puts a burden on the healthcare system, the legal system, taxpayers, and even
solo business owners who keep coming across negative news about how these
psychopaths are messing up people’s lives. Pretty much everyone is burdened by
predatory marketing except the shareholders. (If you hurt one of us, you hurt
all of us.) I don’t care how many jobs these companies are creating, how many
“opportunities” their CEOs are capitalizing on, or how much “abundance”
their billions in revenue create; overall, they’re wreaking havoc on humanity,
doing more harm than good.
Predatory marketing is about taking, not giving.
21 Brittany Shoot, “Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Harms Bees, Study Finds.
Here’s Why That Matters.” Fortune, September 25, 2018,
https://fortune.com/2018/09/25/monsanto-weed-killer-bees/.
22 Carey Gillam, “I Won a Historic Lawsuit, But May Not Live to Get the Money,”
Time, Nov. 21, 2018,
https://time.com/5460793/dewayne-lee-johnson-monsanto-lawsuit/.
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Doing business with a predatory marketer (i.e., someone who takes) is like
doing business with the mob—bad for your health, bad for your limbs, and bad
for your bank account. These are the soulless, solely profit-driven companies
and sales reps who will “make you an offer you can’t refuse.” In other words,
they will fuck your shit up.
THE FORMULA FOR GETTING YOU HOOKED
There’s a formula that keeps the wheels greased on this massive revolving-door
scam where we keep blindly giving predatory marketers our money, and they
keep taking, taking, taking until we’re broke or six feet under too soon. That
formula is “problem – agitate – solve,” and I detest it from the bottom of
my heart.
Traditional copywriters and marketers have used “problem – agitate – solve”
to write persuasive sales copy and ads that make people think they need what-
ever product is being sold. The formula is designed to create discontent, so you
feel like you have no choice but to buy whatever is being pitched.
It works like this. It starts by making you think you have a problem. Then
it ramps up the language and digs deeper (twists the knife, rips your heart out,
gouges your eyes out), making you feel actual pain as you think more about
your “problem” (agitate). Finally, it positions the marketer’s product as the only
possible solution (solve). Often the product is positioned as a “no-brainer”—
i.e., “Don’t use your brain. Don’t think. Just give us your money.” But beware: if
something is touted as a no-brainer, it means your brain is being encouraged to
shut off, so you can let a marketer dictate your fate.
This sneaky formula causes unsuspecting people to reach for their wallets,
enter their credit card info, and buy into something that will be a burden on
their lives and probably on their families too. It will not improve their quality of
life, their character, their finances, their health, or anything else in the long run.
(But it will seem like a “godsend” in the short term.) Eight years later, they’ll
still be making payments on it because they keep letting marketers mess with
their minds and keep racking up dumb-ass purchases.
This formula is the textbook definition of manipulation. By using it, preda-
tory marketers con people into accepting a lower quality of life, usually under
the guise of obtaining a higher quality life!
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An example is the student loan crisis, which is fueled by predatory lenders.

They make students think they have a problem—they can’t afford to attend an
expensive college. The marketers agitate that problem by showing students bro-
chures of beautiful campus pictures, which make students experience FOMO
(fear of missing out). They solve the problem by lending hundreds of thousands
of dollars in student loans at the blink of an eye, which students will spend
twenty to thirty years or more paying off.23 This is all done in the name of
getting customers.
Now, it can be argued as to whether manipulation can be positive or neg-
ative—e.g., some marketers think they’re using positive manipulation to help
people change their lives for the better. Maybe. But if you have to manipulate
someone in any way to buy your stuff, you’re not actually inspiring them to make
the decision on their own. You’re robbing them of their individual freedom and
choice. You’re being a scammy predatory marketer, forcing your agenda upon
another living, breathing person.
FUCK THIS MARKETING FORMULA!
When I first started copywriting, I got hired as a subcontractor for other

companies whose clients needed sales copy written. My clients asked me to use
the traditional “problem – agitate – solve” formula, which I did so grudgingly
because I needed money to pay my bills. Also, I was learning the basic structure
of copywriting.
But following the formula didn’t feel right to me. It didn’t inspire me
or bring out my best. It was boring and felt contrived. I hated the formula. I
thought, “There’s gotta be a better way to inspire people to buy our amazing
product or service—where we’re not agitating them six ways to Sunday. Can’t
people be inspired by who we are naturally and the work we’re doing? Can’t
that be enough of a reason to purchase our stuff ?
So I said, “Fuck the formula.”
23 In reality, the students could have solved their own problem by applying for
scholarships, working to pay for their own tuition, and/or going to a less expensive
school, and refusing to take on any debt.
For a real solution, see Debt-Free Degree: The Step-by-Step Guide to Getting Your Kid Through
College Without Student Loans by Anthony ONeal (New York: Ramsey Press, 2019).
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The Anti-Marketing Manifesto was born out of this realization. I preferred

to follow the philosophy of giving instead of agitating: “Give, give, give. Don’t
take a dime from anyone until you’ve given them massive amounts of value—for
free!” Following this mindset changed my business for the better. Today I don’t
do any work that doesn’t inspire me or doesn’t feel right. I don’t do anything
unless it serves my clients. Period.
REFUSE TO MAKE ANYONE FEEL DISCONTENT
You know what I think? A person only has a “problem” when they realize they
have a problem. When they’re honest with themselves and can face the truth
of their situation, that’s when they can begin to change. They don’t need to be
“problem – agitated – solved” to death by predatory marketing. They’ll benefit
way more by being motivated, educated, and inspired by an anti-marketer!
The alternative is to permanently shift from a getting mindset to a giving
mindset. Just decide to be a giver. To do that, you must stop trying to make
anyone feel discontent! That’s not what life is about. So let’s throw the stupid
“problem – agitate – solve” formula out the window.
In his book, How to Have More Than Enough, Dave Ramsey writes, “The
essence of all good marketing is to create within you a feeling of discontent.
Somebody has something for sale that you need. And all the millions of dollars
spent on those slick, shiny, appealing print and pictures are aimed at con-
vincing you that you simply cannot live without the product the advertiser is
hawking. The result? Discontent.”24
Notice the words “slick,” “shiny,” and “convincing.”
Predatory marketing cashes in on us feeling like we’re trapped in a state of
discontent. In fact, creating discontent is the key strategy behind it—getting
us to think we need or want the company’s product when we really don’t. (If
we’re happy/healthy/successful already, then why the hell would we need
their product?)
Ancient wisdom teaches us to learn to be content. Think about it: one of the
wisest things you can ever do in your life is to learn how to be content, at peace
with yourself, and not let the external world dictate your fate.
24 Dave Ramsey, How to Have More Than Enough. (New York: Penguin Books,
2000), 274.
47
Learn to create your own version of heaven on earth by giving generously in

your business.
START BEING A GIVER
Giving is spiritually sound. And it’s veryyyyy good for business. All spiritual
texts (not just the Bible) mention giving as a foundation for successful living.
Giving is not just a nice (i.e., optional) thing to do; it’s the core idea by which to
live and operate your business in a healthy, sustainable manner.
Think: energetically clean giving that is appropriate and uplifting without
any shed of obligation or martyrdom attached to it.
If some aspect of your business is taking or robbing anyone in any way, then
you can afford to stop doing that yesterday!
Stop asking “How do I get clients?” and start asking “Where can I give
more?” Look for people who are actively searching for help in the areas you’re
skilled at. Make it easy for them to find you. Who is searching for the product
or service you offer? Will your offering genuinely help them? If so, put your
content, your energy, and your material in front of those perfect-fit customers.
Talk to them. Ask them what they need, and then shut up and listen. Then give
them something of value—a free sample, a free trial, your time, your energy,
anything to help them improve their life even one iota.
If your life, business, or bank account seems to be in a congested state (where
nothing is working or flowing), it’s because at some point you stopped giving,
or you’ve been in taking mode, and that’s not working for you. The second
you start giving something of value to the people around you, things will start
flowing again, and not a moment sooner.
MORE EXAMPLES OF REAL-LIFE GIVERS
My Gift of “Free Edits”

In 2012, I had access to a database of business owners who were seeking support
in growing their business. I found an old RFP (request for proposal) from Shane
Ellison, founder of The People’s Chemist. His RFP indicated he was looking to
hire support for his business.
I emailed Shane asking if he needed copywriting help. At first he said no but
wanted to know my pricing. I didn’t respond to his question for an entire year.
48
Then a year later, I followed up again. I offered Shane “free edits to any sales
page of your choice.” He accepted my offer and emailed me the URL for one
of his sales pages. I took half an hour of my time, edited half of his page for
free, and included several revised headlines he could use. He loved my work
and asked me if I would edit the entire page. “How much would you charge?”
he asked.
At that point, I finally answered his question on pricing.
The People’s Chemist became a perfect-fit client, and I’ve been writing and
editing for him ever since. The company doubled its growth two years in a row,
and continues to grow, helping people “ditch the meds.”25
Would any of this have happened if I hadn’t been focused on giving?
The Free 18-Minute Workout That Changes Lives

Fans love The People’s Chemist’s natural medicine products and strong anti-
Big-Pharma stance.
One customer, Katrina, has a remarkable story: “One night I was surfing
the web for celebrity gossip and stumbled across [Shane’s] free 18-minute exer-
cise routines. I weighed 276 pounds at the time, the heaviest I had ever been. I
clicked on it.”
Notice the word “free.”
After Katrina received this gift of exercise routines, a door opened for her
to begin changing her health for the better. She subscribed to TPC’s email list,
began studying Shane’s free blog and email articles (another form of giving),
and bought his supplements. Katrina got motivated, educated, and inspired
(MEI’d) to make positive changes to her eating and lifestyle habits. She ditched
the meds and lost over 136 pounds. Now she’s a transformed woman. Her full
story is on TPC’s blog (written in Shane’s voice).26
Multiply all this positivity by the tens of thousands of people who subscribe
to TPC’s free stuff all over the Internet (courtesy of the various funnels we’ve set
25 Side note: for years, Shane urged me to write this book—the one you’re holding
in your hands!
26 “276 Pound Woman Fights for Her Life and Gets Off Meds,” The People’s Chemist,
last visited April 3, 2020,
https://thepeopleschemist.com/276-pound-woman-fights-life-trashes-meds/.
49
up27), and you can see the massive positive effect this giving has on the world at
large. (Contrast this to the millions who are dying at the hands of Big Pharma).
None of this positivity could happen if Shane was trying to get customers.
He did it all by giving.
Later, TPC invested time and money into turning the 18-minute workout
routines into a free app that anyone can now download on their phone.28 This
gift has helped countless people burn fat and shape their physique.
The Gift of Free Luxury Soaps

At thirteen years of age, Lily Ellison (Shane’s daughter) started her own soap
company called Handmade Soap Club.29 Her soaps are beautiful, non-toxic,
chemical-free, and made with essential oils.
One year during Christmas season, Lily shipped me a free box of soaps. It
was an unexpected and delightful surprise. The scent of charcoal, honey, and
lemon essential oils came pouring out before I even opened the package. I tried
the soaps and loved them. I became a customer and continued buying more of
Lily’s soaps, as needed. I’ve also bought them as gifts for family members.
Today Lily has her own soap studio and is making soaps for Ritz-Carlton
gift shops. She continues to give in the form of writing interesting, free blog
and email articles about her life as a teenager, mixed with educational rants
about soap. Her email subscribers love reading her unique stories. Does she do
everything perfectly? No, but perfection isn’t required; having a giving spirit is
required. See Lily’s story on YouTube to learn more about her success.30
If a teenage girl can give her way into prosperity, so can you.
27 Example of a TPC funnel I helped edit: “Chemist’s #1 Supplement for Total

Prostate Health,” last visited April 6, 2020, https://thepeopleschemist.com/prostate-
health/. Disclaimer: I receive a portion of profits from all sales of this product.
28 TPC’s exercise routines are available at
https://thepeopleschemist.com/18-min-workout/. For the app version, search online or
in the app store on your phone.
29 www.handmadesoapclub.com
30 Lily Jade. “HER Story: Teen Millionaire.” YouTube video. 4:32. Posted Nov. 3,
2019. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LY6Ua5ksOU.
50
NOW IT’S YOUR TURN
Think of ways you can give to people who might be your perfect-fit customers.
How can you leverage that giving, so it’s sustainable?
For leverage purposes, you can offer gifts that are in digital format. Digital
freebies work great because you can pop the link into an email autoresponder
and send it to thousands of people automatically when they subscribe to your
list. Then they can download the file on their computer or phone.
Whether your gift is in digital or physical form, here are some ideas on what
you can give.
• A free downloadable two-page PDF with action steps, actionable info, or
nuggets of wisdom distilled into a short report
• A free sample of your product (or even a chance to win a free sample)
• A free thirty-day trial of your software
• A cheat sheet, reference list, checklist, customizable spreadsheet, recipe,
or handy guide
• A free audio MP3 or video training
• A free written interview that your ideal customers might be interested
in reading
• A free sample project in which you spend thirty to sixty minutes of
your time showcasing what you can do for an ideal client on a task that’s
relevant to their current needs
• A book recommendation or other gift that changes someone’s life
• A blog post, article, or email that motivates, educates, inspires, and sells
The possibilities are endless. Get creative.
CAUTION: THIS IS NOT ABOUT OVER-GIVING
Give only to people who are well-suited to be your perfect-fit customers. Ignore
everyone else. (Be kind in this act of ignoring. Silence is usually the best way to
be kind.)
I’m not asking you to overextend yourself, put your business in jeopardy, or
“cast your pearls before swine.” This is not about killing yourself in the process
of giving. Martyrdom is not the goal.
51
This is about giving in the right manner, in the right places, in the right
time, all of which should be unique to you. You’ll have to figure out the nuances
through trial and error and through honestly assessing your results over time.
Gauge the feedback of those whom you give to. Look at their actions. Do
they respond with enthusiasm? Do they purchase more? Do they thank you
profusely and refer others to you? If so, you’re giving correctly.
Do people attack and criticize you or complain about your gift? Do they feel
entitled to more? Do they unleash drama or resentment upon you in response
to your gift? If so, then they’re showing you they’re not your ideal customers.
Let them go and then move on. You don’t need to give them anything else.
The idea is that no matter where you go or who you interact with, you’re
always asking, “Where can I give more? How can I serve? How can I help this
person?” Your freebies should be directly related to your business offerings.
GIVE, SERVE, AND OVER-DELIVER
Five years after I started writing this book, I hired an editor to help me fine-tune
and polish it and push it over the finish line. After she completed her editorial
review, I not only felt inspired to rework my chapters from a fresh, new energy
(which was true to me), I also discovered I’d be getting thirty days of email
support from her free of charge. I was delighted by this little extra. I barely even
used those thirty days of support, but I was eager to hire her again for a final
round of edits. People who under-promise and over-deliver rock!
Find ways to surprise and delight your existing customers with add-
ons, bonuses, or extras. Toss in a free bottle of their favorite product during
Christmas (or just mail them a holiday card!). Ship them a free sample of a new
product you just launched, or give them a bonus recipe with their order.
Remember, you don’t need to take anything from your fellow human beings
in order to grow your business. Choose to become a giver, giving in ways that
make a huge difference in people’s lives even if what you’re giving seems small.
Now go forth and give!
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CHAPTER 4:
Measure the Right Things

(Spoiler Alert: It’s Your Sales)
“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not every-

thing that counts can be counted.”
— Albert Einstein
The best way to know if you’re giving effectively through your business is to
consider your most important metrics.
For most businesses, sales is the top metric to track, but anti-marketers go
deeper. It’s not just about the gross revenue; it’s also about what’s going on
behind the scenes of your business, your health, and your personal life. Your
most important metrics have to do with everything that makes your sales mean-
ingful, sustainable, healthy, and enjoyable.
Nothing is worse than a business making high revenue, yet everyone working
in it is miserable, overweight, stressed out, or neglecting their family because
they’re worshipping the almighty dollar above everything else.
Predatory marketing focuses on driving revenue at all costs. Those using it
are good at sales but suck at everything else. Going for sales above all else is like
fueling an empty shell, where nothing matters except money.
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As anti-marketers, we don’t worship money. We’re here to serve our fellow

human beings and to master our money (not be the servant of it). Money is
nothing more than a tool that we’re intended to use and manage well. And it’s
truly the best tool to help you do some serious good in the world.
SALES AREN’T EVERYTHING, BUT THEY’RE

A FREAKIN’ HIGH PRIORITY
Sales are a top metric in business because they translate directly into money in
your bank account. Without sales, you have no business. Sales are the lifeblood
of every company because without plenty of money, you can’t do everything
else that you set out to do (even if you’re just a company of one). Without suf-
ficient sales, your business chokes. You can’t afford to promote yourself, hire
the right help, or pay for services that would nudge your growth in the right
direction. Without sales your business is unable to fund your larger mission.
Then nobody knows you exist. How does that help anyone?
In this modern world, money is the primary agreed-upon means of
exchange. Money is an important resource to help us live our lives to the fullest.
As Wallace Wattles says in The Science of Getting Rich, “Whatever may be said in
praise of poverty, the fact remains that it is not possible to live a really complete
or successful life unless one is rich.”31 There’s no benefit to having insufficient
sales. All it does is create hindrances and delays while restricting your growth.
(Although, depending on what you do with them, these restrictions can also
bring out massive creativity and inventiveness.)
That said, there’s a huge difference between worshipping money and being
a servant to it and being the master over money. We don’t need to worship
money, but we do need to understand that money is important, and the more
we have, the more good we can do with it. Predatory marketing is doing enough
bad in the world with money. We need to step up and start doing more good
things with our money. We’re being called to make lots of money (i.e., lots of
profits in our business), manage it wisely, and not be stupid or limited about it.
The number one reason to be in business is to make sales—and, more impor-
tantly, profits. The number two reason (number two by only a nanosecond but
still number two) is to spread your message and your mission, build a customer/
31 Wallace Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich (Virginia: Thrifty Books, 2009), 6.
54
M easure the R ight T hings ( S poiler A lert : I t ’ s Y our S ales )
fan base, and do what you love (i.e., your passion). Without the former (sales/
profits), you cannot fund the latter (all the rest).
Many kind-hearted business owners get these mixed up. They focus on the
message, mission, fan base, and passion first while completely ignoring the
sales and profitability part. While that can be romantic (and satisfying to the
“starving artist” paradigm), it’s impractical, and it results in you going broke.
You can’t spread your message and mission effectively if you’re always distracted
by financial problems.
For this reason, sales is a top metric to track—along with any other mean-
ingful metrics that will make your selling enjoyable and healthy.
Before we explore these other metrics, let’s consider two companies that are
experiencing different levels of sales.
POP QUIZ: WHICH BUSINESS WOULD YOU RATHER HAVE?
If you could choose to have one of the following companies, which would
you choose?
1. Company A is bringing in $2 million in gross revenue.
2. Company B is bringing in $200,000 in gross revenue.
Which business is better and why? Which is the more successful one?
Without batting an eye, the predatory marketer says, “Company A, of course.”
They’re already salivating at the thought of bragging about all that revenue.
Not one to be seduced by numbers, the anti-marketer says, “Hold on
a fucking second. I don’t have enough information to answer that. What’s
going on behind the scenes of each company? What are the actual profits of
each business?”
OK . . .
Behind the scenes, Company A (making $2 million in revenue each year) is
spending so much money they’re barely breaking even. What’s left is actually a
net profit of $20,000.
The owner is spending money on frivolous things and posting evidence of
this “success” on social media (a.k.a. “successorizing”), but he’s not managing his
money wisely. He keeps overspending and getting himself into financial binds.
He borrows money just to stay afloat, and everyone working for him is stressed
out and on the brink of a nervous breakdown. The company is so overbooked,
55
they can’t even deliver on their current contracts in a quality manner. Clients
are getting pissed because their projects are falling through the cracks.
Company B (doing $200,000 a year in gross revenue) has minimal expenses,
high profit margins, zero debt, a roster full of satisfied repeat clients, and every-
one working in the company is enjoying life to the fullest.
The owner lives by the principle “All debt is bad debt.” She doesn’t care what
other people think and isn’t trying to demonstrate her earnings with flashy
purchases. (She avoids any kind of successorizing on social media altogether.)
Her business has plenty of space and breathing room to be able to deliver on
all her contracts with excellence, care, and high quality. Clients love her work
and come back for more. She turns away non-ideal clients, so she can focus 100
percent on serving perfect-fit clients only. Sure, that means less revenue, but it
also means higher profits and a better quality of life for all parties involved.
The owner of Company B is happy to have slower growth (and lower
revenue) to ensure that what she’s doing is principled, sound, sustainable, and
enjoyable. (Oh yeah, and the owner has visible abs because her business affords
her plenty of time to work out.) Family always comes first, even if the business
has to take a hit on sales.
So, which company’s growth is better? It all depends on which metrics you
consider to be most meaningful!
MEASURE THE RIGHT THINGS
Metrics are simply things to be measured, tracked, and, therefore, expanded,

grown, and multiplied. As the popular sayings go, “Whatever you focus on
grows” and “What gets measured gets done.” Both statements are true. Which
metrics are you focusing on?
In addition to sales, pay attention to metrics that will give your life and
business the most meaning, satisfaction, success, and inner peace (or whatever
your desired objectives are). Only you can decide what these are. I love tracking
things that yield me the most joy, inner peace, and ability to do what I love.
WHAT ARE THE ANTI-MARKETER’S METRICS?
As an anti-marketer, you might focus on things like:
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• Profits—not just gross revenue but how much you’re pocketing before32
or after all of your expenses
• Customer requests—tracking and paying close attention to what
customers are asking for (versus what they have no interest in)
• Repeat orders—tracking and paying close attention to what customers
are buying over and over again and the frequency at which they’re buying
(and understanding why)
• Number of perfect-fit clients who are buying from you—knowing
what makes them a perfect fit and why they’re buying from you
• Successful contract completion—tracking the number of paid projects
you complete as a contractor and monitoring what makes these proj-
ects successful
• Debt reduction (or operating debt-free)—tracking the amount of debt
you’re paying off each month (if you’re working to get out of debt)
• Sufficient cash reserves—emergency savings and “war chests” full
of cash
• Good financial management skills33—tracking the number of months
you’ve paid all your bills on time (if you previously struggled with
late payments)
• Personal achievement goals—tracking the number of days you wake up
early, the number of workouts completed each week, or the number of
“date nights” you have with your significant other
• Hobbies and passions—having the space and time to enjoy your family
or personal life (e.g., number of hours invested into specific fun activities
that have nothing to do with your business)
• Having great health—physical, mental, emotional, spiritual
32 In his brilliant book, Profit First: Transform Your Business from a Cash-Eating Mon-
ster to a Money-Making Machine, Mike Michalowicz suggests taking a small percentage of
all your revenue before you do anything else with it and allocating that to a profit savings
account. (This is different from traditional accounting methods, in which revenue minus
expenses equals profit.) By taking your profit first rather than treating it as an afterthought,
you force yourself to shave down your expenses to fit whatever’s left in your business ex-
penses (opex) account. This makes you profitable from day one when you implement the
“Profit First” system. As each quarter passes, you can bump up your percentage of profits.
33 Read The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey for help with learning how to
save money, pay off debt, and develop good money-management skills.
57
Choose metrics that matter to you personally—things that serve you and
your customers. These metrics should honor your deepest values and inspire
you to live life to the fullest. They’re like the checks and balances for your sales,
ensuring you’re not worshipping money at the expense of everything else.
WHAT IS THE IMPACT OF YOUR SALES?
Track your sales, but also be conscious what’s happening “energetically” as you
sell—throughout your business and in relation to your customers. Sales are
super important, but you must also consider how you’re selling and the impact
your sales are having on your overall lifestyle, business, and everyone around
you. Sales for the sake of sales is a hallmark of predatory marketing—where the
main objective is to sell, sell, sell until the predatory marketers put themselves
into an early grave (never mind their customers).
Personally, I want to live young, be healthy, dance as much as possible, enjoy
my writing time, and do great work that my perfect-fit clients love paying for.
In addition to sales, profitability, and the amount of debt paid off, I
also track:
• Number of days I wake up early (having been a former night owl who
previously squandered my morning hours)
• Number of hours spent learning and doing hip-hop dance choreogra-
phies (a passion of mine) each week
• Number of hours spent working on my book
These are my metrics. They’re deeply meaningful to me. They not only
inspire me to increase my sales, they also make me think about what’s most
important to me. I’m constantly improving my life by 1 percent or more each
month because these metrics drive me to do better. They drive me to increase
my quality of life, strengthen my character, build my health and stamina, and
help me feel more joy and contentment.
INTANGIBLES ARE IMPORTANT
Profitability measures the real health of any company, not just the surface-level
appearance of success. Anybody can make a ton of money, but you have to be
mature and grounded to do sustainable and healthy things while you’re making
that money. Anybody can spend their way through a pile of cash, but it takes
58
real genius to achieve bigger and bigger net profits while building up cash
reserves without debt. Profitability shows how disciplined and efficient you are,
how good you are at managing your money, how skilled you are at saying “no”
to unnecessary expenses, and a variety of other things that gross revenue can’t
indicate by itself.
Does running your business debt free serve you? Hell yeah it does. You won’t
have that yucky taste in the back of your mouth of owing money to anybody.
Does running your company debt free serve your customers? You bet. In a
recession or economic crash, your business will be in a much stronger position
if you don’t have any payments to make. Instead of being crippled by monthly
payments, you can use your profits to pay for more promotion, more support,
and more skilled people to help you. This means you can stay in business longer
and keep serving customers with great products or services! Without debt
you’ll not only survive more easily; you’ll grow and thrive. You’ll be able to fund
your present and future rather than be stuck paying for your past.
Does you spending time on your hobbies and passions serve your custom-
ers? Yes, indirectly, because it makes you a happier person. It gives you interest-
ing stories that you can share to your blog and email list. It lights you up, and
this enthusiasm spills over into your business. Having a rich personal life makes
you more relatable as a business owner.
What meaningful metrics are you inspired to track and measure in your life/
business? Whatever you measure and pay attention to religiously will increase.
This increase will show you where your priorities lie and what you value.
QUALITY OR QUANTITY?
Popular wisdom says, “The more people you serve, the more money you’ll
make.” Is this true? Is quantity all that matters? Is “making more money” the
most meaningful goal out there? Fuck no. It’s quality of life that matters above
all else for you and your customers. It’s the quality of service you provide that
matters most.
Some companies aim to touch a million lives or a billion lives. The anti-
marketer takes a humbler approach: “If I’ve truly helped just one person with
my product or service and made their life better for it, I’ve done my job.”
59
OVERSELLING AND NOT DELIVERING DOES

NOT HELP YOUR CUSTOMERS!
“Blake” is a project manager for a company that installs security systems for its
clients. Several projects had fallen behind, and he was hired to get them caught
up. He saw the shit storm that the previous manager had tolerated for months:
clients had been left hanging with no updates on their multimillion-dollar con-
tracts and no progress made on their security systems. One client left $20,000
worth of equipment sitting outside a building where it got soaked by a sprin-
kler on a hot summer day. Nobody noticed, and nobody cared. Everyone was
slammed and backlogged with projects of their own, so no one was available
to care or to take responsibility for this blunder. Vendors weren’t delivering.
Clients weren’t paying. Employees were quitting. It was a total mess.
Meanwhile, Blake’s company was busy selling even more contracts, closing
more million-dollar deals with new clients who would soon be in for a rude
awakening as their vendor failed to deliver.
Blake decided to take responsibility for a mess he hadn’t created. He picked
up the pieces one by one. He called clients individually to apologize and to
schedule things that needed to be scheduled months earlier. With an anti-
marketing mentality, he told his employer: “Stop selling more until you fix your
mess. Cut your losses on the projects you botched. Take responsibility, and
serve your existing clients. Stop saying ‘yes’ to every new project that comes in.”
Is Blake’s company (prior to him coming in) a success story? Hell no. Not if
delivering what you promise is measure of success for you, which it should be.
In this case the push for higher and higher gross revenue and sales is not making
anything better, nor is it serving the company’s existing clients.
Sometimes smaller is better. Sometimes slowing down is a healthy thing to
do. Sometimes saying “no” to new clients is the best way to serve your exist-
ing clients.
SLOW, SUSTAINABLE GROWTH VERSUS CANCEROUS GROWTH
The speed at which you grow is unique to you. Never compare your growth to
someone else’s growth. Such comparison is a recipe for discouragement. You
never know what’s going on behind the scenes in other companies unless you’ve
talked with or worked with the business owner. Someone’s “overnight success”
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could be littered with challenges from hell. Meanwhile, someone who isn’t
famous, flashy, or popular could be quietly making millions, living the life, and
you’d never know it ’cause they don’t fucking care to boast about it.
It’s common for people to work for five to ten years or longer before they
start seeing significant growth in their business. Some grow faster, others slower.
It’s a learning process filled with trial and error and character development. The
faster you learn and adapt (and get yourself to do the right things in the right
way), the faster you’ll grow. But maybe not. Maybe God has a different plan
for you. If you’re a slow learner like me, you’ll also be learning patience along
the way.
The “growth at all costs” mentality can certainly get you higher revenue
compared to having a sustainable, healthy growth mentality. But there are
costs to pursuing growth at all costs. Just look at all the fat millionaires who are
boasting about their revenue anywhere they can. Look at the “wealthy” business
owners with personal lives that are falling apart behind the scenes.
If you don’t have good health and an amazing personal life (doing what you
love, living young, and spending time with those who matter most), then what’s
the point?
Clearly, we should aim for a healthy balance.
MAKE MEANINGFUL SALES
Imagine a third business that blends the high revenue of the first company men-
tioned earlier with the sound principles of the second company. The result is a
third company: a “Pretty Fucking Awesome Business” (PFAB):
Company C (an anti-marketer), which starts out making $200,000 a year or less.
Through years of dedication, focus, and determination, they eventually reach or
exceed $2 million a year. The company achieves this with no debt, no burdensome
expenses, no selling out, high profit margins, an enjoyable family or personal life,
and zero cancerous side effects of unchecked (predatory) growth. They stay humble,
avoid “successorizing,” and focus solely on the metrics that matter.
This business is a real success story!
Obviously, there’s a huge range of scenarios above, below, and in between
these two numbers ($200K and $2 million). Where do you fit in the spectrum?
What amount of profit would fund everything you want to do in life, with
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plenty of cushion for learning, mistakes, mishaps, and emergencies? Only you
can decide what numbers light you up.
What are the meaningful metrics that would inspire you to build your own
PFAB (Pretty Fucking Awesome Business)?
GET EXCITED FOR SALES!
Mic drop. By now I’ve hammered the point home: sales are awesome when
they add to your quality of life and your customers’ quality of life! I don’t know
about you, but I love getting that little PayPal notification (“P” icon) at the top
of my phone every time I get paid. I am Pavlov’s dog, salivating at the chance to
serve. I love getting checks in the mail too, even though they’re old school. I’ll
take money in any form. And I love properly allocating my money.
If you sell products through an online shopping cart, I bet you love getting
those automated order notices sent to your inbox. Who doesn’t love it? Only a
closet socialist.
Learn to love making sales, and love the people in your life who matter even
more. Love the activities you enjoy even more.
Get excited for sales because that’s why you’re in business in the first place.
If you actually care about your product and the world around you, then you
know that every sale you make is helping the world. Your product or service
benefits every living, breathing perfect-fit customer who buys it! (If it doesn’t,
stop selling it immediately!)
Every sale you don’t make isn’t helping your perfect-fit customers, so start
serving and selling!
Track your sales, profits, and any other carefully considered metrics of your
choosing. Figure out why people buy from you, and become a master at deliver-
ing. It’s fun!
Start measuring the results of everything you do in terms of how well it serves
the customer, either directly or indirectly. Analyze each action you take (or
don’t take) in terms of how it’s helping your customer (or not). Run every single
action you take through the filter of, “Is this serving my clients?” If it’s serving
people, keep doing it. It will naturally lead to more and more ethical sales.
Become a client-centric, service-oriented maniac, and never apologize for
delivering a great product or service. Once you learn what works, repeat the hell
out of it—until you’re in heaven (or hell) buying shots for everyone!
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CHAPTER 5:
Ditch the Vanity Metrics
“I’ve seen people dressed head-to-toe in Prada that don’t

have two nickels to rub together. But I’ve seen some country
boys that could write a check to make a bank balance . . . You
can’t tell from the outside people that are living paycheck
to paycheck.”
— Chris Hogan34
In your quest to make sales, the biggest obstacle you’ll ever face is getting dis-
tracted by “shit that doesn’t matter” (STDM).
“Vanity metrics” are a rich source of STDM! These include things like:
• Social media followers
• Likes
• Clicks
• Views
• Smiley faces
• Thumbs-up
• Retweets
34 Dave Ramsey. “Retire Inspired Fall Event Video” YouTube video. 1:05. Posted
July 29, 2016. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abPEbtzQKqw.
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• Engagement or comments
• Any other nonsense that usually never translates into a sale
Marketing experts suggest we should be doing everything possible to boost
our social media following, popularity, and status, even if it means buying fake
followers or getting ourselves into endless, unproductive conversations. But
this is bullshit. That mentality trains us to rely on social media for building
our business. It conditions us to see other people’s random digital behavior as
the primary source of our success. That’s like worshipping a false god. It’s like
placing your fate in something that isn’t real or meaningful.
Your success in business comes through your willingness to work, serve your
perfect-fit customers, deliver a stellar product over and over again, and make
repeat sales. Those are the things that will grow your business and fund your
dream lifestyle.
Don’t be like the common business owner who focuses on and measures
the wrong things—vanity metrics—at the expense of their sales and profitabil-
ity. If you find yourself exclaiming, “Oh wow, we got a thousand likes on our
Instagram post. We must be headed in the right direction!” yet not one single
paying customer showed up as a result of that post, beware. You’re getting swept
up in the false allure of vanity metrics.
If you tell yourself, “Oh snap, we got a thousand views on our video, a
thousand unique eyeballs looking at our content, and a thousand clicks on our
link. We must be doing something right. Our business must be growing,” stop.
Breathe. Face reality. Come back to the evidence of real success. Did any of that
translate into sales for your business? Did you MEI people and draw in perfect-
fit customers? Usually, the answer is no. Usually, all you gained is a bunch of
voyeurs who never buy from you.
Here’s a common story to illustrate this.
THE DANCER/BUSINESS OWNER WHO LOVES ADMIRATION
“Jeremiah” is a professional dancer. He makes a living through various dance-

related activities, including teaching group classes, doing private lessons, and
performing on stage both individually and through his dance company. He
makes $60K a year but is not satisfied with his income. He wants to earn way
more money, so he can buy more extravagant costumes and wardrobe pieces. (I
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D itch the Vanity M etrics
don’t blame him. Shopping is fun.) Jeremiah is looking for ways to increase his
revenue. Only problem is, he’s focusing in the wrong places.
He’s getting high off vanity metrics.
Like many naïve business owners, Jeremiah thinks the key to growing his
business is to build his social media following and increase his fan base and
engagement above all else. He sees other dancers with millions of followers on
Instagram who appear to be more successful than he is. So he starts to associate
those surface-level metrics with success. He attempts to boost his own number
of followers, views, likes, and engagement by flushing valuable time down
the toilet.
Instead of serving paying clients, he spends most of his days replying to every
social media comment with a “thank you,” smiley face, or clever emoji. Instead
of showing up to his paid engagements on time (like he promised), he posts
selfies, “inspirational” quotes, political rants, and the occasional cat video, then
apologizes to his paying clients behind the scenes while offering them an excuse
as to why he was late or didn’t show up. He participates in low-value conversa-
tions that have nothing to do with delivering a fantastic product or service to
his paying clients. Meanwhile, Jeremiah believes a bigger social media following
will eventually (hopefully) translate into more money in his bank account.
It never does.
Jeremiah thinks he’s using social media to grow his business, but all he’s
doing is basking in the attention. None of those metrics are helping him grow
his business or making him more profitable. They’re largely a waste of time.
They’re distracting him from the real issue—that he needs to get better at fol-
lowing through with current clients.
Appearances aren’t the same as reality. “Likes” have nothing to do with
sales or profitability. Engagement is often a cover for meaningless discussions
and endless chances for Jeremiah (and his followers) to kill time, scroll, and
compare their lives to other people’s highlight reels, which aren’t even real!
Chasing vanity metrics doesn’t serve you or your perfect-fit customers.
GET REAL ABOUT WHAT YOU’RE TRACKING
If you’re busy reveling in the attention and digital activity of total strangers,
then you’re not serving paying clients or customers. You’re not available to do
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your most meaningful, profitable work because you’re plugged into the matrix
of nonsense.
We all need to face a number of sobering realities:
• Followers are not always paying customers. (Many of them are fake
accounts or bots.)
• Vanity metrics don’t lead to money in your bank account. (Tattoo that
on your arm if you have to as a reminder.)
• Likes are not sales.
• Clicks are not sales.
• Views are not sales.
• Engagement and comments are not sales.
• Only a sale is a sale.
An Instagram like won’t pay your internet bill. A retweet won’t pay your
rent. A Facebook share won’t make you successful—unless you’ve built service
into it (e.g., you included a link to your landing page, which offers potential
customers a relevant free gift and invites them to join your email list—where
you proceed to MEI them with great email content).
Without service at the forefront of every post you make, it’s all crap. If you
base your success on likes, you’re building your business on a house of cards.
Vanity metrics are the enemy of sales, and you should treat them as such.
They lure you down the rabbit hole of adrenaline due to the excitement of sud-
denly getting 100,000 views (but no sales). If you allow vanity metrics to pull
you off course, this reveals a deeper problem: you prefer attention over sales.
VANITY LEADS TO MORE VANITY
If we were to look deeper at Jeremiah, we’d see his real problem is that he hasn’t
yet graduated from vanity to service. Deep down he values getting attention
more than he values making sales and serving clients.
To his credit, he’s a performer and an artist at heart. Like many performers,
he’s meant to be seen and watched by others. But there’s a big difference between
getting paid big money to perform and being paid small money because you’re
trolling for attention.
Jeremiah’s vanity metrics are distracting him from paid work, pure and
simple. This shows up in his everyday life in the form of money-repelling
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behaviors. He ignores inquiries from potential clients. He delays in responding

to past clients who want to book his company for a show. He makes it hard
for people to pay him. He brings drama and inconsistency into his business.
He’s unclear on his pricing. He’s late to appointments. He flakes out a lot and
botches opportunities to work with higher-level people who are practically
begging him for help with dance-related services. (Dude, WTF? Trust me, your
social media following is not the problem!)
Meanwhile, Jeremiah gets swept up in praise, accolades, and approval. If his
post gets 1,000 views or comments in an hour, he’s ecstatic. He goes off the deep
end of emotional highs, as if he just won the lottery.
The reverse is also true: if people attack or criticize his post, he goes off the
deep end of negativity, defending himself and giving those conversations more
energy than necessary. He spends more time engaging with voyeurs, haters, and
bots than he does with paying clients.
Are any of these actions helping him grow his business? No. At best, they
only grow his ego.
Jeremiah needs to set his fragile narcissism aside and learn how to serve
clients better. Yes, even dancers can do this. So can any other artist, performer,
business owner, or creative person!
The solution is simple: ditch the vanity metrics. Go for sales, not approval.
Stop caring about people’s praise (or hate), and start prioritizing your perfect-
fit clients!
SERVING CLIENTS LEADS TO MORE SALES
There’s nothing lottery-like about getting tons of attention on social media. I

know this from personal experience. I’ve been Jeremiah, and I’ve seen many
“Jeremiahs” along my path—i.e., business owners who thought they wanted to
grow their sales but secretly preferred basking in the attention of others.
The real jackpot comes from delivering a stellar product or service over and
over again while profiting big. The real win is figuring out how to leverage your
skills in a way that leads to high income without running yourself ragged or
getting distracted by STDM (shit that doesn’t matter). As you focus on the
right things, your sales will grow, and you’ll be moving in the right direction.
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WHAT ARE YOU GIVING YOUR ATTENTION TO?
In the beginning stages, business is largely a game in which you figure out,
by trial and error, what are the most fruitful activities to focus on. “Fruitful”
means it leads to sales and happy, paying customers. You’re either focusing on
and doing things that make you a more vain person, or you’re focusing on and
doing things that help you serve more people. There’s no middle ground. You
can’t do both. You must choose a path. This choice is at the heart of your char-
acter development.
Vanity or service?
Followers or paying customers?
Likes or sales?
Pick one.
Fact: Certain activities lead to sales, and certain activities don’t.
Certain activities help your customers, and others don’t.
Certain activities are tied directly to making money, and others aren’t.
It’s your job to figure out which ones are which and to prioritize sales-
generating activities above everything else while honoring your other meaning-
ful metrics.
It’s way more profitable to ditch the vanity metrics and focus on sales.
HAVE A “COME TO JESUS” MOMENT
Can you get yourself to do income-generating activities before anything else? If

not, then you haven’t yet tamed your own mind.
I’m convinced this epidemic of attention squandering occurs due to a simple
lack of character development and maturity within individual business owners.
People simply need to mature to the point where they become more invested
in delivering a stellar product or service and less invested in feeding their ego.
It’s a real “come to Jesus,” soul-defining moment when you decide to dedi-
cate your business to focusing on the right things while saying, “Fuck my ego,
fuck my vanity, and fuck doing anything that doesn’t serve humanity and ramp
up my sales.”
Are you ready to make that commitment, or are you OK with squandering
your life on vanity metrics?
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DO THINGS IN THE RIGHT ORDER
Which comes first, the sale or the paying customer?

Technically, you don’t have a customer (or a true fan base) until you make a
sale. It’s only after someone buys from you that he or she officially becomes your
paying customer.
It’s only after you’ve delivered a quality product or service to them that they
can love what you delivered and purchase more later.
It’s only after they’ve paid you money and a transaction has taken place that
you officially have a business, a paying client, a database of one.
It’s only after you’ve multiplied your customer base, perfected your delivery,
and improved your quality of life, that your business has truly grown.
Many business owners have it backwards: they try to build a fan base first
without making any sales. This is pointless because your business doesn’t grow
until after a sale has been made. Once you’ve accepted payment from another
human being, now the real work begins—the work of delivering what you
promised. You’ll grow as a person in this act of delivering. The post-sale period
is when the most valuable learning and growth takes place. You’ll learn quickly
how effective you are at helping the customer by gauging their feedback. Are
they excited to buy more? Do they love your product, or do they think it sucks?
Are they ideal customers for you, or do you need to let them go?
You don’t learn a damn thing from having millions of voyeurs on social media
who never buy from you. You learn by having 10 clients, 100 clients, or 1,000
customers who are paying you actual money in exchange for your product. Not
bartering, trading, or giving empty praise but paying you cold, hard cash.
DO YOU KNOW WHY PEOPLE BUY FROM YOU?
Let’s dig deeper. Why do clients buy from you? Why do customers give you
money and tell their loved ones about you? Do you really know the answer deep
in your bones, or are you winging it, uncertain?
Many business owners don’t fully understand why their top fans are buying
from them. They attribute it to something that has nothing to do with the
real reason: “They’re buying from me because they like me.” “They’re buying
from me because I gave them a coupon.” “They’re buying from me because
I’m special/pretty/amazing.”
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All false.
The real reason why people buy from you is because you’re serving them in
some way while bringing your true personality into it. They have a need that
you’re fulfilling. They want something that you can help them reach. You’re
providing some kind of tangible benefit or outcome they’re seeking, which
they’re unable (or unwilling) to do or achieve on their own.
If Jeremiah the dancer abandoned his self-absorbed behaviors and worked
to develop his character, he would see a radical transformation in his business.
He could practice showing up on time to all of his paid engagements and not
making excuses for his mistakes. He could shift his focus away from vanity
metrics and toward serving people.
People love buying from those who are reliable, consistent, and who keep
their word. They love buying from businesses that deliver positive, tangible,
measurable results.
Knowing why people buy from you, knowing what they want, knowing what
they need, and being able to deliver those things are all precursors to making
future sales. All of this requires a humble, service-oriented attitude.
To get meaningful answers, you must be willing to listen—not to the words
or emojis of people but to their actions. What are customers showing you they
value? What are they paying you money for? What do they keep buying and
why? These are metrics worth tracking.
WHO CAUSES SALES TO OCCUR IN YOUR BUSINESS?
Initially, I asked myself: “What causes sales to occur in my business?” But this
was the wrong way to frame the question. That wording presupposes that the
answer has to do with an inanimate thing, hence the word “what” being in
the question.
Then I flipped it to “who”—who causes sales to occur in my business?
Why do my best clients buy from me? At that point it became a client-
centric question.
The answer to this question is twofold: you cause sales to show up by MEI’ing
people, making an offer, asking for a sale, and over-delivering to those who buy.
Your customers also cause the sale to happen because they’re saying “yes” to your
offer. You co-create the sale. Your customer is open to being served by you, and
you’re open to serving them. It’s reciprocal, a two-way meaningful transaction.
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Predatory marketing is so full of ego that those using it think they alone
are causing their sales to happen. In truth, their customers’ willful ignorance
and naïveté are also allowing predatory sales to occur. That’s why predatory
businesses get such a massive ego boost from pursuing revenue at all costs. To
them, you (the customer) practically don’t exist. All that exists to them are your
money and their ego.
As an anti-marketer, focus on the “who”—the people whom you’re serving.
Living, breathing, flesh-and-blood human beings are ultimately the ones who
buy your stuff and pay you for it. Rocks don’t buy from you. Plants don’t buy
from you. People buy from you—with all their quirks, personalities, ener-
gies, and motives. They’re the ones paying you money. That’s pretty cool.
A huge amount of gratitude, excitement, and humility should accompany
this realization.
It’s less a question of what causes sales and more a question of why do people
buy from you? Bam. If you can answer that question honestly, you’ve found the
keys to the kingdom.
ANALYZE YOUR TOP-SELLING PRODUCTS

FROM A CLIENT-CENTERED PERSPECTIVE
If you want to study meaningful data, start tallying up your sales and figure out
why people are buying from you. Finding the answers requires that you focus on
your customers’ needs and wants.
First, look at the raw numbers:
1. What are your best-selling products?
2. How much of each product are customers buying per day? Per week?
Per month? Per quarter? Per year?
3. What are your net profits?
4. When are people buying?
5. Are they buying more or less over time, or does their behavior
stay steady?
6. How does each product or service compare to the other products or
services you sell in terms of profitability?
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Once you have the raw numbers, the next step is to figure out why people are
buying these particular products from you.
1. Why do customers buy this product more than your other stuff ?
2. What are your top clients asking you to help them with?
3. What have people shown you that they want?
4. How can you better serve your clients?
5. How are your sales linked to actions you’re taking (or not taking)?
6. What inspires your clients to buy from you personally?
7. What do your repeat customers keep coming back for? What do they
love and why?
8. What would make it easier for people to buy from you?
9. Which of your products are people most enthusiastic about and least
enthusiastic about? Why?
10. Which products do new customers prefer buying from you first?
11. Should you create a new product because people keep requesting it—
no, begging for it—or should you ignore this valuable feedback and go
troll for likes on Instagram instead?
12. Why are potential perfect-fit customers not buying from you? (Is it
something you’re doing or not doing before, during, or after the initial
sales conversation?)
Answering these questions will help you serve people better.
You can also take it a step further and look at bigger-picture themes in
your business:
13. Which of your free reports (as part of your funnels) are new subscrib-
ers resonating most strongly with, as indicated by their quick initial
purchase after they enter your funnel?
14. Which of your blog posts and emails are customers (not voyeurs)
sharing the most?
15. Who outside of your business is talking about your product or email-
ing their list about it in a way that’s inspiring people to buy it? Does it
make sense to reach out to that person for an interview?
Be childlike only in your curiosity for understanding what your clients want,
and be professional AF in delivering it to them. Ask, “Why? Why? Why?” and
see everything with fresh eyes while listening to actions, not words.
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By comparing and contrasting your best-selling products to your lower-

selling products, you will see patterns emerge. You’ll start to see what’s most
important to people. Then you can tailor your offerings around these insights.
As an example in the dance world, beginning dancers are constantly asking
top choreographers to do tutorials on their choreographies and to break down
specific movements that may be hard to execute. Most advanced choreogra-
phers don’t have the time or patience to explain such “basic” things (basic in
their mind), nor do they want to go through the effort of creating tutorials.
Imagine the huge opportunity of humbly serving the underserved market of
beginner and intermediate dancers who aim to become more advanced.
EXAMPLE SALES METRICS FOR A HEALTH

SUPPLEMENT COMPANY
Here’s an example analysis you might use if you were a company selling health
supplements. You could glean useful insights from studying your own sales
numbers and your customers’ corresponding needs and requests.
“A” (our cardiovascular supplement) is our best-selling product for no
reason other than we promote it the most. (At least we think that’s why it’s our
top seller.) We mention it the most in our email newsletter, and we advertise
it the most on Google. Or maybe it’s our best-selling product because most of
our customers have heart problems, and they’re done screwing around with the
negative side effects caused by their heart meds. Maybe we should ask them via
a survey why they buy this product so much.
“B” (our fat-loss bundle) is our lowest-selling product in terms of quantity.
But it brings in the highest profits because it’s our highest-priced item with the
highest profit margins. It creates more cash flow per transaction, with fewer
sales. Only people who are motivated to lose weight buy this product.
“C” (our prostate supplement) is our middle-selling product because only
men can use it. Women can’t use it, so that excludes about half of our customer
base. But wait—maybe we can encourage women to “get their hubby to take it.”
Women are always telling us they’re tired of their man waking up in the middle
of the night to use the bathroom, and they’re scared of the idea of having their
hubby getting surgery to fix the problem. This product offers a safe alternative.
“D” (our immunity-boosting supplement) is a low-selling product because
people only need to use it in certain circumstances or in rare cases (when they
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get sick or before they’re about to get sick). We don’t need to artificially ramp
up sales of this product because we want people to be healthy more than
they’re sick.
“E” (our protein powder) is our worst-selling product because we don’t
focus our business on reaching athletes who would use it often. We market
to everyday people: busy moms and dads with families. We offer our protein
powder as a courtesy to our top fans (who happen to be athletic), and they love
it, so we’ll keep offering it. (We love it and use it ourselves too!)
“F” (our detox product) is another low-selling product. Although fans love
it, they don’t need to order a ton of it because one bottle lasts a long time. They
don’t need to use very much of it for it to have a positive effect on their health.
We don’t need to bombard our existing customer base about this product, but
we can do a big promotion to reach new customers who may be interested in
this product.
See how tracking your sales can generate useful, actionable insights that will
grow your business and allow you to figure out better ways to serve your custom-
ers? Focusing on such client-centric questions will keep you on the right track.
BE A DETECTIVE FOR WHAT YOUR CLIENTS NEED
Be an FBI agent for your own soul. Arrest and detain anything that gets in the
way of you serving your clients. Go “Jack Bauer” on anything that blocks your
ability to serve and deliver! In other words, understand what serves your cus-
tomers to the nth degree. This understanding impacts your ability to sell. This
may require taking an honest look at yourself and your motives and behaviors.
Did you have an emotional breakdown this quarter that indirectly caused
your sales to decline because you subconsciously leaked that negative energy
into your business? Did you fail to respond to a potential customer’s inquiry
for four days, and they got tired of waiting and found someone else to hire? (Or
they changed their mind about wanting your service, but they would have gone
through with it if you had responded sooner?) Did you drink an entire bottle
of wine the day before you were scheduled to talk with a potential client on the
phone, then botched the opportunity because you were hungover and not fully
present on the call? (I’m asking for a friend.)
Were you in “info-consumption mode” too much this month, which took
away from your ability to turn over paid projects faster? Did you argue a lot with
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your spouse or partner, which dampened your energy, weakened your attitude,
and made you snap at potential customers? Did you take someone’s feedback
(whether or positive or negative) too personally, causing you to overreact?
How available are you to serve your customers? Are you scattered, distracted
AF, and essentially unavailable? Or are you in a clean mental space where you
can serve people easily because you have the bandwidth and capacity to do so?
What, if anything, is impeding your ability to serve people? Your daily actions
and behaviors impact your success way more than vanity metrics ever could.
Let’s run through a few scenarios to see if you’ve got this.

Say it’s 7:30 a.m., and you’ve just woken up from a refreshing sleep. What’s
the first thing you do after setting your agenda for the day?
A. Check social media and look at your vanity metrics
B. Do meaningful work, fulfill existing orders, complete paid projects,
and/or write an email or blog article that motivates, educates, inspires (MEIs)
and sells?
Answer: B.
Let’s say you’ve just posted a controversial blog article. Ninety percent of
your readers (many of whom are paying customers) comment: “Spot on. Love
this!” The other 10 percent (who’ve never bought a thing from you) reply with,
“This is terrible. You’re crazy. I’m unsubscribing.” Do you . . .
A) Get into a heated debate with the 10 percent of haters about why they’re
wrong and let this ruin your day?
B) Delete and block the haters and keep writing more similar content for
your top fans?
Answer: B.
Say a magic genie shows up at your doorstep and offers you one of the fol-
lowing outcomes. Which one would you choose?
A) Having 1,000,000 views on your recent YouTube video (which wasn’t
specifically made for perfect-fit customers), and it yields maybe $200 worth of
sales and tons of attention.
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B) Creating a well-made video that resonates with your perfect-fit custom-

ers. It gets you 1,000 views but also lands you 10 sales, netting you $50,000.
Answer: B.
Say a celebrity “likes” one of your social media posts out of nowhere. Do you:
A) Get a rush of adrenaline and spend your entire day feeling “high,” reeling
from the excitement of someone famous noticing you
B) Say “Cool!” and then immediately get back to the work of serving
paying customers
Answer: B.
Which scenario sounds more appealing to you:

A) Getting 1,500 likes on an Instagram post that took 30 seconds to create
and didn’t result in any sales
B) Writing a well thought-out blog post (or book or email newsletter) that
you’re proud of, and two months later, a reader says, “I loved your blog post and
would like to hire you for XYZ. How can I pay?”
Answer: B.
In a twelve-hour day, do you . . .

A) Constantly check your social media accounts to see if anyone’s responded
(and feel disappointed when they don’t)?
B) Focus on meaningful work to such a degree that time flies by, and you get
a lot done in one day?
Answer: B.
If you answered “A” on any of these questions, then somewhere your pri-
orities are backwards. You’re chasing after vanity metrics while neglecting your
sales. Stop it.
If you answered “B” on any of these, you’re definitely on track to becoming
an anti-marketer who’s focused on the right things—or you’re already a success-
ful anti-marketer kicking ass at your business!
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UNDERSTAND THE TRUE “CAUSE AND EFFECT”

OF GROWING YOUR BUSINESS
When you ignore vanity metrics and pour everything you’ve got into serving
your clients’ needs and wants, that’s when everything will start to change for
the better.
As you gain maturity and discipline by working in (and on) your business,
you start to develop a rock-solid character. You become more skilled at discern-
ing wheat from chaff, realness from bullshit, profit from distraction. You get
better at prioritizing sales-generating, income-generating, profit-generating
activities above all else. Meanwhile, you get good at ignoring fruitless “projects”
that go nowhere. You learn to measure, track, and pay attention only to things
that lead to sales—things that truly serve your perfect-fit customers.
Vain people have no idea why people buy from them. Or they attribute the
wrong things to any success they have. Because of this, their success could go
away in a heartbeat, and they’d have no clue how to get it back. They live in con-
stant turmoil, afraid of losing everything. That’s because they don’t understand
the true cause and effect of why people buy from them. They can’t be bothered
to listen to their customers.
By now you should understand the real cause of success—serving your PFCs,
making sales consistently, and not giving a fuck what happens on social media.
Now go and make some sales!
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CHAPTER 6:
Share Insight Often
“A person who won’t read has no advantage over one who

can’t read.”
— Mark Twain
As an anti-marketer, a great way for you to make sales is to write or produce

content that motivates, educates, and inspires (MEIs). If you think the main
purpose of content is to sell, you’re wrong. Wrong by a hair but still wrong.
The purpose of creating content is to MEI people. When you MEI people
consistently, you give them insight that helps them. Selling follows naturally.
This is true no matter what form of content you’re creating (emails, blog articles,
sales pages, YouTube videos, podcasts, or even social media). The goal is always
to MEI first.
If you create content solely for the purpose of selling, then by definition
you’re a spammer and a predatory marketer.
Content that’s written purely to sell usually has no insight. There’s no story,
no substance, no educational material, no “aha” moments, no life-changing
concepts or ideas, and therefore, no reason for people to get excited about it or
remember it.
Think of a typical annoying email you’ve probably seen a lot of—where the
entire message is a sales pitch. This happens when a company tries to sell you
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something without first MEI’ing you. Super uncreative and generic, the text
goes something like this: “We provide XYZ solutions. For a limited time, you
can sign up for 20% off ! Act now!” That’s literally all the content included.
There’s nothing else in the email. The sender might use 100 words or 500 words,
but that’s the totality of their message: “Buy our product now.”
Such emails are spammy, forgettable, and ineffective. They’re a dime a dozen
and a total waste of space in people’s inbox. Anyone, even a software program,
could write them because no thought or creativity are required. There’s no per-
sonalization or voice in the writing. Because the business owner doesn’t bother
sharing their unique perspectives, life experiences, or stories, the email isn’t fun
or interesting to read. That never even occurs to the sender, so they default to
using passionless verbiage.
Bummer. Total waste. Don’t do that.
These kinds of “wasted space emails” don’t help your readers, and they don’t
grow your business!
If you rely on spamming as your primary content strategy (i.e., 95 percent
of the time you’re broadcasting “insight-less” content to people), then you’re
putting your business in a dangerous position. You’ll struggle to make sales
unless you’re already a massive business relying on your sheer size and power
where even a 1 percent conversion rate is profitable. That’s why the goal is to
share insight in every piece of content you create.
SHARE INSIGHT IN EVERY EMAIL
I love email, so I’ll be focusing largely on emailing your list for the rest of this
chapter. But this principle applies to any kind of content you create.
Share insight in every email.
Adopt the motto that every email you send will MEI people, and therefore,
add value to their lives regardless of whether you sell.
Always follow the MEI principle in your emails—motivate, educate, and
inspire. Remember, you need all three in order for someone to sell themselves
on your product while not feeling sold to.
When you MEI people through your emails, they walk away with new
insight and understanding about something. They gain a new perspective that
could “change everything.” They’ll forever remember you as the positive catalyst
that helped them. They’ll credit you for improving their life even though they
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S hare I nsight O ften
were the ones who took the action to change their own life. By doing this over
and over again, you’ll create a solid, memorable brand.
Emails with insight are meaningful. They have substance and depth. They’re
not typical or cliché; they’re damn good. I call them “valuable AF emails.”
They motivate, educate, and inspire. They get forwarded, shared, bookmarked,
printed, studied, remembered, and revisited. And yes, they also sell.
As anti-marketers, we don’t write to sell. We write to MEI. And when we
MEI, the sales follow. Big difference.
THE IDEAL RATIO FOR INSIGHT
Your content should consist of 95 percent MEI’ing and insight and 5 percent
call to action (CTA). This is the gold standard for writing emails that rock.
(This also applies to sales pages, videos, ads, blog articles, and other sales
content.) This ensures that you’re not talking at people or trying to sell them
before MEI’ing them.
Occasionally, you can deviate from this ratio—for example, if you’re running
a time-sensitive sale. But if you deviate most of the time, people will start asso-
ciating your brand with spam. You’ll train them to roll their eyes every time you
send an email or broadcast content.
CHOOSE AND COMMIT TO YOUR CORE TOPICS
“What should I write about?” you ask.

The answer revolves around your company’s core topics. No matter what
your business is, there’s plenty of insightful content you can create (unless you’re
a predatory marketer who has nothing real to say). Your business is here to teach
others about a handful of core topics in a specific way using your unique per-
sonality. Your core topics are the five to seven (or less or slightly more) recurring
themes, concepts, ideas, principles, or subjects that you’ll be MEI’ing people
about for years or decades to come.
The idea is to go deep, not wide.
You must be willing to go deep into your core topics and focus on them over
time—to the exclusion of almost everything else. This extreme level of focus
creates a distinct, solid brand and it makes you memorable and successful.
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You’ll be writing and speaking about your core topics over and over again
in various ways, in different formats, and using different creative approaches, so
they had better be things that truly interest you and matter to you. You should
love your core topics and never get bored of studying them or writing about
them. If something lights you up consistently over time, it’s probably one of
your core topics. If your perfect-fit customers also share an interest in it, it’s
definitely a core topic and something you can MEI them on regularly.
To determine what your core topics are, ask yourself:
• What have you gained deep mastery and knowledge on?
• What skills have you mastered?
• What is your product or service?
• What “work” are you most enthusiastic about doing?
• What are you passionate about?
• What insights can you share?
• What subjects do you understand deeply?
• What have you devoted your life to studying, doing, or perfecting?
• What benefits do you offer to people?
Your core topics should relate to the products or services you offer and/or
the benefits you deliver, and they should tie into your background, life experi-
ences, and so on.
The intersection between your passion and skill sets and what your perfect-
fit customers want is the sweet spot. When your PFCs are willing to pay you
well for something, you’ve officially found a profitable business model. The next
step is to ramp up your profits by writing emails that MEI and give insight on
your core topics.
EXAMPLE: CORE TOPICS FOR A CYBERSECURITY CONSULTANT
Imagine you’re a cybersecurity consultant. Ever since you were nine, you were
intrigued by computers and hacking, and you were a little bothered by how easy
it is to steal someone’s password.
You got your bachelor’s degree in information technology. Now you’re
building a business helping companies protect and secure their data. It pisses
you off when hackers steal other people’s data. “Respect people’s privacy! Get a
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new career!” you think to yourself every time you hear about a data breach. In a
way, this becomes your motto, on behalf of your clients.
You build an email list full of prospective clients and paying clients. You
write short emails about different aspects of cybersecurity that you specialize in
as well as big picture topics that your clients might be interested in. You decide
your core topics are: 1) protecting your data, 2) disaster planning and recovery,
3) cloud services, and 4) network security. You stick to these essentials.
You understand that most people don’t fully understand cybersecurity. It’s
like a foreign language to them. So you work to ensure your writing is simple,
easy to read, and even a bit entertaining. You make sure your emails relate to
your clients’ daily business operations.
Every two weeks you broadcast a short email that MEIs (motivates, edu-
cates, and inspires). You also include a call to action at the end, offering readers
a security assessment of their business for a nominal fee. You use the 95:5 ratio
to ensure that each of your emails contains 95 percent insight, and 5 percent call
to action.
If you have a sense of humor, you might weave that into your writing and find
ways to make technical, dry subjects more interesting or fun to read. To person-
alize your emails, you share occasional stories about your dog, “Meatball,” your
ten-year-old daughter, Sam, and your wife, Billie-Jean (who was named after
a Michael Jackson song). You somehow find a way to tie each personal story
back to one of your core topics. This differentiates you from the thousands of
other cybersecurity specialists who are hiding behind their service, not MEI’ing
anyone. They don’t have an email list, they hate writing, and they assume no one
would be interested in their life or insights anyway.
WHAT ARE YOU KNOWN FOR?
When people think about your business, what would they summarize you as?
Whatever it is, that’s a clue on what your brand and your core topics are about.
An organic chocolate company.
A book editor.
A hip-hop choreographer.
A non-toxic cleaning company.
When they think about you, what interesting details would they add to
these bare-bones summaries?
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“An organic chocolate company founded by a French woman with a gourmet

sense of taste.”
“A book editor from Colorado who is a genius at bringing out your real
voice that you’re excited about.”
“An LA-based hip-hop choreographer who has character, keeps his word,
and fills his classes like you wouldn’t believe.”
“A non-toxic cleaning company founded by a woman who loves traveling
the world and is gung ho about hiring employees who are fluent English speak-
ers. She also hires people who are OCD about being on time, if not early, to
all appointments.”
You can see how these topics would perk up the ears of ideal customers.
The personal details about you (the business owner), your perspectives, and
your personality are what make your content extra-interesting and unique. The
consistency with which you write, share insight, and MEI your list is what will
help you carve out a strong brand over the long run. People will begin to associ-
ate you with specific, recurring, beneficial content that they can count on.
IF IT DOESN’T MEI YOU FIRST, IT WON’T MEI OTHERS
Here’s an example of how I found my core topics in my own business.

When I was first started emailing my list in 2011, I wrote about things I
thought a copywriter “should” write about—the art of copywriting, marketing,
sales pages, etc. But deep down, I didn’t care about those topics. I had zero inter-
est in teaching copywriting and was bored with it. (I liked writing but didn’t
like writing about copywriting.) Plenty of people had already done that, and I
couldn’t stomach reading their stuff. So my early emails mostly flopped.
But I was fascinated with all things related to story and how story inspires
people. I was curious about people’s backgrounds, the details of their personal
lives, their triumphs and tribulations, and what made them uniquely them. I
could get lost for hours, digging deep into the essence of interesting people. At
first, it was bums and criminals. Once I knew better, I began studying successful
people with character.
I shifted from being a fiction writer (in adolescence and college) to writing
creative nonfiction. That allowed me to write true stories, to the benefit of my
readers. Landing my first large client in 2008, I entered the world of business,
where I discovered I could make big money doing something I love while
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helping others. I found ways to use my creative writing skills so they were
applicable to business owners. I could write fun, meaningful articles for clients
who were in business, whose goal was to positively impact people’s lives while
increasing their sales. Bam! I’d found my sweet spot.
Through trial and error and years of experimenting, I discovered my core
topics. To stay focused, I now revolve all of my content around these subjects:
• Anti-marketing
• MEI’ing (motivating, educating, inspiring), and selling
• Being your true self in business
• Writing and speaking as your true self
• Drawing upon your unique background, personality, life experiences,
memories, and skill sets as assets in your writing
• Sticking to your values and never being a sellout
• Fraud in marketing/advertising
• Predatory marketing and the fucked-up shit it causes
Ahhh . . . these are my core topics.
I oriented my brand and business around them, and that’s when things took
off. Anything that substantially deviates from my core topics is not something I
need to write about or email my list about regularly.
KEEPING YOUR CONTENT FRESH
Depending on your business, you’ll probably write or speak about the same
topics over and over again, but you’ll want to do it in a way that’s fresh every
time. (This is so contrary to predatory marketing, which is based on commu-
nicating with repetitive scripts and canned sound bites.) How do you create
content about the same topics over and over again without boring yourself or
other people?
When you’ve found your true tropics, you won’t ever get bored. You’ll love
your life, love your topics, and be open to look for different angles, approaches,
and new ways of saying the same thing. Yes, all of this requires creativity, experi-
mentation, and commitment to your core topics.
When you motivate, educate, and inspire people with your content, your
material never gets old. It’s fresh and exciting every time. People start to look
forward to it. You can educate your audience about the same things over and
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over again, rotating specific topics as needed, by keeping the MEI principle at
the center of everything you do.
SMART WAYS TO MEI AND SHARE INSIGHT
In fourteen years of writing and editing for various clients, I’ve found that
five types of content seem to MEI people the most while bringing in the most
profits. These are: 1) customer spotlights, 2) contrast emails, 3) written inter-
views, 4) personal stories, and 5) rants. You can use any or all of these to create
a healthy 95:5 insight-to-CTA ratio in your content. I recommend using these
for email articles; they can also be adapted for audio or video content.
Customer Spotlights
A customer spotlight is a short article in which you feature a remarkable before-
and-after story or successful “hero’s journey” of one of your top customers
or fans.
When someone sends you unsolicited positive feedback, gushing over your
product, that’s a person whom you can write a spotlight on. Don’t just sit there
scratching your head—use their story! Ask them if you can feature their testi-
monial in your newsletter. Most people would be thrilled to agree.
In most cases, you’ll need to flesh out their spotlight by asking them clarify-
ing questions. Weave your commentary throughout the text. (Note: copying
and pasting their bare-bones testimonial word-for-word won’t have the same
effect because it doesn’t have your commentary weaved in. It also won’t be struc-
tured as a full story.)
To personalize each spotlight, ask the customer for a pic. Even a selfie will
do. Some people prefer to remain anonymous or to use only their first name
or initial, which is OK. Send a thank-you package with some free products or
other goodies to everyone who says yes.
Over the years, I’ve edited hundreds of customer spotlights. One of my
clients made seven-digit profits off a single spotlight that he broadcasted to
his email list. Spotlights are one of the most powerful ways to MEI people, if
you use them consistently over time. Who doesn’t love reading an inspiring
success story?
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You can also use spotlights in video or audio. On his radio show35 Dave
Ramsey has a “debt-free scream” segment that follows the spotlight structure.
People who used his financial principles got themselves out of debt and come
onto his show to share their story. At the end they scream, “We’re debt free!”
These real-life success stories provide massive motivation and inspiration for
anyone listening who is also on the journey to becoming debt free.
Contrast Emails
The news is usually full of shit, but when you find a current events piece that
relates directly to your business, product, or industry, use it!
Enter the “contrast email.” This is where you take a BS idea that’s being
spread by predatory marketing in your industry and contrast it with a better/
smarter/saner/wiser healthier idea that your business promotes.
I learned about the contrast principle at a young age. While reading
Highlights for Children magazine, I always jumped straight to the “Goofus and
Gallant” comic strip. One boy (Goofus) was always doing bad things, getting
into trouble, and hurting others. His brother (Gallant) was always doing good
things that led to positive results. “Bad shit versus good shit.” As a kid I learned
a lot by studying the differences between those two. “Why are they so differ-
ent?” I wondered. That comic strip launched in 1940, and it’s been so effective
at educating kids that it still runs today!36
The contrast principle is a great tool for teaching people about your core
topics. To apply it to your business, look for polarizing areas or extreme differ-
ences in thinking and acting:
• What pisses you off about your industry?
• What do you vehemently disagree with?
• What lies are being spread by predatory marketing in your industry?
• What current events or news articles that relate to your business,
product, or service do you feel driven to comment on?
35 Dave Ramsey. “Top 10 – Debt Free Screams on The Dave Ramsey Show.” You-
Tube video. 1:25:57. Posted March 29, 2017.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_8ebac0ZWc.
36 “Inside Highlights® January 2018. What’s Up with Goofus and Gallant®,” High-
lights, December 14, 2017, https://www.highlights.com/parents/articles/inside-high-
lights-january-2018-goofus-and-gallant.
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• What common problems have your customers faced as a result of follow-

ing bad advice from predatory marketing?
Use all of this as fodder for your contrast emails. Don’t merely report on
the news; put your spin on it. Add your perspectives and opinions to your con-
trast article.
Written Interviews
Written interviews are an underutilized yet excellent form of content that MEIs.
The idea is to interview people who sell products or services that are comple-
mentary to your business or professionals who have real-life skills, knowledge,
or experience on a certain topic that your customers might be interested in
learning about. I’m not talking about cheesy joint ventures or paid affiliates.
I’m talking about people you’re genuinely interested in whom you would gladly
promote and write about for free, as a service to your readers.
Ask insightful questions to draw out the interviewee’s background, skills,
personality, and viewpoints. Cut out anything that overcomplicates the story or
which wouldn’t be relevant to your readers. Everything needs to relate to your
business and/or your customers. (Don’t interview a random person who has
nothing to do with what your PFCs want or need.)
In 2015, I interviewed Joe Dobrow, former head of marketing at Whole
Foods.37 I wanted to know his take on the company’s present-day and past
marketing (or lack thereof ), so I followed my curiosity to a positive end. The
written interview was a huge hit for my brand. Readers loved it and found it
valuable because it dug deep into a topic we’re all interested in: promoting our
businesses in ways that are effective (versus ineffective).
When structured well, interviews MEI and even sell. They’re unique and
cannot be duplicated by anyone else.
37 Michelle Lopez, “Interview with Former Whole Foods Head of Marketing:

The ‘Winning Formula’ for Marketing Organic Products,” AntiMarketingManifesto.com,
last visited April 6, 2020,
http://www.antimarketingmanifesto.com/whole-foods-marketing-interview/.
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Personal Stories
Sharing brief stories from your life and tying them back to one of your core
topics is a great way to MEI people. Not only are stories interesting to read, they
give your readers a glimpse into your everyday life, making them feel more con-
nected to you as a real person. People love the personal details! It helps them
relate to you on a human level. (As opposed to predatory marketers who are
secretive about their lives and unwilling to share any details, thus making it hard
to relate to them.)
Dare to share. Write about your spouse, your kids, your pets, a professional
encounter that amazed you, a sport you enjoy, a lesson learned, your travels,
meaningful moments, anniversaries, birthdays, challenges overcome, argu-
ments you had with your kids, or anything you want. I promise, your life is full
of interesting stories. Everyone’s life is different, so this content will look vastly
different for each business owner.
Note: Use a pic or a selfie occasionally to personalize your stories.
Rants
Rants make for good email openers. They can be funny, controversial, or pro-
vocative, and they trigger or challenge people to think in a new way. A rant
makes for an engaging lead-in to an otherwise dry or technical topic.
Rants are the place to get emotional, pissed off, and/or frustrated for a posi-
tive purpose. Scream, yell, type in all caps, swear, or pseudo-swear even, but do
it all for a positive outcome: to MEI your readers.
My rule for rants is never be a victim of whatever you’re ranting about.
Whether your rant is for or against something, always offer a solution, or else
don’t bother ranting about it. A positive rant should motivate, educate, and
inspire people to improve some aspect of their life. It should fire people up and
give them hope and a clear path forward, not make them pity you.
Dave Ramsey has some great rants on YouTube. Search for “Dave Ramsey
rant,” and you’ll find hilarious, passion-filled clips about credit cards, car pay-
ments, debt, and more. (Watch his video “Think America!”38 and note the
totally unapologetic infusion of his personality, emotion, and passion.)
38 Dave Ramsey. “THINK America! – Dave Ramsey Rant.” YouTube video. 7:05.
Posted Oct. 26, 2016. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1usdOW4RyI.
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SHARE INSIGHT OFTEN!
Start mining your daily life, your memories, all of it, and pour it into your
content! Always tie it back to one of your core topics.
Why is it important to do this? Because it creates the essential human con-
nection that is so lacking and yet so needed in the world of business today. It
also distinguishes you from a spammer and a predatory marketer and solidi-
fies your brand in ways that spammy, insight-less content can’t. MEI’ing is a
form of giving that pays dividends due to the priceless insight you’re providing
to people.
BE WILLING TO EXPERIMENT
There are a million ways to create content and countless formats and mediums
you can use. There’s no right or wrong way. You just have to find what works best
for you and your PFCs and which brings you the results you want. Be willing to
try different approaches, and max each one out until you’ve proven to yourself
it doesn’t work—or you flat-out hate it. You can always learn and improve by
measuring and studying your results with razor-sharp self-honesty. If something
doesn’t work, change it or try something different.
If your content keeps rubbing people the wrong way or drives away perfect-
fit customers, stop what you’re doing and reevaluate. If your content keeps
inspiring people, as proven by their enthusiastic responses to it and them buying
from you, keep creating more content like that.
As you share different types of emails to your list, you’ll learn what has the
most positive impact on readers and on growing your business. The way to
measure this is to pay attention to the feedback you get after broadcasting your
email. Observe feedback in the form of words and actions, specifically from
perfect-fit customers (not from people who’ve never bought from you before or
who are non-ideal customers).
Are readers replying with a “Hell yeah!” or “This is awesome!”? Are they
placing orders? Are they crediting you for changing their life? If so, then your
content overall is MEI’ing them. You’ll never know how it will land for people
until you put it out there. How does your writing land for you? Does it light
you up? Is it something you’re proud of ? Or do you cringe when you reread it?
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What matters most is that your content resonates strongly with your perfect-fit
customers—those who are 100 percent gung ho about your brand!
Sales are, of course, a great indicator of whether your content is
MEI’ing people.
MAKE A PUBLISHING SCHEDULE, AND STICK TO IT
No matter what kind of content you’re committed to creating, develop a consis-

tent rhythm or schedule for broadcasting it, and then stick to it!
I teach my clients to build their email list and mail to it as often as they have
good information to share.
How often is enough? That depends how comfortable you are with MEI’ing,
promoting yourself, and making money.
Most businesses don’t email their lists enough. Most don’t create nearly
enough content. They feel squeamish about promoting their message, or they
simply haven’t adopted the MEI approach. They haven’t made sharing insight a
priority. They broadcast spammy stuff that makes them feel like a sellout.
Your publishing schedule should be based on your lifestyle and the results
you want to achieve, not your own fears. For example, if you’re worried about
bothering people by sending too many emails or posting too many videos, then
fear is dictating your choices.
Never be afraid of sending out too much content. There’s no such thing.
Adopt the attitude that your content helps people because you’re using the
MEI principle.
You’re not responsible for managing people’s inboxes, subscriptions, emo-
tions, or triggers. That’s their job. If they don’t love your content, they can
unsubscribe. You’re moving forward and MEI’ing others with or without them.
CHALLENGE YOURSELF TO STOP HIDING
Many business owners are hiding in some way by not emailing their list enough
or not creating enough videos or audio content and not doing everything in
their power to put their content in front of the right people.
Depending on your personality you might lean more toward either writing
or speaking. I think all businesses should incorporate a mixture of both. If you
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lean more toward writing, challenge yourself to give more through video and
audio. Share your voice, and let people see, feel, and hear your energy.
If you lean more toward speaking, challenge yourself to write more and
email your list more consistently, even if it’s as simple as directing them to a
short two- to five-minute video you made, or to a transcription of your audio.
Always use the 95:5 insight-to-CTA ratio in each email.
REPEAT WHAT WORKS
When you discover something that works, repeat it! This seems obvious, but
most people don’t do it. Most people don’t even know what’s working well
or why.
The moment you find yourself saying, “Something is working . . . we’re seeing
positive results and increased sales,” that’s a great time to figure out, what about
it is working. What you focus on expands. What are you doing that’s actually
making a difference? How are you MEI’ing people? What’s moving you in the
right direction? Dig in and explore, and do more of it.
Pay close attention to which types of content your PFCs are excited about.
That’s a massive clue to keep doing it!
Doing it over and over again—creating more content that works—is repeti-
tive. But this repetition strengthens your character and brings out your best
self—the version of you who is 100 percent capable of succeeding exactly how
you want to succeed. Ideally, you should enjoy the repetition (or else you may
be in the wrong business).
The experimentation period of figuring out which content works is worth
going through. It’s worth knowing what’s most helpful to your PFCs and what’s
not. You might feel vulnerable at times about putting certain raw content
out there. That’s OK. You’ll learn and get better with each piece of content
you broadcast!
Knowing how to create great content that MEIs and sells is one of the most
valuable skills you can master.
Now go and share some insight!
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CHAPTER 7:
Write How You Talk
“It is easy to write. Just sit in front of your typewriter

and bleed.”
— Ernest Hemingway
In business, there are two primary ways to communicate with your market:
writing and talking. In a world where everybody talks, writing is a key element
of the Anti-Marketing Manifesto.
However, I’ve noticed something strange tends to occur when a business
owner sits down to write. Has this ever happened to you?
You’re writing a cold email, warm email, email newsletter, blog article, copy
for your website, or responding to a request for proposal (RFP), and you find
yourself clamming up. Suddenly you don’t know what to say. You worry about
looking dumb. A secret thought runs through the back of your mind: “I need to
come across as professional.”
Ugh.
This thought leads to further dark thoughts: “I shouldn’t say what I really
want to say. I should tone this down. I shouldn’t toot my own horn. I should
try harder.”
For whatever reason, you find yourself inserting BS into your writing. You use
words that don’t sound like you. You pad your writing with pleasantries, cheesy
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verbiage, and maybe even some canned marketing speak. You think you should
be following the rules that other businesses seem to follow. “This is how I’m
supposed to write,” you tell yourself while wishing you could say it differently.
Out comes a piece of garbage that doesn’t feel right. “Lame.” Your own writing
disgusts you. Maybe it embarrasses you. (“I birthed this?” you wonder.) You’re
reluctant to share it, and for good reason: it sucks. You talk yourself out of
hitting the “send” button once again. “Maybe next week,” you lament.
WTF happened? You tried communicating with other human beings about
your business, but something held you back. Something made you want to hide
your true voice and write like someone else.
This is a common dilemma. In fact, it’s one of the biggest reasons why so
many people with fantastic products struggle to grow their business and make
sales online: they don’t write in their true voice. They don’t bring their whole
self into their business. They’re afraid or reluctant to “write like they talk.”
This happened to “Anne,” a business owner.
ANNE HAD A PROBLEM WITH HER WEBSITE COPY
Like many people I’ve talked to, Anne has a great product. She wants to get it
out into the world in a bigger way. She has a website, blog, and email list but
feels like her writing isn’t resonating with her ideal customers. Nor is it showcas-
ing the value of what she offers. She desperately wants to increase her online
sales, but she doesn’t know how.
We got on the phone for a quick chat, and she started talking a mile a minute.
“Omigod, Michelle, I need your help. I’ve created this fantastic line of
organic skin care products. So many women are putting chemical slop on their
faces, and it’s aging them faster! They’re destroying their skin every day, thinking
they’re helping themselves look younger! I hate this! I want to change it! That’s
why I launched my business. It’s going to revolutionize skin care. My products
are the result of years of scouring the earth, so I could find the purest and most
sustainable ingredients. I’ve launched the healthiest, safest line of organic skin-
care on the planet. I kick myself every day though ’cause I can’t figure out how to
market this damn thing. My current customers love the products. They’re going
crazy over them. But why am I having such a hard time finding new customers?”
I listened, nodding. (“Hell, sign me up—I’m your ideal customer,” I thought.
Fuck Big Makeup.)
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W rite H ow Y ou Talk
Passion . . . check.
Enthusiasm . . . check.
Proof of a salable product . . . check.
Anne’s personality poured out of her mouth. F-bombs were freely dropped
within the first sixty seconds of the call. No filter, no fronting, no posturing. It
was as if we were old friends shooting the breeze. Refreshing. Her strong voice
was loud and clear. I knew it would translate well if put into writing.
“Hmm . . . so what do you think is the problem?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. I wrote my website, but I hate how it sounds.”
I pulled up her website and skimmed through her pages. They all pretty
much sounded something like this: “We are a premium provider of quality
organic skin care products. We aim to achieve the highest level of pureness in
each product. We’re a cut above the competition. Since 2015, we’ve been com-
mitted to bringing you the best in skin care. Feel free to browse our selection of
goodies. Treat yourself with a 10% discount by signing up to our newsletter!”
I double-checked to make sure I had the right URL. I did. “Where is Anne
in all this writing?” I wondered.
“I can’t figure out why my site isn’t resonating with people or making sales,”
she admitted. Before I could say anything, Anne was already diagnosing her
own problem: “My writing doesn’t even sound like me. It doesn’t sound like my
voice. I don’t think it’s connecting with anyone. I hate it. I want to fucking light
it on fire and torch it.”
“Bam. I think you’re right, Anne. Whose voice is it then?” I asked.
“I don’t even know. It’s the default voice that came out when I sat down to
write. Like some warped version of my third grade teacher who always yelled at
me for being too loud.”
Ahhh . . . that made sense. It explained why there was no trace of Anne or
her personality anywhere in her content.
There were also no pics, no back story, no reason why she launched her busi-
ness, no enthusiastic ranting, no swearing, no juicy personal details . . . nothing!
I’ve seen this exact scenario so many times: a business owner comes to me
complaining his or her site isn’t selling, and when I read through it, there’s
zero trace of any real human being behind the business. There’s no sign of the
owner anywhere. Even in their YouTube videos, they talk in a stilted manner,
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as if they’re uncomfortable in their own skin. These are people who can’t be
themselves in front of others.
Pretend you’re Anne for a second. Pretend a passionless “default voice”
comes out every time you sit down to write. What’s the result? Out comes
something blah that doesn’t help you grow your business at all. Your writing is
boring as hell and totally forgettable. You use dry, clinical, sterile language that
keeps people at a virtual arm’s length. You use the faceless, vague “we” instead
of the powerful, declarative, personal “I.” Your website gets drowned in mean-
ingless industry jargon and overly formal, business-y language that speaks to
no one.
Ouch.
The solution is obvious: write how you talk!
WHERE ARE YOUR F-BOMBS?
Figuratively, and even literally, what Anne’s site needed was an F-bomb. She
needed to drop a bomb on the current draft and start over. She needed to bring
her true self in, along with her IRL (in real life) voice, personality, and passion.
The fact that she dropped several F-bombs within the first minute of talking
with me was proof of her true voice. Think: a drunken sailor. A passionate
rapper. A female version of Joe Rogan.
Why would she go to great lengths to hide this?
“Anne, why don’t you share more of your real self in your writing? Why
don’t you use more colorful language? For example, you obviously swear a lot.
You express yourself freely in conversation, which is great. Why don’t you put
the same energy, voice, and enthusiasm into your writing?”
“Oooh, I could never do that.”
“Really? Why not?”
“Because I’d come across as unprofessional.”
Ugh . . . there was that sinister word again. Unprofessional. The black plague
that kills creativity and business growth.
Ironically, the desire to appear professional has suffocated many businesses.
This false desire is where creative risks, memorable content, and interesting
personalities go to die. Sounding professional—what does that even mean? For
many it’s an excuse to put on a mask and hide.
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It was easy for me to see the disconnect. Anne’s writing did not reflect her
true self. That’s why it wasn’t MEI’ing or selling. It wasn’t resonating with a
single soul. She was censoring herself and stifling her own expressive voice.
Being professional doesn’t have anything to do with your choice of words in
how you express yourself naturally. Your level of professionalism is about fol-
lowing through on your promises, delivering a stellar product or service, and
doing so consistently over time. That’s it. How you choose to express yourself is
your choice, and frankly, no one else’s business. Swearing or using colorful lan-
guage doesn’t make you unprofessional. Neither does bringing your emotions
into your business. It makes you human.
It takes guts to write in your true voice. But it’s always worth it because then
it speaks directly to your perfect-fit customers!
At this point in the conversation, the business owner I’m speaking with
reaches a fork in the road: they must choose either to write how they talk—and
bring their true self into all facets of their business—or keep hiding while toler-
ating the disappointing results.
In my experience, clients who write how they talk end up growing their
businesses in huge ways that are exciting and fun. Those who don’t write how
they talk perpetually struggle to make sales. Nothing they do seems to draw
in perfect-fit customers. They go deeper into the rabbit hole of doing what
they think they should be doing. Because they’re censoring their true self, their
writing falls flat. Nothing works, so they resort to cheap sales ploys like over-
discounting, bartering, and begging.
If you want to grow your business in meaningful and profitable ways, then
write how you talk.
Sadly, Anne wasn’t interested in sharing her true voice with the world.
Therefore, I couldn’t help her. (Goodbye and good luck, Anne. You’re the
example of what not to do.)
Being yourself in business isn’t for everyone. You’ve gotta have heart, self-
honesty, and genuine self-love. You’ve gotta be open to being judged and
criticized by others who will no doubt have a problem with you writing like
you talk. You’ve gotta have the strength not to take people’s opinions of you
personally because it’s never about you. It’s always about them.
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WRITE LIKE YOU TALK
Not everyone swears; I get that. I’m not asking you to insert F-bombs into every
sentence. I’m asking you to write how you talk and to do so unapologetically.
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto is about communicating as your real self in
all situations and in all formats no matter who might have a problem with it.
How do you talk in your everyday life? Do you use colorful language?
Slang? Colloquialisms? Foreign phrases? Unapologetically bad grammar? Are
you bilingual? Do you bust out in Italian when you’re pissed off ? Do you have
an accent? Does pure poetry come flying out of your mouth every time you
open it? Are you a rapper who yells 99 percent of the time, even when you’re
happy? Or do you have a quiet, understated tone of voice or style that reflects
your true self ?
There’s no right or wrong, good or bad answer here. However you talk, that’s
how you should write.
If you never swear in real life, then don’t swear in your writing.
If you don’t ever use certain vocabulary words when you talk, don’t use them
in your writing. (Unless you’re trying to pontificate the fecal matter out of your
readers in hopes of grandstanding them with your prodigious literary prowess.)
If you swear on a regular basis, you should also swear in your writing, at least
occasionally. Otherwise, you’re sort of lying to people about who you really are.
You’re putting on a front.
Just because it’s business writing doesn’t mean you need to alter, hide, or be
ashamed of your real voice. Quite the contrary. Your business writing should
have your personality weaved in throughout because this is precisely what MEIs
your perfect-fit customers.
DO YOU
Dave Ramsey is a Christian from Tennessee who never swears on his radio
show. In fact, nobody on the entire Ramsey Network swears as far as I know.
Yet Dave often uses G-rated versions of swearing: “Everyone’s obsessed about
counting their ‘dad-gum’ points” (in reference to credit cards) and “What the
‘flip’ were you thinking?” (re: borrowing a ton of money for a new car). I’ve
heard him rant about how people need to get their heads out of their butts and
stop spending money they don’t have. That’s his version of swearing. It’s clean,
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it’s fun to listen to, and it’s perfectly fine because it reflects his values, his true
self, and how he really talks.
The rapper Cardi B has built a successful music career while being 100
percent her unique self. She has a distinct style of talking and rapping that
enthralls and entertains millions of people while rubbing others the wrong way.
Meanwhile, she’s selling music like crazy, breaking sales records left and right.39
She even makes up her own words like “Okurrrrrr,”40 which she unsuccessfully
tried to get copyrighted!41
Love her or hate her, Cardi B shows up as herself—her full self, unapologeti-
cally—and she gets attention, respect, and dollaaas for it.
These are two completely different people using completely different
approaches to growing their business. Both are being 100 percent true to them-
selves. Both are rich. Both have die-hard fans. Both probably have a completely
different set of values. (Understatement.)
You might think people like Cardi B and Dave Ramsey are the exceptions—
like they can get away with being their true selves while you have to play by
someone else’s rules. False.
Everyone is free to live as their true self, even in business. No, especially in
business! This is what we’re being called to do! We already have enough fakes in
the world. Bring your true self to all facets of your business! Pretty puh-lease!
(With stevia on top.) Just be willing to accept the consequences (and rewards)
that come along with doing that.
ARE YOU FREE TO BE YOURSELF IN YOUR WRITING?
You started your business because you wanted to be free, right? Maybe you
wanted to achieve financial independence and do things on your own terms.
Maybe you love doing certain activities and want the time and space to do
as much of them as possible. Maybe you want to help others while enjoying
39 Caitlin Kelley, “Cardi B: By The Numbers,” Forbes, May 31, 2019, https://www.
forbes.com/sites/caitlinkelley/2019/05/31/cardi-b-by-the-numbers/#3b45a35777aa.
40 Candice Nembhard, “Watch Cardi B Explain the Meaning Behind Her ‘Okurrr’
Catchphrase,” Highsnobiety, April 12, 2018,
https://www.highsnobiety.com/p/cardi-b-catchphrases-jimmy-fallon/.
41 Daniel Kreps, “Not Okurrr: Cardi B’s Application to Trademark Word Denied,”
Rolling Stone, July 3, 2019, https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/cardi-b-
okurrr-trademark-denied-855262/.
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the process. Whatever the impetus was for starting your business, most likely
freedom was at the core of it. You wanted to be free in business. So, why would
you not feel free to bring your true self into your writing?
Everything you write needs to come from your true voice. Every piece of
content needs to reflect your personality, values, and viewpoints. Not your
parents’ voice (or viewpoints), not your spouse’s voice, not a demon’s voice, not
a marketing guru’s voice—your voice.
After all, it’s your business.
Be the same person everywhere whether you’re on client calls, writing a cold
email or blog post, talking with someone at the grocery store, giving a speech or
interview, or blasting your list with emails that MEI. Maybe for you “blasting”
doesn’t feel right. Maybe a “gentle rain” of content is more appropriate for your
personality. If you’re naturally sweet, kind, and courteous in person, then this
should also be apparent in your writing style. If you’re a little sassy in person,
where’s your written sass?
CREATE YOUR OWN VOCABULARY
You can even make up your own vocabulary words, terms, phrases, slogans,
and sayings.
Shane Ellison (The People’s Chemist) says if you don’t get control of your
weight, you can end up in the “Fat Cow Hall of Fame,” a place where someone
gains so much weight, they practically deserve an award. Harsh? Yeah. But super
funny to his top fans. (Not funny to his non-ideal customers though!) Shane
takes it a step further by saying, “You cannot be overweight and healthy at the
same time.” This is one of The People’s Chemist’s mantras—a way of reminding
fans to resist the normalization of obesity in our society (where fat people are
encouraged to celebrate their excess body fat under the guise of self-love and
acceptance when really it’s complacency and toleration). The slogan shows that
the company is taking a stand against an unhealthy, “growing” trend.
Dave Ramsey has funny names for well-known credit cards: “American
Distress,” “Discover Bondage,” “Master . . . Card. Who named that anyway?”
By using this vocabulary often, he motivates people to cut up and cancel their
credit cards, so they can free themselves from debt.
In writing this book, I created my own terms and acronyms for the Anti-
Marketing Manifesto. It was fun! I’m ready to MEI you with my PFAB
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(pretty fucking awesome business). (See my “Glossary of Terms” at the back of

this book.)
FINDING YOUR OWN VOICE
Some people insist it can take years or decades to find your true voice, but it’s
not something you need to find—you already have it. All you need to find are
the balls (or ovaries) to use it.
Even an eighteen-year-old entrepreneur fresh out of high school can write
how she talks and use this strategy to build her business. (Hell, even someone
who didn’t graduate can use this strategy!)
Your true voice is both spontaneous and reflective of your highest self. It
arises out of you naturally without any strain or effort on your part. And yet,
you can wrap your voice around your best thinking and your most positive ideas.
Your true voice reflects the pure essence of you fully expressed, unhindered
and unrestricted. It can be cultivated, honed, shaped, and chiseled. It comes
from your soul—the pure, raw life energy of you—who happens to be experi-
encing a temporary existence in a human body. So make the most of it.
You find your voice (the one that’s already there) by using it—by writing. A
lot. You find it by writing consistently, taking creative risks, giving yourself new
and challenging experiences, and learning and improving as you go.
DE-CONDITIONING
In most cases your biggest obstacle to writing in your real voice is the years or
decades of negative conditioning that have held you back for most of your life.
If your mind and body are improperly conditioned, they can corrupt what your
soul (your true self ) is trying to say.
For example, if you have limiting beliefs, self-destructive habits, or fears of
what other people think of you, your mind is poorly conditioned. It’s holding
you back. It will try to get you not to write and not to hit “send.” It will convince
you to erase that candid, heartfelt sentence and replace it with something bland
that doesn’t sound like you at all. Your mind will work 24/7 to talk you out of
doing anything that will make you seen and heard by more PFCs. It will coerce
you into settling for sanitized, boring writing that gets ignored, even though
your deeper self knows better (and is craving fuller expression).
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Your body can also interfere with your writing. If your body is poorly condi-
tioned, it will create pain and sickness to distract you from writing in your true
voice. If you’re chronically sick due to poor eating and lifestyle habits (spurred
on by your f#cked-up mind, which thinks those habits are OK), then your body
will make you feel tired and miserable any chance it can get. For me, that shows
up after eating too much junk food, then getting headaches, brain fog, and
mood swings that prevent me from focusing. Then I have to take entire days off
because I feel like shit and can’t write. Fuck that.
Many famous novelists experienced their body and mind conquering their
soul with alcohol and drug addictions that eventually killed them. For them
writing truly became an act of “bleeding” or even premature death because they
didn’t take good care of themselves. Their careers were cut short due to their
true self getting buried.
As a business owner who’s here to serve people, you must learn to tame your
body and mind and get them working in your favor as you write. By doing this,
you’ll MEI people. It’s inspiring (and rare) to see someone whose spirit has con-
quered their body and mind. Usually, it’s the opposite.
You must de-program yourself from any BS conditioning. Get rid of any-
thing in your thinking or belief system that interferes with you doing your most
profitable work: writing like you talk.
The best way to de-condition is to give yourself new and challenging experi-
ences in your business and personal life. These experiences should force you to
grow and spur you to learn, adapt, and get better.
A WRITING EXERCISE TO GET YOU OVER YOUR FEAR
If you’re afraid of bothering people by sending too many emails to your list,
then you’re probably afraid of being judged and criticized—more than you’re
committed to growing your business. This is a common problem I see. It means
you’ve been conditioned by fear.
To de-condition, consider giving yourself a radical new experience: commit
to sending out a daily email for two years.
Yep, a daily email.
It seems like a lot, but this act will de-condition you right out of your fear!
I did this early in my business, and it helped me learn to focus on productivity
rather than feedback from haters.
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Some people got triggered by me sending a daily email. They urged me to

send fewer emails. I got triggered by their triggers, and sometimes arguments
ensued. But we worked through it like adults (mostly) and moved on (give or
take a few jackasses here and there).
I quickly learned who was a true fan of my writing and who wasn’t. True fans
never complain about you sending too many emails or using certain colorful
language! Quite the contrary. They love reading your stuff and can’t get enough.
They let you be you!
The daily writing habit helped me develop my voice. It conditioned me
to get into a solid writing habit, which led to me being more productive and
making more money in my business. And for the first time, my writing reso-
nated strongly with perfect-fit clients, who fucking loved it.
Warning: sending a daily email will open you up to feedback from others.
Expect it. Embrace it. Profit big off of it. This will bring you face to face with
your inner self and give you plenty of opportunities to push your demons aside.
You’ll learn a ton by producing a huge volume of content. You’ll learn what kind
of writing inspires people most and what doesn’t. It’s the perfect way to practice
the MEI(S) principle on a daily basis—motivate, educate, inspire, and sell.
If needed, delete anyone who repeatedly complains from your list and
move on. You’re not writing for them. You’re writing for the people who want
your content.
To get started, write spontaneously for fifteen minutes each day. Aim for
three short paragraphs. Then press “send”! Sometimes you’ll write more, some-
times less. Dare to broadcast imperfect content. (Are you triggered yet? Good!)
What could be more valuable than writing every day, so you can face and
conquer the BS in your head?
WRITE THE SHITTY FIRST DRAFT
If you find it hard to write, then your first goal is to simply write a shitty first
draft. Give yourself permission to make it intentionally bad. This eliminates any
pressure to get it perfect.
Before you write, pick one core topic to focus on, max.
Sit down at your keyboard (or paper), and give yourself free rein to go wild
on that topic. Write anything and everything about your topic, allowing it to
come out uncensored, unfiltered, and fully expressed.
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At this stage, your goal is to be as creatively free as the two-year-old version

of yourself who ran around naked screaming, laughing at life, and playing, not
yet having learned the rules of civilization or how to behave in human society.
You want to be that liberated in your first draft of writing. Meanwhile, make
full use of your adult vocabulary and insight.
The first draft is the place to be disorganized, chaotic, terrible, full of typos,
and ugly. In other words, it’s the place be fully human—flawed, emotional, and
messy. Get it all out on the page—the good, the bad, the nonsensical, the bril-
liant, the “false alarm” brilliant, the “just kidding, we can’t use any of this; we’ll
have to delete all of it.” Just dump it all on the page (or screen), flaws and all.
You will edit later. And you’ll learn a ton about yourself in the process.
Never limit your self-expression in the first draft of whatever you’re writing.
This part of the process is about letting your soul speak while not holding any-
thing back. (Few people are brave enough to do this. They’re afraid of what
their soul will unleash!)
Getting the shitty first draft written does two things: 1) it warms up
your brain and 2) it frees you to move on to bigger and better concerns, like
shaping that raw material into something coherent and worth reading that will
benefit readers.
Many people skip this vital first step and go straight to editing without
having written anything. They censor every word before the “ink” has had a
chance to be spilled! They critique their own creation before it’s even had a
chance to exist. That sucks and feels demoralizing, so they quit.
Don’t do that. Allow yourself to write a shitty first draft, no holds barred.
EDITING
Ahhh . . . once you’ve written something, now you can work with it.
Now you can think about what you wrote and test it against reality. You can
edit, reshape, restructure, and delete anything that doesn’t belong.
Editing should always be done in the spirit of clarifying a message, so your
perfect-fit customers “get” it—not in the spirit of censoring or hiding your true
voice out of a fear of what others will think of your real self. Clarity—not saniti-
zation—is the goal. Crisp, clear writing is the objective, with all the fat cut out.
Trim the fat from your writing, including any redundant sentences or para-
graphs, wasted words, overused pet phases, stuff that doesn’t make sense, and
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anything that talks a lot without saying much. Also, cut out any sentences that
lean toward falseness or BS (i.e., anything you don’t personally believe in or
anything that’s not reflective of your highest self ).
Edit your writing into a crisp, clear final product—but only after you’ve
dumped everything “fugly” onto the page.
Repeat this process over and over again. Write a shitty first draft, edit, broad-
cast, then gauge the feedback on it. Use that feedback to improve your writing.
Your goal is to write how you talk, always. Let your individuality and
uniqueness shine through in your writing, unapologetically. Organize your
content into something that flows well, motivates, educates, inspires, and sells.
While editing, make sure you stick to the following motto . . .
ONE BIG IDEA PER EMAIL
This principle is by far the most valuable thing you can do when writing to your
list. It’s so powerful, it’s generated millions of dollars in ethically made profits
for those who use it. It reinforces solid brands. It prevents confusion. It leads to
overwhelmingly positive feedback. It pays off big for those who use it. Why?
Because it keeps your writing simple. Simple is easy to understand. Easy-to-
understand writing leads to MEI’ing, and MEI’ing leads to selling.
Don’t jam pack multiple topics, ideas, products, links, pictures, offers, or
CTAs (calls to action) into a single email. Don’t follow the commonly used yet
ineffective practice of stuffing an email with tons of articles and sections just to
make it feel like a professional newsletter.
Keep it clean and simple. One big idea per email.
If you have more than one topic or idea, break it up into separate emails, and
publish them separately. Otherwise you’ll create confusion and mental clutter
for the reader. They’ll respond by glossing over your content and saying, “I’ll
read this later,” which they usually never do.
While editing, sacrifice anything that complicates your point. During this
stage of the process, the delete button is your friend.
“Do not overcomplicate shit.” This should be the rule you live and die by.
Simple, easy-to-read emails are always focused on one big idea, and they
MEI and sell!42
42 Side note to business owners who are also authors: if you’ve published a book,
you can pull paragraphs from your book and adapt them into short email articles for your
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TECHNICAL ASPECTS OF WRITING AN EMAIL
Once you’ve mastered the concept of one big idea per email, everything else
is easy.
Keep each email short, around 500–750 words max. (Some will be
shorter, others longer.) Use your discretion, but make “short and sweet” your
gold standard.
A blog post can be longer (e.g., 750–2,000 words or more), and it can
include lots of links, references, and pictures, as needed.
See my blog post, “Email Basics—Cheat Sheet for Anti-Marketers.”43 It has
ten tips for writing great emails plus examples of how to structure an email. It
covers format, style, and essentials for making your emails readable. It’s based on
many years of helping business owners write emails that MEI and sell millions
of dollars’ worth of products.
DON’T GET LOCKED INTO FORMULAS
You would never use a script, formula, or pre-made template to communicate

to your spouse or best friend, would you? No, ’cause that’d be weird, fake, and
contrived. So why would you do that with your readers—i.e., the human beings
who consume your content?
You don’t need a formula. Just write how you talk.
Today, tons of people have no problem swiping other people’s content, copy,
templates, and formulas. Everyone is obsessed with copying others because
they don’t have the guts to do their own thing. What’s left is a grey residue of
someone else’s work—weak and diluted content that doesn’t reflect you, your
brand, or your voice.
Fuck that.
Your customers deserve you acting (and writing) as if you’re a real fucking
person, which you are, so be real with people in your writing.
list. You can also pop these emails into an autoresponder series and have them delivered to
new subscribers automatically.
43 Michelle Lopez, “Email Basics Cheat Sheet for Anti-Marketers,”
AntiMarketingManifesto.com, Jan. 17, 2020,
https://www.antimarketingmanifesto.com/email-basics-for-anti-marketers/.
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YOU’RE NOT WRITING FOR EVERYONE
Write specifically for your PFCs, i.e., those who’ve already shown you they love
what you’re selling.
Showing up as yourself—writing in your voice, communicating the way you
normally would in person—helps you connect with ideal clients. Someone who
can’t handle the occasional “fuck that” isn’t someone I would want to work
with. (At least not until I’ve graduated to not swearing.)
Showing up as yourself in every facet of your business will help your non-
ideal clients self-select right outta your way.
DON’T HIDE ANYTHING
As more of the general public begins tuning out bullshit marketing messages
and ads, they’ll be looking for anti-marketers and businesses who can be real
with them and tell the truth. People crave truth, even if it’s deep down. People
are fascinated by business owners who are comfortable in their own skin,
showing up as their real self no matter who has a problem with it.
So don’t “hide” anything. Don’t be secretive to the point where you’re mis-
leading people. Be candid. Be frank. Be direct. But also have boundaries like
a motherfucker.
SHARING VS. OVERSHARING
Be aware of walking the line between sharing and oversharing.

Under the guise of “being transparent,” many business owners overshare.
They tell you what they ate for breakfast. They tell you when they’re sick. They
spill the details of their mood swings, their meltdowns, the color of their poop,
or how failure is crushing their soul. TMI, bro.44 They post a crying selfie, in
which they shed tears, then follow this up with a pitch to buy their e-book.
They’re missing the point.
In a way, “authenticity” has become bullshit marketing. Oversharing is
a low-key cry for help or a cry for attention disguised as an act of promoting
their business. If something would be better suited being shared only with your
therapist or spouse, don’t share it with your customers.
44 TMI: too much information.
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Sharing details of your life should be done in the spirit of MEI’ing your
PFCs and deepening the human connection and unique bond that those cus-
tomers have with you and your business. Remember, your sharing should tie
back to your core topics and your product or service. Anything beyond that
might be too random or TMI.
Sharing should never be done in the spirit of seeking attention, sympathy,
praise, or admiration. Nor should it cross some weird boundary in which the
customer becomes your advisor, confidante, and/or donor.
You don’t have to broadcast your personal journal entries with God to your
email list. That’s private. You don’t have to tell people what you ate today unless
your meal plan is something they beg you to share, and your product directly
relates to it. You don’t have to confess the details of the fight you had with your
spouse, thinking it will help others deepen their relationship with their spouse.
It won’t.
The litmus test: Will your sharing lead to tangible, positive results in your
readers’ lives? Will it create a deeper sense of hope, inspiration, or connec-
tion between you and them, or will it cause them to say, “TMI, bro”? Will it
strengthen your brand, or will it make you look unstable (as if you’re just as lost
and off track as they are)? Will it cause people to respect you more, or will it
cause them to pity you?
You have to determine what’s right for your audience. What type of sharing
is most helpful and interesting to your PFCs? (i.e., your highest-paying, most-
fun-to-work-with customers who bring zero drama into your business)? What
content do they have zero interest in?
WRITE MORE, BLOG MORE, EMAIL YOUR LIST
I’m a firm believer that every anti-marketer should have a blog and an email
list. These are non-negotiable. These platforms allow you to keep in touch with
customers while enriching their lives with great content. Blog posts and emails
are the perfect platforms to write your heart out!
While some businesses seem to get away with not having either, they’re
missing out on a huge opportunity to express their voice, MEI people, give
more, and make more sales. (If you don’t want all of this, that’s your choice.)
People without an email list are often dependent on social media, affiliates,
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referrals, traditional media, or other external platforms through which to share

their voice. If you’re OK with that dependency, fine.
Why write? Why not just talk your way into making sales? Because every-
one talks. It’s easy to spout hot air, but it takes real genius to write, even to write
poorly! And, as you’ll learn in the next chapter, building and emailing your list
can be a huge moneymaker.
Today podcasts are all the rage. Would-be YouTube sensations are eager to
blab their butts off while living under their parents’ roof. (I can say this because
I used to be one of them. Every time I favored talk over work, I became increas-
ingly broke and drifted further off course.) There’s so much endless talk about
shit all that little real work is being done.
Writing is work; no doubt about it. It forces you to distill your ideas into
something concrete, succinct, and coherent. Writing is one of the toughest
things to do because you’re forced to face yourself, your thoughts, and your
beliefs—a.k.a. the true source of all your results.
Writing does two essential things for you as a business owner:
1. It lets you examine and work with the ideas in your head. This is
valuable because if you know what’s in your head, you tend to be more
honest with yourself and others. Honesty is essential in the Anti-
Marketing Manifesto. If you don’t know what’s in your head, you’ll
always be at the mercy of life, getting triggered by things left and right.
2. Writing helps your customers get to know the real you on a more
personal level. Think: writing candid letters to a friend at a distance.
You can achieve that similar feeling by writing emails to your list. This
helps people connect with you, which makes them feel drawn to you
as a human being.
GIVE THE GIFT OF READING
By writing you invite people to do two things that are in dire shortage today—
reading and thinking! Reading is an amazing gift to the human race. It’s a
gateway to empowering yourself to the nth degree. Our society is becoming
more and more illiterate and stupid by the day due to people limiting their
reading to ridiculous tweets, asinine Instagram posts, and fake news. The
extent of their “thinking” involves reacting emotionally to reality TV shows
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and click-bait headlines. BS is spoon-fed to them, and their brains eat it up.
Meanwhile, their reality gets twisted, bent, and shaped into something based
on bogus narratives and falsehoods that keep them perpetually underperform-
ing throughout life, from cradle to grave.
Most of the time, reading social media fails to yield any positive benefits
because few people actually put any thought into their posts, and most are
merely posting for attention. It’s a glorified mob mentality, reacting and being a
victim to everything. But reading a book or a series of well-thought-out emails
can change a life. As Mark Twain said, “A person who won’t read has no advan-
tage over one who can’t read.” God bless positive, forward-thinking business
owners who write and make their writing accessible to all.
There’s something tangible and beneficial about a piece of writing that can
be printed, studied, highlighted, written on, or revisited again as a reference.
It’s impractical to make customers wade through an hour-long audio or video
to find a specific point you made. It’s quicker to search for, read, and reference a
short email or blog post.
If your content strategy is based primarily on talking, you’ll put a cap on
your ability to reach highly focused people who don’t have the time or desire to
sit through lengthy audios or videos.
Video and audio should always be supplementary to your writing. Your
writing is your solid foundation on which to communicate in your business.
Audio and video exist to augment your written works.
START WRITING
OK, are you stoked to start writing, blogging your ass off, and emailing your list
on a regular basis?
You should be! Now it’s time to start MEI’ing people and making some
money. Start writing!
I’m not asking you to write literary masterpieces that take twenty years
to complete. (Suicidal Hemingway had it wrong—you don’t have to “bleed,”
torture yourself, or otherwise harm yourself in any way in order to write!)
I’m asking you to write short, simple emails and blog posts that take two
to five minutes to read. Once you get the hang of it, writing becomes fun and
profitable, and your readers will love it too.
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CHAPTER 8:
Build Your Email List Like

Your Life Depends On It!
“There is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness

and truth.”
— Leo Tolstoy
There’s an old spiritual joke about a business owner who gets caught in a tree in
the middle of a flood. He prays for help. Thank goodness he has his phone on
him with an Internet connection, so he can tweet about his dilemma and post
pics of his struggle on Facebook.
“Just being transparent, but I’m really struggling here! Don’t forget to ‘like’
my company page while you’re at it!” he pleads.
Truly interested in seeing the man live, not least of all so his business can
succeed, God sends him a fireman in a canoe, a Navy SEAL on a boat, and a
police officer in a helicopter. Each one tries to rescue the poor dude who’s stuck
in the tree, but he rejects all of their help. “No thank you,” he says. “I believe
God will save me through the power of social media. I kindly refuse your help.”
So they go away, shaking their heads, leaving him stranded.
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Meanwhile, the water gets higher and higher. The man continues to tweet.
Eventually, the flood overtakes him, and he drowns. Since he’s dead, his busi-
ness dies with him.
As he enters heaven, the man approaches God and says, “I prayed. I built my
social media following. Why didn’t you help me? Why did I lose everything,
including my life?”
“What do you mean?” God replies. “I sent you three forms of help, and you
didn’t take any of them. Instead, you wasted your life on social media.”
LOL. It’s a cautionary tale for all of us.
To help us grow our businesses, God has sent three forms of real help that
we’re inclined to ignore: email, phone, and snail mail. These strange, ancient
forms of communication represent three direct ways to communicate with our
existing and/or future customers. They allow us to MEI people, give, serve, and
grow our businesses.
But few business owners use them.
Satan, of course, sent us Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other social
media to distract us and waste our lives away.
(I kid, I kid. Well, sort of . . .)
In this chapter, brace yourself for the unthinkable. I make a solid case for
why it’s foolish to rely on social media alone for growing your business and why
building your email list (i.e., collecting your customers’ direct contact info) is an
overlooked, underrated, yet very profitable way to achieve sustainable, mean-
ingful business growth. (Growth that doesn’t involve being a sellout!)
Building and emailing your list is one of the best ways—if not the best way—
to give, serve, MEI, and make meaningful sales over time.
Yeah, I said it.
Ignore this form of help at your own risk.
HELP IS HERE—TAKE IT!
Every business owner has their own challenges and their own ways of getting
caught in the middle of a flood, so to speak. Maybe your biggest problem is
cash flow. Maybe it’s that you’re secretly bored with your business and don’t
really want to grow it. Maybe you love your business, but you’re not that great
at writing, so you need to hire an editor. Maybe you don’t have a product or
service worth selling yet.
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B uild Y our E mail L ist L ike Y our L ife D epends O n I t !
Whatever your problem is, a solution exists. For many businesses, building
and emailing a list full of perfect-fit customers will solve most of their problems.
STOP THE PERSECUTION OF THE EMAIL LIST!
For years, email has been crucified, mocked, and shunned as business owners
have flocked blindly to the glamor, shininess, and ease of social media. I’ve heard
people say all kinds of crazy things about email: “Email is obsolete.” “Email will
go away someday.” “Nobody uses email anymore.” “If you hide behind email,
you’re a coward.”
Blasphemy!
Relying on social media to grow your business and communicate with your
customers puts you in a precarious position (like our friend who was stuck on
the tree). Building your email list and mailing to it often puts you in a position
of strength. Instead of relying on someone else’s platform to build your busi-
ness, you can create your own platform.
EIGHT CRAZY-GOOD REASONS TO HAVE AN EMAIL LIST
I can think of at least eight solid reasons why it’s worth building and emailing
your list regularly.
1. Ownership
2. Total creative control over your content
3. Direct access to buyers
4. Permission to send messages
5. Higher-quality subscribers
6. Simplicity
7. High return on investment (ROI)
8. An ideal platform through which to give, MEI, and sell
Note: Throughout this chapter I focus on email, but this info can also apply
to text messages, phone calls, and snail mail. Younger generations prefer text
over email. The point is, you’re building a list of people’s direct contact info, so
you can send messages to them directly.
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#1 – OWNERSHIP
Ownership is power. When you own something, it’s yours. Nobody else can
meddle with it (unless they’re committing some sort of crime).
Newsflash: You don’t own any of your social media profiles or pages. Those
could be gone tomorrow. They could be deleted, banned, blocked, hacked,
censored, or suspended at the whim of the platform owners—or the whole plat-
form itself could become irrelevant and disappear. Think: MySpace, Google+,
and Vine. If your profile gets wiped out for any reason, you’ll lose all your fol-
lowers overnight.
Guess what you do own? Your email list. It’s yours. That means you can do
whatever you want with it. It’s the lifeline of your business.
Owning a list of your customers’ contact info puts you in a position of
strength. No matter what happens on anyone else’s platform, you can always
communicate with your list. Your email list is here to stay.45
If you use social media at all, use it to funnel people back to your email list!
#2 – TOTAL CREATIVE CONTROL
Because you own your list, you have total creative freedom over all your content,
including the formatting, style, substance, and for the most part, deliverability.
No arbitrary character limitations, restrictions, rules, politics, or agendas can be
imposed by third parties.
Stylistically and format-wise, email gives you more space to write longer and
well-thought-out messages. You can include a pic, a link to your sales page, or
even a video. Instagram, for example, currently does not allow you to include
links in your unpaid posts. (This may change at some point.) Twitter has a
maximum number of characters that you can post in each tweet. (This may
change someday—it already has once.) And Facebook outright censors certain
content.46 (I doubt this will ever change.)
45 Periodically back up your email list, as needed. Let people subscribe and
unsubscribe at will.
46 Brian Robertson, “Facebook censorship fast becoming an enemy of free expres-
sion for conservatives.” Washington Examiner, March 6, 2019, https://www.washington-
examiner.com/opinion/op-eds/facebook-censorship-fast-becoming-an-enemy-of-free-
expression-for-conservatives.
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Social media is always fluctuating, like a hormonally imbalanced person,

but email is constant. It’s stable. The ability to write and send a digital letter to
someone does not change on a whim.
Because you have total creative freedom in email, it lets you communicate
in ways that are liberating and free from censorship. You can be controversial,
polarizing, politically incorrect, poetic, poignant, or whatever you choose for
your particular brand, style, or message. You can swear, rant, or challenge the
status quo to your heart’s content without the threat of being banned, blocked,
or buried by an algorithm. You’re free to broadcast whatever you want, no holds
barred, to your entire list. You can unleash as much truth or opinion as you
want. You have complete say in what gets broadcasted, when, why, and how.
If your content and/or business threatens the corrupt powers that be, then
building and emailing a list is mandatory. Depending on your industry, you
might be outright censored on social media! For example, businesses that sell
safe natural medicine products are often censored due to Big Pharma’s advertis-
ing dollars and powerful grip over certain media channels.
#3 – DIRECT ACCESS TO BUYERS
Every time you post on social media, your content is filtered (a.k.a. censored)
through an algorithm. Nobody knows exactly what governs the algorithms, but
we do know they’re always changing. Algorithms certainly are not governed
by truth. They’re governed by the agenda of whoever owns the platform (e.g.,
politics, advertising dollars, a mass conspiracy to destroy humanity).
Trying to dance around the algorithms of a middleman puts your business
in a weak position. Customers might be blocked from reading your posts unless
they go directly to your profile, and most of them won’t. Most will sit and scroll
through their timeline, randomly consuming whatever content the algorithm
serves up.
On the other hand, when people subscribe to your email list, you have direct
access to them. You can send them content without a third party getting in the
way! This directness is invaluable. Think: a clean, straight line of communica-
tion to those who want to read your content, study your material, and possibly
buy your products. No third party is inserting its agenda into your company’s
success. This keeps everything simple. When it comes to serving customers and
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making sales, traveling in a straight line is always better than getting lost and
sidetracked on a meandering path full of middlemen.
Plus, consider this: what if your followers decide to go on a thirty-day
Facebook fast, during which they refused to log into Facebook for a month? Or
what if they smarten up and delete their account altogether?47 How would you
reach them? Game over—unless you’ve collected their email addresses.
People are more likely to read messages that are sent to them directly via
email or text, especially when they consciously, voluntarily, enthusiastically
signed up to receive those messages. There’s something beautiful and straight-
forward about sending a direct message to someone.
Social media is best used amongst friends, family, and other groups to relay
highly specific, niche info that’s relevant to that specific group. Think: dorm
rooms, cliques, and cults . . . that’s it!
If there’s anything valuable about social media from a business perspective,
it’s the ability to send someone a direct message (DM), which is similar to an
email inbox (assuming you can’t find their email address through a Google
search). The most valuable times I’ve used Facebook or Twitter were to ask
someone for their email address or phone number, so we could talk directly
about working together in some way. That’s it.
Always choose the most direct path to communicating with your customers.
Fuck all the other noise.
Which would you rather have:

A) 10,000 social media followers who casually follow you on Instagram?
Assume they randomly consume your content (if it shows up on their timeline).
B) 10,000 well-qualified, double-opted-in email subscribers who signed up
to your email list through your landing page or website in response to a free
report you offered about one of your company’s core topics.
Answer: B.
47 Brian X. Chen, “How to Delete Facebook: Lost faith in Facebook after data leak-
ages, breaches and too much noise? Here’s a guide to breaking up with the social network
and its photo-sharing app for good,” New York Times, December 19, 2018,
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/business/delete-facebook-account.html.
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#4 – PERMISSION TO SEND MESSAGES
In a world where people are inundated with unwanted ads and marketing mes-
sages, email gives us all a refreshing alternative. We have control over our own
email inboxes. We can create private email accounts that only receive content of
our choosing. Email is great because people can voluntarily, consciously, enthu-
siastically sign up to the specific newsletters they’re interested in and peace the
fuck out of everything else.
Email is permission-based. When someone gives you their email address
and confirms their subscription (through a “double opt in”), they’re giving you
consent to contact them. Getting permission to follow up is hugely valuable
and respectful (unlike the invasive, privacy-butchering, annoying predatory tar-
geting methods used by many marketers to push their unwanted crap in front
of people).
As you and I browse the web or scroll through social media, we have little
or no say in what pops up. It’s mostly random, usually worthless, and based on
whoever is paying the most ad dollars or whatever the platform “thinks” we
might be interested in. It’s all BS.
Email returns power to the people. It honors what they want to receive rather
than what advertisers want to push onto them. Email is the only platform where
people largely have control over what types of messages they receive (except
for the occasional spam—but spam filters have gotten pretty good at filtering
out actual spam). Email empowers people and gives them a refreshing choice.
They can subscribe to content they believe in, are curious about, or want to
study more.
Email is customer-centric and beneficial. When someone gives you their
email address, it’s the first step in showing you they want to hear more from you.
They want to check out your information, to learn more. And on some level,
they want you to follow up with great content and maybe even a great offer.
It’s up to you to give them content that MEIs (motivates, educates, inspires),
and sells.
Until they unsubscribe, assume that everyone on your list wants to keep
hearing from you. If they ever want to leave, it’s their responsibility to hit the
“unsubscribe” button.
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#5 – HIGHER-QUALITY SUBSCRIBERS
It doesn’t take much conscious behavior or intent for someone to follow you on
social media. It’s often casual and meaningless. Hell, your cat could sit on your
laptop, causing you to follow someone or like their post.
Email shows you what people’s intent is—whether they’re killing time,
lurking, or actively seeking your solution. (It also shows you how effective you
are at making a free offer via your landing page.)
The fact that someone has to lift a finger, type their email address into your
website, and click “Subscribe” shows intent. Email screens out the lurkers and
time-wasters from those who are intent on finding a specific solution—the
one that your product or service delivers. Thus, your email list creates a level of
qualifying that doesn’t happen on social media.
Most people have zero intent on social media. They’re killing time, brows-
ing, scrolling, consuming random junk, spying on others, living vicariously,
bragging, feeling jealous, or otherwise behaving aimlessly. Maybe some of them
will become your customers, but overall, most of these time wasters have no
intent on solving a problem or finding a solution.
By contrast, people with intent are proactively searching for a solution to a
specific problem or searching for help with a specific goal they want to achieve.
They’re goal-oriented, purposeful in their actions, and seeking something
beneficial. They might search on Google, ask friends or family for a referral,
binge read a bunch of blog posts in one sitting, binge watch a bunch of YouTube
videos, or do light investigative research for the purpose of achieving a specific
outcome. Their search might take two to five minutes (or less) or several hours
or days (or longer), but within that timeframe, they’re intent on finding what
they’re looking for. They ignore any junk ads that don’t speak directly to their
need. These are the people you want to reach if your product or service can help
them. They’re great candidates for joining your email list. They have a high
potential of becoming your PFCs, as long as you collect their email address and
MEI them through your newsletter. If you create interesting, relevant content,
they’ll probably love reading your emails. You want to make damn sure these
people find you, so they can add themselves to your email list.
You’re here to serve people with intent—a.k.a. PFCs who are looking for
your product or service. They don’t want to settle for something like it; they
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want exactly what you offer. They just haven’t found you yet. They won’t know
it’s “you” until you MEI them (motivate, educate, and inspire).
#6 – SIMPLICITY
Email is super simple for many reasons. It’s the digital version of what people
used to do back in the olden days—write and send letters. It’s a message that you
type and send to another human being or a group of human beings. It travels to
their inbox within seconds. Amazing.
Anything that makes our lives simpler and more efficient is worth doing.
Meanwhile, social media brings with it several complications that can cause
complexity, chaos, and messes. If you’re focused on success, these are the last
things you want your business to get involved with.
Fake Followers
The New York Times covered the problem of fake followers in their exposé, “The
Follower Factory.”48 In it, they showed how celebrities, athletes, politicians, and
other famous people have millions of fake followers on social media. Some are
bots, and some are fake accounts that people created for whatever reason.
I’ve heard social media “experts” encouraging business owners to buy fake
followers. This is asinine. What good is a fake follower in growing your busi-
ness? Their logic is that it will make your business look more legit in the begin-
ning. Ridiculous. Being legit comes from having a solid product or service that
helps people achieve a positive result.
Even if not you’re not intentionally engaging in fakery, some of the accounts
that follow you might not even be real human beings. They’re created solely for
the purpose of boosting other accounts’ number of followers.
Nothing is real on social media. It’s all about image and BS.
Click Farms
One client told me that “click farms” are a huge problem in social media adver-
tising. Bots click on your paid ad links to drive up advertising costs for you
48 Nicholas Confessore, Gabriel J. X. Dance, Richard Harris, and Mark Hansen,

“The Follower Factory,” New York Times, January 27, 2018,
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/27/technology/social-media-bots.html.
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while boosting profits for the social media platform. This translates into seeing
your social media ad dollars flushed down the toilet.
Digital Waste and Violence

In small and large ways, social media overall is having unseen negative effects
across the board.
A New York Times article reported Sri Lanka shut down social media due to
posts that incited bombings. “(T)he companies that run these platforms seem
incapable of controlling the powerful global tools they have built . . . the toxic
digital waste of misinformation that floods these platforms has overwhelmed
what was once so very good about them.”49
Liabilities
Posting on social media can create a liability for your business, especially if you’re
stupid or careless about what you’re posting. In January 2015, Insureon.com
pointed out that, “Sometimes, a social media misstep is more than just a ding to
your brand’s reputation—some mistakes are lawsuits waiting to happen . . . These
transgressions are often grouped together under the term ‘advertising injuries.’”50
Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, once posted a tweet that triggered an investigation
by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. It ended up costing him $20
million in fines and Tesla a separate $20 million in penalties.51 He was charged
with “misleading investors with tweets.” Hope that tweet was worth it!52
Because of social media’s instantaneous, brainless nature, it induces people
to post stupid, often poorly thought out, or meaningless shit on a daily basis. (I
49 Kara Swisher, “Sri Lanka Shut Down Social Media. My First

Thought Was ‘Good,’” New York Times, April 22, 2019,
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/22/opinion/sri-lanka-facebook-bombings.html.
50 Insureon Staff, “General liability risks from social media,” Insureon, January 13,
2015, https://www.insureon.com/blog/post/2015/01/14/general-liability-risks-from-
social-media.aspx.
51 U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, “Elon Musk Settles SEC Fraud
Charges; Tesla Charged With and Resolves Securities Law Charge,” September 29, 2018,
https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2018-226.
52 Reuters, “Tesla’s Elon Musk says tweet that led to $20 million fine ‘Worth It,’”
Reuters, October 27, 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-musk-tweet/teslas-
elon-musk-says-tweet-that-led-to-20-million-fine-worth-it-idUSKCN1N10K2.
120
guess this is more a function of people’s character—or lack thereof.) There are
horror stories of old tweets and Facebook posts resurfacing and coming back
to haunt people.53 Unless you’ve deleted all your posts, something you casually
posted may turn out to be a source of trouble for you later. Few people put any
deep, meaningful thought into their social media content.
Email Offers Simplicity

Ahhh . . . breathe in this truth. Email provides an uncomplicated way to contact
people. It’s a drama-free medium of communication that lets us keep in touch
with existing and potential customers while MEI’ing them. It’s a refreshing
alternative to the noise and nonsense of social media.
Format-wise, email is one of the simplest things ever. You type words on a
screen and hit send.
It’s fast.
It’s cheap.
It’s environmentally friendly, saving you paper and postage costs.
Anyone can use it.
It encourages deep thinking on your part.
And it forces you to get into the habit of giving great content!
There are no design requirements or formatting restrictions. You can send
plain text emails and make sales. Or if design is your thing, you can use fancy
designs and make sales.
You get to make your own rules!
With email you can create your own “underground society,” where every-
one is focused on the same goals. Instead of being on the surface, in the public
(where lurkers, trolls, and crazies hang out), email takes place where only you
and your subscribers can see what’s happening. It’s less of a liability, and you
invite less crap into your business. This keeps everything clean and simple.
For example, if someone repeatedly complains about your content, you
can simply delete that person from your list. If they’re a repeat problem cus-
tomer who always requests a refund, you can block their IP address, so they
53 Sam Wolfson, “New York Times racism row: how Twitter comes back to haunt
you,” The Guardian, August 3, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/
aug/03/sarah-jeong-new-york-times-twitter-posts-racism.
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can’t reorder or re-subscribe. This allows you to focus your energy on serving
your PFCs.
Because it’s underground, your email list is a tad more private. (I don’t know
about you, but I think privacy is awesome!) Email is also less prone to low-
value conversations.
All of this translates into a beautiful simplicity. Anything that makes your
business simpler and more successful is worth doing. (Ever notice simplicity
and truth are always closely tied together?)
In a complicated, messy world, simplicity is a gift. Use it!
#7 – HIGH RETURN ON INVESTMENT (ROI)
Years ago, when I was starting out as a copywriter, I came across a stat that
mesmerized me: for every dollar businesses spend on email marketing, they get
an average of $43.62 back. This stat is based on research done by the Direct
Marketing Association in 2009. “As such, [email] outperforms all the other
direct marketing channels examined, such as print catalogs.”54
Obviously, this “research” is over a decade old, from a time when social media
was still in its infancy. And it could be considered biased due to the source. But
I remember reading it and thinking, “Sign me up!”
Harvard Business Review echoed this in their August 2012 article, “Why
Email Marketing is King.” In it, they pointed out that “email messages are dirt
cheap to send.” And unlike with TV and print ads, you can easily measure and
track the results of your emails, making the ROI even more tangible. “With
email, you know within 24 hours exactly which messages have been opened,
by whom, what links the openers clicked on, and what part of your message
was working.”55
A more recent article from eMarketer (from June 2016) states, “In general,
email continues to be the most cost-effective choice when measured up against
other digital marketing tactics. Email had a median ROI of 122%, accord-
ing to US marketers polled June 2016 by the Data & Marketing Association
and Demand Metric. Email’s ROI was well above those for digital marketing
54 Lorrie Thomas, The McGraw-Hill 36-Hour Course: Online Marketing, (New York:
McGraw-Hill, 2011), 175.
55 Arthur Middleton Hughes, “Why Email Marketing is King,” Harvard Business Re-
view, August 21, 2012, https://hbr.org/2012/08/why-email-marketing-is-king.
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approaches like social media and paid search . . .”56 I’ve seen some marketing
organizations cite ROIs as high as 2,600% and 3,800% for email marketing.57
So who’s right? Who’s exaggerating? What is the real ROI on email market-
ing? It totally depends on you, your unique business, and how you use email as
a form of communication.
Today email still offers a high ROI, but only if you use it to MEI people con-
sistently. As an anti-marketer, I have years of personal experience confirming
this. I’ve worked with clients who are committed to building and emailing their
lists. The ones who prioritize their email list above all else are the ones who sell
more online, generating millions of dollars in net profits. Those who don’t take
their email list seriously often struggle to sell online (despite being super active
on social media). There must be a correlation here. Like the man refusing help
from the fireman, the Navy SEAL, and the police officer, they tweet too much
and ignore their email list, to their own demise.
Having read and observed hundreds of email newsletters over the years, I’ve
noticed key patterns and themes among those that inspire me to buy and those
that don’t. It always come back to the MEI principle and whether the sender is
motivating, educating, and inspiring people on their list. I’ve written emails for
myself and clients, and I’ve seen the favorable results of creating simple, easy-to-
read emails that MEI.
If marketers and anti-marketers alike can agree that email offers a high ROI
(which will vary depending on you and your business), then it fucking works!
Why does email offer such a great ROI? Because of all the reasons I’ve men-
tioned thus far: ownership, total creative control, direct access to buyers, per-
mission-based, higher-quality subscribers, and simplicity. All of these combine
to create the ultimate kick-ass platform through which to MEI people.
This leads us to the final reason why email rocks . . .
56 Danielle Drolet, “Email Outperforms Social Media, Paid Search for ROI,” eMar-
keter, December 23, 2016, https://www.emarketer.com/Article/Email-Outperforms-So-
cial-Media-Paid-Search-ROI/1014905.
57 Brian Marsh, “Email Marketing Budgets: Spend This Much For 122% ROI [And
How To Do It],” WebStrategies, May 1, 2017, https://www.webstrategiesinc.com/blog/
email-marketing-budgets-spend-this-much-on-email-marketing-for-122-roi.
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#8 – AN IDEAL PLATFORM THROUGH

WHICH TO GIVE, MEI, AND SELL
When you put all these characteristics together, email is the perfect platform
through which to give, MEI, and sell. Even if you’re just emailing one person, it
can open up the door to thousands of dollars’ worth of business.
Building and emailing a list successfully requires you to adopt the giving
principle. It builds character. You’ll be dedicating time, energy, and money to
creating great content, all of which are things only a giver can do. You’ll be
acting selflessly, serving your readers. The more great content you give, the more
you’ll receive—as long as you’re giving appropriately through email.
Email levels the playing field. It’s the perfect medium through which to use
the MEI(S) principle: motivate, educate, inspire, and sell!
Your biggest challenges with email are mostly creative in nature. You’ll have
to figure out how to:
• Draw people into your email list via a relevant free offer
• Qualify your subscribers by measuring intent
• Come up with compelling subject lines
• Write quality articles that include a call to action (CTA)
• Perfect your offer, so that every time you send an email, you’re making
money (depending on your list size and business model)
The better you get at building and mailing a list, the more money you’ll make.
It’s an art and a science. It can reach the point where each time you broadcast
an email, you can make huge profits. (My clients do this all the time.) On the
flip side, PFCs will love reading your emails. They’ll be served by your content.
(And if they don’t love it, they can always unsubscribe.)
The only way to fail at this is not to build your list and not email it consis-
tently with content that MEI(S).
THE MONEY IS IN THE LIST
There’s a saying, “The money is in the list.” It is absolutely true. But the big
money is in following up with your list on a regular basis.
I once spoke to a guy who had 5,000 subscribers on his list, but he hadn’t
sent them an email in 6 months. No wonder his business was flatlining. People
were forgetting that his store even existed. If you’re going to have an email list,
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commit yourself to MEI’ing those subscribers with great content for years
to come.
Pick a content cadence: daily, weekly, biweekly, or whatever works best
for you.
I can’t emphasize the “following up” part enough. Remember how I fol-
lowed up with Shane Ellison a year after he initially said no? That led to a “yes,”
hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of writing projects, and a profitable
business relationship that has benefitted both of us for over seven years. All of
that came from me sending an email. (Shane has also been subscribed to my
email list for years! He follows my tips and makes millions in sales through his
own email list!)
Building your list will bring back dividends forever, if you do it!
THE EXCEPTION IS NOT THE RULE
I can hear some of you protesting, “But Michelle, so-and-so said they make
millions advertising their business on social media.” While some companies do
make money on social media, they’re the exception, not the rule. They figured
out how to accommodate the middleman. They hired a specialist whose sole
job is to stay on top of the ever-changing algorithms. If you look behind the
scenes, most of these companies are making big money because they’re fun-
neling followers back to their email list—where they’re following up, sending
regular newsletter content, and making offers. That’s why many of them are
making money. The big sales are being made on the back end, through the email
list or through phone calls.
If you use social media at all, use it primarily to bring PFCs back to your
email list where you can MEI them, serve them, and make sales.
TRUE STORY
How “Sweetening the Pill” Raised $119K in 30 Days by Getting Access to

Direct Email Lists
“Sweetening the Pill” (STP) is a documentary in production that aims to expose
the dangers of hormonal birth control. It’s directed by Abby Epstein and execu-
tive produced by Ricki Lake. I found out about the project in late 2015, thanks
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to a natural health-related email list that I was subscribed to. The list owner
briefly mentioned STP in an email newsletter.
Using a Kickstarter campaign,58 the STP team raised $119K in 30 days to
help fund the film’s production.59 In 2016, I interviewed Epstein, asking how
they did it. “These campaigns revolve around getting access to mailing lists,” she
said. “Direct email is the best way to attract backers.”
“How much of a boost did Ricki Lake’s celebrity status provide in terms of
getting media exposure for your campaign?” I asked. “And what advice would
you give to business owners who are not necessarily connected to any celebrities
if their goal is to build awareness around a certain campaign or mission?”
“In the end, I’m actually not sure how much the celebrity status helps,” she
said. “We have done campaigns in the past where Ricki appeared on a national
TV show to promote a crowdfunding campaign, and it didn’t move the needle
one bit toward reaching our goal. I think the best advice is to connect to the
community/audience for your project about six to twelve months in advance of
the campaign launch and start to build your network.”
(The full written interview is available on my website.60)
Key takeaways: build your network. Collect email addresses. Connect with
your audience. Do this for six to twelve months or longer.
Guess what? Email is the perfect tool to do all of the above!
A FINAL NOTE
With billions of people on the planet, there’s no shortage of people to reach.

There are no restrictions on how much great content you can produce. If you
have truly valuable content to share, then someone will benefit by reading your
58 “Sweetening the Pill,” Kickstarter campaign created by Abby Epstein and

Ricki Lake. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/92756815/sweetening-the-pill-a-doc-
umentary/description.
59 “Sweetening the Pill” was still in production as of the writing of this book. Ac-
cording to a February 24, 2020 update on the Kickstarter page, they changed the film title
to “The Business of Birth Control.” https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/92756815/
sweetening-the-pill-a-documentary/posts.
60 Michelle Lopez, “How to Promote Natural Birth Control, Raise $119K in 30
Days, and Call Out the Toxicity of ‘The Pill’—Even When the World Seems to Be Against
You,” AntiMarketingManifesto.com, March 27, 2016,
http://antimarketingmanifesto.com/sweetening-the-pill-interview/.
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material. With your unique personality and life experiences, you can write an
endless amount of creative content. The possibilities are limitless. As your list
grows, you can impact more people and make more sales.
Because you can keep growing it for years to come, your email list is a replen-
ishing resource, one in which you and your subscribers win by participating.
You can generate lots of positive energy—and better yet, money—by growing
an email list. So go out there and find yourself some well-qualified subscribers!
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CHAPTER 9:
Grow Your List with a

Funnel You Love
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but

no simpler.”
— Albert Einstein
“Jen” is a business owner who makes and sells handmade jewelry. She uses
gemstones, metal, and other objects that come together to form unique, rare
pieces—necklaces, rings, and earrings—that delight a certain kind of customer.
Her pieces are vastly different from store-bought jewelry; they’re artful, hand-
crafted, and speak to the soul.
Jen is a true artist at heart and pours her whole being into making beautiful
things for women to wear. She’s a walking billboard for her business because
she’s always wearing her own products. When women see her creations in
person (usually on her), they “oooh” and “ahhh” for a good five to ten minutes.
Usually this leads to a friendly conversation. They become so enamored, many
of them ask, “How can I buy one?” Even though they’re total strangers, they
immediately assume Jen’s jewelry costs a lot. They’re ready to fork over $50
to $100 per item. They think, “I never buy jewelry. This is my chance! This is
the piece I’ve been waiting for. I have room in my budget for this. If not, I’ll
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make room. Please God, let there be one of this exact kind available for sale.”
They assume Jen is sold out of everything because her pieces are so amazing
and unique.
Before she even opens her mouth, these women are sold. They’re great can-
didates for becoming perfect-fit customers. They’re 90 percent ready to hand
Jen their money. But before they can officially become PFCs, Jen needs to do
her part by taking their money.
But something strange happens.
In response to the question, “How can I buy one?” Jen shuts down emo-
tionally. She squirms, fidgets, delays, and shrinks. Bites her lip. Cringes. Acts
as if she wants to run and hide. Even though she’s been asked this question a
hundred times, she’s always deeply uncertain of how to answer and whether it’s
OK to answer. It’s as if someone asked her to summarize how quantum physics
works in one sentence.
From this point forward, everything Jen says and does kills the sale. If
this were a movie, the audience would be like, “Noooooo, girl! Just take their
money!” It becomes evident real quick that Jen hasn’t given any thought or con-
sideration into letting people pay her, let alone how to make it easy for them to
buy from her. She’s self-conscious, focused on her own internal drama.
She has no “funnel.”
No way to accept payments.
No clear process for confirming the sale.
No repeatable system or method for closing a deal that’s 90 percent done.
She has issues about receiving money for her creations.
Because of all of this, Jen can’t make money while she’s awake, let alone while
she’s asleep. She’s a broke artist and business owner.
“I can bring my jewelry collection to you, and you can pick out which one
you want,” she mutters. Too little too late. She assumes each woman only wants
to buy one piece, if that.
Polite but unsure, the potential customer nods and says, “OK.”
But somehow it never happens. The collection is never seen in person
because the logistics aren’t clear. The details of “when, what, why, and how”
aren’t specified. Does Jen really expect people to follow her outside to her car?
To her hotel room? To her house? It gets confusing. What seemed like an easy
“hell yeah” purchase morphs into a hassle. Plus, the woman on the other end of
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G row Y our L ist with a F unnel Y ou L ove
the transaction is pressed for time. She’s on her way to some other engagement.
As a last resort, she asks, “Do you have a website or anything?”
Embarrassed, Jen gives the would-be customer a business card that lacks a
picture of her and a call to action. In tiny font, all it shows are her Instagram,
Twitter, and Facebook page URLs. Jen never hears from the person again.
TAKE THEIR MONEY!
It doesn’t matter whether these women find Jen’s jewelry in person or online. It
all ends the same: she does something to push away the sale and lose a potential
perfect-fit customer forever. She lets easy sales fall through the cracks of her
insecurity. This is the story of Jen’s life—and her business.
This blunder happens online too. Women stumble upon Jen’s Instagram
page (featuring her jewelry). They’re intrigued and start binge scrolling through
her posts. They decide they want to purchase something, but there are no
instructions on how to do so. They DM her, saying, “I LOVE your yellow heart
stone necklace! How can I buy it?”
Not really expecting anyone to buy anything, Jen usually ignores these
inquiries. If she responds at all, she waits four days—then doesn’t give a straight
answer: “Give me your number, and we can chat.” “Give me your email addy,
and we can discuss.” “Thanks so much! Glad you like the necklace! It’s avail-
able for purchase on my Etsy page.” (No link or instructions given. No clear
process outlined.)
By this point, the person DM’ing loses interest. They sense complication
coming, and they run! They don’t want to give Jen their phone number or
email. They don’t want to discuss anything. What’s to discuss? They just want
the price, availability, and a link to pay, so they can buy the product and move
on. To them, these additional requests seem like a hassle. They’re irrelevant and
add no value to the buying experience.
Another sale lost.
For Jen to grow her business, she needs to adopt the mentality that people
want to give her their money. They want to buy her jewelry and have it shipped
to their doorstep without any drama. She needs to stop doing things (uncon-
sciously) that make it hard, if not impossible, for people to pay her. She needs
to stop complicating her sales process. She needs to stop creating friction in
the customer experience, stop creating slight irritations that lead a person
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who is 90 percent sold on buying her product to change his or her mind due
to technicalities.
Even if you have a great product, people won’t buy it if you make it a pain
in the ass for them to pay you. They won’t get started or place their order if you
introduce hassles into the process.
ELIMINATE FRICTION—MAKE IT EASY TO PAY
Roger Dooley, author of the book Friction, says, “Every year, more than $4 tril-
lion worth of merchandise is abandoned in e-commerce shopping carts. That’s
more than twice the amount of e-commerce sales.”61
Why does this abandonment happen? The top reasons are frictional in
nature, meaning the business creates tiny little hassles for customers—they have
to set up an account in order to buy; the checkout process is confusing; there
are “surprises” during checkout, it’s hard to figure out what the cost of shipping
is until customers have already spent fifteen minutes filling up their shopping
carts, etc. The “etcetera” consists of all the tiny (or large) hassles—physical,
mental, and psychological—that you force people to go through in order to pay
you. It’s precisely the stuff that wrecks your ability to sell and be paid!
Friction isn’t a problem specific to e-commerce. It can happen anywhere,
both online and offline, for product businesses and service businesses. People
like Jen bring drama into their sales process (usually unintentionally), and this
kills the sale over and over again. It’s not like she’s killing cold leads who have
zero interest in her product; she’s killing a warm lead who’s already 90 percent
sold on her product. That’s a huge problem!
As a copywriter, I’ve often seen friction show up in a company’s funnel or
lack thereof. Your funnel is the system or process in which you MEI perfect-fit
customers and make it easy for them to pay you. Your funnel is all the stuff
(either online or online) that lays out the sales process in a clear path: A, then
B, then C. It can be a combination of landing pages, websites, sales pages, phone
calls, emails, autoresponders, or other things that make it easy for customers to
pay you.
61 Roger Dooley, “The Force Your Business Doesn’t Need with Roger Dool-
ey,” The Entrepreneurship Elevated Podcast. 47:00. August 5, 2019, https://podcasts.
apple.com/us/podcast/the-force-your-business-doesnt-need-with-roger-dooley/
id940156245?i=1000446180255. Listen at around the 10:43 mark.
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IS YOUR SALES PROCESS WELL THOUGHT OUT?
Have you ever given serious thought to your funnel—a.k.a. your unique process
of selling? Have you put yourself in your PFCs’ shoes and asked, “What would
make it easy for them to place an order?”
Few business owners do this. Most people are so self-conscious and embar-
rassed that they focus more on themselves and their insecurities than on serving
their customers’ needs and wants. The result is a poorly thought out funnel or
sales process. Some people can’t get out of their own head, so they sabotage the
sale repeatedly. This wrecks their business over the long term.
I have a theory that the more a person resists growing their business (serving
PFCs and making sales), the more they’ll resist setting up an effective funnel.
Why? Because a well-thought-out, well-structured funnel leads to all of the
above in a drama-free fashion. A great funnel gives you more opportunities to
reach people, MEI them, make sales, serve PFCs, and grow your business. If,
deep down, you’re opposed to any of this, you won’t set up a funnel that works.
You’ll avoid it.
YOUR FUNNEL SHOWS HOW COMMITTED YOU ARE
Your funnel isn’t just a technical thing you set up; it’s an indication of how
committed you are to growing your business, serving your PFCs, selling, and
making money.
People resist setting up their funnel because, deep down, they aren’t fully
committed to growing their business, for whatever reason. They don’t want it
badly enough. (Yeah, I said it.) Maybe they’re in the wrong business. Maybe
they don’t want to face the rejection that comes with selling. Whatever truth
they’re avoiding, they’ll happily do everything but create a funnel that brings
them high-quality leads and sales on autopilot.
If you secretly don’t love your business (or any aspect of it), you’ll avoid
investing in the creation of a great funnel. #FoodForThought.
MY OWN EXPERIENCE WITH FUNNELS
For years I didn’t take my business seriously, even though I thought I did. I said
I wanted to grow, but deep down, I didn’t. This was evident by the many experi-
mental, half-assed funnels that I set up, with zero results. I made wacky offers
133
that nobody was asking for and nobody was interested in (e.g., “For just $997, I
can help you get your head out of your ass.” LOL).
I was creative, had strong linguistic talent, and obviously had a sense of
humor, but I wasn’t using any of it appropriately to grow my business.
All the funnels I created were more a form of self-entertainment than
anything else. Deep down I was trying to convince myself I was a real business
owner rather than just accepting that I was one, moving on, and keeping my
focus on serving my clients.
I was missing the point. The purpose of a funnel is to make it easier for
perfect-fit customers to find you, be MEI’d by you, pay you, and love what you
sell. That’s it. It’s not there to make a business owner more real or legit or to
make her feel better about herself. Those are things the business owner should
be doing on her own, through therapy, or by talking to God, not through pro-
jecting her issues onto her funnel.
For years my biggest problem was that I wasn’t listening to what my clients
were actually requesting. They wanted very specific outcomes. They wanted me
to turn projects over quickly. They wanted everything written in their voice, not
someone else’s. They wanted a high quality of writing that would be easy for
them to edit. They wanted me to respond to emails quickly and treat them as if
they were my only client. They wanted me to always give them my best quality
of work. They didn’t want a shred of drama, excuses, or BS from me because
they were too busy, focused, and success minded to deal with that.
Once I got all of this, I was like, “Shit, I need to deliver this level of service
more often.” That became my new MO. I got great at delivering on all of the
above. Eventually, I increased my rates and started working with even better
clients: people who value funnels, email content, and sales. Yeah!
I STARTED DELIVERING GREAT FUNNELS
Then the unthinkable happened: I got my head out of my ass, and things started
to turn around! Clients began asking me for help with writing their funnel
content. I never had any official training on funnels, but I got paid upwards of
$15,000 to write a complete funnel, including sales page, landing page, email
autoresponders, and Google ads.
The work came easily to me, it took a week to crank out, and it was fun. More
importantly, it gave my clients the results they wanted in the form of increased
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opt-ins, higher-quality leads, and more online sales. It created recurring revenue
for the client and me for years to come.
Despite my lack of formal training, I’ve always intuitively known how a
good funnel works because I’m good at thinking like a clueless/uninformed/
unaware customer—someone who is entering your business without any prior
knowledge of what you’re about. They’re starting from a blank slate. They’re
interested in your stuff but don’t know what to do next, and it’s your job to guide
them through the process. The process needs to be spelled out intuitively—A,
B, and C.
Enter the funnel. It’s the place where intuitiveness meets rationality, which
gives birth to pure awesomeness. Your funnel guides “clueless people” through a
simple process of understanding exactly what you offer, so they can self-select as
your ideal customer (or not).
People who aren’t your PFCs will self-select right outta your way (usually).
Those who are PFCs will be 90 percent sold on your product before you even
talk to them. Then it’s your job to meet them where they are and complete the
remaining 10 percent of the transaction by taking their money!
TAKE THEIR MONEY!
It bears repeating for all the Jens out there: when people want your product,
give it to them! Take their money! This isn’t hard. You don’t need to discount
your products to high hell and back either. Just take the payment. When you
love your business, are serious about growing it, and you’re ready to get paid on
autopilot, you’re ready to set up a funnel.
THE BASIC COMPONENTS OF A FUNNEL
No matter what you’re selling, every funnel has five basic components:
• Landing page with free gift
• Email autoresponders (ARs)
• Sales page
• YouTube video
• Traffic
If you’re new to funnels, I encourage you to learn about each component in
depth by reading my blog article, “Sales Funnel 101: The Basic Components of
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an ‘Anti-Marketing’ Funnel,” on my website at www.antimarketingmanifesto.

com/funnel.
If you already know about funnels, you can skim that article as a refresher.
The way to use the Anti-Marketing Manifesto in your funnels is to do exactly
what we’ve been talking about throughout this book: put your true self, your
personality, your values, your perspectives, your voice, and a pic of you into each
piece of your funnel. Put you into your landing page, sales page, emails, Google
ads, and YouTube video! This is a great way to personalize your funnel and really
connect with your perfect-fit customers.
“JOIN OUR EMAIL LIST” DOESN’T CUT IT!
Note: When thinking about your free gift or opt-in offer for your landing page,
don’t be lazy or trite. Slapping the phrase “Sign up for our newsletter” onto your
main website does not count as an enticing free gift! Few people go around
looking for email newsletters to subscribe to.
But people love signing up for free stuff that’s relevant to their interests.
People love free gifts, free samples, helpful cheat sheets and checklists, and
interesting short things to read—especially ones that are rare, unique, fun, or
insightful. People will also gladly sign up for a chance to win free products that
look appealing to them.
SET UP YOUR FUNNEL!
As an anti-marketer, you need a funnel. Period. It’s not only one of the best ways
to sell without being a sellout, it’s also a great way to leverage your time, energy,
and money, so you can MEI thousands of people 24/7.
When you have a clear, succinct, well-optimized funnel that actually brings
the results you want (more opt-ins, more qualified leads, more sales, more
profits, and more customers’ lives transformed for the better), it’s because
everything is laid out perfectly, making it super easy for people to buy from you.
The way to take your funnel seriously is to listen to what your PFCs are
requesting, then find a way to deliver it to them in a consistent fashion. Put the
entire sales process into a funnel, so you reach new people regularly.
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PUT YOUR REAL SELF INTO YOUR FUNNEL
Customers today are demanding businesses to be more transparent, account-

able, and human in everything they do. So you’d better put your real self into
your sales funnel! This is the fun part! Your funnel should give people a quick
understanding of who you are, what you deliver, and the benefit or value you
give to people, so they know if they’re in the right place or not.
Forget the ads you’ve seen from “funnel experts” who talk too fast and don’t
know how to breathe. You’re not obligated to use anyone’s formula or script. It’s
your funnel, after all. Just tap into your real self, your values, and your perspec-
tives, and lay it all out in a well-organized funnel. This is what will MEI people.
(If you need my help with this, see the section toward the end of this book,
“The Anti-Sales Pitch: Should I Take You on as My Next Client?”)
FINAL OUTCOME
You know something’s working when people are signing up through your
landing page (or even your website), reading your emails, clicking your links,
buying your stuff, and then emailing you, saying, “I love this product! Thanks
for offering it! Great job! Will be placing an order for more soon!” And they
actually follow through because you keep sending them emails as part of your
MEI’ing strategy. They never forget you’re there.
TAKE THE FRICTION OUT OF YOUR SALES PROCESS
In what ways are you creating friction for your customers?

• Are you unintentionally pulling a “Jen” on people who are 90 percent
sold on your product, causing them to not buy from you after all?
• Do you make it hard for people to pay you?
• Do you have seventeen links in your navigation menu?
• Do you have fifty more links in your dropdown menus?
• Do you have two or more separate websites instead of putting everything
under one solid brand and site?
• Is your “buy” button broken? Do you have other broken links through-
out your website or sales page?
• Do you have fifteen options to choose from, and do you force customers
to wade through these options when placing an order?
137
• Does your home page look like it’s from 1999, yet you claim your
business is all about innovation, technology, and keeping up with the
latest trends?
• Is your website ugly, though IRL you love beautiful things?
“Come on, man,” Obama said. You can do better.

You, your real self, and your values need to be reflected in every nook and
cranny of your business, including your funnel. This is precisely the stuff that
impacts your ability to sell.
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CHAPTER 10:
Don’t Outsource Your Essentials
“There are two kinds of artists left: those who endorse Pepsi
and those who simply won’t.”
— Annie Lennox
Do you outsource the essential components of your business to someone else?

Do you expect other people to take care of your content, your sales, and your
relationship with your customers? If so, then you’re creating clutter and confu-
sion for your market. I’ll illustrate this with a couple of stories.
Years ago I subscribed to “Sheila’s” email list because I wanted to learn more
about her insights on a particular topic. She was a trained specialist in women’s
reproductive health. She sold products that helped women ditch the pill (a
toxic pharmaceutical drug) and monitor their menstrual cycle naturally. Her
natural method was proven to be 99 percent effective and much safer than the
pill. Sheila had an app, a journal, and other products to help women track their
bodies’ signals.
“Badass,” I thought. “Fuck the pill. Tell me more.” I was eager to read Sheila’s
unique perspectives on this topic. However, soon after I subscribed to her email
list, I learned she wasn’t interested in sharing her insights.
Right off the bat, she sent several emails plugging the products of other com-
panies for whom she was an affiliate. She promoted their stuff, none of which
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had anything to do with Sheila, her teachings, her business, or her products.
Within a week I’d been inundated with affiliate offers and joint-venture part-
nership emails. Sheila wrote about how her “good friend” was selling a success
mindset program at a special price, how her other “good friend” was offering
a teleseminar on crystal healing, and how her third “good friend” was offering
essential oils at a discount, for a limited time.
This went on for weeks.
“Enough already!” I thought. Where’s your content? Teach me a natural way
to track my cycle already!”
Not once did I receive the information I was so eager to read. All the emails
from Sheila were ads promoting other people’s shit. I got confused and annoyed.
“What the hell did I subscribe to?” Sadly for Sheila, I had no interest in any of
those affiliate offers.
I wanted to tell her, “I just signed up to your email list. I want to hear what
you have to say and what you’re offering. But you’re too damn busy telling me
about what other companies are selling, launching, and doing.”
Big disappointment.
I got tired of the clutter in my inbox, so I unsubscribed. Bummer because I
had really liked the initial content I’d seen from Sheila on her website.
What was happening here? The problem was, Sheila was outsourcing her
essentials—her content, her MEI’ing, her sales, and her relationship with her
customers—to someone else. Instead of taking care of those things herself, she
was relying on affiliates to do it for her. She was failing to give me (and other
subscribers) her own unique content and perspectives. She was failing to keep
her focus on her business and offerings—and therefore, failing to build a rela-
tionship with her actual market.
Sheila was avoiding motivating, educating, and inspiring (MEI’ing) her
audience. This is a costly mistake in business. All the affiliate offers and joint-
venture offers confused and ultimately drove away PFCs like me.
That’s why it felt like a slap in the face when I realized that years ago, I’d
done the very same thing . . .
I DABBLED WITH AFFILIATE MARKETING
Years before I took my business seriously, I experimented with affiliate market-

ing. In 2011, I became aware of two companies in two different industries that
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D on ’ t O utsource Y our E ssentials
offered to pay a percentage of sales for any referrals that affiliates generated.
Since I was in dire need of cash, I signed up.
Meanwhile, I was not very good at selling my own writing and editing ser-
vices. Selling was hard for me. I avoided mastering this work and instead flocked
to the lottery-like allure of selling other people’s packages and programs. It was
a distraction and an escape mechanism—a nice way of avoiding facing my own
inability (or refusal) to sell. At the time I didn’t know that’s what I was doing. I
thought affiliate marketing would help me make money.
I occupied myself with busywork. I plugged those companies’ products to
my email list. I spammed my network with their offers. I used their pre-made
sales copy, tweaked it, and blasted it out to my subscribers. All of this took
up valuable hours, days, and weeks of my life. What was the result? A couple
hundred bucks earned in commissions.
“Cool,” I thought. It was “free” money. Why not enjoy it? I’m sure I used it
to pay bills.
But the money wasn’t actually free. The time and energy I’d invested into
being someone else’s affiliate (even temporarily) could have been used to grow
my own business in more meaningful ways.
The problem was I was diverting my attention and efforts away from the
things that mattered most to my business just to earn some petty cash. I was
playing around with other people’s affiliate marketing programs (i.e., outsourc-
ing my sales) instead of focusing all my efforts on finding and serving my own
perfect-fit clients. I mistakenly thought affiliate marketing was the answer to
my ongoing cash crunch. It wasn’t.
By not selling my own services, I was selling out on my actual business.
Ironically, the two business owners doing the affiliate programs were also
selling out on their businesses. They were outsourcing their sales, message, and
MEI’ing efforts to me and hundreds of other affiliates. They were appealing to
broke-ass people who wanted to make “extra cash” by selling their products for
them. In reality, these people didn’t understand how to sell their own products
effectively. The root cause of this mess was that no one knew how to sell their
own shit, so they were looking for an easy fix.
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THE REAL ISSUE—YOU RESIST SELLING YOUR OWN PRODUCT
No matter which end you’re sitting on, affiliate marketing is a quick fix to a
larger problem or internal resistance: you refuse to sell your own product or
service. You refuse to take your business growth seriously. For many people,
affiliate marketing is a form of outsourcing the essentials to other people.
Those essentials are: 1) your content (MEI’ing), 2) your relationships with
your customers, 3) and your sales. These aren’t things you can hand over to
someone else.
Back in my early days, affiliate marketing appealed to me precisely because I
hadn’t figured out how to make real, consistent money in my business. I hadn’t
figured out how to deliver on what I’d promised to clients. That was a painful
and embarrassing reality to look at, so I ignored it.
Figuring how to sell requires internal work, such as examining yourself, your
habits, your beliefs and behaviors, and sacrificing anything that doesn’t move
you forward. For most people, that’s uncomfortable. It’s easier to turn your
attention to a bright, shiny object, like affiliate marketing. It appears safer, but
that’s based on the false hope that “Other people will find customers for me
and sell my product better than I can.” Many people can’t stomach the intense
self-honesty required to be successful in sales. (I couldn’t for the longest time.)
In truth, I wasn’t devoting myself fully to my real work—writing. I was
halfway in. I was messing around with other things that weren’t my true calling,
passion, or purpose. Affiliate crap wasn’t the winning strategy for growing my
business, income, or profits in a sustainable way. It was a total time waster.
Dabbling and devotion are two different things that require vastly differ-
ent mindsets. When you dabble in your business, you outsource your essentials
(like expecting someone else to eat, breathe, and exercise for you). When you’re
devoted to your business, you take care of the essentials yourself and take full
responsibility for everything that’s important.
Many business owners don’t take responsibility for their essentials. They’d
rather do affiliate marketing because they think it will be easier—as if other
people will take care of the hard stuff for them. If you expect others to build
your business for you, without you putting too much effort into it or putting
your own ass on the line, then this is wishful thinking.
It boils down to a refusal or a resistance to selling your own product.
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HOW COMMITTED ARE YOU?
If your goal is merely to make “extra money,” that’s a sign you’re not fully com-
mitted to or devoted to your actual business. You’re not taking your work seri-
ously. You’re in the “side hustle” mentality. If you were serious about growing
your business, you’d be focusing all your energy on building relationships with
paying customers, MEI’ing them with great content, selling to them directly,
and dancing all the way to the bank. You’d be taking care of your essentials,
doing whatever it takes to be successful.
If you’re seeking extra cash, looking for others to be brand ambassadors for
your business (or vice versa), or asking “influencers” to plug your products as
your primary growth strategy, then you’re outsourcing your essentials. You’re
looking for an escape. You’re shunning the work required to sell your own
product and make meaningful sales. You’re either avoiding something that
scares you or avoiding something you don’t want to face.
If that’s the case, are you truly invested in your company’s growth?
DO YOU HAVE THE RIGHT MOTIVES?
Why would people be opposed to growing their own business? Why would
someone avoid sales—the very thing that brings them money?
Because they have the wrong motives. Maybe they started their business
(or are doing their business) merely for attention, for revenge, to please their
parents, or to pay the bills. There’s no deeper reason for it than that, so deep
down, they don’t really care about or love their business.
If you don’t love your business, you won’t go out of your way to grow it. You
won’t set up a funnel that works, you won’t create content that you’re proud
of, and you certainly won’t prioritize sales or interacting with customers. Even
if you have a fantastic product or service (like Sheila with her natural birth
control products), you won’t sell much of it—for reasons that are seemingly
beyond comprehension.
This translates into negative consequences. I’ve seen people botch huge
opportunities to grow their business, serve more people, and sell more because
they had “deeper issues.” They resisted selling and being successful. They had
hidden motives, ensuring they would always be distracted by worthless activi-
ties that led to them outsourcing their essentials.
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Months after I unsubscribed from Sheila’s email list, I found out she closed
her ecommerce store and stopped selling her products altogether. She cited
“changes in the global economy” as the main reason why she couldn’t sell her
products online. Bullshit. Her real problem was she was outsourcing her essen-
tials. She wasn’t willing to sell her own products. She was focused on the wrong
things. These are all huge driving factors of someone going out of business.
These deeper issues are often reflected in someone’s lack of an effective
funnel, lack of consistent content that MEIs, and friction that pushes perfect-fit
customers away. These issues cause a business owner to be self-centered rather
than customer-centric.
DON’T OUTSOURCE YOUR ESSENTIALS!
As I’ve already mentioned, your business has three essential components: 1)

your relationships with your perfect-fit customers, 2) your content, and 3) your
sales. These are not optional. Ignoring any of these is worse than pulling the tag
off the mattress—it’s chopping off a limb. Without all three, you don’t have a
business. At best, you have a business that’s hiding out.
Don’t outsource your essentials. Don’t rely on other people to do the most
important work for you on behalf of your business.
GET FOCUSED!
Outsourcing your essentials robs you of focusing on the things that matter.
Getting involved with multiple schemes—whether it’s affiliate marketing,
joint-venture partnerships, networking, sharing lists, multi-level marketing,
or kissing the ass of your peers or competitors—takes time, energy, and focus
away from growing your business. It’s a glorified way to avoid selling your own
product. It distracts you from zeroing in on the one solid thing that works big
time. This results in a scattered, unfocused mind, and it demolishes the cohe-
siveness of your brand (if you had one to begin with).
If you fail to focus, you’ll get distracted by everything. You’ll try to bring in
money from random sources at the expense of growing your core business. It’s
fine to have a side hustle, but don’t kid yourself about something that you’re
doing part-time, half-heartedly, or just to pay bills. Do you want to grow your
side hustle, or do you want to put everything into growing your real business?
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FORGET AFFILIATE MARKETING—GO FOR DIRECT SALES!
I know, I know . . . I can feel the hate coming on, and I can hear the gasps in
response to what I’ve been saying. But hear me out!
If you truly love affiliate marketing, joint ventures, or all that other stuff I
mentioned, and you know it’s your life calling, and you’re already pouring your
heart and soul into it and making big money with it, skip the rest of this chapter.
You’ve got everything mastered. But if you feel like you should be doing affiliate
marketing (or any other tactic) because everyone else is doing it, or you think
it’s your key to extra cash, keep reading.
First, understand that affiliate marketing is very different from direct
sales—i.e., selling directly to the customer. In affiliate marketing, a middleman
is involved. You’re either selling someone else’s product and getting a portion
of the profits while leveraging (or hiding) behind their brand, their company,
their sales copy, and/or their rules for selling, or you’re paying your own affili-
ates a commission to sell your product for you, with an affiliate link, on behalf
of your business.
In direct sales, you sell directly to the customer while keeping 100 percent
of the profits. There’s no third party, no partners, and no referrals. There’s no
drama either. You take responsibility for figuring out how to sell your products
without begging or bribing others to sell them for you. It’s essential that one
of the most important pieces of your business (along with your content and
relationships) stays on your desk: the ability to sell your own products.
I once heard an interview in which a female entrepreneur was praised for
having a “successful” seven-figure multi-level marketing (MLM) business. After
looking at her website, I didn’t think it looked like much of a business. I reached
out to her for an interview, thinking maybe I could mention her as a rare success
story in affiliate marketing. I wanted to dig deeper and determine why she
had succeeded with MLM. Was she devoted? Did she truly love it? Was it her
life’s purpose?
She told me privately the interview I’d heard was “very old info. . . Sorry
Michelle. Running a MLM was one of the worst experiences due to catty
women that fought each other due to position.” Wow! That just proved my
point further.
Forget affiliate marketing and all the drama that comes with it. Learn how to
sell directly to your customers!
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RESISTANCE TO GROWING YOUR BUSINESS
Do you resist motivating, educating, and inspiring (MEI’ing) your own audi-
ence—and therefore, ask others to MEI people for you?
Do you resist building relationships with perfect-fit customers—and there-
fore, ask others (who’ve already built relationships with their customers) to
refer people to you?
Do you resist making sales—and therefore, rely on others to sell for you?
Is your primary growth strategy to reach out to influencers or famous people
because you think they’ll be better at selling your product than you?
These are all signs that you resist taking full rein over the essentials of your
business. You resist growing. You’re outsourcing things that have no business
being outsourced. It’s like asking someone to hold your heart in their chest
cavity for you. Absurd. But business owners do this all the time when it comes
to their essentials.
It’s never worth it. There are always negative outcomes to outsourcing your
essentials—brand dilution, customer confusion, and even loss of your entire
business overnight because you built it on a house of cards.
BRAND DILUTION AND CUSTOMER CONFUSION
In 2011, I observed a common behavior in email marketing. In certain circles,

multiple people would plug the same person’s product launch simultaneously.
You may have seen this before—where you get flooded with emails from differ-
ent people notifying you about someone’s product launch. That’s a clue they’re
all affiliates trying to earn a commission! They all talk about how their “good
friend” is launching such-and-such program. Gimme a fuckin’ break. Really?
You’re good friends with that person?
Remember Sheila? Now multiply her by fifty other business owners who also
spammed their lists with those same affiliate offers. Ugh. It got so annoying for
people like me, Sheila’s subscribers. Customers were inundated with repetitive
shit—the same offer from different people, all clustered around the same time
period. This resulted in a gamed, contrived selling environment. It didn’t MEI
anyone. It got to the point where nobody was promoting their own business or
product. Everyone sent out the same canned content on behalf of everyone else.
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More clutter and confusion. This activity diluted the individual brands
of each of those people. It watered down their message, weakened their core
topics, and buried their unique perspectives. It made them forgettable. Instead
of broadcasting their own message and making their own sales, they outsourced
this to other people and vice versa, thus butchering the relationship between
themselves and their (would-be) customers.
I unsubscribed from all of them.
If you do that sort of thing, you’ll train people to expect spam from you.
You’ll dilute your brand.
Human beings don’t need redundant, repetitive affiliate marketing content.
They want real, raw, insightful, unique, truthful, and meaningful content that
can’t be found anywhere else—content that will wake them up and help them
change some aspect of their life for the better. They want content they can enjoy
studying and feel excited to share with their loved ones.
By outsourcing your essentials, you’ll confuse your market. Seriously. They
won’t know what you stand for. They won’t know what kind of content they
can count on you for. They won’t understand your core promises or your core
topics. Confused customers do not get MEI’d, nor do they buy.
ANONYMITY DUE TO PEOPLE NOT KNOWING WHO YOU ARE
The anonymity (i.e., hiding) that comes from outsourcing your essentials can
eventually cause you to lose your business. This happened to “Jason.”
For years, Jason made a six-figure income as an affiliate for a law firm that
sold credit repair services. He promoted the law firm through his affiliate link
on his website and blog. However, on his website, there was no mention of
Jason, no pics of him, no back story on why he was promoting the law firm, and
no mention of why he even cared about credit repair. To his visitors, it wasn’t
clear who was writing the blog or providing the tips.
No doubt, his blog gave useful, educational (albeit somewhat generic) infor-
mation about credit scores and credit repair. It had tons of info. But overall it
was missing a human element. There was no personality or life behind it. All of
Jason’s call to actions (CTAs) directed people to set up a free consultation with
the law firm. The staff working at the firm would then contact those leads, sell
to them directly, and build customer relationships with them.
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Over the years, Jason got good at doing search engine optimization (SEO).
Thousands of visitors came to his site each day. Whenever they clicked his affili-
ate link and scheduled a consultation with the law firm, Jason received a com-
mission. For years, this scheme worked—until it didn’t.
One day, Google (being the Google that they are) changed their algorithms,
as they often do. Overnight, all of Jason’s website traffic and leads dried up.
Vanished. Gone. No more commissions. No more six-figure income stream. It
was all wiped out overnight. He couldn’t explain why it happened either. He
was blindsided.
Jason’s affiliate marketing business may have had a nice, temporary run,
but now it no longer existed. Panicking, he scrambled to find a solution, but
he never did. Spending all those years building a business anonymously had
worked against him.
By nature, affiliate marketers hide or ride on the coattails of whatever com-
panies they’re promoting. In this age of increasing transparency and account-
ability, businesses that aren’t forthcoming about who founded them and why
won’t last long. If you’re building a business where you get to stay anonymous,
there’s nothing solid in what you’re doing. (This is also fundamentally at odds
with the Anti-Marketing Manifesto, which is about bringing your real self into
your business.) You’re building a house of cards that could come crashing down
at any time.
What if Jason had taken care of his own essentials instead of outsourc-
ing them to the law firm? What if he had MEI’d his audience by identifying
himself, infusing his blog with his unique perspective, and sharing stories about
his life to help personalize his affiliate business? As a world traveler, he could
have found ways to write interesting content wrapped around education about
credit repair. Then at least he could have created a personal brand, resulting in
people knowing him on a human level and being more inclined to share his
blog with their circles.
Since he did none of this, he now has no income stream and must start over.
My guess is he never really cared about credit repair in the first place; he was
just doing it for the money. I’ll never know because he never made this apparent
in his content. (It should also be noted that Jason purchased tens of thousands
of fake followers on Twitter, none of whom became paying customers of his
affiliate business.)
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DON’T BEG FOR FAKE REVIEWS
Another way to outsource your essentials is to ask people for reviews. But this
often leads to contrived, disingenuous, or otherwise fake testimonials.
Some companies flat out bribe people to leave reviews of their product on
Amazon. “Leave us a 4- or 5-star review, and we’ll pay you five bucks.” This
is a form of outsourcing your MEI’ing. Instead of motivating, educating, and
inspiring future customers about your product, you ask existing customers (or
worse, random people who’ve never heard of you) to do that work for you in
the form of a solicited review.
Years ago a company offered to pay me five dollars to try their product and
leave a review. They only wanted me to post my review if it was four or five stars.
I agreed to do it before I knew any better. I left a “positive review” for a product
I tried out once, didn’t care about, never used again, and never recommended
to anybody IRL.
Contrast that to products I love and use daily or weekly, which I keep buying
more of on a regular basis and which I’ve told family and friends about for
free. Which review is more genuine? I don’t even remember the name of the
company that paid me the five dollars.
Asking for reviews, paying people to review your product, or offering them
a coupon in exchange for a review ranks up there with buying fake social media
followers. It’s not genuine even though many marketing experts will encourage
you to do it often.
If a customer is truly excited about your product, you won’t have to solicit
a testimonial from them. They’ll bombard your inbox with positive feedback.
They’ll thank you profusely. They’ll tell others about you without requesting a
single dollar in affiliate commissions.
DO AFFILIATES LOVE THE PRODUCT OR JUST THE PAYCHECKS?
We see this often in the media: a famous athlete gets paid a million dollars to
endorse an energy drink full of sugar and artificial crap. They’re happy to plug
the product to receive a check, but they would never drink the product because
it would butcher their health and athletic performance. (Duh).
A famous actress gets paid tens of thousands of dollars to promote a prescrip-
tion drug that’s toxic or unsafe (yet has FDA approval). She does commercials
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promoting the drug, but IRL she doesn’t use the drug herself because of the
long black box warning that accompanies it. She’s only endorsing it because
someone is paying her, not because she believes in it, cares about it, lives and
breathes it 24/7, or thinks it’s beneficial. She’s only promoting it for the money.
That’s the epitome of selling out—using someone just to make a buck. That
doesn’t count as MEI’ing anyone, nor is it based on truth or a product’s merit.
A product or service should only be promoted on the basis of truth, i.e., the
product’s actual value or what it can do for customers.
That’s why celebrity endorsements should always be taken with a grain of
salt. Whether it’s sponsorships, paid endorsements, or affiliate marketing, it
all falls under the same bucket. Rarely does someone genuinely recommend
a product because they love it. They would stay silent about it if they weren’t
being paid to plug it.
WHO STAYS SILENT ABOUT A PRODUCT THEY LOVE?
On the flip side, picture this: your best friend is visiting for a week. She asks if
you know of any good, healthy organic restaurants in the area. You know of a
great one, but you stay quiet. You refuse to share because that restaurant isn’t
paying you an affiliate commission. Huh? How does that make any sense?
IRL, you wouldn’t hesitate to share the name of the restaurant with your
friend. Not sharing would be weird and based on a lie. Plus, it would make you
a shitty friend. Why should it be any different in business?
Should you promote someone else’s product through your business? Yes, as
long as it’s complementary to what you offer and your values align with it. If
your customers would love it and benefit from it—and if MEI’ing them about
it will strengthen your brand rather than dilute it—go for it.
The best reason to plug someone else’s company is you love what they’re
doing, believe in their work, enjoy using their product, and have vetted them.
If you truly love a product, wouldn’t you promote it for free as a gift to your
audience because it’s a wonderful resource that would help them?
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VALUES MUST ALIGN
If you’re famous, and people want to throw money at you, that’s even more of a
reason to stick to your values. Because if you don’t, you could do great damage
to the world at large.
Dave Ramsey’s company, Ramsey Solutions, has many affiliates and spon-
sors who pay him to mention them on his radio show. The caveat is that he and
his company vet each affiliate before accepting their money. Affiliates only get
his endorsement if their values align with his.
In his book, How to Have More Than Enough, Dave recounts how he
cancelled a $150,000 endorsement contract with an Internet service provider
because he didn’t agree with the company’s values.62 The Internet service pro-
vider was doing a joint venture with Playboy, offering customers three months
of free porn if they signed up.
“On the surface, the joint venture was a ‘good business’ decision for the
internet provider because Playboy’s website boasts a high number of visitors.
But money isn’t the standard by which I measure my decisions,” Ramsey writes.
After a short rant on how destructive and degrading porn is, he adds, “I could
not in good conscience endorse an internet provider that purposely designs to
suck more people down into the cesspool of pornography . . . no matter what.”
That’s a solid way to do affiliate marketing if you’re the famous one and other
people want to pay you!
Would you walk away from $150,000 that didn’t align with your values? I
would. Duh. It’s just fucking paper. It’s not worth the price of your soul.
Ramsey’s strong stance is part of his “no matter what” philosophy. Every
business owner with a conscience should develop his or her own uncompromis-
ing list of “no matter whats.” No matter how much status, clout, or popularity a
person or company has, and no matter how much money they want to pay you,
don’t do anything with them unless it matches up with your values.
THE TRAP OF RETAIL
If you sell products online, and you’re considering getting them into retail
stores, beware. This might be another form of outsourcing your essentials.
62 Dave Ramsey, How to Have More Than Enough: A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating
Abundance (New York: Penguin, 2000), 50.
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Many product businesses who sell online cherish the notion of getting their
goods onto the shelves of Whole Foods, Walmart, or Target. They believe these
stores have huge distribution systems that will create huge exposure. That may
be true. But if deep down they’re relying on the store to sell their product for
them (because they’re unwilling to master selling it online), this may be a trap.
In reality, retail eats into sellers’ profit margins like an alligator chomping
on their arm. For many, this game is exhausting. It forces businesses to hemor-
rhage money, lose hope, and eventually become a slave to the retail moguls. The
business owner’s identity gets watered down, his or her passion gets diluted, and
the company’s profits are weakened as it chases after coveted retail space (with
tons of rules and requirements, like adding preservatives to a product to extend
shelf life).
Underlying this is a refusal to sell their own product online. It all goes back
to wishful thinking, the idea that “someone else will sell my product for me.”
If you absolutely love the retail game, and it’s your passion in life, then do it.
If not, it will drain your soul and empty your wallet. If your product can be sold
online and shipped directly to a customer’s door, there’s little or no reason to
mess with retail selling.
PROMOTE YOUR OWN BRAND
Every business must figure out how to sell their own damn product. Once
you’ve mastered this, you can find ways to leverage it, amplify it, or hire skilled
people to help you save time. Never outsource your essentials.
Make your market aware of why your brand is awesome. Spend most of your
time creating content that MEIs people about your product, your topics, and
your background—not someone else’s.
Don’t rehash what others are saying. The customer’s inbox (and life) is
busy enough as it is. Be someone who dares to broadcast excellent world-class
content that can’t be duplicated—content that makes readers willingly share
and forward it on their own without you paying them a dime in affiliate com-
missions. Let them pay you and promote you for free.
By taking this radical stance, you as an anti-marketer, will maintain full
control over your brand, identity, product, and profits. By doing this, you say
“no” to dabbling, extra cash, low-hanging fruit, and selling out—and you get to
be serious about building a business you love, which consistently generates real
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cash. Not petty cash but real cash. This is the ultimate form of selling without
being a sellout!
DIRECT SALES ROCK!
The Anti-Marketing Manifesto is about selling directly to perfect-fit customers

with huge profit margins. It’s about low volume, high margin, and high quality,
and you get to keep 100 percent of the profits.
Selling directly to the public is such a powerful thing to do. It’s a clean,
simple transaction between you and your customers. They visit your website.
They read your content. They browse your online store. They pay you directly.
They reorder again and again. They don’t have to mess with ugly affiliate links.
That’s freedom. That’s exciting!
There’s no middleman, no nonsense, no BS retail policies, and no cheesy
celebrity endorsements getting in the way. You’re a slave to no one. Forget affili-
ate marketing, forget outsourcing your essentials, and MEI people directly! Sell
directly to your customers!
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CHAPTER 11:
Build a Premium Brand
“The most unprofitable item ever manufactured is an excuse.”
— John Mason
One of the biggest decisions you’ll ever make in your business is choosing
whether you want to be a “commodity brand” or a “premium brand.” Most
people don’t give this any thought and let the market choose for them. Bad
idea. It’s worth thinking about and choosing this intentionally because it will
directly impact your business, profits, and quality of life over the long term.
One route will set you up for a stressful life, in which you’re forced to
compete on price against thousands of other companies similar to yours. The
other route will set you up for a life of freedom, huge profit margins, and being
able to breathe. Breathing is good. So is margin—and freedom.
Which route will you choose?
Let’s look at closely at the two branding options.
COMMODITIES ARE FORGETTABLE
A commodity is a product or service with no distinguishing features, character-

istics, or anything special about it. It can be churned out and delivered by virtu-
ally anyone. Thousands of options like it exist. It blends in with similar products
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in the marketplace. Because of this, the business selling it also blends in with
other businesses like it. Think: commodity stew, where everything sits together
for a while, blends, and ends up tasting the same. The carrot is no different from
the potato. The onion loses its flavor. Everything is mushy and stew-tasting.
For the most part, customers can’t tell the difference between commodity
brands. Aside from looking at surface-level comparisons like price and maybe
convenience, they’re all the same. They’re all noise. The commodity business,
product, and service are forgettable, ignorable, and worse, replaceable.
For instance, I don’t care much about where I get my gasoline. To me it’s
just gas. It’s a commodity. I pay for whatever is closest to me when I need it.
Some customers will drive farther down the road to save a few cents. But by
and large, people don’t care about commodity brands because there’s no real
brand behind it—at least not one they feel connected to on a personal level.
It may seem like certain products or services lend themselves to being com-
modities. But in many ways, it has little to do with the actual product or service.
It’s more based on the business owner’s decision to create a personal premium
brand or not. Commodity companies don’t position themselves in a way that
makes customers care deeply (emotionally, spiritually even) about the product
or the company.
Because of this fatal lack of interesting-ness and lack of give-a-shit-ness
among its customers, a commodity-based business is doomed to compete on
price. Whoever can offer the lowest, cheapest, dirt-poorest, most poverty-
stricken prices will “win.” What you charge becomes the only possible differ-
entiator, which reduces you to a number. Is that a game you want to play? Is
your life’s purpose to be nickel-and-dimed to death over what your (high-value)
product is worth? No.
That’s why I tell anti-marketers, “Just say ‘no’ to being a commodity brand.
Dare to choose better. Dare to be a premium brand.”
PREMIUM BRANDS STAND OUT
The opposite of a commodity is a premium (luxury) brand. Unlike a com-

modity, a premium brand is distinct, rare, unique, and, therefore, memorable.
It may even be exciting or fun. But wait! It’s not just about slapping a sticker
onto your product that says “premium.” It’s about bringing your true self, values,
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B uild a P remium B rand
and unique perspectives into your business. It’s about making, producing, and
delivering high-quality luxury products and services.
Bringing yourself into your brand is key. It’s what builds a strong personal
connection between you and your customers. It connects you with people in
deeper ways. When you infuse your personality, mission, background, and
values into your business, you MEI people and sell. People start to care about
your brand in ways that they don’t care about commodities.
As a premium brand, there’s no one like you. You’re a category of one. Your
top customers can’t confuse you with similar businesses because they’re not you.
You’re not just selling something; you also have compelling, positive ideas to
share with the world. You’re a rebel for a good cause. You’re raising positive hell
in sharing your ideas. You inspire people to say, “Fuck that! I’m choosing better.”
A premium brand stands for something and therefore, won’t fall for any-
thing. Because of this, people pay attention when you write or talk. You give
people a damn good reason to care about your message. It becomes impossible
for them to lump you in with anything else out there. You become “commodity
stew-proof,” protected against losing your unique flavor. You’re seen as one of a
kind, because you are!
But only if you own it. Only if you put your personal premium brand at
the forefront of everything you do—not behind everything you do, as a way
of hiding.
A luxury brand enjoys a feeling of space, freedom, peace, and profits—
unlike a commodity brand, which is a slave to chronic stress and competition.
Commodity businesses enjoy none of those freedoms because they must slash
their prices to the max just to stay afloat.
YOU ARE THE SECRET INGREDIENT OF YOUR PREMIUM BRAND
With a premium brand, you make it clear that you are running the operation.
Not Joe down the street, but you. That’s super distinguishing because there’s
only one you on the planet. Most people seriously ignore this fact. They sweep
themselves under the rug while displaying a false sense of modesty. They’re
afraid of making their business “about them.” This fear robs them of creating a
strong personal brand.
The high quality of your product can also distinguish your brand from
others, but product quality is 100 percent secondary to the “you-ness” of your
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business. If you’re missing this key piece (you) in your brand, it won’t matter
how excellent your product is. You’ll still struggle to sell. That’s because your
personality, energy, values, and you are what matter most—in addition to the
quality of your product.
I don’t just buy Lily’s soaps63 because they’re natural, free of chemicals and
artificial fragrances, and beautiful (with cute little dried rose petals on them). I
buy them because Lily is a success-minded teenaged entrepreneur and athlete,
and she inspires me.64 The more she inspires me, the more I buy.
It works the opposite way too. I stopped buying from a company I really
liked (and had spent thousands of dollars with through repeat orders) because
their emails were getting douchier and douchier over time. They made it clear
they didn’t care about their top customers. Instead of putting their true selves
into their content, they acted like something they were not.
LOW VOLUME, HIGH MARGIN
As a premium brand, you can charge more for a higher-quality product while
serving fewer people. The caveat is that you must deliver more value. Don’t aim
to sell your product to just anyone. Aim to serve perfect-fit customers (PFCs)—
those who will value what you offer and gladly pay you higher fees.
Lacking a strong personal brand and PFCs, a commodity business will try to
serve more people at lower prices. They’ll aim to achieve high volume to make
up for shitty profit margins. They’re forced to take on less-than-ideal customers:
those who bitch and complain about the product even after they’ve demanded
lower prices. These are customers from hell. They’re never satisfied. They want
your soul, your firstborn, and more. For the anti-marketer, succumbing to that
insane business model is a recipe for demoralization and failure. Don’t do it.
The anti-marketer fires non-ideal customers quickly.
YOUR PFCS WANT VALUE, NOT DISCOUNTS
You might look at your industry and feel demoralized by an abundance of com-
peting businesses that appear to be doing the same thing you do. But they’re not
63 http://www.HandmadeSoapClub.com/
64 See Lily’s inspiring video, “HER Story: Teen Millionaire,” here: https://www.
youtube.com/watch?v=0LY6Ua5ksOU.
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the same because they’re not being led by you. Your ability to deliver great value
trumps everything else. People will do whatever it takes to pay for things they
find valuable. So stay focused on delivering great value.
Don’t assume every customer will choose based on price. Yes, some will. But
those might not be your ideal customers. Your goal is to find people who truly
value your product or service and then serve them over and over again.
What is value, exactly? Value is about delivering positive, measurable, repeat-
able results (a concept I learned from The People’s Chemist). This is the “holy
trinity” of creating a sustainable, profitable business that helps others.
All three elements—“positive,” “measurable,” and “repeatable”—are essen-
tial to providing customers with ongoing massive value. One without the other
two is missing something.
If you give value that’s positive but not measurable, then at some point your
customers will start asking themselves, “Is it worth it for me to keep paying for
this service?” Many coaches who offer intangible services face this problem.
Their clients often can’t measure the exact value that’s being delivered over time,
so they stop buying. They put the coach on ice.
If you sell something that’s measurable but not positive—same problem. At
some point, customers will wake up and ask, “Do I really want to keep wasting
money on this product that’s not helping me? Does this company have my best
interests at heart, or are they fucking up my life? Would I be better off without
them?” When a patient realizes his doctor isn’t helping him get healthier (but
is profiting off him being or staying sick), he fires that doctor and seeks a better
way to achieve real health.
If you deliver value that’s positive and measurable but not repeatable, you
have a different problem: there’s no way for fans to keep buying more from you.
For example, an author who publishes one book but doesn’t offer any follow-up
products or services lacks a repeatable way to deliver value (other than perhaps
writing future books). If you sell a product that can only be purchased once,
then you’ll only have one sale per customer. If you offer nothing beyond that,
your customers can’t keep buying from you even if they love your first product.
They must wait for your second product to come out, which could take months
or years, depending on your production schedule.
Find a way to deliver positive, measurable, repeatable results. This indicates
that you’re giving real, ongoing value to your PFCs.
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VALUE IS SUBJECTIVE
There’s a saying, “Value is in the eye of the beholder.” What’s valuable (or beau-
tiful, beneficial, meaningful) to one person might not be valuable to another
person. And that’s OK. As much as I love cute, dried rose petals on my pure,
chemical-free soap, I can guarantee you some people don’t care about the art-
istry, purity, or beauty of their soap.
Everyone has the right to choose what they find valuable. Everyone also has
the right to change what they consider valuable. This is why I’ve placed so much
emphasis on infusing your true values into your business—so the right people
are drawn to you. Make it crystal clear what value you deliver. Find people who
treasure what you offer and gladly pay for it. Never cater to poor-fit customers
who don’t share your values. (Chasing them makes for a sucky business model.)
THE BANKSY EXPERIMENT: THE DANGERS

OF OVER-DISCOUNTING
A social experiment that took place in a pop-up shop in New York shows that
over-discounting can butcher a premium brand, at least temporarily. The exper-
iment proved that when rare, valuable artwork is positioned as a commodity
and offered at an extreme discount (while the premium brand of the artist is
hidden), nobody buys the product.
Banksy is a famous graffiti artist who anonymously creates art on the streets
of England. His artwork is unique, rare, and offers bold perspectives on societal
issues. It pops up on buildings, sidewalks, and other surprising places and is
sometimes erased by authorities within hours after it’s created. The artist’s mys-
terious identity and the illegal nature of his art adds to the allure. He’s one of
the most sought-after artists in the world.
A Banksy piece normally sells for tens of thousands of dollars. However, the
artist doesn’t actually sell his own artwork. Apparently, he’s an anti-capitalist.
Therefore, he doesn’t receive any money for his work. But this doesn’t stop
opportunistic fans from extracting his creations from the physical locations
where they’re positioned and selling them to the highest bidder. The singer
Christina Aguilera purchased an original Banksy of a lesbian version of Queen
Victoria and two prints for £25,000 (US$32,000).65 A Banksy set of Kate Moss
65 Matthew Beard, “Aguilera invests £25,000 in Banksy,” The Independent, April
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paintings sold for £50,400 (US$64,719) in London.66 Ironically, this is a case

where a strong personal brand is based on an anonymous person.
What happens when this rare, highly valued artwork is offered at an “insane
discount” of only $60 per piece? Absolutely nothing. Nobody gives a shit. No
one even knows it’s Banksy. The premium brand is hidden. Nobody wants to
buy it.
Presumably to test this, a man set up a street exhibit featuring several origi-
nal Banksy pieces. They were positioned near other gift shop items that were
much cheaper than $60. Without the luxury brand of Banksy being front and
center, the items could only be distinguished based on price. Most shoppers
weren’t aware that Banksy art normally sells for five figures. They assumed the
artwork was nothing special. Few people rushed in to take advantage of the
discount. They assumed the pieces were like all the other stuff available (com-
modity stew). Shoppers compared the $60 price tag of Banksy art pieces to
other products that cost less ($40, $30, $20, $10), and they gravitated toward
the cheaper items.
That day, only a handful of people purchased the Banksy pieces, totaling a
mere $420 in gross sales. The Guardian67 reported that one man bought two
Banksy canvases at the discounted rate, and “. . . this buyer now stands to make
a small fortune. The pictures have been authenticated by Banksy; they are going
to auction at Bonham’s, in London, and they could fetch up to £120,000.”68
This shows that value is indeed subjective, and beauty is in the eye of the
beholder. So you might as well create a beautiful premium brand that your
perfect-fit customers are happy to pay more for. Why not? It benefits you with
increased profits, and it benefits your customers with the joy of buying some-
thing unique and rare.
6, 2006, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/aguilera-invests-
16325000-in-banksy-6104457.html.
66 “Banksy works set auction record,” BBC News, October 20, 2006,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/6069384.stm.
67 Maev Kennedy, “Banksy street stall prints, sold for $60, set to make small for-
tune at Bonham’s,” The Guardian, June 12, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/artand-
design/2014/jun/12/banskey-prints-new-york-stall-fortune-bonhams.
68 It was believed that the street exhibit stunt was pulled by Banksy himself to com-
ment on the fluid and changeable nature of value in our society.
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TEN PERCENT OFF OF WHAT?
Look at a typical junk mail ad or email newsletter, and you’ll often see random
discounts or coupons being offered—10 percent off this, 20 percent off that.
“Save $5 if you spend $25 or more.” These broad, general discounts are signs of
a business trying to drum up sales. They try to appeal to anyone and everyone.
The problem is, there’s no creativity, no unique message, and no life-changing
ideas or insights in that content. It’s merely a sales ploy to lure customers in.
Most recipients hate junk mail and respond by rolling their eyes, thinking,
“Blah, blah, blah.” The result is that the company inadvertently positions itself
as a commodity business.
Most of these ads don’t even articulate what the product is, let alone who’s
offering it (or why) and how it can help people. There’s no motivation, educa-
tion, or insight offered. There’s no personality or voice in the writing. There’s
no mention of any premium brand at all. It’s all about a random percentage off
some random product if you “act now.” A vital human element is missing from
these messages. Before anyone can learn about the brand or what it stands for,
they’re already lumping it in with all the rest of the junk mail.
I see discounting and over-discounting practices often. Many business
owners think that’s the primary way to make sales, but they’re wrong.
TRUE STORY: MY UNFORTUNATE EXPERIENCE

WITH OVER-DISCOUNTING
Years ago I attended a conference full of doctors, nutritionists, and other health
professionals. I was relatively new to the process of selling and was struggling to
make sales in my business. (This was before I became an anti-marketer.)
“Kendall,” the guru running the event, was well admired and considered a
top influencer in the health niche. She knew I was a copywriter. We’d spoken
on the phone a few times, and she almost hired me twice. Each time, it fell
through. (Rejection is God’s protection?) By the time I attended her event, she
had never actually hired me for anything.
In person, I asked Kendall for her advice on how to boost my sales. I had
a copywriting package that I wanted to sell for $5,000 a pop. I knew it would
benefit the right people. I knew it was worth more than $5,000. I also knew
it would require a lot of work and creativity to deliver, but the results (for the
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right client) would be huge. (It was actually a “funnel” I wanted to deliver, but
I didn’t know that yet.)
“Here’s what you’re gonna do,” Kendall said. “No one’s gonna buy your
package for $5,000. Cut the price in half. Offer it for $1,995 for today only. It’ll
sell more that way. I’ll sell it for you at the front of the room, and most people
will probably buy it on the spot.”
I immediately started salivating at the possibility of selling multiple packages
at $1,995. That was better than selling zero packages for $0 (or so I thought).
But something felt off. Instinctively, I knew it wasn’t appropriate to discount
that deep. I knew I wouldn’t be able to deliver my best work for $1,995. That
wasn’t healthy or appropriate pricing for the value it would deliver. It wouldn’t
create breathing room or profit margin for the amount of effort and resources it
would require for me to deliver it. Plus, it felt cheap.
Who was I to argue though? I was broke. Kendall was the “expert” whom
everybody worshipped. Nobody knew who I was yet.
I ignored my inner knowing. I sat back as Kendall pitched my copywriting
package to the room. She lied to her audience. She told everyone she had hired
me for copywriting (not true). She told them I’d helped her achieve big sales
(not true) and that I’d written some of her website content for her (not true).
Then she asked, “Who wants Michelle’s package?” Dozens of hands shot up.
Thirty out of fifty people raised their hand.
“I’m rich!” I thought.
Not so fast.
The sales pitch was fundamentally flawed because A) the pricing was fucked
up, and B) Kendall’s entire pitch was based on a lie (or at least, willful ignorance
on her part—same thing).
I let this lie occur, and I let Kendall make this unethical (and poorly priced,
poorly positioned) offer on my behalf. What other choice did I have?
Today I know I could have simply said, “No. The price is what it is: $5,000.”
Four people bought my package, and they were some of the worst clients
I’ve ever worked with. (I don’t know what happened to the other twenty sets of
hands that went up.) Things fell apart fast. Like I had intuitively known, it was
too much work for too little money (and too much resentment). I got stressed
out and sick and couldn’t deliver the work by the deadlines. Frankly, I didn’t
want to meet the deadlines. There was no space for creativity and no financial
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breathing room with the discounted pricing scheme. The whole situation,
energetically, was not a match for the kind of business I wanted to build. These
poor-fit clients asked hundreds of questions, demanded additional free work,
and didn’t appreciate the final product.
It taught me a hard but valuable lesson: don’t ever treat a premium service
like a commodity. Don’t over-discount just to make a buck. Inappropriate dis-
counting will fuck up your business!
On the bright side, after Kendall’s event, I found better clients who were
easier to work with, and I charged them higher rates. They got great results
from my services and continue working with me to this day. They’re happy
to pay my higher fees and don’t demand a ridiculous discount. Best of all, I’m
happy serving them, and I have way more profit margin to enjoy.
CHARGE MORE, SO YOU HAVE THE SPACE

TO DELIVER MORE VALUE
Do you have a unique process of crafting your product or delivering your service
that can’t be found anywhere else? Do you have high quality-control standards
that would cause most companies in your industry to run away screaming?
Have you scoured the earth to find the most ethical suppliers, highest-quality
vendors, purest ingredients, and/or the best team? Do you offer something
special, a rare extra, a small detail or two, that tugs at the heartstrings of your
PFCs and creates additional value for them? If so, then you must own the fact
that you’re a premium brand and charge customers appropriately for it.
Charging higher prices allows you not only to stay in business but also to
have ample time and space needed to produce your high-quality product—
without rushing or cutting corners. This is a super-important point. Quality
takes time. So does value. It requires depth, breadth, precision, and patience and
cannot be churned out thoughtlessly or carelessly.
Rather than selling to the wrong people and being rushed to deliver poor-
quality work that you don’t even enjoy delivering, you (as an anti-marketer)
need to build plenty of profit margin, space, and freedom into your business.
You do this by saying “no” to non-ideal customers and jobs, so you can focus
entirely on saying “yes” to perfect-fit customers who want a higher-quality
product. Because you have more breathing room, you can afford to deliver
and over-deliver to PFCs who are paying you more. You deliver more value in
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exchange for a better product. But in order to do this without burning out, you
need to charge appropriately.
You’re not Walmart. You didn’t start your business so people could pay the
lowest prices on Earth. Gimme a break! Such tactics are suitable for commodi-
ties, not premium brands. Relying on discounts to sell your product is out of
integrity for a luxury brand.
OWN YOUR EXCELLENCE, AND NEVER

USE THE WORD “AFFORDABLE”
For a premium provider, “affordable” is a dirty word. Banish it from your vocab-
ulary. It conveys no meaningful insight into the real value of your offerings.
(Affordable compared to what? A crappy product?)
Never position your premium product as the “cheapest,” “most affordable,”
or as a “great bargain.” These words are incongruent with premium branding.
They convey inferior quality. If you use such language, do so playfully and
maybe sarcastically—e.g., “Our natural heart supplement is a great bargain—
compared to dying in your thirties from using doctor-prescribed heart meds
that don’t even work and have killed tens of thousands of people from nega-
tive side effects.” Own the fact that your product is excellent. It’s lifesaving, life
changing, or life enhancing. Therefore, it commands a higher price.
If you’re a premium brand, embrace it! Own it. Celebrate it. Charge well
for it. Don’t apologize for it. Don’t artificially lower your prices out of despera-
tion or because you think that’s the only reason people will buy from you. If
anything, challenge yourself to add more to your deliverables (like free bonus
items), or increase the value of your product while keeping the price the same.
If you’re struggling to sell your premium product at an appropriate rate that
gives you plenty of profit margin, go back to “Chapter 4: Measure the Right
Things (Spoiler Alert: It’s Your Sales).” Something in your mentality may be
causing you to avoid sales altogether. No premium brand should ever have a
problem selling at a premium price. Selling is a skill that can be improved and
honed, but if you’re being your true self in business, leading with your personal
brand, and using the Anti-Marketing Manifesto, then selling should come
easily. If it doesn’t, you might have a content problem or a mindset problem,
not a pricing problem.
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If you’re not selling, that could mean you need to give more, MEI the right
people more, and/or bring more of your true self into your business. Always
focus your content and promotional offers around the MEI principle—moti-
vate, educate, and inspire—even if you’re just sending out a quick email to
someone. It works!
COME UP WITH CREATIVE WAYS TO MAKE OFFERS
Don’t just offer a random or generic discount. Take the time to create interest-
ing content that benefits customers while wrapping it around your special sale
price. Come up with creative, valuable ways to make offers. Produce content
that MEIs and sells. This kind of content does the job. No discount needed.
For example, if you want to offer a special coupon code to your entire email
list, that’s fine, but make sure you accompany it with an insightful, educational
article that MEIs.
If you’re a wedding photographer, you can make an offer related to some-
thing you know your clients have going on in their personal lives. You can make
an offer unique to each client. If you see on Instagram that a previous client is
now pregnant, reach out to say “Congrats!” and offer her a special package on
a maternity shoot, including a recreation of one of her favorite wedding shots
that now highlights her baby bump. You don’t even need to mention a discount.
Just offer her a special package!
EXAMPLE OF SMART DISCOUNTING: THE “OUTRAGE SALE”
My client, The People’s Chemist, offers an “Outrage Sale” every few months
on his pain relief supplement, Relief FX.69 He writes a short article about the
dangers of popular over-the-counter painkilling meds and their harmful side
effects (including death!). Then he offers his natural supplement as a safe alter-
native for 20 percent off for a limited time. This is a creative and effective way to
make an offer that doesn’t come across as spammy but as valuable.
The outrage sale always leads to a huge volume of orders, clearing out any
excess inventory while giving price-sensitive customers an incentive to buy.
It gives everyone on his list an incentive to stock up and buy more Relief FX
during the sale. This strategy MEIs people, strengthens the company’s brand
69 www.GetRelief FX.com
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(which helps people “ditch the meds”), creates big cash flow, and generates
huge profits.
The key is that The People’s Chemist doesn’t just offer a random 20 percent
off everything for no reason. He ties the discount to a specific product (Relief
FX) and wraps it around an insightful article that motivates, educates, and
inspires people to ditch the toxic painkilling meds. Readers get educated: they
learn that popular pain drugs have harmed or killed tens of thousands of people
who’ve used them.70 They’re motivated to “ditch the meds” and choose better.
Finally, they’re inspired to take positive action by choosing a safer product. This
all works because Shane brings his unapologetic personality and emotions (i.e.,
his “outrage” that these dangerous drugs are legal) into his writing. Having been
MEI’d, readers gladly buy as much of the product as they can at 20 percent off
the normal price. The MEI’ing leads to selling.
This example should light your brain on fire with ideas for your own busi-
ness. Your clients might not come to you because they’re outraged by anything,
but maybe it’s a different set of emotions over a topic they care about. How
else can you apply this concept to your business? What interesting reasons can
you think of to offer a sale or special package for your existing or past custom-
ers? How can you bundle your services to incentivize new customers to work
with you?
THE BEAUTY OF BUNDLES
One of the smartest ways to discount is to bundle certain products together

and sell them as a package deal with a small discount off the normal price.
Likewise, you can offer bulk discounting on a certain quantity of one product.
This incentivizes customers to buy more, and it yields you nice cash flow from
fewer transactions.
For example, you can create a “starter kit” that bundles several introductory
products together in a way that helps customers get started.
You can offer a “sampler kit” that includes one of everything, so new cus-
tomers can try all your flavors at once. Zevia’s Rainbow Variety Pack is a great
70 Shane Ellison, “10 Painkiller Facts Your Doctor Doesn’t Know About,” The
People’s Chemist, last accessed April 6, 2020,
https://thepeopleschemist.com/10-painkiller-facts-your-doctor-doesnt-know-about/.
167
example of this.71 It includes twenty-four cans of their sugar-free, stevia-sweet-

ened sodas shipped to your door, with two of each flavor in the box. When
customers reorder later, they can pick their favorite flavors and skip the ones
they don’t like.
As a copywriter, almost everything I do in my business revolves around
selling a bundle of some type of writing services. I sell bundles of five emails (or
articles) to my clients for a flat fee. Depending on the type of content being pur-
chased, each bundle ranges from $1,000 to $3,750. With each bundle I sell, the
client gets a small discount off the normal price of a single article. This pricing
structure has been so successful that my ongoing clients never purchase a single
article at a time; they always purchase a bundle of five or more.
This approach encourages repeat orders. Each client can simply buy another
bundle of articles whenever they need it. They can use up the articles over a
period of weeks or months, depending on their publishing schedule.
By purchasing five emails at a time (instead of one), the client is rewarded
with the bundle discount. Additionally, I’m not bothering clients with tiny
invoices, and I’m not burning my time on annoying admin work (creating and
sending out multiple small invoices). This approach is much more liberating
than being a typical commodity copywriter who’s trapped in the “time for
money” business model and who is forced to lower their hourly rates just to
get hired.
Here’s another example. In addition to writing, I help clients with editing. I
have a client who occasionally asks me to edit and polish an email article before
he broadcasts it to his list. He usually wants the edits done quickly—within
four hours or less. After he kept requesting this over and over again, I turned
it into an ongoing service package. Now my client can order a bundle of five
“quick edits” for $1,000 to be used as needed. He loved the idea.
Every time my client requests a quick edit, if I’m available at that moment,
I drop what I’m doing and do the edit immediately. If I’m not available, then I
miss out on an easy $200, and have to wait until next time. It’s fun, and I enjoy
doing them.
This package serves my client’s needs while providing me with quick and
easy cash flow every time he orders a new bundle. I don’t actually give him a
71 See www.zevia.com and search their store page. (Direct product link is:
https://shop.zevia.com/products/healthy-soda/variety-pack.)
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discount; I give him a special bundle created just for him. I’ve created several
packages like this for individual clients based on their specific needs.
Think about your ideal client’s value perception: What do they value? What
are they repeatedly asking you for help with? Do they ask you the same ques-
tions over and over again? If so, create a piece of content that addresses these
FAQs specifically. Put it on your website or blog, or turn it into a bonus PDF
with every order placed.
Are your best customers begging you to create a certain product or service?
If so, find a way to create it and deliver it! That’s adding value.
OOZE PREMIUM-NESS
No matter if your rates are industry standard or far above industry standard,
you want your business to ooze premium-ness. That’s where the customer says,
“I love this!” and they mean it. They show it through repeat orders. They’re not
sitting around waiting for you to send them a coupon; they’re jumping at an
offer that fits perfectly with what they want.
You want your PFCs to feel blown away. You want your processes tight, so
customers are never left in the dark or, worse, feeling lost on the status of your
deliverables. You want to under-promise, over-deliver, surprise, and delight
them and exceed their expectations. It can be really fun to do so. Make your
brand feel luxurious to your client, no matter what rates or prices you charge.
Ask yourself: “How can I deliver more value to my clients starting today?”
It’s worth asking because the answers will make your business truly profitable
and sustainable.
DISCOUNT WITHOUT CHEAPENING YOUR BRAND
You can make big money discounting, as long as you approach it with the right
mindset. Discounting should never be your primary go-to strategy for selling.
But you can use it occasionally and strategically to profit big. Smart discounting
opens the door for a flood of orders that might not have occurred otherwise.
But you must be thoughtful, creative, and personal in your approach—and
make sure your discounting doesn’t cheapen your brand.
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If you’d like to learn more about this topic, check out my blog post,
“Discount Without Cheapening Your Brand: 6 Guidelines to Follow.”72
STOP UNDER-VALUING YOUR PREMIUM BRAND
I once had a client who sold high-quality, high-priced organic snack items
through their website. They had a small base of steady, repeat customers who
valued health and gladly paid hundreds of dollars for a big order of snack
products every few months. These customers had no interest in buying cheaper
snacks with artificial ingredients and too much sugar at the grocery store.
In a misguided effort to widen their customer base, my client discounted
everything in their online store, all at once, all the time. Most of their email
newsletter content consisted of discount codes and coupons and nothing more.
This was harmful to their premium brand. It trained customers to wait until a
discount was offered before they would buy anything. Plus, it came across as
spammy. The owner admitted he hadn’t taken a salary in years and felt emotion-
ally drained by a business that barely had any profit margin. Well, no wonder.
The over-discounting was obliterating their brand and their profits. This led to
a stressful selling environment with tons of work and little pay to show for it.
This company also had a tendency to apologize for their high prices. They
didn’t need to. They needed to own the fact that they were a luxury brand and
start acting like it. Over-discounting was unsustainable for them. And honestly,
they were some of the most stressed-out people I’ve ever worked with.
I encouraged them to stop with the storewide discounting: “Stop offering
‘insane inventory discounts,’” I told them, “and stop using that language in your
emails because it makes it sound like you’re always on the verge of going out
of business.” I encouraged them to focus their content on MEI’ing perfect-fit
customers and to ignore people who didn’t love their products or who wanted
more sugar added to the snacks. I told them they needed to be comfortable
charging full price most of the time, or they would drive themselves out of busi-
ness. Every time they followed my suggestions, they had higher profits.
72 Michelle Lopez, “Discount Without Cheapening Your Brand: 6 Guidelines to

Follow,” AntiMarketingManifesto.com, last visited April 6, 2020,
https://www.antimarketingmanifesto.com/discount-guidelines/.
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DECIDE TO BE A PREMIUM BRAND
The work you’re doing is way too important and valuable for you to be compet-
ing on price alone. You don’t need to over-discount or cheapen your offerings—
ever. The exception is if you’re just starting out and trying to figure out your core
market or even your skill set. You might work for free until you’ve figured out
what the hell you’re doing. The second you figure out what you’re doing and see
that it’s working, increase your rates!
Nobody can be a premium brand for you. That’s your job. You need a strong
conviction that your product or service is too high quality and too valuable to
be treated like a cheap commodity. You’re too skilled, too talented, too forward-
thinking, and too damn good at what you do to be perpetually strapped for
cash because you’re always lowering your prices for no good reason. If that’s you,
stop. Seriously. It’s not only stressful, it’s degrading to you on a soul level. You’re
better than that.
Remember, nobody benefits from over-discounting. If you want to make
healthy profits, let yourself make healthy profits! Build your premium brand!
Don’t compete with anyone on price—ever!
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CHAPTER 12:
Your Only Competition

is Your Former Self
“Man’s only enemies are within himself. ‘And a man’s foes

shall be they of his own household.’”
— Florence Scovel Shinn73
I didn’t always think work was a good thing. For years I had weird associations
with it in my mind: I feared that working too much was bad and would turn a
person into an abusive jerk. Because of these associations, I often avoided work.
Or I did the wrong kind of work—work that didn’t matter to me or which I did
primarily to get a paycheck. Nothing brings more drudgery. Nothing wastes
your life like doing the wrong kinds of work—work you don’t love with all your
heart, mind, and soul.
Today I have a different view of work. I’ve learned that the right kind of
work is cleansing to the soul. So cleansing that it has the effect of scrubbing and
erasing a ton (if not all) of the world’s bullshit from your mind, at least while
73 Florence Scovel Shinn, The Game of Life and How to Play It. (New York: St. Mar-
tin’s Essentials, 2020), 29. (Originally published in 1925.) In the second sentence, Shinn is
quoting Matthew 10:36 (KJV).
173
you’re working. You feel refreshed, accomplished, and energized after doing the
right kind of work. It brings great benefit to your customers too.
Work that’s draining to your soul and agonizing to your mind or body may
not be the right work for you.
The right work is work that you care about deeply. It speaks to your soul and
allows you to sleep well at night. It lets you be at peace with yourself. You jump
out of bed each morning eager to get started on it. The right work challenges
you, makes you want to get better, and leads to favorable results.
In business you have to identify the right kind of work for you. Not doing
this creates your own personal hell on earth. Determining your right work is a
spiritual and personal decision for each individual. It may be a combination of
what you’re naturally great at, what you love doing, and/or what your market is
requesting. Or it may have to do with what you’re invited to do.
THE TOP THING THAT CAN MAKE YOUR

BUSINESS A HELL ON EARTH
Your biggest threat in business isn’t anything outside of you. Your biggest threat
(and perhaps enemy) is the person you see in the mirror and whether she (or
he) will consistently do the right work to grow your profits in a sustainable,
healthy, enjoyable way.
When marketing experts (or businesses in general) talk about crushing the
competition or beating the top industry provider, they’re missing the point.
They’re either consciously or unconsciously adopting the destructive language
of predatory marketing, which is all about shifting blame and responsibility to
someone else.
You’re not in business to crush or beat anyone. You’re here to serve people—
to MEI them with great content, deliver a high-quality product or service they
love, and make plenty of profits that fund everything you want to do in life. No
beating, crushing, or other abusive behavior required.
Getting great at serving your market has nothing to do with what other
companies are doing. In fact, stay out of their business, and focus on your own.
If you’re not paying attention, the person you see in the mirror will cause
you to gravitate to the wrong kinds of work—busywork, ego-driven work, work
that gets you to stray into the darkness, work that explores “what’s wrong,” and
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Y our O nly C ompetition is Y our F ormer S elf
work that causes more problems. All that shit leads a person’s soul off course,
derailing their business as well. The result is hell on earth in your business.
The larger it grows, a company that is consumed by ego work can also wreak
havoc on society. For example, in June 2018, Massachusetts Attorney General
Maura Healey filed a lawsuit against Purdue Pharma, a drug company con-
trolled by the Sackler family. The lawsuit argued that Purdue “fueled the opioid
epidemic” with its opioid product, OxyContin.74 Opioids are addictive drugs
that have killed nearly 400,000 people while tearing apart countless lives.75 Part
of the rise of the opioid epidemic came from doctors over-prescribing this drug
to patients.
Healey argued that according to an email, Richard Sackler told people at a
launch party in 1996, “The launch of OxyContin Tablets will be followed by a
blizzard of prescriptions that will bury the competition.” Note the predatory
idea: “bury the competition.” What about burying the customers?—putting
them into an early grave with your product, before their time?
According to the Washington Post, “Healey’s lawsuit . . . says that individual
members of the Sackler family engaged in acts of deception and misconduct to
make as much money as possible from sales of OxyContin, a powerful prescrip-
tion painkiller. Healey accuses the family of disregarding addiction and safety
in the name of profit, saying that members of the family directed sales repre-
sentatives to push high doses of the drug while knowing its potential dangers.”
These are the ugly fruits of aiming to “bury the competition.”
DON’T COMPETE WITH ANYONE
The point of being in business isn’t to bury other companies. The point is to
serve humanity—to truly and deeply serve them—to the point where people
74 Katie Zezima and Lenny Bernstein, “Sackler family fights back against al-
legations Purdue Pharma fueled the opioid epidemic,” Washington Post, April 2, 2019,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/sackler-family-fights-back-against-
allegations-purdue-pharma-fueled-the-opioid-epidemic/2019/04/02/4d3b68a6-
5578-11e9-9136-f8e636f1f6df_story.html.
75 Maura Healey, “Why I and other attorneys general are saying no to Purdue Phar-
ma’s settlement,” Washington Post, September 16, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/
opinions/why-im-rejecting-the-purdue-pharma-settlement/2019/09/16/1f86e94c-
d8b5-11e9-ac63-3016711543fe_story.html.
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can consciously (not in a drugged or manipulated state) say they love your
product, and it helped them change their lives for the better.
Your biggest competitor isn’t out there; it’s “in here.” It’s between your ears.
Once you get this, you can stop being an enemy to yourself and to others, and
start improving the quality of everything you do.
LOU IS HIS OWN WORST ENEMY
“Lou” is a fisherman and business owner who produces healthy, wild-caught

salmon and other fish products that can be shipped directly to the customer’s
door. He’s passionate about the health benefits of wild salmon. By all appear-
ances, he has huge potential for building a successful business—if only he could
get his head on straight.
His strategy is to reach out to complementary businesses that help people
achieve true health and do guest interviews and blog articles for their email lists
and blogs (a good strategy, actually). A few years ago, he requested an interview
with one of my clients who has a large database of 60,000+ health-conscious
customers. At the time, it looked like a great fit. My client agreed to a written
interview featuring Lou’s perspectives.
To make sure everything was kosher, my client asked me to place a test order
on Lou’s website and ensure it all went smoothly. I was to buy $100 worth of
salmon and other goodies. “Will do,” I said, thinking it would be a breeze.
Mentally, I was already sold on Lou’s products. I loved the idea of having
high-quality wild salmon shipped to my door. “Sign me up,” I thought. “What
a great idea for business. And this dude’s a fisherman, so he probably has an
interesting background too.” I was a good candidate to become his perfect-fit
customer. But whether or not I’d actually become his PFC would depend a lot
on what he did next.
I checked out Lou’s website. Clicked over to his store page. Browsed his
selection of products. I was eager to load up my shopping cart and be on my
merry way. Unfortunately, Lou’s ordering process was one disaster after the next.
Adding a product to my cart was a laborious, time-consuming feat. Figuring
out his pricing and availability (whether a product was in stock) was impos-
sible. Selecting a shipping method required a PhD in AFP (absolute fucking
patience). His store page kept timing out. His FAQs were scattered in places
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that didn’t make sense. I could go on and on. His website—as part of his larger
sales funnel—was the epitome of creating friction for customers.
“If I’m this confused (and I’m a pretty smart person), Lou’s website is defi-
nitely going to baffle the average person,” I thought.
That was red flag number one.
But I pressed on because I had an interview to edit!
Finally, after twenty minutes, my order was placed. Success! Hallelujah!
Take my fucking money already!
Or don’t.
A week later, my package arrived in the mail. But oh snap, another disaster
showed up: his packaging was a mess.
A twenty-page receipt was jammed in next to the salmon products. Whoa.
Kill trees much? Everything was haphazardly stapled together. I skimmed
through it. It was obvious, banal information warning me on how to properly
prepare salmon. That could have been condensed into a half-page insert. What
a waste of trees. It went straight into the trash without MEI’ing anyone. For
someone who boasted of having a sustainable product, his packaging sure
didn’t match.
I took the salmon products (which were packed in ice) out of the box. Over
the next week, I prepared and ate them, and they were delicious—as in, the best
salmon I’ve ever eaten. OK, a glimmer of hope. Lou’s amazing product blew me
away so much, it made me want to give him a second chance. Err, a third chance.
Unfortunately, the old sayings are true: “When a person shows you who
they are, believe them the first time.” And, “How you do anything is how you
do everything.”
All these small problems in Lou’s business were signs of a bigger problem:
he was his own worst enemy. That would not translate well for the cus-
tomer experience.
For starters, Lou hadn’t taken the time to fine-tune his funnel, so he could
truly serve people. (If you remember from Chapter 9, your funnel is your sales
system or process, the way in which you make it easy for customers to pay you.
Your funnel is a metaphor for how committed you are to serving people.)
The final kicker was when I subscribed to Lou’s email list and began reading
his articles. I wanted to learn more about his background, his philosophy, and
what he offered.
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Right away, he sent out a self-pitying newsletter to his list saying something
along the lines of: “Hey guys, it’s nearly impossible to make a living selling wild-
caught salmon because the government is so corrupt. Every day I compete with
conventional fish farms, and it’s so unfair. Oh, and by the way, if you eat farm-
raised salmon, you’re stupid, and here’s 10 reasons why! Plus, here’s a coupon
for 30% off my salmon if you act now.”
Oh boy.
Another talented business owner shooting himself in the foot by being
his own worst enemy and not taking responsibility for his own success (or
lack thereof ).
I relayed my findings to my client. Of course, we scrapped the interview. This
guy was nuts. We weren’t about to expose our long-time fans to his negativity.
Lou’s problem wasn’t the government or conventional fish farms who were
“competing” with his business. His problem was the stuff going on between his
ears. His problem was that he tolerated several mini disasters in his own funnel
and business. Lou was his own worst enemy and biggest competitor. That com-
petitor was taking him down and putting him into a chokehold.
He missed out on a huge opportunity to be featured on my client’s high-
traffic blog and well-qualified email list of tens of thousands of subscribers. Lou
botched it because of his poor attitude and his failure to take responsibility for
his own success. He was not in a mindset of MEI’ing, selling, giving, or serving
people. He thought he was educating people, but he was just being condescend-
ing and whiney.
You can’t help people like that. They have to want to help themselves.
If you think Lou is a rare case, think again. In my fourteen years of being in
business, I’ve seen many people do some variation of the “Lou dance.” Lou is a
composite of several businesses owners I’ve talked to who basically did the same
thing. They all had an amazing product and huge potential, and they all did
things to cause potential customers to run away screaming.
This is proof that you can have a wonderful product, but if everything else in
your business sucks, you’ll struggle to sell. You’ll create a self-fulfilling prophecy
that indeed proves, “It’s hard to make a living doing what I do.”
That’s why the Anti-Marketing Manifesto says your only competition is
your former self. Don’t compete with anyone. Compete only with the former
“you”—i.e., who you were yesterday.
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YOUR ONLY COMPETITION IS YOUR FORMER SELF
Your biggest barrier to growth is the version of you that existed 20 seconds ago,
20 hours ago, 20 days ago, 20 months ago, or 20 years ago. That’s who you’re up
against moment by moment. That’s who is distracting you from adapting and
growing. That version of you has the greatest capacity to ruin your business. He
(or she) is the biggest credible threat to your success.
Your biggest concern should be you—your vices, your bad habits, your
demons, your excuses, your poor attitude (if you have one), your negative
beliefs, any crap that you tolerate, and your day-to-day choices.
That former version of you may need compassion, healing, guidance, or self-
soothing. Either way, the old you should not be running your business.
Many business owners let their former selves run the show. They let the
four-year-old version of themselves make decisions. They act childish, imma-
ture, unfocused, or whiney. They can’t grow or move forward because they’re
resisting the natural flow of life, which is about change and adaptation. Life
forms that don’t adapt get weeded out to make room for better, smarter, faster,
stronger, more useful life forms.
More than anyone or anything else, you have the power to either succeed big
or fuck up your business beyond belief.
People self-sabotage all the time. It’s calling being stupid or needing Jesus
to save your ass. It shows up as bending over backwards to help a poor-fit client
and then making yourself physically ill as a result. It shows up as not calling a
PFC who specifically requested a phone call, and missing out on a $2K/month
ongoing project. It shows up as friction that you tolerate in your business, which
makes it hard for customers to pay you.
People who self-sabotage often blame external factors or competitors for
their failure. They blame the marketplace, the latest trends, the global economy,
politics, astrology, and anything else you can think of. They believe these exter-
nal threats can wipe them out. Fact is, none of those things has anything to do
with their ability to make a choice.
If you think those things determine your fate, you’re missing the point,
which is that success is an inside job. We always have a choice as to how we
show up in the world. We all have a choice as to whether to dig deeper into our
demons or cast them aside and keep working.
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CAST YOUR DEMONS ASIDE
Everyone has personal demons: things that plague them, mistakes they’ve
made, botched opportunities, etc. But we have to move past them, or we’ll
never get anywhere.
Everyone has FUPSOY (fucked up parts of yourself ) to varying degrees.
Welcome to being human. That’s characteristic of the ongoing, flawed nature
of humanity that only a higher power can save us from. That is no reason not to
move forward.
If you spend all your time exploring and fighting your demons and your
FUPSOY, digging deeper into them, you’ll never find your way out, and you’ll
never do anything productive or valuable. That’s why we need to cast our
demons aside and press forward with cleansing work!
Several industries make big money by encouraging people to explore their
demons and get stuck in the exploration of them. Some of these industries are
seriously leading people off track in life.
Big Pharma makes billions of dollars promoting the demon of illness. Drug
companies “discover” (a.k.a. invent) thousands of new “diseases,” so they can
sell you a patented cure. They want you to believe nothing can save you except
their toxic drug. Companies that promote disease are not concerned with what
produces true health. They’re only concerned with disease. Thus, they’re always
looking for signs of disease—even in healthy people—so they can “cure” it!
Whatever you look for, you’ll find. They’re not looking for signs or causes of
health. They’re looking for physiological FUPSOY.
The psychotherapy industry and even the coaching industry both explore
the demon of “emotional problems.” They name, identify, and invent thousands
of emotional problems that get in the way of productive living, so they can sell
you the cure in form of ongoing coaching or treatment. You could spend your
entire day studying all the different emotional problems and going deeper into
your FUPSOY, or you could simply cast your demons aside, move on, and work!
If you’re overcome by FUPSOY, you’ll struggle to sell. You’ll have no band-
width to serve people, give, or MEI others with great content. So cast your
demons aside. Make them follow you instead of blindly following them. (This is
what Jesus meant when he said, “Get behind me, Satan!”)
It’s a moral and spiritual imperative that you push your demons aside.
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BUSINESS IS YOUR OWN PERSONAL LABORATORY
Life generally mirrors back to you whatever you’re being on a consistent basis. If
you’re angry most of the time, life will give you tons of things to be angry about.
If you’re focused, disciplined, and productive, life will give you more opportu-
nities to be focused, disciplined, and productive. If you consistently give and
serve others, life will give you more opportunities to give and serve others. Your
results are largely based on the kind of person you’re being, how you’re showing
up, and what type of work you’re doing consistently.
Growing and running your business is like being in your own personal labo-
ratory where you get to see exactly what you’re made of. If you don’t like what
you see, change it.
The degree to which you’re willing to cast your demons aside each day, is
the degree to which you’ll grow while feeling totally at peace with yourself
and others.
You don’t really even need to face or conquer your FUPSOY. Let God
handle that. Just press on, and do your work. Be cleansed by your work. Control
what you can: your actions. Change whatever needs to be changed within your-
self, and move on.
HOW TO MOVE ON
The best way to cast aside a demon is to recognize it for a brief second, then
ignore it in favor of getting back to work.
In fact, “ignore all negativity” is a great philosophy to adopt. People think
they’re solving problems by studying and talking about all the negative shit
that’s wrong in the world. But unless they have a tangible solution or a better
alternative, they’re not helping anyone. All complaining does is increase the size
of the problem in their mind, making them feel like more and more of a victim.
You’re not defined by your FUPSOY. You can make it smaller and smaller
until it no longer requires capitalization . . . it’s just fupsoy, a made-up word
representing a problem that doesn’t have to exist.
IDENTIFY WHAT MAKES YOU GREAT—AND GET GREAT AT IT
If you’re not competing with anyone, what are you doing?
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You’re focusing on what makes you great and getting great at that. You’re
practicing your craft and getting 1 percent better at your skill set every day
through discipline, implementation, and action. You’re bringing your personal
best into everything you do, regardless of what other people are doing. You don’t
strive to get better for accolades and praise; you strive to get better because you
genuinely want to. You’re taking the time to master your skill set, your attitude,
your ability, and your willingness to MEI and sell. Where your skill set fails, you
hire other people who are more advanced to help you.
Many people have a hard time acknowledging what makes them great. They
either downplay it with false modesty, hide it because they’re embarrassed, or
ignore it because they’re distracted by other things. Being humble serves you.
False modesty does not.
ANTI-MARKETING IS CREATING FROM THE INSIDE OUT
Rather than worrying about external things, focus on what makes you unique.
Learn how to communicate this in every ad, article, blog post, and piece of pro-
motional or educational content you write. Focus on improving yourself daily.
Then you will build your business from the inside out, not from the outside in.
Keep your eyes on the real prize: self-mastery, discipline, consistency, creativity,
resourcefulness, and serving people. (By the way, no external competitor can
take these things away from you—unless you let them.)
The beauty of being you is that you have a plethora of life experiences,
memories, and wisdom to draw upon. No one else can duplicate this. Therefore,
no one else can compete with you. All of your uniqueness can be used as
content fodder to grow your business. Your personality and viewpoints provide
endless anti-marketing content for your readers’ benefit and enjoyment.
Accept and love yourself because that’s the point! Be at peace with your flaws
and imperfections, but don’t ever confuse them as an excuse to be complacent.
Work constantly on delivering a better product—something that rocks your
customers’ world while giving you great satisfaction in delivering it. Whatever
that looks like for you, master it.
As an anti-marketer, you can carve out your own opportunities regardless
of what’s happening in the external world. Actually, you can create your own
opportunities by believing that you can do it and then taking the appropriate
actions to do so.
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You don’t have to play anyone else’s game to win. Play your own game.
Everyone can win at their own game. Just keep giving and serving at the forefront
of your mind. Love the process, and care deeply about it for the right reasons.
With the Internet and other technological advances, there’s no excuse not
to be successful. Literally anyone can do it. Teenagers are making millions of
dollars because they want to. A seven-year-old boy is making $22 million a
year reviewing toys (with a little help from his parents). He has one of the most
popular YouTube channels on the planet.76 You have to want your success more
than you want to sit on your ass, complaining.
Train yourself to believe there’s plenty of work (the “right work”), plenty
of perfect-fit customers, and plenty of fun, creative ways to get your product
in front of the right people. Then get out of your own way. That’s your biggest
challenge—you and your own BS!
My guess is, you probably already know all the ways in which you BS your-
self. (If not, your worst habit is kidding yourself into not knowing.) You are
your biggest barrier to your own success.
In case of emergency, you can always comfort yourself with the phrase,
“Rejection is God’s protection.” If you poured everything you had into making
an opportunity work, and it didn’t pan out, there might be some reason that
you’re not aware of. It might be God trying to nudge you in a different (better)
direction. It’s like a story I once heard about a woman who tried three times to
get an apartment in a certain building in a certain city. All three times her appli-
cation was mysteriously rejected for no reason. She could easily afford living
there. Months later, she found out that building caught on fire and burned to
the ground.
STAY IN YOUR OWN LANE
There’s something very liberating about keeping your focus on your own
work—a.k.a. staying in your own lane.
Too many people look around, spying on what other companies are doing,
to the detriment of their own business. It’s much more beneficial to focus on
your own business and make it as great as it could be.
76 John Lynch and Travis Clark, “A 7-year-old boy is making $22 million a year
on YouTube reviewing toys,” Business Insider, December 3, 2018. https://www.businessin-
sider.com/ryan-toysreview-7-year-old-makes-22-million-per-year-youtube-2018-12.
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It’s a healthy practice to mind your own business (versus cutting into
someone else’s lane and trying to get involved with theirs). Stay out of other
people’s business—unless it’s your life’s purpose to get involved and offer
a solution.
Focus on serving your PFCs. Do your work. Move forward. Pay more atten-
tion to the actions you take each day. It’s about looking inward, not outward.
WHEN TO PAY ATTENTION TO OTHERS
Is there any reason why it’d be valuable to look at what other companies are
doing? Yes, but not for competition purposes.
It’s valuable to study business owners who MEI you. Motivate yourself by
looking at their success and letting it lift you up as proof that you can do the
same in your own way. Educate yourself by studying their technique, learning
from their victories, and avoiding their failures. Inspire yourself by viewing their
success as evidence that “God is good all the time,” and this universe is amazing.
If other businesses are MEI’ing you, that’s a great reason to study their
content. Otherwise, don’t bother. Don’t spy, don’t watch. Just get back in your
own lane. Learn to say, “My lane is awesome!”
You can also briefly study companies in your industry that are behaving
unethically and write about them while using the contrast principle. (See
“Chapter 6: Share Insight Often.”) This is great way to educate your readers and
inspire them to say, “Fuck that. I’m choosing better.”
Emulate successful people who genuinely inspire you. Treat them as role
models, but don’t copy them, don’t compete with them, and don’t try to be like
them. Be yourself.
Other people’s success should never threaten you or make you feel bad. It
should either MEI you or make you feel excited as you bask in the beauty of this
abundant world!
LOVE YOUR WORK, AND DON’T COMPETE WITH ANYONE!
Whatever you do, strive to become 1 percent better each day—better at serving
people, better at delivering a high-quality product, better at creating great
content that kicks ass. Better, better, better. Closer and closer to heaven on
earth (or, oh snap—you’re already there).
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Remember, your choice to work and to perfect your craft has nothing to do
with what others are doing. They’re not a concern to you—not as much as your
work is. They don’t have the power to take away your ability to work. Only you
have that power. So get to work!
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CHAPTER 13:
Be Congruent AF—Stick
to Your Values
“Be impeccable with your word.”
— Don Miguel Ruiz
Customers are always watching, listening, and paying attention to see whether
you’re being congruent with your values. That’s part of a massive shift that’s
been taking place globally. People want companies to be held accountable for
their words and actions. It’s deeply offensive to us when they’re not, especially
if we’ve poured thousands of dollars of our own money into buying that com-
pany’s products, only to discover they’ve been harming us this entire time.
People want to do business with actual human beings who are real, who
walk their talk, are trustworthy and worth listening to, and who don’t spout
empty promises that never come to fruition.
We’re all responsible for holding ourselves accountable in our own lives.
But often that doesn’t happen in the realm of predatory marketing. Predatory
marketers want us to rely on them, and then when they harm us, they don’t take
responsibility for it. When companies aren’t held accountable for their actions,
it’s like a travesty against humanity. It feels personal. It feels like an attack.
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Incongruence is when you fail to live up to the things you say you value. It
looks like this: you make a little slip-up here and there, but instead of correct-
ing your behavior, you start to tolerate further slip-ups. Before you know it,
you’re allowing multiple slip-ups to become your new normal—to the point
where what you say you value becomes laughable. You keep doing this until one
day you find yourself lodged into a state of mediocrity. Your words and actions
don’t match. You become a walking bullshit factory. Next thing you know,
you’re selling your soul for a buck. You’re doing things solely to make money,
but these things have little or nothing to do with why you started your business
in the first place.
Incongruence sucks. We hate it, and for good reason. It’s the essence of being
a sellout.
THE UGLINESS OF BEING INCONGRUENT
Before I show you how being congruent can help you grow your business, let’s
look at a few examples of companies that aren’t being congruent.
“Marriage isn’t all it’s cracked up to be . . .”

Years before I met my fiancé, Dan, I joined a relationship program called “Find
Your Dream Husband.” Led by “Victoria,” the program promised to help single
women attract the love of their life and get married. I took it seriously. I’d had
a string of disheartening, unsuccessful flings and wanted to find a healthy long-
term relationship.
Victoria hired a marketing consultant named “Blah-Face McGee.” Everyone
worshipped him (except me), and he was hailed as a wizard at online marketing.
He promised to help businesses “explode their conversion rates.” I had heard of
him through other entrepreneurial circles I was in.
One day out of the blue, Blah-Face started DM’ing me. Side note: he was
married. Side note: I was a single female and not the least bit interested in
married guys.
At first, I wasn’t sure why he was DM’ing me. He claimed he was just
reaching out to people to see if they needed help. We chatted about Victoria’s
business. I mentioned I was enrolled in “Find Your Dream Husband,” to which
Blah-Face replied, “Oh really? I do their Facebook ads. How are you liking it?”
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B e C ongruent A F — S tick to Y our Values
“It’s great,” I said.

“You know,” he replied, “marriage isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
Crickets.
WTF?
I didn’t know how to respond. So I ignored it. The more I thought about it,
the more it pissed me off. Why was this married guy saying shit like that? Ouch
to his wife.
Someone who thinks marriage isn’t all it’s cracked up to be shouldn’t be
married—and shouldn’t be working for or accepting paychecks from a company
that helps women find their dream husband.
Major lack of congruence for Victoria’s business.
I found it strange that she would hire someone like that. Maybe she didn’t
vet that person. But by then it was too late. As a paying customer, I was feeling
grossed out by the whole thing.
Blah-Face’s comment said a lot about his character, but his follow-up actions
spoke volumes and made Victoria’s company look like a joke. Blah-Face soon
began making flirty, inappropriate comments to me via DM. I blocked him.
Yeah, should have seen that coming. As Maya Angelou said, “When someone
shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” A few years later, I found
out Blah-Face was divorced and onto a new wife. Shocking.
I lost respect for Victoria’s business. I couldn’t take her or her program seri-
ously after that. I never shared that DM conversation with her. I didn’t buy
anything from her again. I just peaced out as a customer.
“Sleep is so important . . . yawn.”

Remember “Kendall,” the health guru whose conference I attended years ago?
(She convinced me to over-discount my prices.) On her blog and in her tele-
seminars, she often preached religiously about the benefits of getting seven to
nine hours of deep, restful sleep. “Sleep is the most critical thing you can do for
your health,” she often said.
Yet during her conference, she admitted she forced her assistant to stay up
all night working on conference-related tasks, so the company could sell as
many consulting packages as possible. Her assistant barely got any sleep and was
exhausted, running on fumes while putting on a happy face for the attendees.
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Kendall pushed her team to sell as much as possible while asking them not
to live by the principles her company taught.
Incongruence, baby.
A nasty yoga mat for your chakras

Mmmkay . . . one more example. A colleague shared this one with me.
Jessica Olie is an influencer with over 648,000 Instagram followers. She
claims to be all about authenticity, organic living, and being true to yourself.
After releasing her own yoga mat, some of her longtime fans were disappointed
with the quality of her product. Apparently, it was made of “nasty ass rubber
with a disgusting chemical smell.” Olie’s choice to use certain materials in her
yoga mat was incongruent with the values she claimed to be about.
Former fans lost interest once she became an influencer and started only
caring about her numbers, her image, and her status. They were like, “Fuck this
chick.” Really, it was the incongruence that turned them off.
Olie also upset people when she failed to follow through on certain promises.
For example, she offered to give away free yoga mats to her followers every week
but then didn’t do so consistently. According to Buzzfeed, “Some fans began to
suspect that the so-called weekly giveaways were only a plot to gain engagement
and followers and that Olie didn’t actually plan to commit to them.”77
People love to sniff out incongruence. It’s deeply offensive to our souls.
When you’re inconsistent—when you don’t do what you say you’re gonna do—
people will notice, and they’ll hate you for it. Longtime fans will be the first say,
“Dude, WTF? What are you doing? This isn’t you.”
Have haters, but have them for the right reasons—like sticking to your values.
ARE YOU WILLING TO DIE, BUT MORE

IMPORTANTLY, LIVE FOR YOUR VALUES?
Are you walking the line between upstanding citizen and shit bird on a regular
basis? If so, you’re being incongruent. You’re not living by your values. You’re
77 Tanya Chen, “A Yogi Influencer Is Trying To Backtrack And Clarify Her ‘Week-
ly Giveaways’ After Upset Fans Noticed They Were Not, In Fact, Weekly,” BuzzFeed,
August 14, 2019, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tanyachen/yoga-influencer-
jessica-ollie-said-weekly-giveaways-were.
190
teeter-tottering between two weak-ass realities without fully committing your-

self to one that rocks. You’re acting like Blah-Face—the type of person who
says, “Commitment is not all it’s cracked up to be.” GTF outta here with that
shit. You’re flakier than the worst case of dandruff.
Your intentions and ideologies might be in the right place, but I’m warning
you not to let the other stuff slide because it will do damage to your business.
ASSESS WHAT YOU’RE PUTTING OUT
Your website might be awesome, well designed, and full of the right compo-
nents, but how are you in person when interacting with customers? Have you
decided in advance how you want to be?
Are you courteous in your writing but rude and bitchy in person? If so,
you’re being incongruent. Now flip it: are you loud and obnoxious in person
but muted and passion-less in your writing? Then you’re being incongruent.
Do you post lavish selfies on Instagram showing you’re “living the life,” but
behind closed doors, you haven’t given yourself a paycheck in years and feel
stressed to the max? Same. Incongruence.
Do you claim to love innovation and technology or say you’re on the cutting
edge of something, but your website looks like it’s from the 1990s and takes
forever to load?
Do you value simplicity and purity, yet your sales funnel is complicated and
confusing to your customers?
Let’s say you’ve MEI’d someone online with your blog articles. Then they
meet you in person and feel disappointed because the real you doesn’t match up
with the online version. How can you reconcile that? How can you make sure
that if people meet you in person, both versions of you match?
That’s why you need to walk your talk in all areas of your business. I know
it’s hard, but you know what’s harder? Being a version of you who doesn’t live by
your values and unleashing that version onto other people.
The solution? Be yourself from the get-go. Be at total peace with who you
are. Infuse your values into every facet of your business from day one.
And then if anyone has a problem with you, don’t be concerned about it
because you’ll know you’re sticking to your values while being true to you.
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Here are some examples of business owners who stick to their values no
matter who has a problem with it. Love them or hate them, they’re making their
mark on the world.
WE’RE CLOSED FOR THE DAY . . . NOT SORRY!
Chick-fil-A closes all their locations on Sunday, so they can “honor the sabbath.”
Does this piss some people off ? Absolutely. But the company isn’t going to
adjust its value system just to make other people more comfortable.
In his book, Eat Mor Chikin: Inspire More People, Chick-fil-A’s founder
Truett Cathy writes, “Closing our business on Sunday, the Lord’s Day, is our
way of honoring God and showing our loyalty to Him . . . I believe God honors
our decision and sets before us unexpected opportunities to do greater work for
Him because of our loyalty.”78
This is a great example of doing what you believe is right, even if it means
losing some profits. And Chick-fil-A isn’t losing anything; they’re gaining a ton.
They’re resonating strongly with those who share their values. A 2019 Business
Insider article states, “Despite being open for 14% fewer days a year than com-
petitors, Chick-fil-A is dominating the fast-food industry.”79 Of course, Chick-
fil-A has no competition because they’re one of a kind; they’re being true to
their values.
John Hamburger, the president of Franchise Times, said, “Being private
means they can do the right thing, not the expedient Wall Street way of
doing things.”80 They’d rather stick to their values than go against them just to
please customers.
78 Truett Cathy, Eat Mor Chikin: Inspire More People: Doing Business the Chick-fil-A
Way. (Georgia: Looking Glass Books, 2002), 100.
79 Kate Taylor, “Why Chick-fil-A’s decision to close on Sundays is a brilliant busi-
ness strategy,” Business Insider, June 2, 2019,
https://www.businessinsider.com/chick-fil-a-closed-on-sunday-business-strategy-2019-6.
80 Kate Taylor, “Chick-fil-A likely loses out on more than $1 billion in sales every year
by closing on Sundays — and it’s a brilliant business strategy,” Business Insider, July 29, 2019,
https://www.businessinsider.com/chick-fil-a-closes-on-sunday-why-2019-7.
192
“WE WILL NEVER SELL IN STORES”
My client Shane Ellison (a.k.a. “The People’s Chemist”) sells natural health
supplements through his website.81 One of TPC’s biggest selling points is that
he refuses to use preservatives, fillers, additives, and other junk in his products.
A few of TPC’s customers have requested that he sell his products in stores.
Even though people ask for this, Shane refuses to do it because it goes against
his value system. According to an email he sent me, stores require additives,
preservatives, or “anti-caking agents” to be added to extend a product’s shelf life
and to protect against mold. None of those ingredients offers a single health
benefit. Therefore, Shane refuses to adulterate his products with them. Period.
The answer is, “No. We will never sell in stores.”
This is a case where the business owner’s value system trumps everything else,
including customer requests. It doesn’t serve people (or their health) to have
TPC’s products loaded with preservatives, just so they can be sold in stores.
Also, because of Shane’s high quality-control (QC) standards, his produc-
tion time takes longer than the average supplement. His QC is more rigorous,
and products are sometimes on backorder until a new batch is ready. So be it.
Customers who value this razor-sharp precision will get to enjoy the highest-
quality health supplements on the planet—and they share TPC’s values of true
health and longevity.82
“WE DO NOT TAKE CREDIT CARDS”
Dave Ramsey, who is known for helping people get out of debt, has the most
inspiring debit card policy I’ve ever read. It’s full of personality, and it’s a great
example of a company sticking to its values. Here’s an excerpt:
We are NOT accepting credit cards! Never have and never

will. I mean, come on, do you listen to the radio show at all?
Have you ever heard of a plasectomy? Please understand that
accepting credit cards is something that will NEVER happen
81 www.ThePeoplesChemist.com
82 I mention Shane a lot in this book. Note: he did not fund or finance this book,
nor is he accepting any profits off the sale of this book. He refused to! All he did was strong-
ly encourage me to finish this book. #AntiMarketerForLife.
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as long as Dave is still alive (and even forever after that!) . . .

We understand that some people will get upset over this deci-
sion . . . However, all we are doing is simply aligning ourselves
with the advice we give America.83
His policy goes on to address the monopoly that Visa and MasterCard have
on the debit card industry, which prohibits merchants from only taking debit
cards. Obviously, anyone can enter their credit card number and still buy some-
thing on Ramsey’s site. Nonetheless, he’s taking a stand for what he values by
encouraging people to only use a debit card.
ASSESS YOUR VALUES
Business demands a set of values that guide you through everything—tough

times, prosperous times, challenging times, smooth times, all of it. If you haven’t
already taken the time to clarify what your values are, sit down and figure them
out. What principles will you live and die by?
And by the way, having values isn’t solely a religious thing. I understand that
so much about religion is off-putting to those who aren’t ready for it. That’s the
big cosmic joke God played on us: he encrypted some of his secrets in bizarre
language that doesn’t make sense to those who aren’t ready for it. It’s up to you
whether you want to explore that or not. Nobody has a right to push their value
system on you.
You can decide to have values, such as: “I will always keep my word,” “I will
promise less, deliver more,” “I will talk less, work more,” “I will do everything
with dignity,” “I will be punctual AF,” or anything else that inspires you. The
only time to change your values is if they’re shitty. Only you get to decide that
for yourself. Nobody else can decide it for you. Nobody else can change your
character for you or change your habits for you. It’s all on you.
Note: Some people aren’t even aware of what they value. They might uncon-
sciously gravitate toward things that cause them to fail. For example, I once
valued getting attention more than I valued making sales. This led me to take
83 “Debit Card Policy,” DaveRamsey.com, last visited April 6, 2020,

https://www.daveramsey.com/company/debit-card-policy.
194
actions that brought me attention but not sales. I changed this, and now I value
sales over attention.
The moment you realize your values aren’t leading you in the right direc-
tion, change them and never look back. I changed mine. It was worth it. I’m
unrecognizable from the person I once was because I changed what I value. It’s
like changing your heart from the inside out.
Your values should make sense to you (but not necessarily to others). They
should make you happy with yourself and your choices.
Take the time to develop your character, change any habits that are driving
you nuts, and make better choices—until you’re satisfied with who you are and
can sleep well at night. As long as you remain true to yourself and are willing
to accept the consequences (and rewards) that come with that, it will all be
worth it.
ASSESS YOUR OFFERINGS
Now’s a good time to get honest with yourself. Is there anything you’re doing in
your business that you don’t love, enjoy, or believe in? If so, it’s gotta go. Is there
anything you’re doing that goes against the values you claim to hold? If so, some
serious change is in order.
Scour your business, and figure out what needs to be changed. Look specifi-
cally at three areas: 1) your content, 2) your relationship with your customers,
and 3) the way you run your business.
Your content includes your website, your blog, email newsletter, funnel, and
any other communication you’re putting out. Make sure all the content you’re
creating is serving people in a way that reflects what’s most important to you.
Make sure your website and funnel showcase you as a real human being, not just
your product or service. (That’s the missing piece for a lot of business websites.)
How are you interacting with customers? Does your communication need
to be simpler and less dramatic? Do you need to apologize less, explain less,
or defend yourself less? How are you interacting with potential customers
who’ve never worked with you before? Are you freaking out or treating them
as an equal?
How are you handling daily operations in your business? Make sure you’re
running your business in a way that’s leading you where you want to go, from
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the small details to the larger ones. Think: packaging, invoices, thank-you cards,
bonus offers to long-time clients, how your store page is organized, etc.
If you hate working on Fridays, don’t work on Fridays. If you’d rather devote
that day to family time, do it.
If hip-hop dancing puts you in a great mood, then do it first thing in the
morning before you do any business work. Consider it part of your non-nego-
tiable growth strategy.
If reading two random Bible verses a day brings you a sense of peace, then
start adding that to your morning routine.
If you flat out hate delivering a certain service, get rid of it! Stop offering it.
Stop agreeing to do it.
If creating a certain product turns you into a cranky, bitter person because
you abhor everything about the process, stop doing it. Stop selling it. Deliver
yourself from deliverables that drive you crazy.
You’re the boss. You make the decisions.
ASSESS YOURSELF
Look for areas where you can put more of the real you into your business. After
all, that’s what anti-marketing is all about! It’s not just about putting an idealistic
version of you into your content or online presence; it’s about putting the real
you into everything: your communication, the way you deliver your product or
service, how you package it, any ingredients you use, and any policies you have.
You might have pretty packaging, but what’s inside? Do your product fea-
tures and attributes match up with your values? (If you value simplicity, is this
obvious in everything you show to your customers?)
If something doesn’t match up with the truth of you, it’s gotta go.
If you feel like you’re not being true to yourself or your values, ask yourself
what needs to change.
BE CONGRUENT AF
Business owners who live and die by their values are very compelling to watch,
observe, and study. They walk their talk to the max. They’re in alignment with
everything they do. They’re the same person off the job as they are on the job.
They practice what they preach. If they catch themselves making a mistake,
196
they’re the first to admit it and correct it. They take responsibility for every-
thing that happens in their business.
One of the best skills (or perhaps character traits) you can develop is to be
congruent as fuck (AF). This means you live by your values with razor-sharp
precision. Is the goal to be 100 percent perfect all the time? No, but strive
toward a percentage that inspires you. Maybe it’s 80 percent. Maybe it’s 99.999
percent. Maybe you’re so off track right now that 51 percent sounds like a
victory. Start wherever you are, and vow to become more of living example
of what you stand for. Be willing to die for what you say you value, but more
importantly, be willing to live for it.
CONGRUENCE IS INSPIRING!
Being congruent is a huge part of the “inspire” element of the MEI principle—
motivate, educate, and inspire. People who are congruent naturally motivate us
to get our shit together. They seem like whole people, not fragmented. They’re
not trying to cover something up or make up for some deficiency. Nor are they
trying to bullshit anyone. They are who they say they are, nothing more or less.
Being congruent is a quality that will help you grow your business because
it will make people trust you for the right reasons. When you follow through
on your promises over and over again with consistency (plus or minus the
occasional “human imperfection”), this makes people relax when they pay you.
Trust and credibility don’t come from an image, a suit and tie, a fake follower
count, paid reviews, or other surface-level crap. They come from doing what
you say you’re gonna do.
This is why it’s so important to make sure every facet of your business reflects
your true self and your values. The people you hire should also share your
values. Everything from your suppliers, vendors, consultants, to your employees
and contractors—all of it needs to match your values. Everything! Otherwise
you’re selling out.
If your business sells marriage-related counseling services, make damn sure
both you and your married contractors love being married and are wholeheart-
edly committed to the institution of marriage. Otherwise you’re scamming
your clients. It doesn’t matter if the scam is intentional or accidental. A scam
is a scam.
197
Even your customers need to share your values. Otherwise, delivering your
product or service will be a nightmare! When the values match on both sides
of the transaction, working with customers and serving them will be deeply
satisfying to all parties involved.
GO FORTH AND BUILD YOUR BUSINESS WITH INTEGRITY
When you infuse your values into every part of your business—your website,
sales copy, the way you interact with people, sales conversations, the way you
collect payments, the method by which you deliver your product or service, and
even your packaging—you’ll become very compelling to customers who share
your values. They’ll look at you in awe of how solid your personal brand is. You
might even be compelling to those who have a different value system than you.
They might realize they want to choose something better. Buying from you or
just studying your content might help them permanently change their thinking
and behavior for the better.
Isn’t that the reason why you’re in business, to help people get better?
Be the real you, and stick to your values everywhere you go. If you make a
mistake, admit it, fix it, and move on.
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CHAPTER 14:
Grow, and Be a Rebel

for a Good Cause
“Constantly change the changeable, while steadfastly clinging

to the unchangeable.”
— Rabbi Daniel Lapin
At this point it’s time to take everything you’ve learned courtesy of the Anti-
Marketing Manifesto and use it to grow your business! Let’s put it all together
and make some shit happen!
I don’t care how you choose to grow; I just want you to do it in a way that
makes your life enjoyable—for you and those around you. Life is too short to
waste on misery. Positive growth is the goal.
To understand positive growth, let’s first look at its opposite: decay.
BEWARE OF COASTING
In the summer of 2007, I was fresh out of college with a degree in English.
Months later I landed a $50,000 salaried work-at-home writing gig. It was a
dream come true—my first “big” client, much bigger than previous clients I’d
worked with. I thought I had made it.
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Over the next year and a half, I studied my client’s industry, learned about
business, cranked out content, wrote, edited, wrote some more, and enjoyed my
new income.
But I got lazy. I started coasting. Instead of doing everything I could to
improve my writing services daily and become more valuable to that client, I
grew complacent.
In April 2009, my client went out of business, and I lost my salary. I didn’t
see it coming. It came out of nowhere. Some people might say it was due to
the recession, but really, it was because both of us (my client and I) didn’t
adapt. Overnight, his business dried up, and his customers stopped buying.
Meanwhile, I hadn’t adapted my business, skill set, or mentality to serve him
better. Although I had some ideas about how he could serve his customers
better, I didn’t develop them with full intensity. I didn’t help him shift his busi-
ness model, so he could thrive through the recession.
It was a hard lesson on the dangers of coasting on my initial success. It was
also a lesson on the dangers of relying too heavily on one client or on one par-
ticular way of selling.
I had to learn this lesson several times with several clients before I got it.
Never assume you’re “set.” Ever. Don’t rely on anyone for anything. Don’t
expect a thing from anyone. Circumstances could change at any time. Change
is the nature of life. People change. Businesses change. Customers come and go.
The world shifts like an ocean. Surf the waves or get wiped out. Adapt or die.
In a universe of constant change, the only thing that doesn’t change is time-
less principles. One of the eternal principles of business is “If you’re not growing,
you’re dying.” It’s impossible to stay the same or be stagnant forever. If you’re
not growing, your business is actually disintegrating. That process of falling
apart might take months or years (or even decades), and you might not see it
coming, but it’s happening. You’re either moving in one direction or the other.
WE’RE ALL HOMOS . . . SAPIENS, THAT IS.
As business owners, we’re in a unique position to forge amazing paths for the
rest of humanity and to inspire people to choose to follow our path—or not.
Businesses can do great good, or they can do great harm. It boils down to a
choice. To do the most good that you can while you’re alive, you must get good
at adapting and thriving.
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G row , and B e a R ebel for a G ood C ause
I’ll illustrate this with a story about human evolution.

Last summer, my fiancé Dan and I traveled to Washington, DC, to visit
his daughter who was turning six. We took her to the Smithsonian National
Museum of Natural History. (Fun fact: if you were to spend 1 minute at every
exhibit at the Smithsonian, it would take you over 200 years to view everything.)
We found ourselves in a section displaying various species of humans. Homo
erectus . . . Homo floresiensis . . . Homo heidelbergensis, the latter of which sci-
entists think we (Homo sapiens) evolved from.84 Life-sized statues of extinct
humans were propped up behind glass. Their hair, eyes, and skin looked uncan-
nily familiar. Some were short (about half our height) and shaped differently
in the face and bone structure. They slightly resembled us but were different
enough to seem weird. We looked into their eyes as if they were real, but they
were just statues representing something that once existed.
We learned that every human on the planet today is part of the species
known as Homo sapiens. We’re the only species of humans that still exists.85 Even
with our vast cultural diversity today, we all have this huge “thing” in common:
our species adapted, survived, and continues to thrive, as a whole. Go us!
All other human species went extinct like the dinosaurs, but we’re still here.
That’s pretty wild to think about—that other species of humans didn’t make it,
but we did. And who are we, exactly? Why are we here?
Despite all the various groups people are so eager to categorize themselves
(and others) into, we really are only one species: Homo sapiens. We’re humans!
We’re in this life together. We have our differences, but that doesn’t change the
fact that, as a whole, we’ve gotten very good at making our lives work.
This begs the question: where will we go from here?
Are you willing to adapt and grow yourself and your business, so you not
only barely make it but flourish in the coming years?
The best way to help humanity is to be the most successful version of your-
self and to grow your business exactly how you want it to be while staying true
to yourself.
84 “Homo sapiens,” Humanorigins.si.edu, last visited April 6, 202

0, http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-sapiens.
85 “What does it mean to be human?” Humanorigins.si.edu, last visited April 6, 2020,
http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-sapiens.
201
Note: Adapting doesn’t mean competing with other companies. It means

growing yourself and your abilities.
WHAT MAKES THE DIFFERENCE?
Since I lost that writing gig in 2009, I’ve worked with many other clients. I’ve
seen a wide range of strange and interesting human behaviors in them, some of
which were adaptive and productive and some of which were self-destructive
and self-sabotaging. Some of my clients (many, actually) went out of business,
like my original client did. Others adapted and grew, got even stronger, built up
their profits to insanely healthy levels, and continue to serve customers to this
day. Looking back, some of my current clients have said they thrived during the
recession of 2008–2009. For them, there was no recession. It was just another
challenge life threw at them, which they conquered.
What’s the difference between people who go out of business (or struggle
as if they’re about to go out of business at any second) and those who soar to
massive heights? It always comes down to their mentality and their actions. You
either have a growth mentality (which leads actions that lead to success), or you
have a coasting mentality (which leads to actions that cause decay).
There’s no middle ground.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO GROW, REALLY?
Growth requires you to stretch and challenge yourself daily while taking
massive care of yourself.
Growth requires you to work, learn, gain awareness, get stronger, improve
on what you’re doing, face what’s not working, let go of what isn’t serving you,
and create positive changes.
Growth requires you to say “yes” to healthy things and “no” to unhealthy
things. When you mix these two up, it hinders your ability to move forward.
Growth is the process by which you learn discernment—the ability to dis-
tinguish between what’s truly healthy for you and what isn’t.
Growth happens when you sacrifice things that cause your life or business
to disintegrate. By sacrificing the bad stuff, you make room for everything
to improve.
202
Finally, growth is a process that lasts a lifetime. You will never stop growing
until the day you die. At that point, you’ll no longer be human; you will return
to dust. Depending on your beliefs, you may go on to another spiritual realm.
SOME HUMANS RESIST GROWTH
It’s an interesting phenomenon that some of us resist growing our business. This
resistance is usually subconscious—i.e., we don’t even know it’s there. We don’t
know what secretly drives our decisions and behaviors.
Deep down, you might have negative associations with growth, such as:
• Growing your business will turn you into a workaholic jerk.
• Growing your business will make you fat because you’ll get so busy, you
won’t have time to exercise anymore.
• Growing your sales will turn you into a greedy person.
• Growing your brand will make you famous, and you don’t want to lose
your privacy or peace.
Therefore, you refuse to grow.
For the sake of your quality of life, you need to untangle these negative
associations in your brain and start associating healthy growth with positive
outcomes, such as:
• Growing your business will lead to greater profits, which will let you do
more of the things you enjoy.
• Growing your brand will allow you to be seen and heard by the right
people—those whose lives can be changed for the better once they start
studying your material or buying your product.
• Growing your sales and your ability to manage money will ensure that
you become financially independent and a slave to no one. By growing
your profits, you can give more, be more generous, and help more people.
• The whole reason you’re here in the first place is because God put you
here, so you could grow in specific ways and contribute to the evolution
and forward movement of humanity.
203
IS ALL GROWTH GOOD?
Technically, cancer is a form of growth. It comes from the unchecked prolif-

eration of cells often caused by a human allowing too many toxins to stay in
their body.
There’s a certain point at which a business can become unhealthy in its
growth because no checks and balances are in place. There’s nobody saying,
“Wait a minute, slow down. Are we doing the right thing here?”
Cancerous growth is not the goal for an anti-marketer. We’re aiming for
healthy growth.
Healthy growth is like a crock pot meal. It takes longer to prepare and
requires more work, thoughtfulness, and awareness than just slapping some
junk in the microwave. It requires character development, patience, and sacri-
ficing unhealthy behaviors. It requires developing a solid product or service first
and then growing your sales of it.
One school of thought says, “You should grow as fast as possible, even if
you don’t know what the hell you’re doing. Say ‘yes’ to everything, including
every opportunity that shows up. Say yes even if it means taking on debt to pay
for things you don’t have the money for (or doing other things that might go
against your values). Sell your product before it even exists.”
Another school of thought leans on the conservative (biblical) principle,
which says, “He who hastens to get rich will not go unpunished.” This approach
is more about “wise contraction”—i.e., saying “no” to unhealthy practices even
if it means slower growth. It requires perfecting your product, so it actually ben-
efits customers, not rushing your shoddily formed, half-assed prototype into
the marketplace just so you can capture some premature sales. Wise contraction
leads to healthier, more sustainable, more ethical growth over the long term.
YOUR GROWTH IS UNIQUE TO YOU
It’s important to note that growth looks different for each person and for each
business. Your growth is very personal and unique to you, and you don’t need to
compare it to anyone else’s growth. Your path is actually between you and God.
God (or whatever higher power you believe in) might want you to grow in
specific ways that have nothing to do with what your neighbor is doing. Your
path might involve slow growth, which teaches patience and resilience as you
204
build your character to be able to handle the huge growth that might be coming
down the road. Your path might involve fast initial growth, which teaches you
the value of staying humble.
You should never try to grow in the same ways that someone else is growing
their business because that’s inauthentic. Plus, it will make you miserable. Your
true path will look and feel different from everyone else’s path.
PRODUCT FIRST
Before you can really grow your business, your product needs to be right. By
that I mean it needs to be something you love and believe in wholeheartedly.
You must love the process of creating it, promoting it, talking about it, and
delivering it. If your product embarrasses you in any way, you won’t go full out
in growing your sales. You’ll find any excuse not to do it.
Don’t just sell a random thing that some guy in a suit convinced you to sell.
Sell something you deeply care about, something God gave to you or something
you were invited to create, and the invitation was spot on.
Finding the right product is half the battle. Then you can easily MEI people,
give, serve, and over-deliver with beautiful boundaries.
SELL OUT YOUR INVENTORY, NOT YOUR SOUL
I’m all for having a business where you sell without being a sellout. Sell so much
product that you run out and have to order more supplies or more ingredients to
make more! Create a waiting list! Have your stuff on backorder! Be spaciously
booked. But don’t skimp on quality, or your top fans will be the first to notice.
Create a business where you have more work than you can handle, and figure
out how to intelligently and gracefully deliver it without killing yourself or com-
promising quality. If you’re a product-based business, sell out your inventory.
If you do this repeatedly, then your new problem will become figuring
out how to get better at keeping up with demand or even getting ahead of it.
Those are great “problems” to have. They’re much more interesting than small
problems like not making enough money to pay your bills. (Yawn. That’s so pre-
Profit First, so pre-Total Money Makeover.)
Your new challenge then becomes getting more efficient, replenishing your
supply, and increasing your ability to deliver faster while not polluting the
205
earth! Are you up for the challenge? Meeting it requires that you think smarter
(with your big beautiful Homo sapiens brain!) while always honoring your
values, purpose, original mission, and high level of quality-control standards.
Feel free to sell out your inventory (or the equivalent of it) and enjoy it. Go
huge! Go as big as you want in your business—or stay as small as you’d like.
Some people (like me) get great enjoyment from working with fewer clients but
charging way more for the luxury experience, so we can give more of our atten-
tion to doing a better job. There are no rules. It’s up to you. It’s your business.
Just don’t ever be a sellout.
DON’T BE THE ORGANIC COMPANY THAT

SELLS OUT TO A JUNK FOOD COMPANY
Imagine you’re the owner of a company that sells sugar-free, healthy organic
treats online. All the choices you make determine whether you become a sellout
or whether you stick to your values.
Let’s say you build a fan base by creating unique articles about snacks, along
with interesting stories from your personal life. You posts videos from your
home office on YouTube and build an email list. You use the Anti-Marketing
Manifesto to promote your products to your fans. Your words bring truth
and inspiration to people’s lives even though you’re just writing about snacks
and treats.
One day you become so “internet famous” that you’re offered $15 million
by a large junk food corporation for the purchase of your business. However,
the buyer insists that for the deal to go through, your snack formulations must
be altered to include artificial preservatives to extend shelf life. If you agree to
these changes solely on the basis that you’ll be getting paid more money than
you’ve ever earned before—even though you strongly disagree with the use
of preservatives—you’re being a sellout. Likewise, if you’ve previously ranted
about how awful that company is because they’ve contributed to the world’s
obesity problem, you definitely don’t need to be selling your business to them
no matter how much they’re offering.
If you have integrity, you’ll tell the junk food corporation, “No thanks.
That’s not congruent with my brand or my values.” You’ll turn the deal down.
You’d rather die than sell out. You’d rather be an anti-marketer who sticks to her
206
values. Can you imagine how much content fodder that decision would give
you? It would make for a great “anti-press release”!
In an ever-changing world, cling to your principles. No matter what trends
or fads show up, never compromise on your values. Stick to what’s true for you.
(If your principles fail you, that’s an indication you never had any to begin with.)
BE A REBEL FOR A GOOD CAUSE
As you grow, be a rebel for a good cause. Do what’s right, always.

Any narcissistic jerk can amass a huge following and do evil with it. It takes
real character to grow a business while doing actual good in the world.
Throughout this book I’ve given you several examples of anti-marketers
who are rebels for a good cause. They’re speaking out against a toxic status quo,
calling out stupidity, and offering tangible, positive solutions for a better way
of living. They’re guiding people to choose wiser, smarter, healthier things for
their life. God bless them. They’re serving a higher purpose and growing their
businesses while they’re at it.
You can do the same in your own unique way.
At a soul level, your conscience knows what’s right and what’s good. You
can sit quietly and tune into it any time you want. You can test its wisdom.
Seriously, test it. If your conscience guides you in the right direction, keep lis-
tening to it. If it steers you off course, it’s not really your conscience talking. It’s
something else.
LET GO OF YOUR OLD STUPIDITY
Your business and brand will grow and evolve just as you do. But your values
in both your business and personal life need to shine through no matter what.
As you grow your business, your values may change, or they may stay the
same. The only time to change your values is if they suck! If they’re making you
or others around you miserable, it’s time to change them.
While I was writing this book, I had a spiritual awakening—as in now I’m
a person who “talks to Jesus.” My values changed over the five-year process
of writing this book. Early drafts showcased an angry, judgmental voice that
wasn’t the real me. It didn’t reflect the legacy I wanted to leave on the world. For
207
five years I had to work my way through those early (ugly) drafts, get them out
of my system, and be willing to let them go.
During that time I changed profoundly as a person. Most of the work I did
on this book involved building my character. I had to learn to say “yes” to the
right opportunities and “no” to the wrong ones.
I was antsy and eager to publish this book years before it was ready, but that
didn’t feel right. I didn’t want to release something that would embarrass me
five or ten years later or something I’d quickly outgrow and change my mind on.
I didn’t want to settle for an inferior final product.
So I kept working and perfecting my craft. I hired people to help me. Over
time, it became clear who had the most positive effect on me and who was
guiding me in the right direction. After hiring the right people to help me,
something finally started to click. My true voice began to emerge. For the first
time, I was genuinely excited about my “product”—my book.
You’re reading this book today because I was willing to grow, evolve, and
let go of my old stupidity. The old version of me could never have written this
book. I had to become someone better. I had to adapt. That growth was part of
my own unique creative process, and it was 100 percent worth it.
GROW!
Take a look at your own business. Are things getting better each day, or are
they decaying?
Are you consciously choosing the direction that you’re growing in?
What kind of growth do you want to achieve in this lifetime? Get specific
in clarifying your vision, and then make a plan to do it! Use the Anti-Marketing
Manifesto to bring out your best in everything you do.
Whatever your vision is, I wish you the most satisfying levels of success.
208
Now Get to Work!
“In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many
of them you can get through, but rather how many can get
through to you.”
— Mortimer J. Adler
Now for some “anti-inspiration.” Most people who finish reading this book
won’t do a single goddamn thing with the information they’ve just read. That’s
just facts.
I don’t know if it’s laziness, complacency, or a mixture of both, but a lack of
inspired action will kill your success. Why bother reading a book if you’re not
going to let it seep into your heart, mind, and soul? Why bother letting some-
thing into your brain if you’re not going to use it to benefit your life? Instead of
being like most people, please do something with whatever you’ve learned from
this book. What resonated most with you? Use it to grow your business. Adapt
it and customize it to your liking. And whatever didn’t resonate—scrap it.
I’m not the fucking expert on your life—you are. So enjoy taking respon-
sibility for that. Because here’s the thing: all the self-help books on the planet
won’t make a bit of difference if you don’t take action.86 No book—not even
this one—can transform your business for you. Chapter 6 won’t write your
86 See also Aytekin Tank’s article, “Why reading 100 books a year won’t make
you successful,” Medium, November 2, 2018, https://medium.com/swlh/why-reading-
100-books-a-year-wont-make-you-successful-cd9c3cf672f5. Tank says, “Personal develop-
ment books are only as helpful as the action we take after reading them.” Amen.
209
blog posts for you, Chapter 8 won’t build your email list for you, and Chapter 9
certainly won’t smack you in the face when you’re making it hard for customers
to buy from you. Only you can do these things.
No one is going to care about your business for you or ensure you’re in the
right business to begin with. You have to give people a reason to care. And you
need to have some honest conversations with yourself about what you really
want to experience/achieve/do/be/accomplish before you croak. It’s your life
and your business.
Has this book helped you in some way? I’d love to hear your feedback. Send
your thoughts to antimarketingbook@gmail.com.
210
N ow G et to W ork !
To recap, this is the Anti-Marketing Manifesto:
1. Treat People as People, Not as Targets

2. Motivate, Educate, Inspire . . . and SELL!
3. Stop “Getting” Customers, Start Giving
4. Measure the Right Things (Spoiler Alert: It’s Your Sales)
5. Ditch the Vanity Metrics
6. Share Insight Often
7. Write How You Talk
8. Build Your Email List Like Your Life Depends On It!
9. Grow Your List with a Funnel You Love
10. Don’t Outsource Your Essentials
11. Build a Premium Brand
12. Your Only Competition is Your Former Self
13. Be Congruent AF—Stick to Your Values
14. Grow, and Be a Rebel for a Good Cause
211
The Anti-Sales Pitch: Should I
Take You on as My Next Client?
“Being good is good business.”
— Anita Roddick
While writing this book, I had an epiphany: copywriting is better suited to be

my side hustle than my main career. That’s totally OK as long as I’m not kidding
myself anymore.
All these years, I had it backwards. I was trying to grow copywriting into
a full-time business when really my calling was to be primarily an author of
creative nonfiction books (like this one). I fell in love with the book-writing
process and realized I’d much rather devote my career to writing more books
and going deep into subjects that matter to me. Plus, it’s a dream I’ve had
since I was a kid. I’d rather be a full-time author than a full-time copywriter.
#TrueStory. See? Even I learned something from this book.
That said, I really enjoy doing copywriting stuff—funnels, email newsletters,
blog articles, and sales copy—for anti-marketers. They’re a rare breed and fun to
work with. All others, I cannot tolerate.
So I’m not looking to book myself solid with a ton of clients, but I do want
to leave the door open for working with a handful of talented, amazing business
owners who get the message behind this book and who genuinely love it and
agree with it. Are you my next perfect-fit client? Do you know what specific
help you need?
213
If this book spoke to your heart, you feel like you might be an anti-marketer,
and you’re excited to have me to write or edit content for you, let’s talk. Email
me at antimarketingbook@gmail.com.
214
Bulk Orders, Resources, and More
Do you love this book so much, you want every one of your employees or
organization members to have a copy? I offer a generous bulk discount! To
purchase multiple copies, email: antimarketingbook@gmail.com with the
subject line, “Bulk Order.” Also see www.antimarketingmanifesto.com/bulk for
more info.
For a handy list of all footnotes, links, and references mentioned in this
book, visit: www.antimarketingmanifesto.com/book-resources.
If you’re a business owner who wants to learn more about anti-marketing,

keep in touch by subscribing to my email list at: www.antimarketingmani-
festo.com. (Most of what I write never gets posted publicly to my blog. The
email list is for insiders and true fans only.)
215
Glossary of Anti-Marketing
Manifesto Terms & Acronyms
Almighty, All-Knowing Expert—Someone who believes they should be

your god and that you should listen to their advice no matter what. They cause
aches and pains in your life because you deplete your dignity fund or take out a
second mortgage to pay for their advice.
AFP (Absolute Fucking Patience)—Something customers and potential cus-
tomers have zero of as they’re browsing your website or trying to figure out how
to pay you or place an order with you. Don’t require people to have a PhD in
AFP in order to do business with you.
AMM—Anti-Marketing Manifesto. A philosophy that teaches people how
to sell without being a sellout. It revolves around using the MEI(S) principle
for all content creation in your business—motivate, educate, inspire, and sell.
Anti-marketers put customers before profits and shun the ways of preda-
tory marketing.
CTA (Call to Action)—Compelling text written toward the end of an email
or sales page that intelligently invites people to buy your product or place an
order. A good CTA includes a link to your sales page, order form, or payment
page. (See also “Ratio for Writing Emails that Rock.”)
Dumb-Ass Purchase—A purchase that requires you to deplete your retire-
ment fund, dignity fund, or emergency savings, take out a second mortgage, or
go into debt in order to pay for it. This can include a coaching program or other
high-priced product that you thought about for fifteen minutes or less. (Or any
other dumb purchase you’ll regret later that harms you.)
217
Dignity Fund (a.k.a. “Fuck Everything” Fund)—A massive stash of cash

savings and/or investment funds that you’ve built over time via the profits of
your business, allowing you to be financially independent. It gives you the power
to walk away from anything you hate and give the middle finger to anyone who
deserves it (optional).
Low-Value Conversation—Any conversation, discussion, or debate (offline,
online, on social media, or any other medium) that is ultimately a waste of time.
It leads to no productive or positive outcomes in either your business or in any
of the participants’ lives. Usually, the deeper someone gets into a low-value con-
versation, the more it pisses them off, drains them emotionally, or demoralizes
them. It distracts a person from their true purpose and their work.
MEI (Motivate, Educate, and Inspire)—These are the three pillars of the Anti-
Marketing Manifesto. The MEI principle is an approach to creating content
(both educational and promotional) that helps people and inspires them to
change their lives for the better. Content that MEIs always provides insight.
MEI(S) (Motivate, Educate, Inspire . . . and Sell)—When you MEI people
consistently, it leads to a fourth pillar of anti-marketing: selling. You know
you’re MEI’ing people when they sell themselves on your product or service
(rather than you trying to force a sale upon them through influencing, persuad-
ing, or manipulating). Get ready to enjoy increased ethical sales in your busi-
ness with the MEI principle!
MLB (Michelle Lopez Boggs)—The woman who wrote this book and loved
acronyms so much, she turned her name into one.
People with Intent—People who are actively seeking a solution, which your
product or service can help them with. (As opposed to time-wasters and lurkers
on social media who are scrolling, spying, and killing time with no intent or
purpose behind their actions.)
PFAB (Pretty Fucking Awesome Business)—Self-explanatory. You get to
decide what this looks like for you. It’s a result of using the Anti-Marketing
Manifesto and selling without being a sellout.
PFC (Perfect-Fit Customer or Client)—Your highest paying, easiest-to-work-
with, most enjoyable repeat clients who bring zero drama into your business
and who love paying you big money. These are your ideal customers whom you
look forward to serving and who get great value out of your product or service.
Focus all of your content and anti-marketing activities around reaching PFCs.
218
G lossary of A nti - M arketing M anifesto T erms & A cronyms
Predatory Marketing—The act of promoting, selling, or pushing a product or

service that harms people either directly or indirectly while not being forth-
coming about the truth. Any business, company, or person can be a predatory
marketer either intentionally or unintentionally. Rick Singer, the mastermind
behind the college admissions scandal, used predatory marketing tactics to
lure in parents by making them think they were doing something beneficial for
their kids, when, in fact, they were flat out cheating on their kids’ college admis-
sions.87 Monsanto’s toxic product Glyphosate is killing off the bees, and there-
fore, could kill off humanity.88 Predatory marketing is about seeking growth at
all costs, prioritizing revenue over the well-being of customers, and taking zero
responsibility for harming humanity. Fuck predatory marketing.
Ratio for Writing Emails that Rock—The 95:5 insight-to-CTA ratio. For
every email you write, aim to have about 95 percent insight and 5 percent call
to action. This ensures that you’re not “talking at” people or selling them but
rather MEI’ing them, so they can sell themselves on your product voluntarily.
Sellout—Anyone who goes against their own values in order to make a buck.
STDM (Shit That Doesn’t Matter)—Everything and anything that impedes
your ability to work, serve perfect-fit clients, and make sales. STDM includes
all vanity metrics such as likes, clicks, views, smiley faces, thumbs-up, retweets,
engagement, comments, and any other nonsense that usually never translates
into a sale or an opportunity to serve a PFC.
Two-Way, Meaningful Transaction—A sale that occurs because you MEI’d
someone, made an offer, asked for the sale, and truly served the person buying
from you. That other person (the perfect-fit customer) also causes the sale to
happen because they’re seeking the solution you offer, are willing to be served
by you, and are open to saying “yes” to what you’re selling. Their life is better off
(not worse off ) after they purchase from you.
VAFE (Valuable as Fuck Email)—An email that motivates, educates, and
inspires (MEIs) people and therefore, sells. It provides valuable insight to those
87 E. J. Dickson, “Who Is Rick Singer, the Mastermind Behind the College Ad-
missions Scam?” Rolling Stone, March 13, 2019, https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/
culture-news/rick-singer-college-admissions-scam-807736/.
88 Brittany Shoot, “Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Harms Bees, Study Finds.
Here’s Why That Matters,” Fortune, September 25, 2018.
https://fortune.com/2018/09/25/monsanto-weed-killer-bees/.
219
who read it. It follows the 95:5 insight-to-CTA ratio. (See also “Ratio for
Writing Emails That Rock.”)
Wasted-Space Email—An email written purely to sell and which contains no
insight whatsoever (a.k.a. spam). It doesn’t motivate, educate, or inspire (MEI)
anyone and is a waste of space in people’s inbox. It uses a 0:100 insight-to-
CTA ratio.
220
Acknowledgments
It took over six years for this book to be birthed. The first five and a half years
were a mild form of torture, and the last six months were some of the funnest
writing and editing I’ve ever done.
During that time I grew and matured as a person. My material transformed
from something that low-key embarrassed me to something that I’m now
genuinely proud of. What you see in your hands is unrecognizable from the
earlier drafts.
I’d like to thank Robin Colucci for critiquing an early draft of this book and
for helping me figure out my initial outline. Going through that process with
you seriously helped me mature as a person and as a business owner.
Thank you, Shannon Horn, for reading an early version of this book and
providing feedback. Your curiosity spurred me to keep going when I had nearly
given up.
Thank you, Felicia, for nudging me with your comment, “Finishing your
book is your ticket out of debt.”
Thank you, Ann Maynard, for doing a brilliant developmental edit on a later
draft of this book. Your suggestions sparked my true voice to come out (finally!),
which made it easier to nail down my true message. That was fun and rewarding
to experience, and I can’t wait to work with you again on a future book.
Thank you, Shane Ellison, for being a fantastic client for seven years and
counting and for being a living embodiment of anti-marketing in action!
Thanks for encouraging me to finish this book and for suggesting the word
“anti-marketing.” (Shane did not fund this book, nor is he profiting off of the
sales of it.)
221
Thank you to the team at FriesenPress for producing my book and bringing
it from a dream to a reality.
Thank you, Dan Boggs, for being the love of my life, for healing me, for
softening my edges, and bringing me out of my comfort zone (like taking me
to Mexico for the first time). Thank you for reading several versions of these
chapters. Thank you also for your lion noises, which will make sense to no one
but us.
I’d also like to thank the IRS for being completely insane. (Wait, oops, how
did that sneak in here?) Correction: I’d like to thank the IRS for all the “motiva-
tion.” (That aggressive repayment plan really lit a fire under my ass!) Hopefully,
the royalties on this book will pay off all the remaining debt I owe you.
Thank you, Dave Ramsey, for making me seriously hate debt and for giving
me a proven plan to get out of it. Thanks also for making occasional Jesus refer-
ences on your radio show without apology. It sunk in, and it has truly changed
my spirit.
222
About the Author
Michelle Lopez Boggs left her customer service job in 2006 to start her writing
business and never looked back. One of her first projects was editing and per-
forming research for the New York Times best-selling book Columbine by Dave
Cullen. Armed with a BA in English/Creative Writing, she worked as a techni-
cal writer, then switched to copywriting, editing, and finally, anti-marketing.
Based in Colorado, Michelle now teaches business owners to follow the
MEI principle— Motivate, Educate, and Inspire. She has helped her clients sell
millions of dollars’ worth of products and services online by writing as their
true selves and crystallizing their human emotions onto the “page.”
223

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How to Sell Without

MICHELLE LOPEZ BOGGS

Copyright © 2020 by Michelle Lopez Boggs

All rights reserved.

This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to

1. Business & Economics, Sales & Selling

Distributed to the trade by The Ingram Book Company

F*ck Marketing, Or Why I Became an Anti-Marketer 1

To my future self: I am so proud of you!

“We live in the most marketed-to culture in the history of

Predatory marketing is a plague on society. It drives us into debt, depletes our

1 VPRO. “Shoshana Zuboff on surveillance capitalism | VPRO Documentary.”

Billions of dollars are spent on consumer research, as if we’re nothing more

GROW YOUR BUSINESS WITH ANTI-MARKETING

“If anyone here is in advertising or marketing . . . kill yourself.

— Bill Hicks, comedian

PREDATORY MARKETING USES PROPAGANDA TO SLOWLY KILL

The brainwashing starts early. In 2004, researchers published a paper, “Food

While multiple factors influence eating behaviors and food

Note the words targeted, intensive, and aggressive.

PREDATORY MARKETING WILL DRIVE YOU INTO DEBT

Do you want your customers to be able to afford buying your high-quality

gov, last visited April 3, 2020,

PREDATORY MARKETING WILL GET YOU HOOKED ON DRUGS

Note the key term: marketing expense.

SMALL BUSINESSES DO IT TOO

Will See More Crime,’” last visited April 3, 2020,

GET RICH QUICK . . . NOT

I GOT SICK OF THE BS

Not a single predatory marketing message has ever enriched or improved my

Hence, the Anti-Marketing Manifesto was born. I started working with

“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man;

At its essence, being an anti-marketer is about following the golden rule in

Treat People as People,

“Money is worth nothing to the man who has more

— George Bernard Shaw

Traditional marketers view us as targets, hence the predatory term “target

There’s something degrading, condescending, and sterilizing about the way

EVERYONE IS DOING IT, SO I SHOULD TOO

THE DYSFUNCTIONAL LANGUAGE OF MARKETING

16 https://www.marchex.com/industries/financial/, last visited April 3, 2020.

YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO GROSS THINGS TO GROW YOUR BIZ

Instead of treating people as bullseyes and focusing solely on profits, you, as an

POP QUIZ: WHAT WOULD AN ANTI-MARKETER DO?

TREAT PEOPLE AS PEOPLE, NOT AS TARGETS

The Anti-Marketing Manifesto is about empowerment, free will, and individual

IF YOU TARGET ANYTHING, TARGET “BS”

as well as email. (Not canned communication in fake-happy voices with paid

PUT PEOPLE BEFORE PROFITS

As modern-day humans, we have a very real need for money—lots of it—to

WHAT SHOULD YOU CALL YOUR CUSTOMERS? IT’S UP TO YOU

As an anti-marketer, you want to meet people on their turf. Have a conversation,

A FINAL WORD IN THIS LONG BUT HELPFUL FIRST CHAPTER . . .

Using aggressive predatory marketing is not the same as doing everything in

be weak in spreading your message, or to be a wimp in selling. Don’t hold back

“You will never influence the world by trying to be like it.”

EVERYONE IS TAUGHT TO LOOK ELSEWHERE FOR THEIR TRUTH

Gurus scoff at us figuring things out for ourselves. They’d prefer it if we

MENTORSHIP HAS BECOME A JOKE

“NEVER TAKE ADVICE FROM ANYONE”

Uncertain and doubting myself—because this expert had a seven-figure

Why do our brains shut off when an expert starts talking?

Having wasted money on plenty of gurus in the past, I “womaned” up and

FORGET BEING AN INFLUENCER