← The Copywriter Club Podcast
The Copywriter Club Podcast
TCC Podcast #436: Writing VSLs with Svet Dimitrov
01:01:34
Writing Video Sales Letters is an art. It's not enough to simply record someone reading a regular sales page. They depend more on stories and keeping listeners engaged because you can't afford to lose your viewer's attention.
Loading summary
Transcript77 lines
- [00:00]
WIX Ad
So you've got a business, but what about a brand? The difference? More of you WIX gives you the freedom to create your website, own your brand and do it on your own, exactly how you envisioned it. Experience limitless customization. Boost your creativity and efficiency with AI tools for every part of your business journey. Scale up with built in SEO, E comm and scheduling features. Put more of you in your business. Go to wix.com and do it all yourself.
- [00:30]
Rob
This is the Copywriter Club podcast. If you applied for 200 different projects or jobs each time sending a new.
- [00:54]
Svet
Cover letter with your pitch, I imagine that you would learn a thing or.
- [00:56]
Rob
Two about what works and what doesn't work in the application process.
- [01:01]
Svet
That's what Svet Dimitrov, my guest on.
- [01:04]
Rob
This episode of the podcast, did. That's not even the reason I asked.
- [01:07]
Svet
Svet to join me on the podcast. I heard another copywriter talking about how Svet is one of the best VSL copywriters in the world today. VSLs are video sales letters and they're different from regular sales letters because you can't afford to lose your viewers attention ever. We talk about this in this episode and what you can do to improve your own VSL writing skills.
- [01:28]
Rob
If you want to write VSLs, make.
- [01:30]
Svet
Sure that you stick around. We also talked about Svet's contrarian advice that copywriters, especially copywriters who are just starting out, should not have a website. Obviously that's not the way that most of us think. Websites are there to build credibility and help clients see the various ways that we can help them.
- [01:47]
Rob
But Svet argues, and I think I.
- [01:49]
Svet
Agree, that there is a better approach that connects personally with your prospects. So you may want to stick around and hear what Svet does. As you might expect, this episode is brought to you by the Copywriter Underground. I've completely rebuilt the content vault to make it more usable and useful. In the process, I've added more than 70 different workshops to it. There are even more coming down the road. Workshops that are taught by expert copywriters like Paris Lampropoulos, Joanna Wiebs, Stefan Georgi, Jack Ford, Shanti Zak, Laura Belgray, and like I said, dozens of others. But it's not just copywriters. We've got marketing experts teaching how to build funnels, how to market using tools like LinkedIn and Pinterest, how to put yourself in the right mindset to succeed, and so much more. That's just the workshops. There are dozens of templates, a community of like minded writers holding each other accountable on Slack and monthly coaching with me. It's time that you joined us inside. You can learn more@the copywriterclub.com TCU and now my interview with Svet Dimitrov Foreign.
- [03:00]
Rob
I'm thrilled to be able to chat with you. I love to start just by hearing how you got where you are. How did you become a copywriter? Before we started recording, I mentioned that I've heard your name associated as being one of the best VSL copywriters in the world right now. So how'd you get there?
- [03:21]
Svet Dimitrov
Thank you first for inviting me, Rob. It's a pleasure to be here. And yeah, my story goes back, I would say probably, probably by the time I was doing my master's degree actually and I was really struggling, that was 2009, 2010 to finish my mama master thesis. And I did read. So this was in the era when you couldn't find a lot of stuff on Google so had to like sieve through a ton of pages. I, I think I went to like the 10th page of Google, which probably nobody goes there these days just to find, just to do research. But I think that's, that's when I really started to understand that research is really important. I gotta appreciate it, gotta love the game. Although it was, I was still struggling to find a good way to express my thoughts in my master thesis. And I think I sieved through like maybe 10 physical books. Then I mentioned research on Google. I think I probably went through like more than a hundred PDFs that I found online and all that stuff. And it was kind of a crazy couple of months just doing research and research and not, not getting anywhere, which was frustrating. But then there was this mind mindset shift that I said hey, if I'm going to say hey, I, I, I, I can't do it, I, I won't be able to do it right. But when I said hey, I, I, I need to do it and I, I, I will do it, things started to get better. So after I finished my master's degree I started applying. It was actually in European policies and politics. So I started applying for different positions in the European Union related to politics, my management and all that stuff. And I couldn't land any. And I probably sent like more than a hundred different applications. Most of those applications were not only consisting of a CV but also a cover letter. So I wrote a ton of COVID letters. And later, like years later I realized that has helped me a lot to master my skills in writing and also in persuasion because when you're writing a cover letter, you have to convince the other party to hire you, right? So I realized that that has helped me a lot. But I needed like a few years to really understand that I was not cut out to be an employee for first, first of all, the European Union, different institutions. And I also realized that writing all those cover letters and stuff was, was really helpful to like put in the reps because I was probably writing every single day. I was changing stuff here and there. Obviously I wasn't writing a completely new cover letter, but I was constantly trying to change and see how it's going. And then a few years later I, I had an office job which was not related to what I was studying and I, I didn't enjoy it at all. So I, I quit it after a year and a half and since I had some money saved and just like a month before I quit my job, I actually met a Chinese girl at, at the hotel I was traveling with with my family doing a European trip. And I met a Chinese girl and I chat, chatted with her a lot. And then she invited me to go to China. And long, long story short, a few months after that I went to China and I really enjoyed, enjoyed it there. And I was like, hey, I, maybe I can start learning some Chinese and find the job in China. I still wasn't 100% certain I was, I was going to do a free freelance career and I had no idea what color copywriting was, but this, since I've already studied and learned English and then French, I was like, maybe, maybe I can start studying some, some Chinese. Obviously I wouldn't master Chinese because it's completely different, much harder language, but still it would help me to land a job. And a few months after that I landed unpaid internship, although it was full time job I would say, in China. And while I didn't enjoy it very much when I went there because I realized it was very different from what it was supposed to be, I, I, I enjoyed living there, I enjoyed connecting with the people and, and there's a saying in Bulgaria that one year abroad is like two years at, at home. And well, I would say that when you go to China or probably another country in Asia since they're so much different from let's say Europe, Western Europe and, and the U.S. i would say that one year in China is like three or four years at home. So I spent only three months, but it felt like a year or more. So when I came back I was like, I definitely don't want to Find a job. But since I had so many different experiences and impressions from China, I decided to create a website to write about, like a travel blog. Although I was also writing about lifestyle, healthy living, healthy eating. And since I was, I knew that I wouldn't be able to support myself with a new website, a new blog. I also started looking for content writing jobs at first, but I use my website as a portfolio. Obviously it's not a necessity nowadays to have a web website. And I would probably even advise people not to create a web website at first. This is my experience and I used that and I think it actually played quite well. And I started landing a few jobs here and there about content writing. And then I would say a year and a half later I started exploring copywriting. And I realized it's not just like copy and pasting words on a, on a Google document, it's completely different. And it requires a lot of persuasion. It's most of the time it's much well paid than writing articles for other companies. So that's the short story in like five minutes.
- [10:13]
Rob
Yeah. How you shifted over. So let's go back to just the experience of writing these hundreds of COVID letters. I'd love to know what you learned from that experience or what tips you have for writing a good cover letter. And the reason I ask this is there's been over the last few months a little bit of a move for some copywriters to try to find a real job, either a part time job or full time job, so that they have some steady income as the economy's been a little less predictable. Things like AI and some of the layoffs that have happened over the last couple of years. So. But they're struggling, they're struggling to find those jobs just as much as they're struggling to find freelance work. It's hard to make those connections.
- [10:55]
Svet
So what did you learn from that.
- [10:56]
Rob
Experience that really helped you sell yourself when you were reaching out with COVID letters and resumes?
- [11:03]
Svet Dimitrov
Well, I would say that I learned how to get to the point as quickly as possible. So in the first one or two paragraphs I would try to grab their attention and then also try to share what are my biggest strengths and why they should hire me. Obviously I wrote very, very bad cover letters at first and some of them were starting with a very weird question and some of them were like trying to be very, very trying to express my wealth of vocabulary, which I think is something that you should never do when you're writing copy unless you're writing for. Let's say Harvard professors, for example, probably they would appreciate flexing your vocabulary. But. But I think, yeah, definitely. I learned that I have to be very succinct and concise and straight to the goal, straight to the point when I am writing a cover letter. And it's probably the same with copywriting, when you're like writing an email or even a vsl, which is very long most of the time, or at least 1500 words or more, which is probably longer than most cover letters anyway. You have to go straight to the middle of the action. That's how Charlie was able to land a. An internship. It's called an elite VSO internship with Fran Reyrengio. Probably you've heard of him, you've been in the game for very long. He's one of the best VSL writers in the world. And one of the. It was a very elaborate process to hire those copywriters for his internship because it's free. But you have to pass through different phases. And one of them was to hand copy a whole VSL, which was 8,000 words. And I took. It took me like 414 hours. And the second thing or part of that phase was also writing a cover letter, which had to be between 750 to 1500 words. And yeah, that cover letter was. I used a lot of storytelling and I got straight to the point in the middle of the action. So that's what I learned from writing so much or so many cover letters, rather. So, yeah, this is something that's a good tip for beginner copywriters, but I would say for most copywriters, because I would see sometimes even those copywriters that are a little bit, let's say old school or that have come from a different generation, they would. They would re. Rely on different. I would say they're. They are not accounting the ch. Change changing environment of the new generation where we have, I would say, lower attention spanning. So we. Sometimes they will start with a paragraph or two about just kind of like fluff. And I think it's better to just go straight to the point, grab the attention, grab them by the eyeballs, and then move on.
- [14:44]
Rob
So a quick follow up on that. You mentioned stories. And I think that a lot of COVID letters in particular, as I think about the structure for them, usually saying, hey, I want this job and here's all the reasons that I should get the job. And you list out your coverage qualifications. And if you're doing it well, you're.
- [15:02]
Svet
Trying to match the qualifications in the.
- [15:04]
Rob
Job description, but almost never have I thought through that that's a great place for a story. So were you telling your story or were you telling or weaving this in a framework that made it into a story in some way? Doing it feels like you're doing something a little bit different from what most people do.
- [15:22]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, especially for this point because I'm very, very proud of those. I was the only non native copywriter at Lended or kind of got hired for that in internship. And Fran also told me I had the best kaka cover letter out of all the three that were the last, the last three, three people that got accepted. So I used my own story and then tried to tie them with the VSL that I had hand copied. And it was a very beautiful transition because it made a lot, a lot of sense. For example, I haven't shared this with a lot of people, but I have a physical problem with my gut where the esophagus or the full food tube is very narrow before it goes to the stomach. And this means that when I eat very solid food, for example bread or meat or something fatty, it, it can get stuck in, in, in the, in the esophagus. And I had to go to the hospital every quite a while. I've actually had it. I, I went to the hospital last week to do this kind of. They insert the tube and there's also balloon that has to like be pumped so it makes the esophagus wider so I can swallow better. And I call this process deep throw, throw, throw thing because it goes really, really deep, like 20 inches deep. And I used that story because I was hand copying a cover VSL video sales letter about an ED Pro product. So it tied in very beautifully with that story. And the first line of that cover letter was that I was puking every single night for like three months. Which is a true, true story. I was 11 years old, so I didn't say, hey, this is, this is good, this will be a story about blah blah. I just started. I was puking every single month. So this like, what the hell is going on? This is a cover letter and he's talking about puking. So this is how I grabbed his attention. And then I tied that in with the edge VSL as well because I was talking about deep throtting and then ED and all that stuff. And then I mentioned that I can tie in different elements, which is very helpful not only for VSLs but also for emails. For example.
- [17:58]
Rob
I'm glad I asked that because what you are doing is a massive pattern interruption from all of the other kinds of COVID letters that will be out there. And so I think that this is one of those ideas that anybody who's listening and thinks, yeah, I am going to apply for, you know, a real job, you know, in air quotes to use stories or to do something different so that the hiring person, the creative director, whoever it is, will actually notice you. And then that point you can at least have a conversation where you can talk about your skill set and hopefully make that personal connection. Yeah, so you also mentioned, and I want to follow up on this before I forget that you don't actually recommend that a lot of copywriters start with a website. Why not? I mean I know there are lots of places where you can connect with people without a website, but a website tends to be a really good place to share success stories, build trust, that kind of stuff. So why do you think that it's not necessary at least at the beginning?
- [18:59]
Svet Dimitrov
Because it's a waste of time in the beginning. I would say because you can go just open a Google Google document, you can create your own portfolio. You can even add some design elements maybe on Canva and then transfer those to Google Doc or just create your portfolio on Canva. Both of those applications I would say are free and they don't require any crazy amount of no knowledge compared to when a website. Because if you're creating your own website and if you're using let's say a WordPress.com subdomain, then it wouldn't be very, very, very good website. If you're creating that on Wix for example, it's going to be an ugly website. So if you want to create like an eye catching website, you're going to spend a lot of time, you're probably going to invest some money into buying a domain, you're going to invest some money into probably a designer and it's gonna take you hours. Instead you can just go create a Google Doc. You can add those images of people saying go, go do stuff about you. You can be a little bit more creative. You can even have like a cover letter in front of the of your portfolio. This is how I usually do it and I'm not even sharing my website anymore. I'm now rearranging the website and it's probably going to share it anyway soon. But this took me like four or five years. I haven't updated my website and I haven't shared it anywhere. And people that have paid me five figures for VSLs and for other copy projects have never asked for a website. They Just want to see a Google document. And what I would do is I would just write like, I don't know, like a few paragraphs, something like hey. And I would try to personalize it. Hey Mark, below you you're going to find my most recent portfolio. But before that I want to share a few benefits of working with me. And if, if I really like like the person or if they really like the opportunity that's presented to me, I would probably even have like a part of a cover letter in a way that I would probably touch upon things that I have found on his or her profile. For example, I kind of created like a very, very short cover letter in front of the proper portfolio for a person that wanted to do like a rev share proper project with me. And he really appreciated, he was like, oh my God, nobody has done this before. And it took me like five to 10 minutes. You just go to their profile, you just do some research. That's what we are. What, that's what, that's what coco copywriters are for. Right? So you do, you do research, you try to find something that you have in common maybe or just something that can draw the attention and say, okay, this guy went to my website or went to my social media or whatever and include that before the portfolio. And then you just, and you can even do that with most pro prospects you're speaking to because you have that as, as a Google Doc and then you create a copy, then you change the name, then you change some of the benefits maybe if it's a person. For example, if I'm. Most of my clients are in the US and I always say that I'm based in Europe, which means that I'm like seven to ten hours ahead of them, which means that they're going to get their copy in the morning much, much earlier. So that's kind of a benefit. If they are based in Asia, I would try to come up with something different, but these are like very small things that add a lot of value to your portfolio because they would just expect a Google Doc with one or two samples, but then they get a lot more. Sometimes I would even include a picture of me doing something crazy because it adds this element. And sometimes I would even shoot a short loom video which would talk about my experience. And I would probably just open the Google Doc and just go through it and say, hey, this is me. But then they would also see my face and it would be a very cool experience.
- [23:31]
Rob
I really like this idea. I mean in some ways it is a Website, but it's not, you know, the typical website. Right. But what you're really doing here that I think makes the difference is you're personalizing this message or this site that you're creating with a Google Doc to the person you're talking to every single time. And even though it may be based on a template, the, the communication is one to one, which is not the typical website experience. And this feels unique in some way that I think gives you a really big advantage.
- [24:02]
Svet Dimitrov
And it's free, 100% free. It just takes very little time because obviously time is also money. But if you are, as you said, I actually didn't even think about that. If you send them to website, it's not going to be that personal, obviously. And this is very, very unique. And then you can add even GIFs to that Google Doc to make it a little bit more humorous and spicy in a way. So people are like, oh, this guy has a sense of humor. This is great.
- [24:34]
Rob
Yeah, no, I, I mean, you mentioned doing it with Google Docs. I can imagine people could do the same thing with a notion template. There may be two or three different kinds of ways to do this, but it's a great idea. Virtually free, like you said, and personal. Yeah, this is definitely something I think, especially with beginning copywriters. But even experienced copywriters can use this kind of an idea to their advantage.
- [24:57]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, exactly. I mean, even I actually started using it when I was a little bit more more experienced because I think I got even more confident in a way that I can use that and also that I'm sharing. Like I also see sometimes when they're hiring for a senior copywriting position, they always want to see a long video. And even if they don't ask for it, I would sometimes still shoot a long video and find some stuff that makes sense. Sometimes I would just try to provide some free value in advance even and say, hey, I imagine this and that, or I checked your website and here's what I found. That can even be fixed very, very quickly or something. So these two things, something very personal in whatever you're using, whether it's Canva, whether it's Google Doc or Notion, as you mentioned, probably not. Notion is even sexier in a way than Google Docs. And then if you even include a long video, then it's like, oh my God, you're going so much, you're doing so, so much more than the average person who is applying. So it sets you apart. And I think people are saying that competition is getting fiercer. And fiercer these days. And it kind of is true that there are more PP people that there are calling themselves copywriters or that are still copywriters, but at the same time they're getting so lazy with AI. They are like using. They're just sending irrelevant stuff and they're. Sometimes they would even have a small mistake in the outreach. They would sometimes spell my name because sometimes I get hired Julie Jr. Copywriters and content writers for some of my own projects. They would spell my name Sven or whatever, something which is probably sometimes like an auto correction maybe, but still that doesn't, doesn't make sense when it's like, hey Sven. And it's like, okay, come on.
- [27:07]
Rob
That should be the first thing you.
- [27:08]
Svet
Catch is the person's name.
- [27:09]
Rob
But we've all seen the email that goes out even with the first name block without names and yeah, yeah, it's stuff like that. So, so, okay, so you started writing copy. How did you become so well known for, you know, VSLs and writing in the health niche? How did you move into that direction?
- [27:31]
Svet Dimitrov
Well, maybe I could start with the second part of this question, how I started with the heavy up niche. And probably it, it would make a lot of sense because as I said, I had this health issue with my esophagus and, and to curb the. I, I wouldn't say it's pain, but it's a lot of the discomfort and happens most of the time when I'm stressed and especially when eating, eating Sony food. So I had to learn to eat more slowly, which is actually better for, for, for your health. And anyway, I enjoy the food more, but I also started eating on much more healthy way as well. Like I would avoid sugar. I would eat a lot of fruit, fruit and veggies and lean meats and all that stuff. So it, it kind of makes sense because I'm also very active physically or it used to be a little bit more. Now that I have a very young daughter, it's a little bit harder to find that time to go out and do a workout every day. But before that I was very active. I was working out almost every single day for at least 10 to 15 minutes, sometimes twice a day and eating in a healthy way. So it just made sense to be writing in the health niche. I know it's a lot of people say it's the most competitive niche right now and it, it probably is. But at the same time, if you are good, you can. There's always this hunger for the best of the best, right? And it doesn't matter if AI is getting better and better. People say that AI will replace copywriters. And I say copywriters who can use AI will replace other copywriters. This is, this is related. So I'm always saying to begin a copywriters, you have to learn or you have to master copywriting very, very quickly or at least master the fundamentals and then start using AI and you wouldn't have any trouble of fine new work. But if you're a beginner and your EE ing English is not great or your co op is not great, you have to work much, much harder than it used to be before. But once you get at a certain level and start using AI, you wouldn't have any problems. You would actually be having probably more work than ever. So I think I lost my train of thoughts. I was talking about.
- [30:05]
Rob
Yeah, I think as far as like connecting with clients in the health space.
- [30:11]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, this is one of the reasons why I started then. I had, I. Yeah, I had one guy who was running an AA agency got referred to me and the first, like he was mostly active in the health space. And I wrote a few ads for Facebook and a few landing pages for some of his health clients. And I actually really, really enjoyed it because I was already writing a lot of content for, for my website. As I mentioned, it was not only about travel, but also healthy living, healthy lifestyle. And the health niche is very specific in a way because you have to do a lot more research and they have to support every single claim of yours with very credible sources. Otherwise you would get into a lot of trouble. You cannot be saying this would. This would increase your Testosterone levels by 25%. Unless you have proof from a credible source like the national center of Biology or whatever it's called, or Harvard University or some, some university. Doesn't matter what university. It has to be from university or from a very credible source. And I think that's where my love for research, which materialized probably as I mentioned during my master's degree around 15, 16 years ago, really kicked in because right now actually I'm doing another health project which involves a ton of research. And I'm actually even having a little bit of a hard time because I was, I did probably like 30 hours of research this month just on a project that is not even certain. But I kind of, kind of enjoyed it a lot because it just got me back to my roots to just like going exploring like the first, at least the first two pages on Google, which nobody goes to the second page anyway. And and yeah, health, as I said, even, even when I was writing content for my website, when I was quoting something, I would, I would always look for a, for a credible source. And nowadays that I'm, I'm also the co op chief for, for a company, for a Brazilian doctor company and the copywriters who write a lot of VSLs, I always say, hey, where did you get that idea from? You have to like have this source. You have to have this source. We need the source. I have to see the source. I have to double check if, if it's true. The FDA and FFTC are more stringent than ever these days, so every single claim would have, it has to be substantiated, otherwise you would have, you would get into a lot of trouble.
- [33:05]
Rob
Yeah, the laws around that in Europe and the U.S. the law in the U.S. is called DSHEA. And yeah, there's all kinds of rules there about not saying that something cures or mitigates a disease. There's limits. You can talk about ingredients, you can talk about the research that's been done on ingredients. But just because something includes an ingredient doesn't mean that the thing can do what the greedy does. There's so writing the space can be a little tricky and it's good to know or to have writers who understand this kind of stuff. How important is showing that kind of knowledge to, you know, a copy chief or to a company that's hiring writers? Or is that the kind of thing that they say, well, we can train you on that. We'd rather have you be a persuasive writer?
- [33:51]
Svet Dimitrov
I would say the second part being a more persuasive writer is more important, but the ability to combine those two and also to be, to really know how, how to do re. Research well and really know to distinguish between a thing that's really worth researching more and more is gonna really help you. And I think I probably got a little bit rusty in the last few months because as I said, I spent so, so much time on research. But I, I start, I finally started digging some gold and I think actually had an email to my list this morning that, that said if you remember the ad by David O. About Ro Rolls Royce, that's 60 miles per hour. The, the only thing that you would hear is the engine clock or something. I think.
- [34:48]
Rob
Yeah, the ticking. The ticking of the clock. Yeah.
- [34:50]
Svet Dimitrov
King of the clock. Yeah. So he said that he spent, or he at least claimed that he spent I think like three weeks digging through different papers to find that kind of exact quote from Somewhere and this was the most, the most successful ad of Rorofs Royce I think all over the years. So with, it pays off to do a lot of research, but so sometimes you can get lost in a lot of research. So I'm not saying I'm the best researcher in the world, but knowing how to do research, how to do it somewhat fast and how to especially find the best big ideas because it's, it's, it's, it's a bit. The, the big ideas is what really sells and makes a promo go to seven figures or even eight figures. This is the big idea that nobody has found. And this big idea has actually to be, it doesn't have to be completely new or alien, but it has to have this. And I remember this when I was part of Co op accelerator and we had a live event in Tampa and Stefan had a presentation saying, Stefan George Steph had a presentation saying that this new idea or new mechanism has to be 10% different because people have, have to have heard of it in a way, but it has to be a new, just, just a little bit. Otherwise if it's very, very new, no, nobody's gonna believe that. Right.
- [36:27]
Rob
So let's say, yeah, people are looking for things that are familiar but different enough that they notice them. If it's too familiar, they don't notice. But if it's not familiar enough, it's seen as strange and weird and we push those things away.
- [36:38]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, exactly.
- [36:40]
Rob
So let's talk about writing vsl. This thing that you do mostly now. How's it different from sales pages? What are some of the things that we need to consider in addition to finding that big idea as we start to structure a vsl? And just in case anybody doesn't know what a VSL is. Video sales letter. So it's really a sales message in a video format?
- [37:00]
Svet Dimitrov
Yes. Well, I would say the big idea or the mechanism which are a little bit different, but let's, let's say they are, they're the same for, for the sake of this argument. So the big idea or mechanism are kind of like when you're looking for them, whether it's a sales, A sales letter or ttsl, Tech sales letter or vsl, you, I would probably have the same approach. But when you are writing a vsl, it's kind of different. It's, it's harder in a way because with TSL or the tech sales letters you have the headline and then we have sub headline bullets and all that stuff and people can skip and skim and then they can stop and see. Okay, this sounds interesting. With the vsl, most of the time you can't skip ahead. So it has to flow much, much better. Obviously the sales letter has to also flow very, very well. But with vsl, there's, if you lose the reader for just a couple of seconds, they're just gonna leave and that, that's gonna be it. With the tech sales letter, it's a bit different. Obviously if they, if, if you lose the reader a few times, even with your subheads or the bullets or the privacy design, they're still going to leave. But the VSL has to flow very, very, very well. Especially in the first part, the lead. The good, the good thing about VSL is that the head headline is not that important as with a tech sales letter, because with tech sales that they have to grab their attention with a headline that is a very, sometimes it's very elaborate. There's like a few lines of the main headline, then there's the sub headline and there's something else. With a vsl, it's usually a very short headline. But then you have to be, you have to be very, very persuasive in that lead. In the first, I would say at least 30 seconds, maybe even 5 to 10 seconds and then the next 30 seconds. So they really want to pay attention to the rest of the vsl.
- [39:21]
Rob
And I know there's a lot of training and books about how to write great leads. Do you have a favorite, you know, as far as what you'd like to start with, or is that determined entirely by the research, the idea that you come up with?
- [39:36]
Svet Dimitrov
I would say it's more. Yeah, it more depends on what the research and what the market is. And I would, most of the time when I'm, when somebody hires me to either write leads or a whole vsl, I would ask whether they want a particular kind of lead or they want me to send them my ideas. For example, last year a person who is very well known in the health niche hired me to write a few leads and I asked them and I sent him a few ideas. I think like four or five ideas for leads with the loom video and said, hey, I have these four ideas or five ideas do you think? Or which, which do you like the best? So because he wanted to like just two leads and he said, okay, go with this one and this one and that, that's how I, I, I, I roll those leads. So I would usually prepare a few more than they are asking for at at least the ideas. And sometimes if it's like a new client probably. And especially if the lead is not very, very long, I would probably deliver at least another lead. Or maybe for example, a new health client hire hired me recently to write three Facebook ads and I delivered four just to make sure I'm over delivering, but also not over delivering by a crazy amount. Because if they hire you to write two leads and you deliver one more lead, that's kind of too much. If it's like a short Facebook ad and you deliver one more, that's fine. I would say. So there has to be a fine line between over delivering and then delivering way too much that the person can then abuse you in a way.
- [41:23]
Rob
Yeah, yeah, you open yourself up to when you start breaking those boundaries. There is a fine line between over delivering and giving up basically everything that you've got.
- [41:36]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, I agree. And so, but that said, I think with leads I would say the most or the ones that I really enjoy writing are the ones that I actually that you mentioned this so called pattern Indian interrupt where you would say, for example, there's a story that I shared about my deep throat holding experience was a kind of a pipe interrupt. So I think those perform very, very well. Sometimes it will be like take a look at this weird object or something that's completely not related to, let's say the health niche or the state. Nature doesn't matter. It has to be something completely alien to what the my market has heard of. And I think those always like almost always convert very, very well. Of course you have to like, it's not only the lead, the offer has to be good, but if you can do that, great, great job with the lead and the offer is good, I think that's a win, win situation.
- [42:44]
Rob
I really appreciate what you were sharing about the fact that a VSL has to flow in a way that a normal sales letter doesn't. And as I'm thinking through this idea, a lot of copywriters, you know, we get caught up in features and you know, mentioning, you know, the bullet points in a sales letter and I hadn't really considered how much that would get in the way of a video sales letter and how much more important a through line a story that you can weave the entire time. So as I'm thinking about some of the best VSLs that I'm that I've seen, they really, it's almost like one story after another story after another story. It's, it's you know, open loop almost don't close the loop before you start the next story. To close the loop. And. And so it's in some ways like dialing up the persuasion almost every paragraph.
- [43:36]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah. Yeah, I actually did think that the VSL has to be. Has to flow that, that much. But I recently read it somewhere and yeah, that makes so, so, so, so much more sense because I, I actually enjoyed, I thought before I started writing VSLs that are there so much more difficult to write. But then when I started writing, I guess it was more. A more natural process that I just have. It has to flow better and every single sentence has to, like, flow with the other one. That's why it's really important to read the copy out loud a few times because that's where you spot those weird transitions or clunky flow. And you can fix it if you, if you don't re. Read it out loud, there's a very high chance at least some of those paragraphs or sentences wouldn't flow that much. And if you don't like rereading or listening to your voice, you can just copy and paste the whole VSL into an app and it can reread it out for you. Maybe. Probably it's even better because you hear it from another person or it doesn't matter if it's like AI voice or not, but it's really helpful to hear it. And actually, I think that's also when I was doing my bachelor's degree and my master's degree, because a lot of my exams were oral and I have to present them and talk. I would always, when I was studying the course materials, I would always read it out loud and it would help me a lot more to memorize it.
- [45:23]
Rob
Okay, we've mentioned AI a couple of times. How are you using AI in your business? And I know you're probably not just saying, hey, chatgpt, write me an intro or whatever. Have you set up various agents to help you or these super prompts that you're feeding into it all the time or examples of your work? How do you use AI to get good copy or at least good ideas.
- [45:48]
Svet
Out of the system?
- [45:51]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, that's. That's a great question. Actually. Kind of shared that on my favorite Facebook poll just a few hours ago that I was using AI probably since 2012 or maybe 2010 actually. But it wasn't the. It wasn't ChatGPT or Jasper, but it was Google Chat Translate, because Google Translate also kind of form of AI. And before, before I started getting into freelancing and copywriting, I was doing a lot of translations. And when you just Color, copy and paste a lot of text into Google Translate, especially back then 15 years ago, it would give you a very, very bad translation. But if you copy and paste just sentence by sentence, it would give you a much better translation. So my, my point is that it's it right now it's similar. Obviously AI is much more advanced and even the first version of ChatGPT or Gemini or Claude would give you much better result with a very bad prompt. The more elaborate your your prompt is, the better will be the more like if you can provide it with a very, very good brief, it will give you a much better output end result. But what I found is if you, let's say if you give a problem to whatever AI you're using and say, hey, can you write me this vsl? Even if it's the biggest brief that you can imagine, if you say write the whole VSL or write the whole sales letter, it's not going to create a great vsl. But if you do it section by section and you give it great examples, let's say, hey, this is a great lead from whatever, this has grossed $8 million. You can follow this lead closely, just change whatever, it's going to give you a very, very, very good first draft and then you have to just edit it very, very slightly. And if you do it by section by section by section, it's going to give you a great output. Obviously the more elaborate and your home prompt is the better. But in my experience if you do just do it by parts and I also saw a post or actually a video of David Garfield filming, right. He was also mentioned that he was using the same approach. He would just do it section by section and it would give, the result will be 10 times better. So this is kind of my approach. I also use it for research though. I found that using AI for research can be great, but it also can be a double edged sword because it will give you so especially for the health net, it will give you sources that don't exist so have to data or check them sometimes it will give you. Sorry for that. It would give you ideas that are great but there's no claim, there's no source for those claims. So you have to be really vigilant about those sources and claims and, and you have to be very like, can give you a lot of ideas very, very quickly and I have found some great ideas. But then I would, I would see an idea and I would, I would go to Google and do my own research and then I would use AI again to like distinguish between what is the strong, strongest idea, for example. But I wouldn't ever rely 100% right now on AI just to give me ideas. It can give me ideas. I would then consider them, do my own research and then start writing.
- [49:59]
Rob
Yeah, that makes sense. So I want to ask you a different kind of question here. There is a belief, and it's probably true, that it's very difficult to make a living as a copywriter, as a non native speaker. And you know, there are a couple of exceptions to that rule. You are one of them. What advice would you have? Well, I guess, I mean, you've proved that you can survive because you've done very well as somebody who didn't start out speaking English. But what is, what advice do you have to those who maybe are English as a second language? They want to be copywriters. They want to be able to connect with clients, with good work, high paying work. How can they go about developing these skills like you have in order to succeed?
- [50:49]
Svet Dimitrov
That's a great question. And I think I get this question almost every single day by somebody following me on social media.
- [50:57]
Rob
That's interesting.
- [50:58]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, yeah. Well, probably not every day, but at least couple of times per week because obviously they can see I'm not a non, I'm a non nan speaker of English and they would see that I'm somewhat successful. Obviously I can be a lot, a lot more successful and I, I strive to be successful every single day, at least by 1%, as James, James Clear writes in his book. But yeah, I think the most important thing is to really practice copywriting every single day. It doesn't have to be a lot of time at the beginning. But if you say, I'm gonna write just twice per week, it could be more, more time, let's say two, two hours per week. During the weekend you could write for 10 minutes every single day, which would be less than two hours. It would be probably 70 minutes. Right. But it would be better because you would be practicing your craft every day. So I advise that people devote, let's say that doesn't have to be on a time frame. It could be like 300 words, 400 words, 500 words, even less every single day. And once they see it's getting easier and easier, they can ramp up that either the time they spend, they spend on writing or the number of words. So I would say practicing every single day is the most important thing. The second most important, or they're kind of equal, is to read good copy or read any kind of copy every Single day. Obviously the, the, the, the better the copy, the better. And then the third thing, and probably the most important if you want to grow really fast, is to hire a coach or a mentor who would help you go there. I think that, I actually don't think. I believe that's what helped me really increase my income by maybe like six or seven times between 2020 and 2023 and now probably even more in the last few years is when I started investing in courses in my masterminds. As I mentioned, I was part of COP accelerator for a few years and meeting those people especially. And it's, it's. And it's not only because people are more, more experienced than you and you will learn more about copywriting, how to write better copy, but also because those people are successful and that the people you surround yourself with is very, very important factor in your success. Because if you're just surrounded by people who are struggling to get there or haven't done it, you will also struggle. Obviously you can't surround yourself only with people that are super successful because if there's a very big difference between their level and your level, you will probably get demotivated in a way. So there's like, there should be people that are a little bit lower, like at the lower level than you, but also people that are much, much higher level. So we have this incentive to just become better and better and better. So I would say just to sum up, write every day, read every day, and write every day or write or like hire a mentor so you don't write in a vacuum.
- [54:51]
Rob
Yeah, I mean, I asked about, you know, non native speakers, but all three of those things apply to native speakers as well. If you want to be copywriting, you should be doing all three of these things. So there's, there's not, there's not a secret sauce to any of this. It's put in the work, put in the reps, get feedback, and do it all over again.
- [55:09]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah. So for non native speakers, I would say that they shouldn't. Like for, for example, with me, it was very different because I came from an academic background. I had my master's degree, I did a lot of research. I was trying to impress people with my vocabulary. And when I started my travel blog and my travel and lifestyle blog, I would try to flex my vocabulary, which I think was working against me when I switched from content writing, which is probably fine, but still, you don't have to, like, learn English at a superb level. You have to understand the nuances. You have to but you have to write really basic copy. It's better to write very, very basic copy at first. No, let's say a thousand words or less than to be, to have a very rich, like a very rich vocabulary. But then you would be trying to sound very, very weird and not a lot of conversational. So, for example, probably you and a lot of people on this, while listening to this popular podcast episode, would recognize Evaldo from Brazil. Albuquerque. I think it's.
- [56:30]
Rob
Yeah. He's the one exception most people mention when they say, oh, anybody can make it if Evaldo can make it.
- [56:35]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, the idea is like, especially because Fran told me, because he's a friend with Evaldo, his English was like five words, like 10, 15 years ago. So the thing that really helped him write very good copy was his limited, actually level of English because he would have a very limited amount of words to use, and he had to make the best use of them. And I think there's a lot to be said that where you have, where you write very common conversational copy, most of the time it would work where sometimes people would just write this very long sentences, very long leads that are like, this first sentence is like 25 words or 50 words or whatever. I've seen very different cases. This is gonna work most of the time against them because the, the market most of the time is not sophisticated at all. So we have to write at a very basic level between the fifth and sixth grade, sometimes even lower. So every single Joel, Jane or John can understand it.
- [57:53]
Rob
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. This has been, this has been great just learning from you. I've got a couple of ideas, especially around the personalized website. I just think there's such a great idea there to share. So I appreciate you sharing all of this stuff. Svet, if people want to follow you and see what you're up to, where's the best place to go?
- [58:15]
Svet Dimitrov
Well, I would say they would follow me on Facebook. Maybe they can also go to my website, copywritingtitan.com and I have a few links there that they can follow me on social media. But if they type my name, Svetoslav Dimitrov or Svet Dimitrov on most on most social media, most active on Facebook and X. You and I actually connected on LinkedIn. I kind of with LinkedIn, but I'm still checking. But I'm not going to be posting because I, I, I, I just don't see the value in it right now. Maybe I will come back later with a better strategy. But yeah, these are the most the places that I I'm most active on.
- [58:57]
Rob
I'll link to those in the show notes for this episode so that people can connect with you easily. And yeah, I appreciate you sharing everything that you have. This has been a fun conversation. So thanks Svet.
- [59:10]
Svet Dimitrov
Yeah, it was my pleasure. Thank you so much for inviting me.
- [59:18]
Svet
Thanks to Svet for sharing his story and his path to becoming a successful copywriter. As we were talking, Svet mentioned that he doesn't have a website. Obviously that was a big part of the initial part of our conversation.
- [59:30]
Rob
His old website doesn't talk about his.
- [59:32]
Svet
Current business at all and he doesn't refer people there and he instead uses landing pages customized specifically to each prospect that he's vetting in his discovery process. Naturally, I wanted to know more about this. We talked a bit about it here. But to see what he's sharing with his clients can't really do that on a podcast.
- [59:51]
Rob
So this thing that I'm calling the no website website.
- [59:55]
Svet
I asked Svet after we finished recording.
- [59:58]
Rob
If he would share this idea, this.
- [60:01]
Svet
No website website with me and he sent me a couple of examples to look at. It's so simple and I think the no website website idea is one that more copywriters could benefit from using. Especially copywriters who are just starting out or who doing a lot of pitching and want to personalize what their prospects are seeing on their website. So I asked Svet if he would share that exact template that he uses and walk through a couple of examples for the members of the copywriter underground.
- [60:28]
Rob
Like I said, this idea is simple.
- [60:29]
Svet
But the real power of the no website website is that no one else is doing it. So it stands out, which is a huge part of getting clients to pay ATT to you. If you want to see how to use this no website website strategy to land clients, jump into the copywriter underground before March 12th and you'll see what.
- [60:46]
Rob
Svet does and how you can use.
- [60:47]
Svet
This strategy to land your own six figure clients. You can learn more at the copywriterclub.com TCU that's the end of this episode of the Copywriter Club podcast. If you like what you heard, please share it with someone that you know.
- [61:00]
Rob
Or if you don't know another writer.
- [61:03]
Svet
Or freelancer who you can share this episode with, visit Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast and leave a nice 5 star review about what you like about the show. It will help others find it and I promise when you share it, your friends will thank you as always. Thanks for listening.
- [61:19]
Rob
See you next week.
- [61:35]
WIX Ad
What's the difference between DIY and Doing it yourself? It's the difference between a part time passion and a full time business. WIX gives you the power to turn your passion into a money maker with a website that fits your unique vision and the business tools you need to succeed. Let your ideas flow with AI that guides you but keeps you in the driver's seat. Manage your business from one dashboard and keep it growing with built in marketing features. It's time to turn your daydream into your dream job. Do it yourself. Go to wix.com.