TCC Podcast #87: From Losing Everything to the A-List with Paul Martinez - a podcast by Kira Hug and Rob Marsh

Our guest for the 87th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is none other than A-list copywriter Paul Martinez. We covered a lot of ground in this one, including how Paul landed a place as Parris Lampropolous’ copy cub (for seven years) and his process for finding ideas that hook the reader so they’ll see his offers. The resources he shares are excellent. Here’s most of what we cover in this episode:

•  how an English degree and a job in real estate helped him find copywriting•  what he did to recover from losing almost everything and how that still impacts how he spends his time today
•  what he learned from real estate sales and how that’s made him a better writer•  what he did to find clients as a new copywriter and the #1 thing that reallymade a difference
•  how you get yourself in the right room with the right people•  what he learned as a copy cub for one of the world’s best copywriters
•  what you can do right now to be a better copywriter (you may not want to do this)•  how he keeps his copywriting skills sharp today
•  how Paul finds big ideas playing around on the internet all day long
•  how he structures his projects today (and his advice about retainers)•  how he deals with failures

That’s a lot of hows and whats—and every one of them is worth the listen. There are also a whole lot of links. To hear this episode in its entirety, click the play button below. Or for a full transcript and links to the stuff Paul mentions, scroll down. 
The people and stuff we mentioned on the show:Google Adwords
Parris LampropolousBrian Kurtz
Dan KennedyJohn Carlton
Barnaby KaelinAlexi Neocleous
Jim RutzRaymond Carver
Joe SugarmanTodd Brown
Atlas ObscuraHow We Got to Now
At Home by Bill BrysonHistory of the World in 100 Objects
Now I Know MoreThis is Your Brain on Parasites
Clayton MakepeaceClayton’s Sales Page Template
AgoraNatureCity
SoundviewWeiss Research
Mike WardMoney Map Press
Jed CantyPaul on Facebook
PaulMartinezCopywriting.comKira’s website
Rob’s websiteThe Copywriter Club Facebook Group
Intro: Content (for now)Outro: Gravity

 Full Transcript:


Rob:What if you could hang out with seriously talented copywriters and other experts, ask them about their successes and failures, their work processes and their habits, then steal an idea or two to inspire your own work? That’s what Kira and I do every week at The Copywriter Club Podcast.Kira: You’re invited to join the club for episode 87, as we talk with copywriter and business owner Paul Martinez about digging deep to turn things around after losing it all, the importance of sales skills in copywriting, emotional hot buttons and what really makes people buy, and what it takes to create successful promotions for companies like Motley Fool, Soundview, and Nature City.

Kira:Welcome Paul.Rob: Hey, Paul.

Paul:Hi; hi guys.Kira: How’s it going?

Paul: It’s going great; great to be here.Rob:Yeah, we’re stoked to have you here.

Kira:So Paul, a great place to start is with how you ended up as a copywriter.Paul:Yeah, sure, sure. So I began my journey actually in the real estate world. Well, going a little further back, my background is actually I went to school for fiction writing and ending up getting an English degree. I pretty quickly realized that, you know, that really wasn’t going to pay the bills. So I ended up in real estate, and actually discovered that I really liked sales. And I was pretty good at it, I studied it a lot. I got better and better but, there was a problem: that I didn’t know how to generate leads.

And, you know, this was 2000, 2001. Real estate marketing at that point was, believe it or not, still really based around cold calling. Like, literally going through this thing called a “colds directory”, which was like a phone book, but it has a little diamond next to the people who owned a house. And my broken told me, just like,

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