copy that is dead.

Key Takeaways

This video was a little sad to record, but we've had to make a very difficult decision about the Copy That channel. And um you can skip ahead to what we are moving on to next if you wish, but it is a pretty big change and we want to be uh as transparent with you as possible. We also want to reveal a little bit about the future of copywriting and marketing and how it's taught on uh platforms like YouTube and how we've tried to fit in or I guess not really fit in. >> So, what are we actually going to do with the channel? Uh that is the question that we're going to answer in this video and like we said, you can skip ahead to get the answer if you'd like. Uh but we think it's going to make more sense if we first explain how we got started in the first place. For the last uh 5 years, Sean, Rod, Lindsey, and I have poured our hearts into making silly uh but hopefully helpful content about copywriting and marketing. And in fact, Copy That was never meant to be a business as such. Uh it started off as Sean and Rod separately streaming uh copywriting reviews, you know, 5 years ago. Uh and eventually they decided, "Why not do this together?" Um and then eventually they invited me to join um as some, you know, I guess token English guy. Uh and uh Lindsey has been in the background that whole time making sure that the the channel and brand was was running properly. So, it was never intended as a for-profit business. It was never intended to be something that was structured or official. Uh it just kind of ended up happening. Um which was really fun. But that is not how most copywriting and marketing channels start on YouTube. Usually, uh at least in our experience, it seems that with other people there is more of an agenda. There is more of a direct drive to make as much money as possible off of beginners. Mhm. >> Um which we've always found a bit sad. I would I would say something stronger than that. >> Honestly, one of the main drivers for us making content on YouTube was how frankly disgusted we were with how other copywriters and marketers were treating newbies on platforms like YouTube and really using the worst types of copywriting appeals to draw in newbies with a dream or with desperation and then forcing them effectively to pay for courses and other educational materials that are terrible or that you can get for free. When we make a paid thing, one of the things that we try to do is make sure that everything that we teach more or less cannot be found for free elsewhere in the world or in books, but rather is based on our experience or on our unique spin on the things that people generally teach. And that allows us to feel comfortable talking on our channel about basically all of the basics. But if you go to some of the major channels out there, it's all promise-driven, it's all using sort of cheap copywriting gimmicks and tactics to lure newbies in and lure desperate people in too, all in the hopes of basically extracting as much money from people as possible. And we've always found that not just distasteful, but actually downright loathsome and frankly hateful. >> Morally abhorrent. >> Morally abhorrent. Yes. And so we find that that is still happening now, but it's starting to diminish a little bit as people have started to move on from copywriting as this like crazy money-making opportunity. Now we're actually starting to see um the people that want to get into copywriting want to get into copywriting because they're interested in writing and actually getting used to the skill. They're not treating it as a get-rich-quick scheme. >> I think one of the reasons that we became relatively popular on YouTube is because we didn't do the same formulas that other gurus were doing. We just genuinely tried to be ourselves, which led to a lot of the silliness. Yeah. And you know >> Well, that was driven by me mostly. >> Driven mainly by Sean. But that I think really helps set us apart. And we've we've built a fantastic community because of that. And I I love our subscribers and our Discord server members. Like they are fantastic people and and for the most part everyone I think wants to do this for a good reason. Which we have been so grateful for. Absolutely. It's such a privilege and an honor to have been able to help people achieve the fulfillment and the career that they've wanted in their lives. And we've actually become very good friends with a lot of people who, you know, they started as a complete newbie. Like what is even copies? And they watched our free stuff. They got work. They bought our paid stuff. And you know, over the years they became our friends. And then, you know, they've worked with us. And then they've gone on to even bigger and better things. And so it's just a privilege to be able to provide this kind of service to people at this point. Anyway, that brings us back to what's going to be different on this channel as we move forward. See, as we said, Copy That has always been a hobby business for us. Any money that we earn from the courses either goes straight back into the video production or into paying our very small team who keep the brand running. Shout out Noah who's filming this right now. >> Thank you very much, Noah. Sean Rodman and I, we all earn our living from either client work or the other businesses that we own, not from Copy That. And over the last few months that real work has become a lot busier for [snorts] us. Between us, we have launched an agency. We launched another agency. I don't launch an agency. We double down on a marketing leadership position. And one of us even embarked on one of the brand world's most exciting projects. Not to mention all of the small consulting pieces that we're always doing on the side. Ultimately, we are busier than ever before and we have less and less time for Copy That. So, the other day um we had a very serious discussion uh basically as a group. And um basically we wanted to answer what do we actually want to do with Copy That as a platform. And two things were clear. We can't justify investing more into Copy That with its current business model. The current way things are is not sustainable. But, we would never go the usual guru route of promoting hyped-up promises to newbies uh just to sell more courses. So, that left us with two options. The first option was kill Copy That as a brand completely so we can focus on all the other work that we have to do. Or evolve Copy That as a brand so we can justify spending more time on it without compromising our morals. And we would like to be honest with you about what we decided and why. Copy That as you have known it for the last five years is now dead because we are completely changing our business model. We will still be ourselves. We will still make videos that we find fun and we will still prioritize honesty about copywriting and marketing above all else. But, we do have to change how the brand makes money and operates. And we are determined to do it without exploiting newbies or being shady. Look, you can either make money in this space by selling the dream to newbies and hoping that loads of them buy your course, or you can make money by selling to more experienced copywriters and marketers who want professional development resources, or you can sell to businesses themselves. Um we intend to pursue the second option there. There will be plenty of details to follow in the next couple of months, but here is a sneak peek at how we are changing and what the new CopyThat will look like starting this year. First off, now that we have answered almost every question a beginner could possibly have in our mega course or our FAQ playlist, our YouTube channel is going to start to focus more on in-depth videos that are useful to experienced copywriters and for business owners who want to improve their marketing. Don't worry, we will still have content for beginners and intermediates every now and again, but we have had enough people tell us that they have been able to get work in this space learning just from our free videos and our free mega course and applying those lessons. So, our advice to you as a beginner is to do that. And second, we are completely revamping our paid funnel. We are going to put a lot of our old master classes into our YouTube membership or on Patreon, and that has already begun if you check out the videos on our channel. But within a few months, we're also launching the next step above our mega course, a 90-day incubator that does the one thing our mega course doesn't, provide direct day-by-day guidance taking you from where you are after watching all of our free stuff all the way to a copywriter ready for projects polished portfolio in hand. It's something that a lot of you have asked for, so we are finally doing it. We have actually stopped selling some of the courses that we have to offer because we don't want newbies to have to buy five different things. We just want to have one amazing course that gives you everything you need and is extremely affordable. >> Third, we have launched an inner circle mentorship program for experienced copywriters and marketers and very capable beginners, but we'll only be accepting those who can comfortably afford it and those who we know we can help. No one skilled newbies or people who are uncertain about this career. What we're offering to mentees essentially is access. Access to copy reviews, access to our network, access to opportunities, access to coaching calls, and a whole lot more. But mostly we are offering mentees access to us, ongoing access to us, so that they have the attention that they can use to actually leverage in their career. We are actively using That as a way to source new clients for our agencies and as a way to find new copywriters and marketers that we want to hire. These people will mainly be the ones that we can trust, the people we can build a relationship with, and that will mostly be the people that we work with in our inner circle. This allows the business to justify a higher ticket service. It allows us to make money from businesses and to justify the time that we spend working on new Copy That content, both paid and free. If you want to apply to get in, you will have to sign up for the waitlist linked in the description below this video. It'll be the first link that you see. And we do also have something else very, very, very exciting up our sleeves, too. We're not quite ready to reveal what it is just yet, but if you have ever asked us to make more content about specific niches or types of marketing, such as emails or Facebook ads or e-com, you should definitely keep an eye on your inbox. If any of that sounds like it will be useful to you, head to the page down below and sign up for our secret waitlist. Anyone on that waitlist will be the first to know when we drop access to our inner circle, which we only open every now and then, or any other big announcements relating to these new opportunities. So, all that's left to say is thank you so much for supporting us these past 5 years. The first video posted on Copy That was actually a Shawn rambling style selfie video. We all miss those. Which was released on December 7th, 2020. But we've only lasted this long because of you. The business itself may be evolving, but the core of Copy That will never change. In other words, Copy That is dead. Long live Copy That.