John Oszajca said:

In marketing the talk about "pattern interrupts" a lot. The thinking is that we all have a built in resistance to sales messages. When we start hearing the standard introductions we shut down a bit. But if you turn it into a story then their resistance does not come up and they don't realize they are being sold to until they buy.

Hey John: sorry to resurrect such an old thread, but I've been updating my autoreponder series to jibe a little bit more with the examples and concepts you detailed in the Copyrighting for Musicians lesson, and I've got a question for you.

Right now, the 5th email in my autoresponder series is where I'm going for the sale, with an  LTO for a bonus track version of one of my CDs - I'll paste it into the body of this post, below. As you can see, I'm basing it off of Email #4 - The Offer, from your lesson, and it uses relatively assertive sales language.

However, I wouldn't say this is really a pattern interrupt, as you explained it in your earlier response to me. Do you think that telling more of an offbeat story and making a more oblique sales pitch doesn't work as well for the big "buy my CD" email as it does in the earlier emails where you're more interested in building the relationship?

Thanks!

-----------------------------------

Email #5 - LTO

Hi {!firstname}:

I really hope you've been digging the music that I've been emailing you about over the last couple of weeks. Songs about conquistadores, partying with the devil, running from Michael Jackson's zombie lawyers….pretty much exactly what you signed up for, right ;)?  

Well, I know that it's nice to have a fun song show up in your inbox every few days, but today I'm going to up the ante a bit and propose a seriously cool addition to your music collection - for the next 72 hours I'm offering a sale on a special, limited-edition pressing of the Radio Nowhere album "Interstate Medicine".

Now if you've clicked on the links in some of the emails I've sent you previously, you've heard a couple of these songs, and by now hopefully you know the words and can sing along. Excellent!

On this edition of the album, though, I'm also including two bonus acoustic tracks that have never been offered for sale before. My mom hasn't even heard these (sorry, Mom).

Here's where you can get the CD:

http://www.radionowhere.net/rnimcd

I'm very proud of this album, and I think it features some of the best songs I've ever written, not to mention some of the hottest musicians I've ever been lucky enough to record with (thanks again to Peter Gabriel, Bonnie Raitt, Van Morrison and Counting Crows for loaning me some of the best players from your bands!).

Honestly, I'm really jazzed about the bonus tracks, though, probably because I just cut them a couple of weeks ago, and no one's heard them yet. I really think they offer more of an insider's look at the heart of the band.

Once again, here's where you can grab a copy:

http://www.radionowhere.net/rnimcd

Please keep in mind, though, that I'm only making this offer for fans. The general
public will not be hearing about this, they've never heard these bonus tracks, and you've only got 72 hours before the clock runs out on this offer.

So if you want to pick up your own special, limited-edition version of the album, click this link now:

http://www.radionowhere.net/rnimcd

Just to be reeaalllyyy clear - the offer is limited to 72 hours. When time's up, the offer will be gone for good.

~ Mike from Radio Nowhere

P.S. Oh, and one more thing - the CD comes with an immediate digital download of the entire album and a .pdf with all the lyrics, so you can start rocking the tracks instantly while you wait for your CD to show up.

P.P.S. Apparently, you can smoke the shrink wrap that the CD comes in. Yes, I'm serious.

Thanks , John. That makes sense. I'm actually almost done with another version that's more in the line you're describing, and that offers more opportunities to tell a story while still putting the sales offer up front - think I'll go with that one!