My rags to riches story
The subject line at the top of this letter is actually a lie. Im not yet rich. Im no Donald Trump or Warren Buffet. I dont drive around in a Porsche and walk into restaurants and order whatever I want without looking at the menu.
But Im a damn sight better off than I was a few years ago.
Let me start at the beginning.
I was working on a wage of about $35,000 a yearthen I applied to be the telemarketing manager of a recruitment call centre that paid me more than double my previous income.
It seemed like a fortune at the time.
In fact, I remember the first few weeks I worked at that job I felt like a charlatan. Amazing how things change as today I would NEVER work for that amount of money.
But then something changed. I went to a seminar and they talked about taking over a business for free building it up and selling it. So I looked through the papers, found an opportunity, quit my job and jumped in head first.
What happened? My business partner and I had very little money no skill in the area (it was a hairdressing salon) and had never been in business.
To cut a long story short, despite our best efforts, the business folded within 6 months and I found myself broke and on the bottom of the world.
Id already borrowed money from my mother so I couldnt turn that way and I didnt know where else to go.
I found a guy in Paddington who let me rent an apartment with low rent in the first week but half-way through that week I couldnt afford to eat and I am serious.
I literally did a sales presentation on marketing to the local Indian restaurant (who was never going to buy) and invited myself to a meal afterwards.
Anyway, I was desperate and penniless, so I placed a classified ad in the newspaper on credit (cost: $18) and I hung out my shingle. Managed to borrow some money off a friend to pay the rent for the week and when the ad went in, the phones rang and slowly but surely I got clients.
It was tough probably the toughest experience of my life.
But a few months later I met my wife and fell madly in love she said I looked like a guy who was on drugs because my eyes were so sunken in but she was wonderful enough to love me anyway despite my terrible dress sense and the ordinary state of my life.
Thankfully, she also cooked for me which was great, because I was still living on the smell of an oily rag.
I was living hand to mouth week to week cold calling & hustling in order to get by. And thats when I decided I needed to get something stable.
I found a client who would pay me a reasonable amount of money for three days a week of work M & M Pest Control and I transformed his business over a period of several months.
Anyway, that lifted my confidence and gave me a spring in my step. I worked with various clients, before eventually seeing a job opportunity for Readers Digest. My wife had a strong gut reaction to this and told me I must apply for that position.
If you want to know what the copywriting manager at Readers Digest thought of my skill level, simply click here and scroll to the top of the page.
Anyway, for a number of reasons, I didnt ever work for Readers Digest, but all this gave me the confidence to move forward.
I started focusing on copywriting and work just swarmed in. More money than Id ever earned in my life. Then I built my database got some larger clients on board and the rest is history.
Today I earn a great income never make cold calls work in my shorts in an office near my home dont have to slosh through rush hour traffic and all the work comes to me as a result of the turn-key systems I have developed over the years.
Scott Bywater is a successful direct response copywriter and heads up Copywriting That Sells, a direct response advertising firm. Want to learn how to get more customers then get your hands on his popular 17 page ebook 7 ways To Increase Your Turnover... No Matter What The State Of The Economy. Its been downloaded by over 8,247 business owners over the past five years and you can get your hands on it now at http://www.copywritingthatsells.com.au
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