This was a particularly difficult project to tackle. The client markets a series of printed self-help dossiers which show people, simultaneously, how to take control of their own lives and avoid the manipulation that others might inflict on them, and how to start the kind of business that might help them earn a comfortable living on their own terms. The dossiers are marketed using this 10-page printed letter. Tone of voice recognises the difficult situation that many of the target group are in, and offers credible rationale for why and how the product might help them. Sales letter for Persimmon Publishing.
Power, Freedom. Wealth. You know you want them.
Here’s how you can get them.
Ask yourself this.
Who’s in charge?
Not of the firm you work for. Not even in your house.
Ask yourself who’s ‘in charge’of your life?
Who’s in charge of the single most precious thing you’ll ever be given?
Who’s making the decisions?
Who decides what you’ll do with the hours of your day?
Who decides how much money you’ll get in return for your labours?
Who decides what you can spend it on, or even how much of it you can spend at all?
Is it you?
If it is, then ‘Congratulations!’ If you’re truly in command of your own destiny, doing what you want to do with your days, earning as much as you want and not allowing anyone else to dominate or manipulate or exploit you, you’re in a very small, but fortunate, minority. If you’re not, though, if you just never seem to have the control over your lifestyle, or the personal power, or the money that other people appear to find easy to achieve, read on.
Because we’re about to explain to you about a trap that keeps many people both poor and powerless.
This is not the kind of poverty afflicting those unfortunate enough to be living on the breadline.
This is a poverty that afflicts ordinary, working people in their millions, keeping them so tied up in interest payments and bills that they never have chance to make enough money to enjoy or to save.
However hard you work, it makes no difference.
It’s a trap.
Look.
You have to have a home to live in.
Because of the high cost of property you have to have a mortgage.
Paying the mortgage (as well as feeding and clothing yourself and your family) means you have to go out to work each day.
You have no choice about this, because you have to be able to pay the mortgage and the bills.
This might be bearable enough if you went off to work everyday knowing that once you'd earned the money to pay the mortgage and the other bills the rest of what you earned was yours to keep.
But of course it isn't like that.
You have to pay taxes to the Government, and the Council, and then more taxes on all the things you buy.
In the end, you work hard all month, have virtually no time to yourself, and wind up being just about able to pay your bills and keep yourself fed, clothed and housed.
That’s if you’re lucky!
But have you moved forward at all?
No.
And that’s why you have to go back again and start all over the next month.
When the story is precisely the same.
You work long hours simply to pay your 'can't be avoided' bills and taxes. And you're left with nothing to show for it at the end.
Can you leave the job?
No! Because if you do you won't be able to pay the mortgage and the bills.
So you carry on again next month and the month after, not even able to find time to think about ways to escape the situation you're in.
If you keep going like this, you’ll never save any money, will you?
And if you're not able to save the money you'll need later on, what will happen to you when you stop work, but have nothing put aside because you were too busy month after month, year after year, just keeping the bills paid?
Even more importantly. when will you ever free up the time to enjoy your life?
If you're not in control of your life because of working for other people, month after month, to pay the bills, when will you get to do the things you really want to do?
When will you make sure your life doesn't end up just a long list of 'if only’?
The problem is, you're trapped by the 'work minus bills minus taxes = no money plus no time' equation that entraps so many people and stops them from ever achieving either real wealth or a lifestyle over which they have real control.
But you'd like control over your lifestyle, and the chance to build real wealth, wouldn't you?
Then read on because, struck by the large number of people trapped in this way, a successful and widely respected British businessman took the unexpected step, in 1992, of establishing a 'teaching circle', with a restricted membership roll (ie a strict limit to the number of people invited to join at any one time).
The purpose of the circle was to assist others who had similarly 'normal' backgrounds to the businessman's own, in freeing themselves from the misconceptions and constraints which were trapping them.
Which were keeping them in The Poverty Trap.
By doing this, since 1992 the circle has been able to show over 30,000 people how to break out of the trap of working to pay bills and taxes, with no chance of achieving real wealth.
The group has shown them how to achieve the independence of thought and action necessary to live their lives however they wish, making as much money as they choose to make along the way.
That's right.
The freedom to live their lives as they wish, and make as much money as they choose.
In the years since this select teaching circle was established, it has helped thousands of people to redirect their thinking, efforts and time into new ways of working capable of giving them the lifestyle and wealth they'd been looking for.
Now, for its Winter 2004 enrolment, the businessman has decided to invite applications to join his circle from carefully preselected members of the public.
I am thus pleased to be able offer you the chance to apply for membership of this remarkable group.
Can anyone really show you how to gain freedom, power and thousands of pounds each month without having to go to work every day?
Yes.
Someone who has not only achieved this for himself, but has already helped thousands of others to achieve it.
A man who specialises in helping people leave the poverty trap and take control of their own life and fortune.
Let me assure you at this point that both the successful, multi-millionaire businessman at the head of the circle, and the circle itself, have very well respected names and reputations.
However, because the number of members who can be accepted in each Enrolment is heavily restricted, we have been asked to reserve their identities at this stage.
Rest assured, however, that this is a group with enormous experience of helping people like you to break free of the poverty trap and fulfil their lifestyle and wealth ambitions.
In 11 years, the circle has assisted over 30,000 people.
The highly valuable teaching that the circle offers includes shrewd, practical, first-hand financial advice to help you break out of the trap of employment and establish a money generating venture of your own, suited to your own skills and ambitions, and fully compatible with the kind of lifestyle you would really like to lead.
Because there are only 3 ways to acquire serious money...and only one of these is likely to be open to you.
You'll learn what this way is, and how you can do it for yourself.
But that’s only the half of it.
The circle’s teaching also delivers eye-opening insights into the processes and influences which currently direct how you're forced to live your life and which are, in the view of the multi-millionaire businessman at the head of the circle, keeping you trapped.
All around you, the people you know, work with and live with are using subtle controlling tricks to ensure it's them, rather than you, who benefits from your efforts.
You'll find out how to put a stop to this. Even how to turn the tables.
Wouldn't you like to have a man who approaches life in a way which has made it possible for him to develop enormous wealth, power and freedom, coach you personally?
More freedom? More power? More money?
Wanting them is nothing to be ashamed of. In the end they're the things most people long for.
And here's your promise from the millionaire businessman:
"When you join, I will guide you to these goals through ten lessons, as I have guided others for the last 11 years. Every month you will receive a pack containing confidential materials which will allow you to progress up through the levels of power, freedom and knowledge. There are ten levels in all, and you receive one level per month.
As you complete each level, you will rise in personal power, and your financial life will start to come under your control. All materials are strictly secret, and I would ask you not to reveal any information to anyone of a lower grade than yourself. You will understand why I insist on this when you see the nature of the materials."
Membership of the circle is by invitation only.
Because you have been identified and preselected, you are now invited to apply for Membership of the millionaire businessman’s circle.
If your application is approved, you will be enrolled in the Winter 2004 programme and your Membership will commence immediately.
Over the following 10 months you will receive two bound books every month, each of about 24 pages. It takes a few weeks to read and digest the material, which is why it will be sent to you at monthly intervals.
One of the two books you will receive each month will be all about helping you to understand and break free of the forces and constraints which are currently keeping you in the poverty trap.
These books will show you how to free yourself, take control, and achieve an independent, enjoyable and rewarding life on your own terms, rather on the terms of others.
The second of the monthly books will tell you in detail how to create the kind of business for yourself that can be started with virtually no money, can be run in your own way and in the time that you choose, but which can generate all the money you need, month after month.
In the end, that's what you'd like, isn't it?
There are ten levels in the circle’s course, and month by month you'll rise through them until you become, finally what the circle refers to as an 'Initiate'.
At that point, you’ll find that your life really is your own.
You’ll find that you have the resources you need to make all the money and wield all the power you dream about.
What would it be worth to take control of your own life? And your own fortune?
It's impossible to put a value on the information offered by this course.
What would it be worth to break out of the poverty trap and make real money?
What would it be worth never to have to do a job you hate again?
The answer is 'a great deal’. Yet, astonishingly, you pay nothing at all unless your membership of the circle is accepted.
NOT A PENNY
And, indeed, the millionaire businessman no longer accepts a penny at any point from your membership fee.
He doesn't need to! He's already done what he'll show you how to do.
The charge to receive the full course is normally £360, but if you decide to pay in full we are currently able to offer Winter 2004 Membership to you at £300.
If you prefer, you can pay by monthly subscription at £35 a month for 10 months.
Apply today, using the enclosed form, and we'll start you off on the way to building your own, personal wealth, by sending you a copy of 'The Midas Touch', an outstanding book about wealth creation written by the businessman at the centre of the circle, absolutely FREE.
If you decide after you receive the first month's material that you don’t want to receive the rest of the course, your copy of 'The Midas Touch' will still be yours to keep, even though we'll refund your first month's payment in full.
If you decide at any time later on that you want to leave the group, you’re free to do so simply by cancelling your remaining payments.
Even if you do, you will still have benefited greatly from the levels you have completed up to that time.
Our Guarantee
If, when you've received the first month's material, you consider that Membership of the circle will not help you to change your life and your financial situation in the way that you’d hoped, we'll refund your first payment entirely, and you may keep the first month's material, as well as your copy of 'The Midas Touch'. You will not be asked for any explanation!
The truth is, you really can’t lose.
If you don't see, immediately, how the material you receive as a member of the circle is going to change your life, we'll refund your money.
We look forward to receiving your application and, we hope, to welcoming you into the circle, at which time we will be able to reveal the identity of both the circle and the millionaire businessman to you.
Yours very sincerely,
John Hartley
Director of Programme Enrolment
Persimmon
PS.
The testimonials you've read within this letter are just a few of over 1000 such genuine letters from former members of the group received and made available to us by the millionaire businessman.
PPS.
Remember. What we're offering is information that will break you out of the poverty trap, give you freedom and control over your own life, and set you on the road towards making real wealth.
But if, after seeing the first month's material, you decide not to take the course, we'll refund every penny you've paid and you can still keep the material and your FREE copy of 'The Midas Touch'.
APPLY FOR YOUR MEMBERSHIP NOW USING THE ENCLOSED FORM.
If your application is not received within 7 days, we regret that your place may be offered to an applicant on our waiting list.
THINK CAREFULLY.
WHY WOULDN’T YOU DO SOMETHING THAT'S ALREADY HELPED 30,000 PEOPLE ESCAPE THE POVERTY TRAP AND TAKE CONTROL OF THEIR OWN LIVES?