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[LWN] 💰 The Business Lesson I will NEVER Forget...

[LWN] 💰 The Business Lesson I will NEVER Forget...

Lunch With Norm's Weekly Newsletter - Sign up for the AI eCommerce Summit, Low Inventory Fee Calculator, and The Perfect Prompt

April 15, 2024 • Estimated Read Time: 15 minutes

💰 Casual Attire, Serious Business…

When I was overlooked at a car dealership, an unsuspecting salesperson was given a BIG surprise…

What you’ll find in this week’s newsletter:

💰 Casual Attire, Serious Business… [My True Story]
🗞️ Latest Amazon News & Updates
🤯 Getting Amazon Sponsored Brand Video Ads to ACTUALLY Work [How-To]
✅ 10 Tips to Make the Perfect Prompt
🎙️ What You Missed Last Week
😬 The Listing Optimization Opportunity Almost All Sellers Miss

🚨 BIG NEWS!!!🚨

Kevin King and I, are putting on an incredible AI summit for eCommerce sellers with 18 of the top AI experts in the industry. Registration is now officially open so grab your spot 👉 Sign up

💰 Casual Attire, Serious Business [My True Story]

Back in the day, I was in my mid twenties running a successful marketing business.

My partner Dave, and I hated wearing suits and ties.

We were jeans and a t-shirt kind of guys.

But dressing up in a suit and tie was all part of doing business back in the 90s.

However, we started dressing down for “Casual Fridays” at the office because we had enough of the formality.

Anyway, our next big move was to start a courier company within our business.

We needed to check out a few car dealerships and buy several vehicles.

On a (casual) Friday, we walked in to a Chrysler dealership with our jeans and t-shirts.

Not a single salesperson looked in our direction.

It was like we were invisible.

We went in with the full intention of buying multiple vehicles (think of the commission!)

It was an easy sell.

We tried making eye contact with the sales team…

Nothing.

We could tell these guys thought we were a waste of time.

After 15 minutes, we looked at each other and said, “Let’s get out of here.”

As we're walking out the door, this 70 year old man stopped us and asked if anybody has helped us yet.

We said, “No, not at all. We're leaving.”

He replied “Well I’d be happy to help you two gents.”

This guy was old school.

We ended up cutting a huge deal with him and bought multiple vehicles and vans for our new courier company.

The guy was awesome.

And guess who made all those commissions…

It wasn’t a bad way to end his Friday.

It just goes to show you, you should never judge a book by its cover.

Enjoy the rest of the newsletter.

— Norm

What are you most comfortable in?

After answering, comment what you thought of the story!

🗞️ AMAZON NEWS & UPDATES 🗞️

What’s happening in the world of Amazon today…

🧑‍⚖️ Jury orders Amazon to pay $525 million to Chicago tech firm for patent infringement - Read more
📨 CEO Andy Jassy’s 2023 Letter to Shareholders - Read more
🙅‍♂️ Amazon CEO: Don't Wait for Us to Launch a ChatGPT Competitor - Read more
🤖 Amazon names business and tech leader Andrew Ng to its board, boosting AI expertise - Read more
🥷 More Amazon shoppers are scamming sellers with fraudulent returns - Read more
BONUS: If you are trying to figure our how to calculate low inventory fees - Check out the low fee inventory calculator from SmartScout

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS THE BEARDED GUY?

Can you find Norm in the picture below? Scroll to the bottom of this newsletter to see the answer!

Getting Amazon Sponsored Brand Video Ads to ACTUALLY Work

Contributed by Chris Rawling’s Sophie Society

I've run over 400 different PPC video ads on Amazon, and my team and I spin up new ones every week.

Here's how I do it profitably:

One of the best ways to transcend the Amazon PPC algorithm game of constantly adjusting bids and budgets is to master the art of running profitable video ads and custom image ads.

The problem is, with Sponsored Brand Video, the options are limitless, and there is an upfront time and $ commitment to produce the video asset.

All without any kind of guarantee that it will work.

So how do you make a video ad that will convert at a healthy ACoS?

THE 3 SECOND RULE ✅

A vast majority of the Sponsored Brand Video ads we've run that were successful had one thing in common:

They got to the action in the first three seconds.

They didn’t waste time with the logo, and intro, b-roll, or anything else, they just got right to showing the product being used actively by it's ideal customer avatar.

The first 3 seconds determine 90% of the success of the whole ad.

So when planning out your ad, spend 90% of your energy planning out the first 3 seconds, and the remaining time planning out the other 27 seconds (SBV ads should be about 30 to 35 seconds long).

WHAT IF THERE'S NO ACTION???

If your product doesn’t have action, then the type of ad to do instead is a UGC (user generated content) - style testimonial ad.

A knife can be shown doing what a knife does - that is an example of a product you can show in action.

But a supplement you just swallow and wait for it to work.

There's no action.

For these kinds of products, find an attractive character to do a testimonial ad, add captions, create 3 variations to test against one another, and run them against one another to find out which will perform.

SPLIT TEST ✅

Whether you go with the action style video or the UGC style testimonial video, create 3 to 5 variations of it to run against one another.

The difference doesn’t have to be major.

If I’m selling a knife I might try one where the first three seconds is me cutting through paper, another where I’m curing a tomato, and another where a hand is pulling it out of it’s holder and then chopping carrots.

For the UGC video, you can split test what is said in the beginning of the video, what static image of the product is imposed over the video, or just try a different person saying the same thing.

The important thing is that you start off with testing multiple hypotheses. This gives you a greater chance of getting one of them right.

OPTIMIZE THE CAMPAIGNS OVER TIME ✅

Once your Amazon PPC video ads are live, you will want to maximize their performance over time by optimizing them twice weekly.

To learn more about how to manage creative ads on Amazon effectively, join the Profitable PPC Challenge coming up in a few days.

We’ll go over some of the video ads that have worked well for us, how we got them to perform, and how we optimize them.

We also go over everything else PPC related you need to know to run Amazon PPC Profitably in 2024 and help you to install them into your brand.

WHAT YOU MISSED LAST WEEK

👇 Highlights from last week’s Lunch With Norm podcast episodes👇

How To Use AI For Video Creation And Editing

Watch the full episode here

Main Takeaways:

Edit and Refine Content with AI 🧐 Tools like Pictory can help edit your video content by removing filler words, silences, and unnecessary segments, making your videos more concise and viewer-friendly
Generate Video from Articles 📚 Convert your existing blog posts or articles into video content using AI
Leverage AI for Script Writing ✏️ Use AI to assist in writing scripts for your videos. Platforms like ChatGPT can generate creative, engaging scripts that you can fine-tune and use as a basis for your video content
Use code: NORM20 for 20% off Pictory - Here

How to Prompt Like a Pro - A Deep Dive into AI Prompting

Watch the full episode here

Top 10 Tips to Make the Perfect Prompt:

Understand Your Model: Different AI models (e.g. GPT-4, Claude) have unique capabilities and limitations
Provide the Right Information: When prompting AI, the more context and information you give, the better the output
Specify the Desired Format: Clearly indicate how you want the AI's response to be structured, whether it's an email format, list, or narrative structure, to get outputs that meet your expectations
Use Examples for Better Results: Provide examples of the style, tone, or content you're aiming for
Iterate and Refine: Start with simple prompts and gradually refine them based on the AI's outputs
Use Role-playing to Define Tone and Style: Assigning a role or personality to the AI (e.g., an enthusiastic product reviewer) can help generate content that matches a specific tone or style
Break Complex Tasks into Simpler Steps: Break down the task into simpler, more focused prompts. This approach often yields better quality and more precise outputs
Repeat Key Instructions: If there's a crucial aspect of your prompt, repeating it can reinforce its importance to the AI
Ask AI to Improve Its Own Prompts: If you're not satisfied with an output, you can ask the AI to suggest improvements to your original prompt
Explore Advanced Features and Settings: For users who delve into AI models' API or advanced interfaces, tweaking settings like "temperature" can alter creativity levels and output variability.
Use code: Beardo10 for 10% off Perci AI

Is Amazon Influencer Marketing Worth It In 2024

Watch the full episode here

Main Takeaways:

Choose the Right Influencer ✅ Match influencers to your product's target audience. Avoid influencers who have promoted similar products excessively to maintain credibility
Focus on Product Quality First 🔍 Before engaging with influencers, ensure your product is of high quality and addresses a specific customer need. Influencers can generate initial interest, but repeat purchases depend on product satisfaction
Develop a Comprehensive Influencer List 📝 Categorize influencers by platform (TikTok, YouTube, Instagram) and reach (micro or macro influencers)

AI UPDATE: Edit Images in ChatGPT

Did you see this cool Chat GPT update?

When creating images on ChatGPT, you now have the ability to edit/change specific areas of an AI image.

It tried it out myself.

Check out how easy it was for me to completely remove the CN tower from this image I made in seconds.

Before…

After…

I found this article for more information about the update.

Pretty cool stuff.

THREE UPCOMING PODCASTS

You can watch all episodes on YouTube or on my Facebook page at 12 pm ET on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday!

**Guests and topics are subject to change**

Monday - Keys To High Conversions

Benjamin Webber
started with retail arbitrage and turned it into an 8-figure private label business
specializes in generating high conversions through listing optimization, and building teams

Watch LIVE 👉 Sign up here

AI Wednesday - Making Sense of the Google March AI Update

Jonathan Gillham - Founder of Originality AI
developed a modern plagiarism-checking solution
on a mission to try and provide transparency regarding the true originality of any written content

Watch LIVE 👉 Sign up here

Friday - Why should (your audience) write a book?

Chandler Bolt - CEO of SelfPublishing.com
a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, and
the author of 7 bestselling books including his most recent book titled “Published.”
Watch LIVE 👉 Sign up here