How To Write Subject Lines That Get Attention With Matt Trainer

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“It’s easy start to become the king of the shit heads when you’re doing better
than everybody else is listening you, and to the problem with that is that becomes
very stagnant for growth, and you’ve got to really really own the fact that the
people that you hang around with the most, that’s who you become.“

Hi, my name is Igor Kheifets and this is the List Building Lifestyle, the only podcast
which delivers cutting edge conversion strategies from the online trenches straight to
your earbuds. Download the transcript of today’s episode and all future episodes at
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once again it’s time to claim your List Building Lifestyle.

Igor: Welcome back to another edition of The List Building Lifestyle with your
host, Igor Kheifets. Matt Trainer is well known for his extraordinary digital
marketing agency where he built websites for MTV, Paris Hilton, Dr Phil and a
bunch of other celebrities. After meeting Frank Kern or in Orlando, he moved to
La Jolla California to work shoulder to shoulder with Frank on the explosive
mass control, and Mess Control 2.0 launches, which produce seven figures in
sales. Today, Matt’s on a mission to create a thousand online millionaires
and become a self-made billionaire. Matt, great to have you on the show,
brother.

Matt: Thanks so much, man, you’re awesome.

Igor: Thank you. So, I hear you’re a big fan of email marketing and
you’re big on controversial subject lines. So I’d love to just dive in
and start with that part, because I see so many wussy e-mail marketers, it’s
getting, it’s seriously getting on my nerves right now.

Matt: [laughter] Yeah, I know. So weak. Marketing from your heels, it’s a
bad thing to do. I get a lot of heat from some of my emails, but you know what?
I get a huge response, too. Like the one I sent out, I don’t know if you saw
it or not, but I sent one a few weeks ago, and the subject line was The Top
Three Reasons I Love Satan.

Igor: Wow. [laughter]

Matt: I mean, you automatically want to read it. It doesn’t matter what the
hell I’m saying. But so, I got a huge response from that, and I was
expecting to get tons of negative response, and I was okay with that. It’s
just part of it. But the response I got actually shocked me was, I really, it
was all satire, kind of making fun of Christian belief systems basically. I
expected to get a ton of you know negative feedback from Christians and stuff,
but it was really very positive. I had hundreds, and literally, hundreds of
people emailing me in response, saying, “Wow, that’s the best email
I’ve ever read. Thank you so much. As a Christian I like this and this and
this and this.” And then they were quoting Bibles, verses and stuff to me.
And yeah, it was just to elicit a response, I didn’t even promote anything in
there, which is really, really bad in my opinion but I just wanted to see what
people would say. [laughter]

Igor: Well you know what they say, it’s kind of like dating, where the girl
needs to either hate your guts or love you, but if she isn’t different to
you, then you’re not getting any attention and you’re not in the game.

Matt: Yeah.

Igor: So if you got to use Satan, the Devil and Christianity to get attention
and to get a response, then absolutely go for it. Go for it. I mean just break
the rules, absolutely.

Matt: Yeah. Just be compelling, that’s what I tell everybody. I mean
it’s hard to do, but just don’t be boring. I’m like you. If I see
one more email that says, “Check out this new video, great hot
product.” Or something like that, man nobody gives a shit. [laughter]

Igor: [laughter]

Matt: You got to make it interesting on some level.

Igor: Yeah, because there’s just too much stuff coming out. I was just
reading an email from Daniel Levis, a great email copywriter, he’s got this,
he’s I got this. He’s the email alchemist, he called himself. And he was
writing this email about how we don’t need more information. People think
that the markings about giving great information out. But the reality is,
there’s plenty of it. What we need is entertainment, is we need more
interesting people because everybody’s freaking boring. So how do you keep
your emails interesting and engaging?

Matt: Well, I mean this is going to sound pretty brutal, but I’m just not a
pussy. I mean everybody’s scared of the world, is scared of everybody’s
opinions and scared of somebody being offended or all this shit. I don’t
care about that. I just want to get attention. So I do everything just to do a
pattern interrupt. That’s that. That’s it. And even if that pattern
interrupt only lasts a few seconds and it’s enough to get them to open the
email, then I can send them some stuff. But yeah, I know Daniel very well. He
and I are friends, you know we’ve promoted each other stuff, and he’s
awesome, and I agree 100%. In my own email marketing training, I talk about that
exact thing. Infotainment. Tiny little bits of information wrapped in a giant
wrapper of entertainment. Just to shake people up. I mean in the end, the email
is nothing but a banner ad. That’s it. You’re just trying to sell a
click, and that click in this case is to open the email. Then the next step is
to get in the click, a link in email. And it’s basically just a banner ad.
Get them to open it and then click your banner. And to do that, you got to be
interesting. I mean really, if you just study Cosmopolitan, that’s old
school guys do. Cosmopolitan headlines and that kind of stuff. Or like the sites
like The Cracked. TheCracked.com and some of those other places. Or even The
Onion, some satire type headlines, that’s the stuff that I like to use. Just
be different and interesting and not be afraid to piss people off.

Igor: You know, this is a really big idea, a big thought, big concept I think
for many of the beginner list builders listen to our show. Because when you
start out, you really don’t want to piss people off. Right? You want
actually people like you. You sure are desperate to get other people’s
approval. But it’s funny because, if you’re going around seeking
approval, what happens is you get none. So in order to gather people’s
approval, you actually have to express a really definite opinion about things,
often polarizing opinion which gets attention, and that seems exactly like what
you’re doing right now. Even after all these years in email marketing. So my
question is Matt, would you do the exact same thing if you were just starting
out say today?

Matt: No, I would do it even more hardcore. [laughter]

Igor: [laughter]

Matt: Just of firmly put a stamp in the ground. “Wow! Who the hell’s
this guy?” I sold from my heels for a lot of years, same thing, just trying
to get people to like me. And in fact, my first website I started with my own
brand was called TheMarketingMoron.com. It’s still up there for just for
archive of purposes. There’s a lot of good content on there so I leave it
up. But I’d literally publicly call myself a moron to try to differentiate
myself, but to do it in a way so that wasn’t offending anybody, and all the
self-deprecation type stuff that was, became big in the 90’s and sort of
it’s gotten bigger now. People just not want to be themselves and scared of
have any sort of expression. I was the same guy. I did the same thing. I called
myself a moron publicly, even though I’m clearly not, and I don’t
believe that about myself at all, but it’s how I thought I needed to put
myself out in the public. I don’t want to seem like I’m better than
everybody, I want to be an asshole, I want to be the nice guy. “I’m a
marketing moron, tongue in cheek stuff.’ I immediately what it did it
immediately discount my stuff to everybody. So it took me many years of putting
out content and stuff, proving that I’m not a moron, for it all the sudden
make sense to people and I wasted a ton of time, probably left millions of
dollars on the table and that kind of stuff. So I would do it radically
different again. I would just come out hardcore swing in with my opinions. You
don’t have to be an asshole, but just at least have some opinions and be
interesting.

Igor: Yeah, I mean if you’re honest, if you’re expressing honest
opinions and you’re just being real, then you’re going to alienate some
people. That’s perfectly fine. I’m sure you’re not everyone’s
cup of tea. I have alienated more people on my list than I think anyone ever. I
get unsubscribes all the time, get spam complaint, get people writing angry
email somehow big of an asshole I am. I mean I got plenty. Right? Plus, I’m
Jewish. Right? So that doesn’t, I mean it doesn’t help.

Matt: Yeah.

Igor: So all in all, what’s going on is that, as long as you’re real,
you are pushing people back, but guess what happens? You’ve got other
gigantic group of people who actually like you for being real. I mean that’s
how you attract. You repel the bad prospects to attract the good ones. So Matt,
you just mentioned a big concept, which I think is one of the most important
ones out there, yet it’s the least talked about one, and it’s self-deprecation.
I believe that self-deprecation when done right, can actually get people to
like you. Like you can actually have like total strangers like you instantly
though self-deprecation. So do you mind if we take the conversation into
that direction, and perhaps talk about how you use self-deprecation in your
emails, or maybe using, you’re doing it right now as well, in order to gain
rapport with your list?

Matt: Okay, yeah. For sure. Yeah, I mean I used to be a huge fan of
self-deprecation. If you do it lightly, it certainly can get people to like you,
but here’s a giant problem with it. At first that sounds good. You want
people like you. Who doesn’t? We’re all just, I firmly believe that all
of us here on this planet are all just endlessly seeking unconditional love.
That’s it. It’s only reason we do anything, is to try to get
unconditional love coming our way. So it feels good. If you do what you’re
talking about and get people to like you instantly, you’re absolutely 100%
correct, however the problem is that it stops right there. Because if you’re
doing that stuff, typically with the reason that people like you instantly is
because you’re instantly like them, because they’re talking shit to
themselves all day long every single day. Because in the end, I think most
people hate themselves, or at a minimum don’t love themselves on some level.
So the self-deprecation thing comes really easy, because that’s how you talk
to yourself all the time anyway. I mean a lot of people constantly call
themselves stupid or dumb or not worthy or not good enough, all kinds of things
we say to ourselves. So self-deprecation comes easy, and it does make that
connection instantly because people recognize that part of themselves
immediately. But again, it stops right there. Once you go any further past that
and you continue on down that lane, then people start seeing you like them, and
then you’re going to lose them. Because guess what? They don’t like
themselves, and they want to go follow somebody else that’s not them. So
I’m a firm believer that you shouldn’t do any sort of self-deprecation
unless it’s done in a very controlled way, but it’s very, very clear.
It’s nothing but a joke, and tongue in cheek and you immediately move on to
something that says, “Hey, I’m a badass.” So because what you
don’t want to do is use those kinds of tactics and get connected with your
audience, and then keep yourself at the level of the audience. Because if they
see that you as the same as them, they will never give you money. Because they
don’t even like themselves, so why are they going to give you money or give
you attention or give you something whenever they see a part of themselves that
they don’t even like. I know it’s really deep.

Igor: Yeah, it is. It’s very, very deep. I don’t think I’ve ever
heard it would go as deep about self-deprecation you just did right now, and I
feel that you touch upon at some amazing points. I would like to bring some of
my own perspective into this, if you don’t mind. Basically what I feel, the
way I feel about self- deprecation is something you sprinkle on top of the cake,
right. So what you do is use a little bit of it, just like you said, in order to
add an element of likeability to your marketing. However, again just like you
said, you still want to appear superior through some sort of super power. Right?
So you, I remember you had the SEO superpower. Right? You’ve built websites
for celebrities, that’s a superpower. So you’re basically downplaying
your own abilities lightly, but at the same time, it’s clear that you’re
superior, which is why they’re willing to give you money because they want
to be more like you. They’re projecting themselves upon you, and they want
to basically be you at the end of the day.

Matt: Yeah. You just can’t give too much of that to them. The other problem
you have too is there are a couple little things that happen. One is that you
can take that a little bit too far, and I’m just mostly speaking from my own
experience. You can take that too far, really, and put yourself in a position
where you’re trying to save people. And I think a lot of people do that when
they don’t like themselves a lot, and so they’ve got some sort of
superpower, like you mentioned that, they want to share with the world, and
instead of it being a healthy way of doing that, you can step over the line
where you are just trying to save people. By saying that I mean fixing other
people’s problems before you fix your own. I’ve seen that in myself a
lot by even through email marketing. Sounds weird, but I’ve noticed reading
through some of my older stuff that I was trying to save people through emails
by trying to cram things down their throat whenever I was just trying to love
myself. [laughter] Sounds weird,

Igor: [laughter] I’m going to use it as episode title. “Matt Trainer
Loving Himself” [laughter]

Matt: [laughter] It’s interesting, man. Really I really lashed on this whole
personal development side of things, because once you really get past all the
tactics and strategies and marketing, in the end what’s on the other side of
all of that, is people. You got to learn how to really integrate with people. I
found myself in a situation that I, you continue to do your marketing and be
entertaining, or at least interesting on some level, and you know like you said,
you build up an audience, you repel the people that don’t resonate with you,
you attract people to do and they will stay longer. You build up your tribe.
I’ve done it. I’m sure you have it too, where you got this certain
amount of people that no matter what you promote, they’re going to buy it.
Just because they follow you, they trust you, the whole thing. That’s
awesome. That does whenever your email list turns into a literal ATM machine.
When you need money, you go promote something that fits well with you and you
know you got a certain number of people that will buy it. And that’s cool
and all, except for it can also turn into something where you kind of turn into
what Garrett J White calls the king of the shit heads, where yeah you’re
smart bad ass guy with your superpower in this tiny little group. The big fish
in a small pond kind of thing, and you might be the bad ass there, but what
about in the real world? Or what about somebody with the bigger email list, or
different audience, and all of the sudden we don’t… Just something kind of
like, if you’re living in a small town like I used to and you make six
figures a year, I mean you were the king. Made the most money in town and
obviously, you make more money in today’s value system that means something
to people. It’s easy to start to become the king of the shit heads when
you’re doing better than everybody else that is listening to you. The
problem with that is it becomes very stagnant for growth, and you’ve got to
really, really own the fact that the people that you hang around with the most,
that’s who you’ve become. And if you’re hanging around the people on
your list for instance, like I did a lot of, like spend a lot of time on
webinars and Q&A calls, and all this story stuff, and I started noticing
that my mindset was changing and shifting to one of my customers, instead of
being me. So I turned into the king of the shit heads. And the only way I got
out of that was just going to masterminds, surrounding myself with people doing
much better than me. People that are doing the things I want to do with my life,
and really owning the fact that who I hang around with, is who I’m going to
become. So I’m very careful about who I hang around with. I know that kind
of got away from email marketing, but it’s still the same thing. I mean in
the end we’re dealing with people and you want to protect your mindset, and
reach people without the self-deprecation and without kind of tearing down your
own brand subtly over time, which was what I was doing with The Marketing Moron.
I mean I’m slowly putting bullet holes in my own brand over time from call
myself a moron all the time. Anyway, the king of shit head thing is something
has been big for me in the last couple years. I’ve learned how to navigate
around that. I don’t know what your audience is like for your podcast, but I
know this is pretty advanced for a lot of people. [laughter]

Igor: Yeah, it is. I think it just went way over the heads of most people
listening which is why I want to circle back and ask you different question. You
mentioned earlier that the whole make money online scene when you strip all the
bullshit and all the tactics, it’s really about personal development, and I
agree with you here wholeheartedly. So I wanted to ask you, after working with
so many people and building one of the largest teams online ever, I think, what
would you say is a couple, maybe two, three most important qualities you believe
you’ve had or you have is that attracted people to you, and that allowed you
to build your own tribe?

Matt: Man, it’s hard to talk about yourself. I think probably the number one
thing is I’m pretty fearless. I used to say that I’m completely
fearless, but that’s not true. We’re all scared of something. So I’m
kind of fearless when it comes to speaking my mind and stuff, and I’m not a
sycophant. I don’t just swallow everybody’s bullshit because it was told
to me. So I test everything, I test everything to the extreme and to the extreme
on the good end and the extreme on the bad end. So I know what happens on…
Whenever I’m doing something I know it inside and out because I test
everything to extreme. And since most people don’t test anything ever, then
I’m an authority automatically because I test things. So being fearless and
testing, I think is two things that people really… I don’t think they care
so much about the testing, but they know that because I’ve tested so much I
have the knowledge and skills and results that they want. So I think, shit I
don’t know, maybe so why some people follow me. [laughter]

Igor: [laughter]

Matt: Because some days I swear I’d tell you, some days I’m like,
“Man, I know I’m not even qualified to stand up here and tell anybody
anything.” [laughter]

Igor: Well you mentioned something big. You said you test. Right. So whatever
you say, whatever the opinion that you’re expressing, right, it is based on
real world test, and that is awesome. So my question to you is, since most lists
builders listening are at the time, at the point of their life where they aspire
to become more like you. They’re still not there, right, but they want to be
more like Matt Trainer. So how this testing quality, if you will, or character
trait, or behavior, or whatever you want to call it. How can a newbie implement
this in order to start attracting people and start building their tribe? How
would that work?

Matt: Well it’s just, you got to start with not believing anything anybody
says. So what happens is, everybody gets into this game and start taking
courses, listening to podcasts like this, going through various trainings, and
they treat it as gospel. Like that’s came down from God and it’s on
golden plates, or whatever. This is just not the truth. Most the stuff is taught
you can do the exact opposite, and still make money. And sometimes doing the
exact opposite will make more money. So I would just tell everybody just get
some training, listen to podcasts like this. Listen to people that have been
there, but then test go to the opposite. Just make your own path. I mean
that’s how you’re going to have to do it. Figure out what you want from
life, stop trying to please a bunch of people and be entertaining, and test the
shit out of everything.

Igor: Yeah, but be entertaining. Don’t test that, just be that, because this
is like the one thing I’m 1000% certain about is, that if you’re
entertaining in today’s society where everything is based around
entertainment, then we just have to look at Hollywood. Right, and how much money
they’re making, to see how that is true. You can get away with a lot of
things that you’re doing wrong, and you will, again, make a lot of money.
Again, a beautiful piece of advice right there, Matt. Thank you so much. So,
what are you up to these days?

Matt: These days I’m moving. Kind of moving away from the internet
marketing, teaching stuff, more in the personal development. I really, really
resonate with that stuff a lot. I just launched a meditation course, I’m
teaching meditation, and a little bit more spiritual kind of things. For money
side of things, I’m very determined, not that I care about the money, but
I’m very determined to become a self-made billionaire, and I don’t care
about the money. I’ve had lots of money in my life, I’ve had all the
material bullshit, and that’s not what I’m after. I just want to do it
to say I did it, and because I want to make some changes in the world, make it a
better place. And if you are a billionaire or have been a billionaire at least
at one point, people listen to you in a different way. And it’s the only
reason that Donald Trump is such a big deal right now, is because he’s a
billionaire. That’s the only reason. If he didn’t have that, nobody
would care because everybody can say inflammatory things, but he’s a
billionaire. He’s got a success track record. No matter what you feel about
him. So that’s what I’m working on, I’ve got, I teach a lot about
the coming, what I believe it’s coming, a financial collapse in the world
economic system, that’s good and bad both, because the future is much, much
brighter with the advent of all block chaintype technology to build bit coins
built on. The future of that stuff is where I’m focusing big time. I’m
building a publishing network to basically build the next generation of ad
network. I want to beat some of the big guys to the punch with some of this
blockchain technology. So I’m working on the future of the internet,
basically, and I really think that there’s a ridiculous amount of
opportunity in the blockchain stuff, and really in just loving yourself. Getting
personal element nailed down, meditating daily, and that kind of thing.

Igor: Nice. Way to be, man. Keeping busy. So where can we go to find out more
about your meditation work, as well as the blockchain technology?

Matt: You’d had to get on my list, really. I mean I talk about this weekly
on my radio show, but my radio show’s private to customers only, so
you’d have to be a customer of something, even if it’s something cheap
like my meditation course. I sell it for 40 bucks. It’s a four week course
for 40 bucks. So cheapest product of ever sold by far, by the way. But the
MattTrainer.com, that’s Matt with two T’s and MattTrainer.com is my
blog, you can get on my list there. MattTrainer.com/meditation is my meditation
course. Just get on my list. That’s how you learn about me, is get on my
list because I mail out some really seemingly random stuff that you won’t
see anywhere else. I promise you. [laughter]

Igor: [laughter] Alright. So you heard him boys and girls, MattTrainer.com to
get on his list, and MattTrainer.com/meditation to get the $40 for four week
course, meditation course. Get on his list, on the customer list, and become a
part of the Matt Trainer radio show. So Matt, thank you so much for being here,
thank you so much for taking your valuable time and giving it to us. Lots of
great insights, and amazing value. Till the next time we talk, have a good one.

Thanks for listening to The List Building Lifestyle Show, make sure to subscribe on iTunes
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we share on the show might double your list and double your business. Download the
transcript of today’s episode and all future episodes at listbuilderslifestyleshow.com and
don’t forget to claim your complimentary copy of “The Wealthy List Builder’s Survival
Guide” at listbuildinglifestyleshow.com/survival . This is Igor Kheifets until next time we talk, have a good one.

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