How To Build Overnight Credibility Without Income Proof or Testimonials

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Hi, my name is Igor Kheifets and this is the List Building Lifestyle, the only podcast
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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.

Jonathan: You are listening to List Building Lifestyle with the King of List
Builders himself, Mr. Igor Kheifets. What is up my man?

Igor: All good and I would like to be transformed into a King, the King of Proof
since today’s episode is all about that.

Jonathan: Okay? Alright, I’m down with that.

Igor: Okay so the King of Proof shall speak his mind and you know the reason I
want to chat about proof because it seems to be a one of the largest and like one
of the most common barriers that people use as an excuse why they are not making
sales and why they are not reaching out to people, why they shouldn’t be writing
their own emails and all that good stuff. Now in my opinion, that’s bullshit
because proof means nothing. I will explain why. You see income screenshots can be
easily faked and you know that Jonathan.

Jonathan: Sure.

Igor: Yeah, I mean anyone can do it, today with PhotoShop available. I have even
seen video proof faked that’s like incredible to which extent scammers will go to
kind of fake their own proof. Same thing for testimonials, they can be easily
forged. So what is left? I mean how else do you create proof? And does it mean
that if you have legit proof, you know proof that you are really making money, it
won’t work. Well first things first, if you do have legit proof, it helps. But it
helps in the stage of pushing people off the fence not so much of getting their
attention because they get shoved proof in their faces all the day long and what
it ends up creating is what is called ad blindness. So at this point, you get on
your Facebook feed and you scroll three scrolls that’s all you need three scrolls,
you’ll definitely see at least one screenshot of someone saying I’m making all
this money inbox me. Right? Unfortunately that sort of saturated the market and
the consumer got kind of sick and tired of that. So using proof as means of
getting people attention is no longer effective. The subject lines that used to
work back in the day such as “How I made $17,443.22 or something”, you know weird
numbers. We have been told to use them that doesn’t work anymore. Nobody is
impressed with that. Because everybody knows how, really just how easily proof can
be faked so does it mean you shouldn’t use your proof? No, you should definitely
use your proof but only at the stage where the prospect already believe that you
are genuine about everything else. At that point, you can say okay and here is
what I made last month because at that point they will be much likely to believe
you and that will play right role in pushing the prospect off the fence. Now
testimonials can be forged easily as well like I said but too play a really cool
role if the prospect is already considering to buy from you. If you shove
testimonials down people’s throats before they believe that you are genuine in
everything you’re saying that automatically you’re the bad guy that fakes his own
testimonials.

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: We have all been there. We can present as many testimonials as we want, we
can be presenting them until we are blue in the face in fact that is exactly what
I can do to anyone who want to argue with me about the quality of my traffic, they
can just got to igorsoloads.com/testimonials.html and they will see an infinite
scroll of proof that traffic is producing sales, high opt in rates etc. but that
won’t help if the prospect already believes that I’m an asshole, that I sell fake
traffic.

Jonathan: [laughter]

Igor: It just won’t help because they would be like, “Oh look how much proof he
faked.” Automatically that would be the perception. So what then do we do? Because
the average prospect is skeptical, sick and tired and just not likely to believe a
piece of proof that we show them. What I discovered that this has been true not
only in the last five years but actually in the last 500 years. People have been
scammed in all sorts of ways ever since the beginning of time. There is this
principle of duality according to Zen philosophy where everything has its
opposites like black and white, yin yang and stuff like that so if you’ve got
honest people in the marketplace you will always have the dishonest ones and vice
versa. So if since the dawn of time people were scammed and proof is really a
subjective concept that really doesn’t help then what do we do? Now I would like
to of course keep this within the realm of making money online industry
specifically the bus op space, the space where we sell information products, I
mean you fit there Jonathan with your podcasting course as well as your podcasting
service because you need to provide proof to people that results in actual income,
right?

Jonathan: Yeah.

Igor: So in other words, what do we do? What kind of proof can we provide to
people that will initially build enough trust for us to then open the door to
entirely different conversation where we are no longer the enemy or the potential
threat but the more so an ally. So I have given this lots of thought. I spent a
lot money testing paid advertising with my own income, paying out of pocket, not
with my customers’ money although that element is present in my business where I
get to enjoy the benefit of seeing how other people’s campaigns perform so I get
that knowledge and experience and I try to feed it back to the marketplace the
best I can and so the only type of proof that I’ve discovered that work to build
credibility right off the bat has nothing to do with income proof but it has
everything to do with emotions. So I’m talking about the emotional proof that can
only be created in my humbly but accurate opinion through storytelling.

Jonathan: Nice. [laughter] How do you use stories without having any actual proof?
How does that work, Igor?

Igor: Now that’s a great question. So how do you tell a story that tells people,
“Hey, I’m legit. I can show you how to make money. I can show you how to succeed
yet I am a nobody myself.” Or maybe I’m somebody with slight results maybe tiny
little results but not much. So that’s the question I’ve asked myself when I first
launched my coaching thread on the Warrior forum where I wanted to coach people
for $300 now at the time I wanted to get married. Actually I told the story how I
got guilt tripped into getting married but you know I felt it was my idea at the
time. I was about 1000 bucks short for a trip to the Czech Republic where me and
my wife eventually got married at this beautiful castle. So I needed the money and
I decided that I’m going to make that money online. At the time I made a little
bit of money, I had a list of about 1700 people that was modestly successful with
affiliate marketing not enough to quit my day job but I was already depositing
ClickBank checks in the bank which incidentally man, I’m trying to remember this
right now, it would take three weeks for the check to clear, can you believe that?

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: It would take me a month to make the money, ClickBank would take two weeks
to send the check and for the check to get to me and then I had to wait three more
weeks for these the Israeli bank to clear it with the U.S. bank. It was a
nightmare. Honestly, it was really a nightmare. I said to myself, “Look I want to
make this money online no matter what and I’m going to use whatever I’ve got and
I’m going to get 3 people to pay me $300 because that would be enough to pay our
plane tickets and the hotel because Czech Republic is not an expensive country,
you could get away with really cool vacation for two including hotel for less than
1000 bucks.

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: So started writing the copy, and at the time I was heavily influenced by
John Carlton, Dan Kennedy, Frank Kern, Ryan Dice of the world and so I found this
sales letter I could model and I modeled which in a way which I believe is most
effective, I think I still have the sales letter somewhere, it was fairly short
sales letter only about five pages long which is no where near what I write today,
it’s more like 25 pages.

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: Yeah, so the sales letter basically said, “Look I’ll be happy to coach you
because I can and because I have this thing that I want which is to get married in
Czech Republic. You know what I’ve done Jonathan, knowing that I have no proof
whatsoever, what I’ve done is I simply told the story. I told the story of how my
wife kept nagging me for two months about this amazing castle in Czech Republic
where people get married where it’s the most amazing fairy tale like experience of
how she dragged me to a travel agent, how I was presented with the price tag, how
I agreed to take the trip not having the money and in all the emotions that went
through my body when I had done and then later that night when I couldn’t fall
asleep because I realized the commitment I got myself into I told that story and
used it as “reason” why to offer the coaching. I was completely honest about the
fact that I am not a guru. I used it basically saying look I’m not a guru, I had a
mediocre results with affiliate marketing so if you are in a place where nothing
works for you, I can help you take the next step up. I can get help you to get to
where you are making 200 bucks a week. It’s not for you if you want to get rich,
this is for you if you want to take the next step which is to the place where I am
right now and I can show you what I’ve done, and hopefully you’ll get the same
results. Again no income screen shots, Jonathan. No testimonials whatsoever. Just
the damn story, honest damaging admission saying that I’m not a guru and a buy now
button to PayPal for $300. Now what happened in the next two weeks, I generated
four clients. Four clients, Jonathan. I don’t kid you, four clients so that was
more than I needed and I went to Czech Republic with extra spending cash which was
awesome by the way. It was a four day trip and it was pretty damn cool, one of the
best experiences of my life. Now what is important though is that it sparked
another set of amazing experiences. First off, I got my first coaching clients.
The first coaching client was a guy from Australia which I ended up taking to
$10,000 per month.

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: Yeah, he paid me only 300 bucks but I ended up just teaching him everything
that I was learning at the time and all of a sudden after doing that after telling
this story in my sales letter, I realized oh my God people believe me and by
telling my story in a genuine way it actually makes more sales and I started doing
it more often and I got the confidence to write more sales letters and before you
know it within the next few months, I made my first $10,000 month. I took the
first guy with me to that point because he was literally copying everything I was
doing. He was telling his story. He was writing his own sales letters etc. I also
started working with three other people one of whom became one of my flagship
success stories and ended up co-hosting a coaching program with me, the same
coaching program I mentioned many times on the show, she was responsible for the
content in the coaching program and she ended up getting to a point of making
about $12,000 or $14,000 per month at one point. I don’t know if she is making
anything like that right now, we are not communicating right now. I haven’t spoken
to her in awhile but at that time again I helped her get to that level and I
actually wrote her first sales letter for her with the same exact concept she was
selling and outsourcing on the Warrior Forum. She sold I think 2000 copies of that
product. Amazing.

Jonathan: Wow.

Igor: It was again same thing, telling a story which provides emotional proof
element which then allows the prospect who reads the letter to not see you as the
enemy anymore but rather see you as a genuine human being with a name and history,
someone they can relate to and that changes the way they see you from now on and
moving forward. So that is what created the sales, that is what has created the
success and every since I’ve been using stories in my marketing. Obviously at this
point several years later, I’m telling much better stories and this is a skill you
can perfect over time but even then when I sucked at story telling, I still made a
lot of shit happen.

Jonathan: No kidding, man. I’m sitting here shocked thinking that wedding story
actually worked in a sales letter. I struggle so hard, I can’t even and I choose
not to write sales copy because it’s just not fun for me but the way you’re
describing it sounds okay. [laughter] Sounds like something doable so where did
you start your journey in storytelling? Was it something that you studied or was
it just by you putting it out there and trying? Where did this begin for you?

Igor: Well, as I mentioned I was a big fan of John Carlton’s work, of Dan
Kennedy’s work and the storytelling element was mentioned several times as a tool
in their tool kit. Now obviously there was other elements like scarcity, the
guarantee, the bonuses which is the obvious stuff that pops up for everybody who
is brand new to the copywriting so that is why you see beginner copywriters mostly
write hype with a guarantee, a deadline and a PS. That’s how most beginner sales
letters look like but you know what I spotted is that every single time these guys
would produce a new sales copy, they would tell some sort of story. Then once I
spotted this and I took note and you know how the moment you start looking for
something and something starts appearing everywhere?

Jonathan: Yeah.

Igor: So I stumbled into a seminar recording where John Carlton was the speaker,
one of the speakers and he went on stage and for the next 60 minutes he was just
literally teaching storytelling. He was telling you there are three types of
stories, I don’t quite remember what they are, I’ll do my best to remember them in
just a minute but basically he just went on for 60 minutes about how stories are
your best bet to convert if you got no proof, no market credibility and you’re
just brand new and trying to hit a volatile marketplace that’s full of
competitors. So I guess it stuck with me and I used it. Now trying to remember the
types of stories John spoke about is I clearly remember he was telling the one
about the mad scientist story which is basically I had this problem and I couldn’t
solve it, I went to guru A, I went to guru B, I went to guru C none of these
solutions worked for me so I committed my life to finding the solution to this
problem and eventually developed my own. So that’s one story which is the mad
scientist story. The one story that worked for me with the wedding for instance is
not really the mad scientist story, it’s more of a personal experience story where
it’s the reason why story. It’s basically the reason why the offer has been
created in the first not how I came up with the content so the focus is put on why
am I offering such an amazing deal and why should I be trusted. Every since I told
a bunch of different stories, there is the story of two men for instance which is
another one that I love. It was first used to sell these subscriptions to TIME
Magazine back in the day and I think you heard it Jonathan, it’s pretty popular.
Basically, it goes something like this; two men live in the same town, went to the
same high school, were pretty average in school. After graduation applied for work
in the same factory and get the job and start working. Twenty years later, the
same two men are pretty much are the same. They both has families, both has middle
school education, both are pretty fit, lean and health and both still work at that
same factory only one man is still a mid-level employee and while the other man is
the CEO. What’s the difference? TIME magazine. [laughter]

Jonathan: Just a quick and it’s the Wall Street Journal and that actual letter was
built the whole publication, was that direct response letter with the two men and
it’s a great little sample there.

Igor: Oh yeah, thank you so it’s the Wall Street Journal. But the point is it’s
the two men, right? It’s clearly like painting this clear picture of difference
between the behavior, the one behavior that created the separation which led to
one person succeeding greatly in life professionally while the other person
remained exactly where he was for the last 20 years. So there is a bunch of
different types of stories you can be telling for sure and if you are smart
enough, if you observe any high quality marketer you will note that everybody
tells stories. So one of the most important stories you can ever tell and by far
probably the most effective one is your origin story. It’s the story without which
you do not make sense as a marketer. You know what Jonathan? I am big comic fan
both Marvel and DC comics and Batman happens to be one in my top three favorite
characters so Batman. Who’s Batman? He is basically Bruce Wayne, a guy who puts on
a bat suit and goes fighting bad guys at night. But does Batman make any fricking
sense without the origin story of a bad guy mugging his mother and father and
killing his parents right in front of his eyes and him kind of falling into
depression and falling into a pit of bats and deciding to become a vigilante.

Jonathan: Nice.

Igor: It makes some sense maybe but not much; it makes way more sense if we know
the story. That is why no matter which Batman film you watch, which ever version
of Batman because there is no a bunch of different versions, my favorite one is
The Dark Knight series, I absolutely love that.

Jonathan: Yeah, me too.

Igor: So there is always the origin story that we are seeing because without it,
it makes no sense because the most recent Batman version with Ben Affleck in that
movie Batman vs. Superman. They still show the origin story for Batman, even
though everybody knows it but they still show it because they can’t be sure if the
viewer watching the movie knows that story so they need to show it and again and
again. So for you as a marketer, right you’re not Batman, you’re not fighting bad
guys but you are solving some sort of a problem or a need in the market place. So
that’s your bad guy and now you need to tell a story of where you come from and
why you have devoted at least some part of your life to solving that problem for
others. That could be that game changing story which if told to your prospect can
make them look at you and say, “You know what? I like you. What else do you have
to say?” Then you can talk to them about your product or your service but until
then you better be telling them stories because it’s going to be really hard to
get them to listen otherwise.

Jonathan: Now, Igor is this something that when people sign up for your VIP Club,
is this something that you help them with?

Igor: Yeah, sure. We definitely work on storytelling if that’s something that you
want to do but more importantly if you don’t know how to tell your own stories,
the one thing you could check out is you can reach out to us by going to
igorssoloads.com or by emailing Dennis if you already know how to reach him and
asking about the conversion bundle where we build you a full blown sales funnel
with your own origin story, okay that includes a long form sales letter, two
squeeze pages, a 30-day email sequence, all for just $1997 and this has proven to
be extremely effective at getting complete newbies without any credibility to get
their first set of sign ups which is incredible. I mean I’m still amazed how good
the stories work and if you will how predictable the human psych is and
irresistible we are for say good emotional story to our right because we always
want to think of ourselves as the and what’s the term they used in the Bonfire
Vanities? The masters of the universe, right? We all want to think of ourselves as
masters of the universe.

Jonathan: Yeah.

Igor: But the truth of the matter is we are predictable. Our brain responds a
certain way to certain elements and storytelling is one such element that just
hypnotizes the brain into becoming more receptive, becoming more open-minded and
not being so fricking skeptical all of the time.

Jonathan: Grief man so we went over time on this that’s how important storytelling
is to your business. Thank you, Igor. Thank you, List Builders for tuning in and
we will be back with you next time.

Thanks for listening to The List Building Lifestyle Show, make sure to subscribe on iTunes
or Google. Play to never miss an episode because who knows just one conversion tactic
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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