Bob Bly

Bob Bly is a freelance copywriter who has written copy for more than 100 clients including IBM, AT&T, Praxair, Intuit, Forbes, and Ingersoll-Rand. McGraw-Hill calls Bob “America’s top copywriter” and he is the author of 90 books, including “The Copywriter's Handbook.” Find him online at www.bly.com or call (973) 263-0562.

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Does Generational Marketing Matter in B2B?

Performance Marketing

Today, the marketing trade press is obsessed with generational marketing: marketing to specific generations. Consumer marketing has long targeted buyers based on age and generation. But B2B is different — [...]

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How to Generate Online B2B Sales Leads That Convert

Performance Marketing

The problem with online B2B lead generation today is that many marketers who do it are not, in fact, generating sales leads — they are just generating inquiries and giving [...]

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B-to-B Direct Marketing’s Death Is Greatly Exaggerated

Performance Marketing

A number of trade and business magazines have said the term “direct marketing” is archaic and should be replaced. One of these magazines suggested the terms “data-driven marketing,” “omnichannel marketing” [...]

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Is Long Copy Making a Comeback in B-to-B Content?

Performance Marketing

In consumer direct response, long copy in some product categories — examples include dietary supplements, investment newsletters, mail order merchandise and business opportunities — more often than not generates higher [...]

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3 Reasons B-to-B Marketing Is Damn Hard

Performance Marketing

Which is more difficult in direct marketing: B-to-B or B-to-C? I think most marketers would say consumer direct response is more challenging. But in the increasingly complex multichannel marketing environment [...]

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The Trouble With Digital Marketing

Performance Marketing

Without a doubt, digital marketing is where it’s at in B-to-B. Many companies post their product literature and whitepapers online, and print ads in paper trade journals are way down, [...]

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Is a Free Book the Answer When It Comes to Lead Generation?

Performance Marketing

I’m working for several marketers whose campaigns are centered on the offer of a free book. But in an age where it seems everyone is publishing a book, is a [...]

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Can a Computer Write Better Copy Than You?

Performance Marketing

There’s been a lot of talk lately about companies developing software that can write copy. Naturally, copywriters are both a bit skeptical and a bit nervous that, if the software [...]

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Sometimes Old-School Is Better

Performance Marketing

The search engine Google is a boon to freelance copywriters, giving us fast access to much more information than we could ever dig up at those old-fashioned data depositories we [...]

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Qualifying Prospects With the MAD-FU Formula

Publishing News

In a recent issue of my e-newsletter, "The Direct Response Letter," I wrote about how many of my readers send me their URLs and ask me to critique their websites [...]