“Here’s Your Real Bottom Line
When It Comes To  Smart Marketing!”

by Craig Garber

Here's a curious story:

On March 21st, 1975, in Cleveland, Ohio... Chuck Wepner, a relatively unknown and unimpressive heavyweight boxer... went nearly a full 15 rounds with legendary heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali.

What was scary about this, was... Wepner was referred to as "The Bayonne Bleeder" because of the incredible amount of punishment he took...

Even when he was winning!

In fact, in September 2003, in a piece honoring Wepner's career... Tom Donelson of Inside Boxing had this to say:  "Wepner was what one would call "a catcher", a fighter who often used his head to block the other guy's punches - not the kind of strategy that leads to long careers."

   At 6-foot 5-inches and over 220 pounds, Wepner was a giant, with a plodding and awkward style.  He constantly pressured his opponent until he either won or was knocked out.   He never gave a second thought to how many shots he would absorb before landing his telling blow."

Before that Ali fight, Sports Illustrated boxing writer Mark Kram had described Wepner as, "a wide, long slab of heart and dreams who is one of the last club fighters, the kind who gives you what he has, who turns a ring into a red-wine sea and keeps coming on for more."

And Wepner trainer Al Braverman once described Chuck as "...the gutsiest fighter I ever met.  He was in a league of his own.  He didn't care about pain or cuts.  If he got cut or elbowed, he never looked at me or the referee for help.  He was a fighter in the purest sense of the word."

After training for the Ali fight like he'd never trained before, a confident Wepner gave his wife a pink negligee on the morning of the fight, and told her she would "soon be sleeping with the heavyweight champion of the world."

And for one fleeting moment, Wepner must have felt like that heavyweight champion, as he knocked Ali down with a right hand to his chest.

Unfortunately though, this wasn't the way the movie finished.  Ali scored a technical knockout of Wepner with just 19 seconds left in the fight.

"When Ali was down, I remember saying to my ringman Al Braverman, ‘Start the car, we're going to the bank, we're millionaires.'  And Al said to me, ‘You'd better turn around, because he's getting up, and he looks pissed off."  After the fight, Wepner's wife pulled the negligee out of her purse and asked, "Do I go to Ali's room or does he come to mine?"

Ironically, in defeat, Wepner remains one of the few men who actually went the distance with the greatest heavyweight who ever held the crown.

Now here's the rub:  At the very same time this fight was taking place, thousands of miles away from Cleveland, a struggling actor bought himself a television set with 100 dollars he had as a birthday present, so he could watch the Ali-Wepner fight.  This simple and innocent act, was a turning point that would alter his life forever.

After watching the fight, the actor, named Sylvester Stallone became inspired to write the script for a Hollywood movie you may have seen, called "Rocky".

Rocky went on to win the Academy Award for best picture in 1976 and launched Stallone's very prolific and successful career.

Because of the movie, Wepner also earned the nickname "The Real Life Rocky".

Here's Stallone's version, from an interview he had with James Lipton of The Actor's Studio:  “I saw this Chuck Wepner character who was just this fighter of really very, very little skill, but you know, kind of like a real American working-class stiff who just takes it on the chin and comes back and is just a very symbolic kind of character. 

And I thought, "There it is.  There… it… is."  He was fighting Muhammad Ali who was like, you know, the perfect fighter, and he knocked him down -- and that validated his entire life.  He didn't expect to win, but he knocked him down.  And you could never take that away from him. 

I went, "There… My God.  Now if I can get that onto the page..."  So I went home and I started writing. And I wrote for three days straight…”

Several producers offered to buy Stallone's screenplay, because they wanted to cast a big name star in the title role.  In fact, the movie studios offered the struggling actor, an incredible amount of money at the time - $400,000 Dollars, to buy his script.

Stallone refused however, and instead took $20,000 Dollars for the script, along with the right to play the part of Rocky himself.  For this, he was paid the actor's minimum wage - a paltry $340 dollars a week.

The studio then offered Chuck Wepner a similar choice - a $70,000 Dollar flat fee, or one percent of the movie's gross profits.  Wepner, thinking about today and not looking at tomorrow, and not even bothering to work out the numbers, took the guarantee...

A Decision That Wound Up Costing Him...

$8 Million Dollars!

Chuck Wepner still lives in Bayonne and works in a liquor store.

The moral of this story, as it relates to your marketing efforts, is... you've GOT to know your numbers.

It doesn't matter if something can sell... it doesn't matter what your sales copy can do for you... and it certainly doesn't even matter if you've got a wildly excited marketplace, if...

You Don't Know Your Numbers!

Meaning, how many units do you have to sell to make any money?

And, how many units do you have to sell just to pay for your ad costs?

Will enough people get to see your ad so that you can even make any money in the first place?

What about your fixed costs?  Things like rent, overhead, and employees salaries?

How about your variable costs?  Like postage... or pay per click advertising... or display ads?

Can you use remnant advertising to reach your marketplace and save yourself a bundle?

If you don't know this information before you start your marketing plan, you're likely to come out on the same side of the equation as Chuck Wepner did, and not on the side Sylvester Stallone did.

Knowing your numbers is the real bottom line, when it comes to being a street-smart savy marketer.

In my next tip, I'll give you a nice and easy spreadsheet I've created to help you figure out how to price your products, at least when it comes to online marketing.

Look for it then -- you'll be able to download it and start using it, immediately.

And the following week, I'm going to give you an end of year special you'll benefit from, for years and years to come, if... you're smart!

I won't be sending out any tip next week -- I'm taking the week off and celebrating Thanksgiving with my family.  If you're doing the same thing, I hope you and your family have a lot of fun with each other.

And if you're not, and you live here in America or Canada (to the best of my knowledge, the only places where Thanksgiving is celebrated)... then why aren't you?

P.S.  Last week I talked about using stories in your marketing to get your message across.  Are you starting to see how effective stories are?

And are you starting to see how you can "hook" your readers with all sorts of visual and emotional tie-ins?

Good then. 

Now go and start thinking about how you're going to re-vamp your marketing pieces with some cool stories.

P.P.S.  Stallone could never in a million years, have invisioned how watching the Wepner-Ali fight, would ultimately change his life.

Just the same way you're sitting here reading this Tip Of The Week right now, and you have no idea what action step you’re going to take, that dramatically changes your life.  The moral of the story:  get out there and start taking action... NOW!

Later.

And if you haven 't already done so, go ahead and click here right now to sign up for my FREE Tip Of The Week -- it's the Number One Direct-Response Marketing And Copywriting Newsletter for independent business-owners.

Any comments?

Send them to me by scooting over to the contact form on my "Here's How To Contact Craig" page, and maybe I'll publish them -- I appreciate your feedback!

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