When I entered the direct marketing/ publishing world in 1981, I kind of knew what an entrepreneur looked like.
But meeting my “new boss” (and eventual mentor) Marty Edelston took it to an entirely new level.
He was brash, and bold, always demanding everyone to work as hard as he did… and it was both inspiring and frustrating because no one could ever meet his standard for excellence.
But as we all know, there is no one flavor of entrepreneur/ founder/self-made CEO.
And meeting Bill Bonner a few years later (when I was still a pup) was equally inspiring for very different reasons.
[If you don’t know who I am talking about when I mention Bill Bonner, the founder of the juggernaut Agora, I implore you to read on; and if you know about him and his legendary career and huge footprint on direct response marketing and publishing–he’s still active by the way–well…I implore you to read on.] 🙂
Marty, for lack of a better term, was a control freak (in only the best ways).
Bill controlled his environment by relying on others…making his partners, employees, freelancers, everyone he touched, self-reliant… enabling them to grow at their own pace (or not) … creating millionaires in the process… while he focused on what he did best.
And that would be writing copy.
But he was a copywriter with a big vision beyond the words on the page.
And he never seemed obsessed with the trappings of having a big vision. That is, he always seemed so peaceful… while being successful.
And he just kept writing.
He combined humility and mastery into a package like no one I have met in my over 44 years in business.
Those of you who are copywriters — or are familiar with the copywriter’s mindset — would probably agree that the brain it takes to write creatively (and get people to pull out their credit cards) is not wired to run a large company.
There are exceptions… and I am not belittling every copywriter by saying none are equipped to be a CEO.
But Bill defied the odds — big time — while setting a gold standard as a copywriter/ CEO.
Simply…Bill Bonner is one of my heroes.
He has been since the first time I met him, circa 1983… by becoming a “reluctant business tycoon” … being excellent at his craft and creating an environment where others could flourish, being the CEOs of their domains.
Obviously, he had to hire smart people too.
But don’t let this mild-mannered entrepreneur, who is probably most happy when he’s writing copy and spending time with his family, whether in Baltimore, Florida, England, France, Central/South America (or other parts of the world), give you a sense that he is not a force in direct marketing and business building.
He authored a philosophy on how to run one’s business and life with integrity and impact by letting others handle the details he’s not an expert in.
He would be the first to admit it hasn’t been smooth throughout… but it’s been successful by any measure.
And he never had to brag…and besides, it ain’t bragging if you did it. 🙂
I’d like to share a few pieces of wisdom (from the outside looking in) I have learned from Bill over the years from working with, and observing, the various Agora companies — wisdom that I use every day in my business… and life.
“Skate where the puck is going to be, not where it has been”
I’m sure we all have heard this quote from hockey hall-of-famer, Wayne Gretsky… and if Wayne wanted to work at Agora as a side gig, he would have been very happy.
Whether it’s from astute planning or a little bit of luck — or both — the key to spotting trends is to keep your head up. And despite Bill’s commitment to writing (which is usually done with head down), he regularly recognized opportunities where others did not.
Three things come to mind immediately:
1. “Inventing” the e-newsletter when there were very few of them around
He launched The Daily Reckoning (a summary of financial markets) in 1999, literally for friends and family (I think he said he began with a small but hearty 30 active subscribers), well before there were e-letters everywhere… and certainly very few of them were sent daily.
He had help from folks around him in expanding The Daily Reckoning into a business model:
“Hey Bill, we can sell products inside this e-newsletter!”
So maybe he didn’t invent the e-newsletter.
But he was there at its birth.
Cutting-edge thinking right in his sweet spot.
And content marketing at its finest.
2. “It’s better to make them than buy them”
The “them” are copywriters… and this was counter to what was going on in direct marketing at the time.
It still is for the most part.
Bill (and his amazing partner Mark Ford a.k.a Michael Masterson) made a key decision early on to grow their creative team in-house… and in interviews and discussions I’ve had with both of them over the years, they consider this one decision to be possibly their most critical one, at a time when copywriters were benevolently holding many marketers hostage (due to the writers having unequaled and unique talent).
Agora had a vision to create that talent from within (while still paying for the best on the outside to supplement their in-house team).
I often lamented about not creating an in-house copywriting team throughout my career at Boardroom. (We were one of the friendly “competitors” of Agora.) But I realized that Agora had two secret/ not-so-secret weapons named Bonner and Ford.
You can’t even begin to think about doing this without writers (and coaches) who are superior to the trainees… and they need to be comparable to the best in the world.
That was Bill and Mark.
They fit the bill (pun intended) and handed this down to future writers (and coaches), which became one of the keys to their success.
And the marketing world is full of Agora-trained writers making millions today.
3. Investing in places others avoid
In 2017, I took a trip to Nicaragua, a country like many others in Central and South America that had experienced strife and internal conflicts for decades.
But once again, Bill and Mark saw an opportunity where others did not, and they invested in some land around 30 years ago and built a resort called Rancho Santana, which is now a destination for travelers from all over the world.
I only bring up “The Ranch” to once again show how Agora thinks — beginning with Bill and Mark… extending to their executive team… and friends and colleagues.
There are many other “investments” they’ve made–beyond real estate–that have contributed to their success (and avoided by others)…including many of the products and the content they produced over many decades.
“Don’t just make money… deserve it.”
That’s the opening quote from Bill Bonner to a group of financial publishers who gathered at Rancho Santana in Nicaragua in 2017, in which I was included. I was there because I had worked with so many of them during my career…and at the time, there were three Agora divisions that were members of my Titans Mastermind.
With that opening quote, Bill was referring to the notion that “making money” seems to be the top priority when making recommendations to investors and the only thing financial publishers find satisfying.
Bill turned that on its ear by saying that “we’re not paid to be right… but we are paid to do the work.”
What does that really mean?
After all, we don’t follow investment gurus and publishers who regularly recommend losing propositions.
Wouldn’t you assume your gurus (or your financial advisor) are only as good as their last stock, bond, or crypto recommendation?
And that when they are wrong, we must run away and look for alternatives?
I always thought that… and I have been around this business for over four decades.
It was always about the hot guru of the year… or the month… or the week.
But when Bill gave us the example of various Agora newsletters recommending investing in gold for nearly 20 years when gold did nothing but go down, and then you look at where Agora is today, it does make you wonder.
Bill’s take:
While many subscribers might have left Agora because our experts were ‘wrong,’ many more stayed with the company because they could trust that the research was sound and continuous.
And despite the experts not always being right, they always knew they had a knowledgeable advisor, not simply a “get-rich-quick recommender.”
Now all of that sounds nice… and it’s easy to think that Agora is dreaming that this could be true when they had been wrong about many predictions in the past.
Of course, they were right about a lot too.
It is, however, what this CEO (copywriter) believes.
He says it out loud… and I believe it’s a sign of true leadership.
Whether they were picking winners or losers, they were always “doing the work” (and showing the work in great detail), and then intelligently explaining why they were right or wrong.
And the facts are the facts.
Agora has stood the test of time. This argument would fall on its face if I was talking about a company that had gone bankrupt multiple times or was no longer around.
In the world of financial information among direct marketers and newsletter publishers, Agora is not in a bubble.
They are the bubble.
A “bubble” that has a top line revenue line that has been well over a billion dollars for many years.
Their 40+ year run is about long-term consistency and realizing, before it was too late, that they were not in the entertainment business (as many of their competitors were).
That is, they were always serious, right or wrong.
Despite some entertaining promotions over the years. 🙂
Invest in people… and give them the opportunity to sink or swim
This lesson is a tenet of business that should always be taken into consideration… whether you are the one handing out the opportunity or running with it.
It’s about taking responsibility for yourself and pride in your work… and thinking of yourself as an entrepreneur, even if you are a salaried or commissioned employee.
It’s about creating an army of “intrapreneurs.”
Bill Bonner built his army, turning them eventually into CEOs.
Agora took this philosophy to a new level, creating independent companies inside the mothership, many of which exceeded hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.
Independent CEOs, marketing, editorial, and creative departments, still with an eye on the overriding philosophies that Bill and Mark instilled.
With healthy (and sometimes not-so-healthy) competition between the divisions.
But the individual companies, for the most part, shared what they were doing and how they were doing it… often within private Mastermind groups (like mine), and with the outside marketing and copywriting world too.
I remember speaking with Bill in the early 1980s about competition being coexistence… and that all boats rise when you share “secrets.”
We have proof in almost every industry that living life this way in business beats thinking that what you have is so proprietary that sharing it will negatively affect your bottom line.
In the industry we are talking about here, almost all the largest financial publishers who Agora (and I) grew up with in the 1980s are gone, much smaller than they once were, or are now subsidiaries of Agora because Agora bought them.
And Agora is not a corporate raider. Many individuals and companies knocked on their door to be part of the “Agora Bubble.”
Studying Bill (and Agora) will teach you a lot about marketing, copywriting, and business building.
Why Agora stands alone in their category:
- They did the work… with congruency and consistency… in the face of being wrong (a lot).
- They didn’t keep it all to themselves. They shared freely in the spirit of education… which led to others wanting to “be like Agora“…not out of envy but as a growth strategy.
- In some cases, the “others” sought them out so they could work there… even be bought by them… to be part of the Agora family.
- And humility always being a core value and never being boastful while you are doing the work.
This last one is not true of everyone who has followed Bill in the Agora hierarchy. Many wanted to regularly read you their press clippings.
But not Bill.
When you talk with Bill Bonner today, he will always begin by sharing the mistakes he made along the way before he tells you about any of the successes.
And you will have to push hard to get him to brag about anything that was a huge winner.
That’s why I decided to brag about him today.
Warmly,
Brian
P.S. The post above is one of 59 essays written by 59 individuals, compiled by two of Bill Bonner’s most trusted consiglieres (Mark Ford and John Forde) into what is now The Bill Book.
It was an extension of the 45th anniversary party that was held for Agora and inspired by the fact that Mark and John felt that one evening could not express what Bill Bonner has meant to the direct marketing and publishing industry…not to mention copywriting, business building and as one contributor put it, the creation of an “empire of ideas.”
I was privileged and honored to contribute my thoughts to this compilation…and I felt compelled to share them with you today in the spirit of advancing many ideas I believe are worth living by…in business and in life.
I hope you agree.
P.P.S One of the highlights of my career took place in early 2019 when I reached out to Bill for an endorsement for my book Overdeliver…and here is what he wrote:
Nobody has paid closer attention to the world of direct response advertising like Brian Kurtz. His new book – his opus magnum – brings that world to you, in great detail.
This is a must-have book for anyone in the business…and anyone seriously interested in how people decide what, when, and how to buy.
Brian, well, over delivers….as usual.
-Bill Bonner, Founder, The Agora
Coming from a humble “overdeliverer” like Bill, this endorsement graces the top of the first page of a four-page opening section of my book titled, “Praise for Overdeliver”
There’s “praise” and then there’s praise…and after reading this post today I hope you now realize why this particular blurb was extra special coming from an entrepreneurial titan such as Bill.
This one gets filed in my “atta boy folder.”
And like Bill, I am not done yet. 🙂