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Wizard Academy alumnus Matt Mason has some profound thoughts on Disneyland, midlife, and churros. Matt, who since 2019 has served as the official state poet of Nebraska, is hoping that those and other introspections he shares in his latest book of poetry will touch readers and help fuel his ambition to earn a living writing, […]

Calculating the Cost of Customer Acquisition When your advertising leans on the weak wooden crutch of discounting, it is only a matter of time before that crutch splinters and slowly pierces your heart. Discounting is a seductive drug like heroin, meth, and fentanyl. It rarely kills you quickly. It prefers to kill you slowly. Yes, […]

You have the passion, the talent, and the songs. What you need is visibility. CrowdedSongs.com gives you access to a searchable database that allows buyers to find you when they are lookingfor something new and different and remarkable. CrowdedSongs.com doesn’t pitch your songs to record labels and TV shows and bands looking for material. Those […]

    If you’re ready for your mind to be blown, read the full list of songs written by Jimmy Webb. This man is a songwriting hero, a major dude. We’ve popped in a few of his songs below, recorded by names and faces you will recognize. Yep. He wrote all of these and dozens […]

Everybody’s high on consolationEverybody’s trying to tell me what is right for me.My daddy tried to bore me with a sermonBut it’s plain to see that they can’t comfort me. Sorry, Charlie, for the impositionI think I got it, I got the strength to carry on.I need a drink and a quick decisionNow it’s up […]

Ain’t no sunshine when she’s goneIt’s not warm when she’s awayAin’t no sunshine when she’s goneAnd she’s always gone too longAnytime she’s goes away Wonder this time where she’s goneWonder if she’s gone to stayAin’t no sunshine when she’s goneAnd this house just ain’t no homeAnytime she goes away And I know, I know, I […]

Melinda was mine‘Til the time that I found herHolding Jim, loving him.Then Sue came along, loved me strong,That’s what I thought.Me and Sue, but that died too. Don’t know that I willBut until I can find meThe girl who’ll stayAnd won’t play games behind me,I’ll be what I am,A solitary man, solitary man. I’ve had […]

Well, you went uptown riding in your limousineWith your fine Park Avenue clothesYou had the Dom Pérignon in your handAnd the spoon up your noseAnd when you wake up in the morningWith your head on fireAnd your eyes too bloody to seeGo on and cry in your coffeeBut don’t come bitchin’ to me Because you […]

Leroy, boy, is that you?I thought your post-hangin’ days were throughSunk-in eyes and full of sighsTell no lies, you get wiseI tell you now we’re gonna pull you throughThere’s only one thing left that we can do We gotta get you a womanIt’s like nothin’ else to make you feel sure you’re aliveWe gotta get […]

WATCH THIS VIDEO. IT’S IMPORTANT. WE’LL COME BACK TO IT LATER. Jimmy Webb and his girlfriend, Susie Horton, frequently had lunch at MacArthur Park, a convenient rendezvous point since Susie worked directly across the street. When she ended the relationship with Jimmy, he remembered specific sights and scenes they had shared at the park during […]

Isn’t it rich?Are we a pair?Me here at last on the ground,You in mid-air,Where are the clowns?   Isn’t it bliss?Don’t you approve?One who keeps tearing around,One who can’t move,Where are the clowns?There ought to be clowns.   Just when I’d stopped opening doors,Finally knowing the one that I wanted was yoursMaking my entrance again […]

Our song began in 1971 when Hunter S. Thompson wrote about the end of the 60s. He may as well have been writing about the end of a love affair. “We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. So now, less than five years later, you can […]

“Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Has it been five years? Six? It seems like a lifetime —the kind of peak that never comes again. San Francisco in the middle sixties was a very special time and place to be a part of… but no explanation, no mix of words or music […]

Read more about rowdy Ryan Patrick.Check out the positively professional podcast, Mash Matters.

  Sotheby’s is selling an important original manuscript by Neal Stephenson, one of the wizard’s favorite authors. The video below is an interesting one. 

Click the book cover to continue down the rabbit hole. Click this link to read Manley’s Chatbook. A few weeks ago, I walked with the wizard to the front door during the ice storm that hit Austin. We opened it, and there stood Manley Miller. The airlines had canceled his flight. A few minutes later […]

When the wizard and Princess Pennie bought this 400-year-old renaissance trunk at auction, Christina Gressianu volunteered to pick it up near her home in Colorado, store it, then drive it to the Wizard of Ads partner meeting in Fort Worth. Christina is a highly celebrated and award-winning photographer. During the weeks the trunk was stored […]

Michael Kaeding had no idea how to run his family business when his father unexpectedly passed away. “I had no preconceived notion of the way things were supposed to be done,” Michael recalls. “We just started to naively solve problems, and that was the magic.” Today Michael is the CEO of a company that designs, builds, and […]

William Hackett-Jones sent this to us with the following note: “Simon Patterson is a friend who has been writing a song a day for about 2 years now. Today’s offering is one for the writers and translators of the world. Indy, if you could add a link to his Patreon, I’m sure he’d be over the […]

Luis from Mexico and Wicho from Guatemala with the wizard’s mom,who lives just a block away from the restaurant.The video below opens with Dennis Collins of Miami talking with her. 

“If you’re like me, you whip out your phone to look up a recipe. Unfortunately, this is where things usually go horribly wrong, because it’s never that simple.” “Nine times out of 10, clicking on a recipe search result will rarely give you the actual recipe right up front. Instead, you’re stuck reading (see: ‘panic-scrolling’) […]

The insightful musings of tech writer Stephen Wolfram underscore my belief that using ChatGPT or any other LLM for ad writing will almost certainly create predictable ads that blur you into your category. The goal of an ad writer is to differentiate the brand, not make it sound similar to all the others. – Roy H. […]

Four obstacles prevent most people from becoming persuasive communicators, whether in print, in front of an audience, or on video. And those obstacles are SNEAKY obstacles. That’s the conclusion of Michelle Gladieux (Glad-ee-oh), a communication consultant with 18 years of experience teaching at the highest levels. “The ability to dazzle an audience is far more accessible than […]

“The Kraken visual branding is gorgeous, from the logo to the colours. (Whoever designed the logo, I want to kiss you on the lips.) They played with the concept with such form and grace. When I look at the logo, I know it is alive. But what if I told you that what makes the […]

  “Following John Turner’s death in 1987 a suitcase was passed to them by his widow, Betty. A quick glance revealed family photos and other pictures taken for his camera club, and it was consigned to the loft for 30 odd years… It is believed the pictures were taken while Turner worked as a property manager, […]

“One of the first things I noticed about the man I’d eventually marry was that he spoke in clichés. Clichéd clichés, too, the kind favored by greeting cards and motivational speakers: Absence makes the heart grow fonder; what you can believe and conceive you can achieve; teamwork makes the dream work.” “Honestly? I wasn’t into […]

Quixote is fantasy verging on absurdism. Sancho is reality as dull as dirt.  This is the split-world we two-legged apes exist in: Fantasy & Reality. Fantasy is conjured in our collective minds.Reality punches us in the gut.Emotion is the bewitcher that rules both kingdoms. You can wish upon a star but it won’t take you […]

A fact is information minus emotion. An opinion is information plus experience. Ignorance is an opinion lacking information. Stupidity is an opinion that ignores a fact. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. One last thing: BS is a factless opinion expressed with flair. – Tom Grimes, Waterboy of Amarillo

Entrepreneurship is like jumping off a cliff and building an airplane on the way down. The entrepreneur out in front has others following them off the cliff, bringing necessary parts with them. Experienced entrepreneurs know how to build a plane better and faster than they did the first time. Entrepreneurs see the ground as that […]

Entrepreneurship is like jumping off a cliff and building an airplane on the way down. The entrepreneur out in front has others following them off the cliff, bringing necessary parts with them. Experienced entrepreneurs know how to build a plane better and faster than they did the first time. Entrepreneurs see the ground as that […]

  Ten years ago, scientists discovered “a geometric, jewel-like object at the heart of quantum physics.” This jewel-like object is called the amplituhedron (cool name, right?) and it, “dramatically simplifies calculations of particle interactions and challenges the notion that space and time are fundamental components of reality.” * A theoretical physicist at Harvard, Jacob Bourjaily said that when using the amplituhedron, “The […]

“There is a feeling among the people who speak Irish that the language is something priceless, like a precious stone kept in the pocket. You don’t speak Irish; you have your Irish. It’s wonderfully exact. There is a word for the roof of a dog’s mouth (carball) and the steam rising from a fermented haystack […]

Jacob Williams, the youngest son of the wizard and Princess Pennie, is the mastermind behind the 2-year project called RomanticSpotsInAustin.com. If his pilot program proves to be sustainable, there will soon be a RomanticSpotsinYourTown.com, assuming of course that your town is at least as big as Laurel, Mississippi and you live somewhere in the U.S., […]

Burt Bacharach Medley: Knowing When To Leave; Make It Easy On Yourself; Always Something There To Remind Me; I’ll Never Fall In Love Again; Walk On By; Do You Know The Way To San Jose, sung by the irreplaceable Richard and Karen Carpenter.

“Today’s 52-card deck preserves the four original French suits of centuries ago: clubs (♣), diamonds (♦), hearts (♥), and spades (♠)… Some historians have suggested that suits in a deck were meant to represent the four classes of Medieval society. Cups and chalices (modern hearts) might have stood for the clergy; swords (spades) for the […]

  Princess Pennie has had a team of people building this website for 24 months and it will launch next week. Now that the programming is done, the next steps are to create a romanticspotsin_______.com in every city as large or larger than Laurel, Mississippi. The US and Canada and Australia will be first, but […]

Thank you, Tim Miles, for bringing this SuperBowl ad to our attention – Indy and the Tiny Tribe

Dave Young, Vice-Chancellor of Wizard Academy in Austin, risked life and limb to climb onto the Stardeck of the Wizard’s Tower perched on a plateau 900 feet above of the city of Austin so he could take this photo and make this video for you! Dave is Awesome. – Indy Beagle I’ve been trying to […]

“Why armadillo racing?”– SS Sparky Sparks“Marshall the Goldsmith”– JP Engelbrecht“Stop Torturing Toddlers”– Susie Marcks“At a crossroads”– Robert Topping“It finally happened”– Earl Lindgren“One bloodied Bible”– Joshua Harrison“Find a way”– Jack Heald“We do anything”– Dennis Barton“Pssst. Yeah, you.”– Mark Savage“Something smells funny”– Cory Davis“Money’s not it.”– Ron Nakamoto“What exploding banana.”– Gary Watkins“Somebody once said”– Pyotr Belov“You’re halfway […]

This is the initial billboard that Stephen Semple put up for a client.It became a series of billboards that was a conversation back and forth.

“Change Your Path.”– Hugh Benham“You’ll want one.”– Leo Edelstein“I am lost.”– Dana Guerra“Ease his pain.”– Thom Sauber“I said yes.”– Jack McManus“Could be worse.”– Tim Durkin“Darryl did it.”– Darryl Robinson“Leader’s One Job.”– Bob Kinnison“After 33 Years.”– Jordan Craig“She said yes.”– Jay Mead“Benedict knows you.”– Kathy Nelles“It’s always monkeys.”– Chris Cowan“Death comes softly.”– Tom Davis“Sales Goals Amiss.”– Caroline Chavez“You […]

“Look out belief.”– Tim Storm “Pumpkin killed again.”– Jeff Sexton “Meet my moose.”– Jan Raven Stitt “It’s finally over.”– John Linsmeier “Your confusion detonates.”– Eran Strickland “I could lie.”– Luisa Fernanda Toledo “Well that’s interesting.”– Craig Arthur “She got caught.”– Mike Sanders “Jeremy, everyone knows.”– Judith O’Broin “You Thought Wrong.”– Asia Gregg “I am bad.”– […]

  Place / Decoration / Pasta Tahiti Grafitti Ziti Serengeti Confetti Spaghetti Eswatini Bikini Linguini Chartwell Church Bell Clamshell A game invented in the wizard’s private laboratory by Brad  Whittington, Ian Rogers, and Roy H. Williams, Feb 3, 2023

Dale Carnegie, Earl Nightingale, Jim Rohn, Zig Ziglar, Blaine Oelkers. “Blaine who?” Blaine is not yet as widely known as those other motivational luminaries, but he does have one huge advantage over them; he is alive and inspiring a new generation of businesspeople those other legends did not live to see. Stop, listen, and learn […]

Hi Roy, Hi Indy,   Thanks for the sneak preview of the Monday Morning Memo. I was particularly drawn to your statement, “Most ads are not written to persuade…” The human brain is really good at filtering.  We ignore anything we are used to seeing.  This is why the first time we drive to a […]

  If you are my friend now or a friend I am yet to meet,regardless of our differences, I like you for being you.And I always will.I don’t care aboutHow rich or poor you areThe colour of your skinYour religionYour sexual preferencesWho you vote forYour views on COVID or climate changeYour sporting preferencesWhether you like […]

Recently Unleashed, ChatGPT is often described as “Google on Steroids” On Tue, Jan 24, 2023 at 4:24 PM Cedric Yau <cedric@wizardofads.com> wrote to the other Wizard of Ads partners:   Hi Partners!   My friend Mikhail and I are expanding our expertise in NLP (Natural Language Processing) to include the latest technologies like GPT3 and […]

“I just spent three days at VidCon, the annual social media convention in Anaheim, hanging out with a few thousand current and future internet celebrities. And it’s increasingly obvious to me that the teenagers and 20-somethings who have mastered these platforms — and who are often dismissed as shallow, preening narcissists by adults who don’t […]

On Mon, Jan 30, 2023 at 7:03 AM Charlie Moger <charlie@wizardofads.com> wrote:   Hi Indy,    Those Corvette pictures revved up my mental wayback machine. Back when I was a baby radio promotion guy in the 80’s, I worked at an ABC radio station in Houston: 97Rock. It was my first big-time radio gig—and, at […]

Seven Secrets of Social Media Success There’s a difference between knowing how to use social media and knowing how to leverage social media. Using social media won’t do anything for your business, cause, movement or sales. Leveraging social media will. You can’t leverage social media if you don’t know how to create share-worthy and follow-worthy […]

When a publishing house releases only one book a year, you know it will be a blockbuster. That’s always been the case with award-winning Bard Press, which has brought out 18 business bestsellers over the past 25 years. This year the boutique imprint has tapped authors Ed O’Malley and Julia Fabris McBride, whose book on leadership, due […]

  CHAPTER ONE: We  assume that every plumber can plumb, right? We assume that any A/C company can make the house warm in winter, cool in summer. We assume that every jeweler can sell us a diamond, and a lawyer must know the law, or he wouldn’t have a license to practice. So how do […]

1. Facts  2. Numbers 3. Hands 4. Words These have definitely poked around in my head today – it actually made me think about the personal training clients that I have, and the part that I get most excited about is when I get to introduce them to new information, and even better, when I’m […]