I followed a link the other day and happened across a “minimalist” web site selling an e-book. This isn’t particularly odd, but what struck me as positively astonishing was the marketing copy being used to sell said book.
This is marketing copy lifted from that popular (claiming tens of thousands of page views per month) minimalist site. The marketing copy is intended to promote an e-book on minimalism:
This Book Is For You If You Are:
- Inquisitive about the minimalist lifestyle
- Minimalists who want to take their lifestyle to the extreme
- Radical thinkers or those who wish to be
- Open minded
- Willing to live a life beyond the norm
This Book Is Not For You If You Are:
- Comfortable living a mediocre lifestyle
- Overt consumerists happy in their materialism
- Against radical viewpoints
- Close minded
- Advocates of an average and normal life
Do you see what’s happening here? This is a marketing technique that I learned in my brief foray into multi-level marketing. They call it “posturing”. I’m going to call it the “take away”. Here’s how the “take away” works:
- The author lists off some positive things
- One or two of them resonate with you. After all, you’re reading a minimalist blog at this point – you’re probably at least “inquisitive about the minimalist lifestyle”
- You’re still not sold. Yes, you’re inquisitive – but you’re not sure you need this book.
- The author begins a series of personal attacks, masquerading as a helpful list.
- You begin to feel deficient in some way, which increases your desire for the product.
Think about this for just a second. Read the second bulleted list above, only read it the way your brain is intended to process it:
- Your lifestyle is mediocre, and you’re okay with that.
- You’re into overt consumerism.
- You like to be “safe”; you’re intolerant of radical viewpoints.
- You’re closed-minded.
- You’re just average; you have no desire to be better.
They’ve moved from giving you the positives to trying to make you react strongly to the negatives. The entire second set of bullet points is tailor-made to make you feel deficient. ”You’re just a mediocre person with a mediocre, consumerist life, and if only you weren’t so closed-minded and intolerant you’d be soaring with the minimalist eagles.”
In other words….are you ready for this? The “minimalist” authors that pull this garbage are doing exactly what the mainstream media, marketers, and advertisers are doing! The message is pretty much the same broken record:
“Right now, you’re not happy. It’s sad really; you probably don’t even know how unhappy you are. That’s okay, because this product will make you happy. Aren’t you so lucky that you can buy it right now?”
Isn’t the point of this whole minimalist thing to get us away from this garbage?
Please let me be clear here. I’m not against people getting paid. I’m not against somebody having an e-book to sell. Authors deserve to be compensated for work that readers love.
What I am against, however, is this bogus minimalism that’s being promoted out there. The person who wrote the above sales pitch, almost by definition, is not a minimalist. They’re a materialist blogger that sees minimalism as just another product to be marketed.
And that’s sad.