$100 Offers

I concluded recently the $100 Offers – How to Make Offers So Good that People feel Stupid Saying No (Alex Hormozi, 2021, 164 pages), and I think it is an okay book.

It’s interesting to notice that, at the time of this writing, this book has 4.9 starts on Amazon, with close to 30 000 ratings (!). It could be the highest indicator of its quality. But I think the explanation for those high ratings are probably in the fact that the author tries to sell the book the same way he sells other things, and it may even work better for the book than for the other things, I suspect.

To explain myself, first I must say that the text in this book keeps reinforcing itself (like those tedious marketing campaigns or emails that push the same buttons again and again). And it probably works for many of those reading or listening. Secondly, a book like this will be read by people who (like me!) are more or less very interested (or desperate!) trying to find a way to sell things. The very fact that the author reinforces himself dozens of times as an authority in selling, and to the extent that some of his arguments are even mathematical and sound bullet-proof, the readers may feel they hit jackpot. Thus, the reviews. Which, again, are asked by the author right there, in the text itself, at the time of the reading (like no other book I read before) – I guess this may be the closest to the “please like, share, and hit the notification bell” in writing that one could imagine.

However, I wonder if the same positive response would be reflected one year after the reading, for example. Because, as the time passes, I’m not sure too much of its message is as good as the author thinks it is. Or as even I thought it was at the time of the reading.

Again, to explain myself, first I must say this is not a scientific or academic book. Which may not mean much, but it does in the sense that the best scientific minds are very aware of the possible shortcomings of almost any reasoning. Secondly, the author seems to believe you can “position” any product or service as a premium one, as long as you have something special and write a powerful offer, covering all possible showstoppers in the mind of the buyer.

What’s the problem with that, you may ask. Well, the first one it that creating something really unique and special is damn hard. Very few will make it. There are multiple sodas in the market, for example, but just one Coke. You may blend something together and claim it is better. But I guess people will see you through as soon as they try it. So, no, creating premium products it not simply an act of will. Secondly, the book is in a way a product of its time, in which we are bombarded with “irrefusable” offers by email or calls, for example, almost every day. Not only as before in the late-TV infomercials, but every day. And, guess what, many of us have learned to say no or simply ignore, because there is a sense of being BS’d. It will sure still work with many, but I question the effect for the majority in a given market.

In any case, this is not a bad book. You may enjoy it, and perhaps there aren’t many better alternatives for this kind of marketing elsewhere (or I didn’t do my homework yet). But the lack of criticism and the “cult”-like feeling of this one is just too much for someone like me.