About Zac Nelles

Zac Nelles is a strategic marketing advisor and an award winning direct response copywriter as well as an author and speaker. He has won an award with American Writer’s and Artists Inc (A copywriting training subsidiary of Agora Inc, a $300,000,000 direct mail company.)

To a small circle of Dan Kennedy’s Copywriting Academy Alumni he is known as ‘Kangaroo Zac’ and Dan Kennedy’s personal enforcer. (You’ll figure out why later)

He has worked with companies from industries including health, finance, business opportunity, beauty, software, seminar providers, coaching, training and consulting. He has helped each client design build and implement marketing systems to maximize sales revenue while minimizing manual labor.

He has been able to uncover hidden sources of revenue for his clients and create the necessary marketing assets to capitalize on them. This has created new sources of income and improved the results of existing lines of business.

My story

Once out of university, I worked in sales for 4 years initially selling roof restorations, then I added a bunch of other home improvement products where I had to find my own leads. Obviously when you are new to sales finding your own leads means knocking on doors, doing trade shows and booths at supermarkets.

Yeah, I was over that in about 2 weeks.

But where to finds leads if I wasn’t door knocking? This challenge led me into the world of direct marketing and copywriting. By learning how to create direct marketing systems, I was able to create a steady stream of leads.
A steady supply of leads turned around my flagging sales numbers and ended the tedium of cold calling. In fact every time I put $100 in the mail about $2,000 came back in commission. This was my first attempt at direct marketing. My results only got better from there.

After that I took a marketing role in a start up Software Company that sold enterprise project management systems.

This completed my marketing education. It gave me exposure to longer selling cycles and more sophisticated marketing techniques that are required to create enquiries and to make sales in many high value markets.
While I was there they had me telemarketing (what a waste of my talents – but I still managed to hit the call objectives over 50% of the time). The first marketing piece I ever wrote for this company pulled 3% response in a direct mail campaign. I would change almost everything about the piece if I had it over again. But that letter alone could have built that business if the business owner was switched on. He wasn’t and we parted company after 18 months of spinning our collective wheels.

In all that time I have never stopped studying and honing my marketing and copywriting skills.

With my lessons learnt it was time to move on. And so I did. I had realized that what I really wanted was to write copy and be sure that my clients got the absolute maximum value they could out of working with me.

I’d noticed that many copywriters didn’t know enough about marketing to do anymore than write what the client asked for, even if it was not in the client’s best interests.

I’d also noticed that many marketing consultants left the client high and dry on the delivery front. They would leave them with all these good ideas that they couldn’t actually do anything with and so they got shelved, wasting the consulting fees.

Many times a potential client has approached me and asked to me to work on a particular project but after going through my comprehensive marketing diagnostic we found that there were more lucrative and often easier ways to increase their revenue.

For this reason, now all new client relationships start with a comprehensive marketing diagnostic.
The diagnostic puts nearly a decade of my personal marketing experience to work on your business along with years of devoted study to all the important lineages of direct marketing and often uncovers many opportunities that may not have occurred to you.

Outside of the world of business

I am an avid cook and the Self Proclaimed Iron Chef Deep Fried. Clashing nicely with my interest in well-being and holistic nutrition, I do tai chi daily and eat vegan about a third of my meals – the more I run the less I want ‘normal’ food. I just enjoy cooking deep-fried food, I don’t do it that often.

At 6’6” (196cm) and 145 kg (320 lbs) I am perhaps the largest barefoot runner on the planet. Currently I am training to run a marathon barefoot. (Then on to ultra marathon running.) I plan on completing the Leadville Trail 100 – also barefoot in the next 5 years. Paraphrasing Christopher McDougall and his seminal book on running, specifically barefoot/minimalist footwear running Born to Run, “The Leadville Trail 100 is best described as running the Boston marathon twice, hiking to the top of Pike’s Peak then doing it ALL again, at night. Leadville is the highest town in the U.S. at an altitude twice that at which air planes are required by regulation to pressurize their cabins. So if you want to simulate the altitude do all that running with a sock in your mouth.”

I am also an active investor with a growing real estate portfolio and part-time trader of a variety of instruments including stocks commodities currencies and options over various timeframes.

Finally, I spend a lot of time reading (about a book a week) and listening to music (Blues, Swing, Funk Ska, Soul and Jazz) when not doing this I am often playing one of number of strategy games.