David de Souza

Nov 19, 20191 min

The Boron Letters - 80/20 Summary

Updated: Feb 8, 2022

  • Amazon: Link

  • Score: 6/10

  • Skill Category: Copywriting

  • Mental Models: Attentional Bias, Curiosity Instinct, Friction, Second-Order Thinking, Supply and Demand, Vividness Bias

The Mental Models from the book:

'The Boron Letters' can be summarised into 6 mental models:

1. Attentional Bias

  • List words that suck you in and divide the list into 2: Positive words + Negative words eg. 'Crisis' instead of 'problem'. Read this list before writing.

2. Curiosity Instinct

  • Ask questions and answer them yourself in your writing

3. Friction

  • Transition words help your writing flow "And, of course, ...."
     

4. Second-Order Thinking

  • The biggest mistake: Finding a product first. You must always find a market first.

5. Supply and Demand

  • To be in high demand be hard-headed. Clients, won't admit it but they are relieved with someone who takes a handstand.
     

  • When picking markets to test: Use 3 guidelines: Recency, Frequency, Unit of Sales
     

  • Pay attention to what isn't free and is staying on top of: Amazon/The New York Times Non-Fiction List

6. Vividness Bias

  • Invoke the senses.

Mental Model Mind Maps

Mind maps can help you to remember the most important parts of a book. Signup to my newsletter below to get a free mindmap of this book:

    600
    0