There’s this scene in True Romance.
Alabama. Bubblegum popping, Elvis worshipping, sweet as American pie Alabama…
Sitting her ass down across from a mobster who’s about to turn her face into hamburger meat because she knows where the stolen cocaine went.
She could cry. She could beg. She could piss herself and pray.
Instead? She spins the most beautiful bullshit story you’ve ever heard. She’s just a girl from Alabama, fell for the wrong guy, innocent as fresh baked cookies on Christmas morning. She doesn’t know shit about cocaine. She’s practically a Disney princess.
The mobster? He doesn’t buy it. (Obviously not. I mean he’s a mobster…)
But there’s always the bit in movies where it gets interesting.
Although the lesson here is that it doesn’t really matter.
Mainly cause Alabama commits to that story like it’s gospel truth. (Flat earthers anyone?)
She tells it with such wide eyed conviction, such authentic charm, that even while this psychopath is beating her bloody, some tiny corner of his brain wants to believe her.
She makes herself impossible to hate, even when he knows she’s lying through her pretty little teeth.
That’s the marketing lesson everyone’s too scared to tell you.
Your audience isn’t stupid. They know you’re selling. They know you want their money, their email, their precious attention span. They can smell the sales pitch from three miles away.
But if you tell your story with real conviction?
If you show up as an actual goddamn human being with personality and authenticity and charm?
They’ll buy from you anyway.
Not because they’re marks. Because they actually give a shit about you.
Alabama didn’t win that scene with superior tactics. She didn’t out think the mobster. (RIP James Gandolfini)
She won because she was so authentically, undeniably her that even her enemies couldn’t help rooting for her a little.
Your marketing doesn’t need to be polished. If anything. Overly polished marketing now just reeks of AI piss.
It doesn’t need some guru’s seventeen step funnel horseshit. It needs to be human enough that people connect with the beating heart behind the sales page. Your sales page does have a heart right?
And the thing is. These marketing guru’s keep wanting to push people into cosplaying as a faceless brand. (Obviously cause of AI and the AI shit they’re trying to sell you)
What I’m suggesting is you should Start being Alabama. Who is charming, real, impossible to ignore, even when everyone knows exactly what game you’re playing.
And the marketing cliché that reigns supreme?
People don’t buy products. They buy from people they like.
And Alabama? Everyone liked Alabama. Even the guy literally torturing her.
That’s influence. You won’t read that in any Robert Cialdini book. But you’ll learn about it by spending 2 hours watching True Romance.
Plus. It’s 2026. Time to stop being boring and start being unforgettable…
Stephen Walker.
P.S. I should’ve probably written discover instead of learn but hey. Influence innit?