Yesterday, I sent an email with some sort of pulp fiction story, featuring a secret agent named Bond Jebakovic. Reactions were… mixed. Here’s one:
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This email went right above my head. The hook didn’t hook me and I found no place to enter back into the narrative while *gasp* skimming the rest.
I had no idea what you were yapping about…
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Some reviewers were more favorable though:
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This, my friend, is ridiculous. I applaud you! 😆
At first, I was completely befuddled reading your email. (Possibly because I was exhausted and grumpy after a long day.)
I came back and re-read this morning. The metaphor began to emerge… and of course, I clicked the link because. Curiosity.
I celebrate audacious self-expression (it feels like you had great fun writing this — did you?) and being yourself in business. This is work as play, and so delightful.
I don’t know how well it works as “marketing,” but maybe you’ll tell us later. (Hint, hint.)
I personally think it’s worth creating, just because you wanted to.
Thanks for being! 🥰
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A few other people wanted that same question answered. “Did this work as marketing? DID IT MAKE SALES???”
As of writing right now, some 12 hours after yesterday’s email went out, I can say the email did make a few sales, three specifically.
Is that good? Bad? I can only tell you this:
In my experience, the sales for any given email are probably 20% due to actual copy in the email… 40% due to the list, meaning the relationship they have built up with you over time… and the remaining 40% due to the offer (is it exciting, is it new).
The offer in last night’s email was my new Daily Email Habit service.
I opened this offer up to my list 4 days ago, and I’ve been promoting it every day since via daily emails.
I’ve made sales with each email. A few dozen with the first one… and then, predictably, fewer sales with each following email, because there were fewer people on my list for whom this offer is new and exciting. (The ones who found it exciting and new probably already bought.)
But there’s a bigger point:
That is simply autonomy. Doing what you want, how you want, when you want, just because you want.
Autonomy is very important for me. Maybe it’s the same for you.
Like my reader above says, I had fun writing yesterday’s email. And, even though the email might have been unreadable to many, it was valuable to me, because of the idea at the core of the email, which I wanted to present in a dramatic fashion, and which might come back to me in the future in some new and profitable way.
But imagine if I had a full-time job, and imagine if I wrote something like I did yesterday. What kind of careless or indulgent boss would let it slide?
Or imagine if I were working for a client, and I decided to deliver yesterday’s email as copy for him to send out?
At best, I’d get pushback, and I’d have to do some convincing that this is really the best way to proceed.
At worst, I’d get yelled at and told to go read some HubSpot articles to learn how email marketing is really done.
If you’re in either of those situations — a full-time job, or clients — don’t get me wrong. I’m not ragging on you. There are lots of good reasons for both a job and for clients — money, security, experience.
Still, it’s nice to have something of your own as well, something where you can do as you like, something you can fall back on if the job or the clients ever go south.
Of course, autonomy is good for you. But it goes beyond just self-interest.
Autonomy frees up your mind and probably makes you better at your work for your employer or your clients, because you can be more relaxed and honest, since you know you have alternatives.
Autonomy allows you to create stuff you wouldn’t be able to create otherwise. Many times, that stuff won’t work. But sometimes it will, and the world will be a slightly better place for it.
And autonomy inspires others and gives them hope. At least I know I’ve been inspired in the past by seeing others living and working how they want — it’s what pushed me into working for myself, much more than the promise of becoming a billionaire.
All that’s to say… autonomy good. And daily emails, even if they don’t hook everybody every day, are my own little daily step towards autonomy.
Maybe they can be yours as well?
If you want my help with writing daily emails consistently, so you can build something for yourself, and not just for your clients or employer: