Yesterday, while vegetating in the changing room at my gym, I came across a provocative post written by a Morgan Housel.
That name sounded familiar. It turned out I’d seen it high up on the Amazon bestseller lists.
Housel is the author of The Psychology of Money — an ugly title, but one which has sold over 2 million copies and been translated into 52 languages.
Not only that. Housel is also a partner in some venture fund called Collaborative. I guess that might mean absolutely nothing, but it might also mean he’s very, very rich.
Anyways, Housel’s post was titled, Ideas That Changed My Life. “You spend years trying to learn new stuff,” says Housel, “but then look back and realize that maybe like 10 big ideas truly changed how you think and drive most of what you believe.”
So what are Housel’s big ideas?
I’ll share just one. Housel believes the only path to long-term success, besides luck, is sustainable competitive advantage. And get this — Housel also believes there are only 5 sources of such competitive advantage:
1. Learn faster than your competition
2. Empathize with customers more than your competition
3. Communicate more effectively than your competition
4. Be willing to fail more than your competition
5. Wait longer than your competition
And now, if you like, I’ll tell you about a single way, and a rather simple way, to tap into all five sources of sustainable competitive advantage in one go.
I can tell you about it from personal experience. Because I believe I’ve tapped into all five sources of competitive advantage by writing these daily emails.
Maybe it’s obvious how, maybe it’s not.
Check it:
1. Learn faster than your competition. I know what I will write in my email today, but I’m not sure about tomorrow. And so I’m constantly on the hunt for valuable and new ideas to share.
When I write about those ideas, I get a clearer understanding, or realize my total lack of understanding. Plus I remember them better. Some of these ideas I even apply in my own email marketing, and grok them on a completely different and much more real level than simply “knowing” about them.
2. Empathize with customers more than your competition. I never made much effort to share intrusive personal detail about myself in these emails. I find it unpleasant to do so more than once in a mercury retrograde. But inevitably, over four years of daily writing, many personal stories came out.
Pop quiz: How did my ex-girlfriend react when I gave her an expensive gold bracelet on our one-year anniversary? Hint: It wasn’t pretty.
I wrote an email about that a year and a half ago. When I recently asked people which of my emails first comes to mind, these kinds of personal reveals were near the top. And yes, this is how empathy works on the Internet.
3. Communicate more effectively than your competition. Yes.
4. Be willing to fail more than your competition. Uff. So many stupid things I’ve written. So many offers I’ve made that have gone nowhere. So many experiments that blew up in my face. Nobody remembers. Even I struggle to dredge them up, and I’ve got a keen instinct for shame.
5. Wait longer than your competition. Conventional wisdom says it takes 7 “touches” to make a sale. But how about 775?
Two weeks ago, on December 3, during my last bout of promoting my Most Valuable Email, one of the people who bought has been on my list since October 19 2020. That’s 775 days. He never bought anything from me before, though he replied to my emails on occasion.
Imagine poor Frank Bettger a hundred years ago, trudging around Chicago in his galoshes while the wind and snow whipped is face, visiting cigar-smoking business owners and trying to sell them life insurance. Back then, doing 775 “touches” was not feasible.
Today, thanks to the Internet and email, it’s quite feasible. In fact, it’s easy and even fun.
I’m not telling you to follow what I did, or even to do what I’m doing now. My path to 1458 “touches” — my best estimate — has been unique. And even today, I do things that might be suboptimal, but that allow me to stick with daily emailing for the long term.
My point is simply that if you’re not writing regular emails, start doing so. It can give you lasting competitive advantages like few other things can.
And if you want my personal help and guidance with that, well, I’m not sure you can get it.
As I announced three days ago, I’m launching a coaching program, which will start in January, specifically about email.
Quite a few people have expressed interest so far. But I’ve turned most of them away. They simply had too few of the necessary pieces already in place.
I will be promoting this coaching program for another three days after today.
If you can see the possible value to your business of sending regular emails — and doing so for the long term — then the first step is to get on my email list. Click here to do so. That done, we can check whether you have enough in place already for me to quickly guide you to email-based competitive advantage.