Yesterday I was listening to a Dan Kennedy seminar where Dan says, in his typically tactful fashion:
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There is no magazine out there — you can check the newsstand — there is no magazine called, Wives In Sweatpants and Sneakers.
There’s all sorts of unimaginable fetishes. But that is not one of them. There’s just not a lot of interest in that.
That’s their business.
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Dan’s point is that what business owners have gotten used to, they no longer find exciting. It also means they also don’t notice the bad stuff any more.
The past week, I was promoting a done-for-you newsletter service.
I figured no qualified leads would respond, since I write so much about email marketing and making money from email. If there’s one thing I’m known for, it’s probably that.
Surely, business owners who manage to track down my email list — in spite of my best efforts to hide it — surely such business owners also think email marketing is sexy and are already doing sophisticated email stuff in their own businesses.
I was wrong.
I got readers reaching out to me who have large, successful businesses.
Some of them have email lists of tens of thousands of people, made up of customers, who have never been mailed.
Others send out an email here and there… make good money each time they send out that lonesome email… and don’t think or know to do it more often.
And one person, who wasn’t replying to the done-for-you newsletter service, but who did take me up on the Newsletter Consult I did last month, followed up yesterday to say:
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Thought I’d follow up after our recent discussion, which was much appreciated.
So went ahead and ran a one-month birthday sale for a 2-YR subscription at a $1K discount. Don’t think we have done a sale in 5 years, nor one for a 2 year sub duration.
With 4 days yet to run, we have so far generated $18K in sales with 4 people subscribing for the 2-YR plan and 1 other taking up a (full priced) annual sub.
Not bad considering I only mentioned it as a PS in the twice a week email alerts, plus December is historically a slow month for sales here. This has been our best December to date!
I plan to send two more such alerts this week and have been pondering what to write in case we might be able to tip one more cheerful soul over the edge.
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The results above are clearly not common.
The person who wrote me offers a yearly subscription costing multiple thousands of dollars… has lots of credibility built up over a long time… and can now make an extra $18k with an “oh by the way” casual throwaway in a PS, after a 5-year promo hiatus.
But uncommon details aside, the point still stands:
You might have that beautiful email list, wearing sweatpants and sneakers around you. Maybe you’ve been looking at it for years, and maybe you’ve stopped appreciating how just how sexy it really can be.
I figure that’s as much my fault as yours.
Clearly, I’m not doing a good job putting forward offers to help you get more value out of your email list.
I’ll work on fixing that in 2024.
Meanwhile, it’s mid-December. It’s almost the holiday season. Who the hell wants to work?
I do. So I have a quick, band-aid offer for you right now:
If you have a business and are making sales… if you have an email list and have been neglecting and mistreating it for too long… then I offer you my 1-hour “Extreme Makeover For Email Lists” session.
One hour, to hear what your business is about, who your customers are, what you offer them, how you currently mail them.
I will then tell you the quickest and easiest buttons to push to make money from your list, in the future as well as now. Maybe I can even help you pull out some thousands of dollars from your email list by the end of this month.
I’m limiting this offer to three people, the first three qualified people who reply.
Price is $300.
I will not be offering this again, at least not at this price.
In case you are interested, hit reply, tell me who you are, and I can send you the payment link.