🪄The thing I'm fixing ASAP

“Everyone has a first impression until they get punched in the mouth.”

-Me

A little over a year ago, and copywriter friend of mine sent me a DM. The gist of it was they needed some cash, fast:

This person was talented, but was so new to the game that getting new clients was a considerable challenge.

We had a quick chat, and cooked up a no-brainer offer together:

The offer was for a 3-part welcome series for the low low price of $200. If you know anything about the copywriting world, this is a tiny fraction of what an established freelancer would charge.

But I knew my friend could deliver the goods, and he also needed to deliver a rent check to the landlord by the end of the weekend.

I sent the offer to my list.

And by dinnertime, my friend collected a couple thousand dollars.

Yes, we put together a great offer and wrote some inspired sales copy.

But the reason that this worked so well was because we reminded people that a good welcome series is an asset that can pay substantial dividends over time.

The $200 price was a logical and reasonable investment that would yield thousands upon thousands in the future.

No, I’m not here to sell you a welcome series. I don’t do that kind of thing anymore.

(Neither does my friend. He’s on track for a multi 6-figure year working on his own stuff.)

But I wanted to highlight the value of this basic email automation so that you pay attention to what follows.

A great welcome series has a couple of jobs to do. Before we get started writing, let’s be clear about what we want to accomplish.

Here’s my Welcome Series Wish List:

1. Set expectations. Let people know what type of content to expect and how often.

2. Boost deliverability. Ask for replies and whitelisting to boost the odds you stay in the inbox.

3. Further attract our ideal subscribers and build rapport. Inject some personality and let people know what you’re about.

4. Repel and filter out non-ideal subscribers. Kick the troublemakers to the curb quickly.

5. Make some money. Listen, unless maintaining an email list is some sort of sick hobby of yours, the ultimate goal is to make the effort worth your while. About 5% of your new subscribers are in the mood to buy something right away, so make it easy for them to do so!

I think you can hit all of these points with as few as 3 emails, but I’ve come to believe that more is even better.

I’m creating a 7-part welcome series for my own list, replacing the limp, lame single email that most of you saw when you joined.

Here is the outline I am going to use:

Email 1 - Set expectations, offer a bribe for replies to boost deliverability, bury a low ticket offer in the P.S.

Email 2 - Tell my email marketing origin story, including how I launched my first business out of my garage and surpassed a million dollars in revenue in 9 months, thanks largely to a “borrowed” customer list. (Note to self - double-check statute of limitations before going deep into details.)

Email 3 - Talk about my beliefs and the “mission” of Email Magic. (It’s to save puppies in case you were not aware.)

Email 4 - Tell a really good story, ending on a cliffhanger. (Maybe the one about the customer who paid me $18,000 in $20 bills, stuffed into a paper lunch bag? Or maybe the time I appeared on Wheel of Fortune?)

Email 5 - Resolve the cliffhanger from #4, and deliver a valuable strategy, tip or tactic related to the story takeaway. The result should be a squirt of dopamine and a quick win for free.

Email 6 - Use the “Before-After-Bridge” storytelling framework I learned from Joe Portsmouth at WriteOn to present a low ticket offer for the “next thing” people will need after implementing the lesson from email #5. Give a reason to purchase it now, but no hard sell.

Email 7 - Reiterate the deadline for the offer and set expectations for regular campaign content after this automation ends.

Anyways, that’s the plan. Time to get writing.

Greg

P.S. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the middle of Q4.

If you have something for sale, you should be selling it!

I’m hosting a live training and Q&A this Friday, Nov. 10 at 2PM ET, to share my best Black Friday/ Cyber Monday strategies and tactics that you can implement NOW.

Craft the most successful Black Friday/ Cyber Monday promotion that you’ve ever run.

However, the live training and Q&A is only available to Mail Mages, my paid subscriber community.

It’s $9.99 per month, a bigger no-brainer than the welcome series offer my friend did.

You can join any time before Thursday at midnight and still receive the Zoom link.

Questions about Mail Mages or anything else? You know where to find me. I personally reply to every email.