Most email lists slowly die because they fail to answer one question in the subscriber’s mind every time an email arrives: why am I on this list?<\/p>\n
The subscriber might not consciously ask this question. But at some level they’re always evaluating whether the emails they receive are worth the inbox space they occupy. And when the answer is consistently no or not really or I guess, they either stop opening, eventually unsubscribe, or worst of all, continue on the list but never engage.<\/p>\n
The email that makes people glad they’re on your list answers this question decisively. It delivers something that the subscriber genuinely values \u2014 something they wouldn’t have found on their own, something that makes their work or life better in some specific way, something that makes them feel like they got access to something worth having.<\/p>\n
What does this actually look like?<\/p>\n
It looks different for different audiences, but the common thread is genuine utility. Not utility in a vague, general-information sense. Utility in the specific sense of: this helps me with the specific problem I’m trying to solve right now.<\/p>\n
For a business audience this might be a counterintuitive insight about a common practice in their industry that saves them time or money. It might be a specific framework for making a decision they frequently have to make. It might be a specific tool or resource that solves a problem they’ve been struggling with. It might be a real story from your own experience that illuminates something about their situation.<\/p>\n
What it isn’t: a summary of things you found on the internet. Generic marketing tips available on any marketing blog. A roundup of news items the subscriber could have found themselves. Content that demonstrates you read a lot but doesn’t offer anything the subscriber couldn’t get from their own research.<\/p>\n
The bar for email that makes people glad they’re on your list is genuine original thinking. Your perspective. Your experience. Your hard-won insights. The things you know because you’ve done this work for years, not because you read about it.<\/p>\n
This is both harder and easier than it sounds. Harder because it requires you to share something real rather than curate something safe. Easier because genuine original thinking is rare enough in email that it stands out immediately.<\/p>\n
What do you know that others in your space aren’t saying? Start there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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