Issue #160 All About Email

Hi, friend. 👋

Welcome to Issue #160 of All About Email!

Last week, we discussed email reporting, some tools (free and paid) to do this and (of course) mixed in some AI (more on that at the bottom of this email).

This week, I promised to share the results of a little experiment I’ve been running in my newsletters for the last week or so. It’s something you can try yourself.

Let’s go! 👇

Have I Seen This Email Somewhere Before?

Maybe you have, friend, maybe you haven’t. 🤔

Let me ask you another question…

What happens if you don't have anything to write about?

It's a question I often get asked by prospective clients or similar statements like:

• How do I start?

• I have nothing to say.

• I have writer's block (that's a tough one).

• There are no new products or stories for me to promote.

✍️ Writing regularly does get easier.

💬 As you engage more with your audience (which a good email marketer should) and analyse your campaign reports, you will learn what content your audience likes.

🧠 But if you still get stuck, you might want to consider:

• Gathering user-generated content to create an email campaign. Audiences love nothing more than hearing other users of your product or service.

• Try reviving old blog posts that contain evergreen content.

• Create RSS-to-Email campaigns (if supported by your ESP) that will automatically send your blog posts to your audience.

• Write a “thought” piece on an industry-related topic (e.g. all image emails).

• Has your company changed, or has new staff been hired? Introduce them and educate your audience.

• If you are an eCommerce brand, you might want to share customer testimonials or even your favourite products.

• If you are struggling, make sure you are signed up to your competitors’ email lists (they are subscribed to yours) and see what they have been writing about.
  
  (You can use a tool like SendView to do this instead of signing up manually)

💡 As you can see, there is always something to write about, even if you think you're stuck.

🚨 But there is one more thing you can try, friend…

Experiment Results

That final thing you can try if you are out of ideas or short on time?

⚡️ Re-use your email campaigns! - especially if they still add value and are relevant.

🧪 I’ve been running an experiment in my last two WordPress newsletters and the last two issues of All About Email (this newsletter).

• Last week’s All About Email, in which we discussed reporting, was first published on 6th December 2021.

• This week’s newsletter was first published on August 23rd, 2021.

💪 Re-using previous emails allows you to:

• Resend high-performing campaigns to new subscribers; let’s be honest. It will seem new to most of your existing subscribers. **

• Update previous campaigns to add additional relevance or value (as in this case, I only re-used 50% of the original email).

** Last week’s email was 80 - 90% the same as I sent three years ago, but no one noticed.

That’s it for This Week 👋

⏭️ Next week is all about BIMI, following the changes announced by Google below 👇 and Zoho Mail now supporting it.

Email Marketing News & Tips

This week's excellent and insightful email news & tips:

• Hype Yourself - How The Hype Yourself Newsletter Doubled Subscribers In One Year. A chat with Lucy Werner on her best strategies. (Email Tooltester)

• BIMI for All - Gmail allows more senders to protect their brand using BIMI Common Mark Certificates. (Google)

• Best Practices - Think Your Newsletter Needs an Overhaul? Here’s Why It Probably Doesn’t (Yet). (Inbox Collective)

• Reputation - How to Fix Email Reputation and Improve Deliverability. (Litmus)

• The Dark Side - Master the Art of Dark Mode Email Design and Coding (Email on Acid)

• Should I? - Resending emails to non-openers. (Des Brown)

• Get Your Name - This excellent interactive email lets you choose your wrestler's name. So much fun! (Email Camp)

• DMARC - growth in 2024: A snapshot of surging adoption. (Valimail)

• Q4 - RGE’s Last Quarterly Planning Ideas of the Year Collection. (Really Good Emails)

If you have a question about this email or email marketing, reply, and I will answer you as soon as possible.

I hope you have a great week! 👋