The piece of writing that I produce that gets the most feedback and interaction is, without a doubt, the weekly email that gets sent to all Club and above members every Monday morning. The topics vary enormously, I never try to “sell” anything but I do seek to add value in some way, and collectively, over the course of many weeks, they undoubtedly help to strengthen my relationship with the members that receive them. It’s follow up.
Now, of course, there is work involved in doing this, and I’ll be honest, it’s not always easy. But I never miss a Monday – because it’s important. One member who has completely “got” this is Inside Tracker, Chris Blunt who recently sent me a note, which said:
“I just wanted to drop you a quick email to let you know how grateful I am for the idea to send regular weekly emails to my customers. It gives me a great boost when people think highly enough of them to take the time to respond back and there’s clear evidence now that they are tangibly helping the business – and I’ve only been going a couple of months.
It all started for me when I came across something so ridiculous that I felt I had to write to all the people I knew and tell them about it. That first email went out to just 186 people, but in the course of writing I thought of something else to say, so I told them that I’d send them another email next week (I made my goal public. I wonder where that idea came from!) and from there, it just kept going.
To be honest, I’m a little bit addicted to it now. I look forward to a Monday morning when I get to write that week’s email.
Some of the benefits I’ve seen from developing this habit and sending this stuff include:
- People are coming to me, asking for advice – they definitely value my opinion more now and my weekly emails are clearly establishing me as a perceived expert in my field.
- As you advise, I don’t directly sell in these weekly emails, but I have had several sales as a direct result. For instance, I got a response last week that said: “Thanks for the email, Chris, I need… please call me.”
- I’m getting recognised and building new relationships. For instance, at a recent networking meeting someone walked up to me and said: “You’re the guy that’s been sending me all those emails…” (I always wear my branded polo shirts to these events) and we got talking about business on the back of that.
- It’s a great way to grow my database – I have people, every week now, asking me to add them to the distribution list for the emails and I would never have thought nine weeks ago that people would actually be asking me to send them stuff. Honestly, it’s remarkable.
My tips for anyone thinking of starting a weekly email would include:
- Definitely do it. It really is worthwhile.
- Use a proper email marketing system. I use MailChimp myself but there are lots out there.
- Write the first email, and in it, tell them what you’re going to talk about next week – in other words, make a commitment to send one the following week and say what it will be about. This has two benefits:
– You’ve made a promise to send one next week
– You already know what it’s going to be about so you don’t need to spend time faffing with what to write about next week
- Keep a list of potential topics. I’ve now got a list of about 50 things to write about, and each week I pick up something from my day to day activity and add it to the list.
- Let your personality shine through. I try to keep my emails quite light. I try and make sure I give enough so that they are useful but they are never too long that they might turn people off.
- Don’t get hung up on or worried about how many people are or are not on your list. No one else knows how many people are in your database and I faffed about for months not sending anything because I thought I had to get all my contacts into one place and on the right system. How stupid is that?
- In the end, I just started sending it and then I add people as and when I come across them.
I do get some unsubscribes but not that many, and in truth, I haven’t let it worry me at all. I think of it as just “cleaning my list”. If someone that I really want on my list unsubscribes, then it gives me a great reason to send them a physical card or to call them – they’ve done SOMETHING so you’ve got a talking point. I’ve also sent the odd personal email to someone that has unsubscribed to ask if there was any particular reason why – again, it’s been another good talking point and a chance to engage, and in one case, it looks like I’ll actually get some business from it.
The truth is, I’ve barely scratched the surface of the potential here, but I have started and I can sense now, every month, that I’m making improvements and the feedback I’m getting is really encouraging. It seems that my wife is wrong and that I can be interesting and do have something worth saying!
It’s a really great feeling when you get a reply saying “thanks that was really useful”. I make sure my team see all the replies and it gives all of us a small boost for the day.
I wholeheartedly endorse Nigel’s notion that sending out regular non-sales emails to your list is absolutely the right thing to do and personally, based on my own experience now, I think it’s a really critical step for any business that’s serious about maximising the potential from their customers, building long-term relationships and achieving ambitious goals.”
Chris has put together a few more tips and resources to help any EC member that’s not already doing weekly emails and you can get it at: www.letsbebluntaboutit.co.uk/ec-toptips
Of course, when you go and get his info sheet, you can also subscribe to Chris’s weekly emails so you can see exactly how he does it and what all the fuss is about.
Sequence is the superhero at play here. Those of you in Bolton will recall that Sequence is a machine. She delivers really impressive results solely through follow up and she’s also a big fan of the Turkish football team Fenerbahce.
