Welcome to the 15th issue of Always Be Learning! The newsletter that's so good, it'll make you forget your entire investment portfolio is in a downhill ski race.

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First Things First:

Did ya miss me??

For those of you that didn't notice, I took last week off from the newsletter as I was on vacation and teaching the first cohort of my Email Marketing 101 course.

To make up for skipping last week’s issue, today I’m going to share a snippet of what I taught in my course!

But before we dive in, I want to give a special shout-out to this week's...

Friend of the program:

If you enjoy reading my work, you’ll love this marketing newsletter 👇

The Water Cooler breaks down the most influential marketing campaigns, why they work, and how you can implement them in your business.

Try it now for the perfect combo of insight & actionable advice:

Today's Marketing Breakdown:

The 5-star framework to selling anything with email

1. Identify Your Goal

What do you want the recipient to do after receiving your email?

• Book a demo?

• Place an order?

• Leave a review?

Once you have your end goal in mind you can write compelling copy that drives toward that goal. 

2. Audience

Who is going to be receiving this email?

• Prospects?

• Active customers?

• Lapsed customers?

The more specific you can get with your target audience, the easier it will be to write the email. Your audience should feel like you’re writing directly to them. 

3. Desired Outcomes

You have YOUR desired goals defined in step 1. But what does your email recipient want?

Go beyond the first answer here. What is the transformation that your customers want to see?

Let’s use The Beard Club as an example (the company I work for).

What do our customers want?

First answer: a dope beard

Beyond the first answer:

• Confidence

• To be unique

• To look more mature

You want to speak to those feelings that go beyond the first answer. That’s the desired outcome they’re really after.

4. Pain Points

What pain points are your recipients currently dealing with?

More examples for The Beard Club:

• Slow beard growth

• Patchiness in beard

• Skin irritation from shaving

By poking the pain point in your copy, you remind the recipient why they came to you looking for a solution in the first place. 

5. Objections

Your recipients are looking for every reason to NOT buy from you (if they can help it). 

Some common objections:

• Not enough time

• Not enough money

• Not an urgent problem

Your email copy should aim to crush these common objections.

• Not enough time? 

  • Show them how quickly they’ll see results

• Not enough money? 

  • Show how your product is a screaming value at its current price. If you want to be more aggressive, offer a discount.

• Not an urgent problem? 

  • Make it urgent. Introduce a limited-time sale.

Let’s put it all together:

Example at The Beard Club

1. Goal: get 1st order

2. Audience: prospects 

3. Pain point: slow growth

4. Objection: It’s too expensive

5. Desired outcome: to be unique 

Example copy for this email might look like:

There you have it! 1 marketing tip to help grow your DTC business.

Here’s what else I’m checking out in the DTC marketing world:

1. Try not to tear up watching this incredible ad (spoiler: you will)

2. 6 quick tips to upgrade your writing skills in the next 5 minutes

3. Apple announced plans to diversify their revenue (and are taking market share from incumbents in the process)

Hope this has been helpful!

See ya next Thursday,

Joe

P.S. Whenever you're ready, there are 3 ways I can help you:

1. Join the waitlist for my Email Marketing 101 course (click here).

2. Apply to join my free slack community of DTC marketing leaders (click here).

3. Sponsor my newsletter and get your brand or business in front of your fellow ABL subscribers (reply to this email).

P.P.S. And if you want to start writing your own newsletter on beehiiv, get started here!