When I was 11 our family moved from the suburbs to a 100-year-old farmhouse in rural northeastern Ohio. Since I was homeschooled and living a solid 30 minutes from civilization, I got into some pretty weird hobbies. This one year in late winter, I saw some sap oozing from a maple tree in our backyard, […]
Continue reading“Uh, are you sure about this? This isn’t the kind of email we usually send out. I’m not sure how this is going to work…” The response made me chuckle—exactly what I’d expected. “Heh heh, trust me,” I thought, “this is gonna work juuuust fine.” The reluctant guy I was corresponding with was the owner […]
Continue readingWhen I was in college, we had this ritual during finals week: The students got to turn the tables and finally give the *professors* a grade for the semester. These performance reviews were kind of fun and sometimes quite therapeutic. You’d fill out little bubbles on a Scantron sheet and, optionally, write out any extra […]
Continue readingBack when made my living writing code instead of copy, I had a dark secret: Sometimes I would “swipe” chunks of code from the Internet without fully understanding what the heck they did. Truth be told, most software devs do this from time to time. And in some cases, it works out just fine. More […]
Continue readingRegular reader Jennifer shows job hunters how to write a resume that will stand out. She’s in the middle of creating an email course for her online class, and she asks: I’d love to know how you studied up on creating such amazing course funnels? You mentioned in a previous post about how often […]
Continue readingYesterday I did a consultation with a writer named Sue. Sue runs a weekly webinar about “3 blogging myths” where she sells her high end “how to blog” course. During our discussion she asked what she should say in her emails to get more people on the webinar. My reply: “Use the ‘blind tease.’” The […]
Continue readingMy inner loss aversion monkey is screeching and rattling the bars of his cage right now. The little guy is a furry ball of poo-flinging rage, all because of my trip to the UPS Store yesterday. What’s a “loss aversion monkey”? It comes from a study that some scientists did a few years back. They […]
Continue readingLongtime subscriber Andy is a jeweler with his own store. He recently told me he’s going to start writing regular emails to his list of several thousand past customers. I warned him that I might have to critique some of his emails, but he went ahead anyway. After his first email went out, he confessed […]
Continue readingRight now I’m working on 2 different free email courses. These are both for Simple Programmer, which is a business my buddy John started up. In January he brought me in as a partner to run his marketing. The first email course is one that John put together about 18 months ago. It’s called, “How […]
Continue readingThe raging debate among email marketers is: Single or double optin? If you’re not familiar with the terms, double optin means that you send each would-be subscriber an extra email when they try to subscribe to your list. Then the new subscriber has to click a confirmation link in this double optin email before you’re […]
Continue readingIn college I had a roommate named Brad. Brad was a proud “meterosexual,” back before that was a thing. He had this elaborate hair care routine—he bought only the best salon-quality hair care products and scoffed at anything that cost less than $30 a bottle. Me? Just give me the cheapest shampoo/conditioner at Wal-Mart and […]
Continue readingSubscriber Claudio is a programmer who wants to make a name for himself by building a thriving blog and email list, and writing a book. He’s bouncing around in his own head, though, and can’t get traction: I run a personal blog since 2008. I haven’t posted consistently, there were periods where I posted 2 […]
Continue readingYesterday I got pretty frustrated with this email sequence I’m writing for a client in the mortgage lead generation niche. This particular client has an ice cold list—nearly 1,000 leads and past customers that haven’t heard a peep from my client in months or years. I banged out the first email pretty fast, but when […]
Continue readingEver heard of the book, “The Richest Man in Babylon”? One of the key takeaways in that book is this: “Don’t carry buckets, build pipelines.” In other words, build a machine that generates results without your direct involvement. Most people hear that and jump right to the idea of creating products to generate “passive income” […]
Continue readingThe email I sent a few days back about my guest posting “mental block” musta struck a nerve—my inbox lit up with replies. One of them was from a biz owner named Holger: Late last year I launched a SaaS for tele-marketing freelancers and small agencies (strictly b2b). It’s been three years in the making […]
Continue readingAndy runs a jewelry business, and he’s looking for a breakthrough. He writes: I keep flirting with the idea of sending emails like this to our clients…but something keeps me from doing it. Maybe it’s because I’ve been at it (the jewelry business) so long that it bores me. Or maybe I’m tired of a […]
Continue readingHow To Sell Your Online Course With Email Back in 2009 I was desperately hunting for a job. At the time I was 2 years into my 6 month contract as a temp. Every day when I’d swipe my badge to get into the building, I’d half expect to see the little light on the […]
Continue readingHere’s something I didn’t fully grasp when I launched my first product: Not everyone is your customer. Now I wasn’t expecting EVERYONE who signed up for my email list to buy my book. But deep down, I kinda thought I could convince MOST of them. What I learned, though, is that the real world works […]
Continue readingI got seduced by the friendly monkey and the pretty UI. It didn’t take long for the ugly cracks to start showing through that fresh coat of paint. “Oh, you want to send a welcome email with lead magnet A to these subscribers, and a different message with lead magnet B to those subscribers? “Good […]
Continue readingAshley Hoyland is just getting started as a freelancer. She’s looking to make a name for herself writing direct response copy—but she’s intimidated by the thought of getting clients. She says: Hi Josh, Let me begin by saying how impressed I am by your copywriting skills. After looking at your website, I could tell I […]
Continue readingSometimes I think my brain is trying to kill me. All day, while I’m working, it’s running off in the background, thinking up things to work me to death. It’s especially good at finding little annoyances in life and convincing me that I should “lifehack” them, or find a way to automate or optimize them […]
Continue readingIt’s discouraging, having to hold down a day job when you really want to be hacking on that great idea for a web app you’re kicking around, or writing your book, or starting your own business. You look at your lack of progress on one hand, and the huge block of your day that you […]
Continue readingMy outlines used to be a mess. I’d sit down to write something, and I’d feel like I had to outline first, because that’s what writers do, you know? So I’d throw a few bullet points down on a piece of paper. No, not even bullet points. They were more like a collection of random […]
Continue readingIt’s been close to a month since I decided to get serious about my writing and set a goal for myself of publishing four ebooks in the next 12 months. So how is it going? Although it’s hard to tell on a day-to-day basis, when I look back at the past month it’s clear I’m […]
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