How To Seal A Lasting Bond With Your Email Subscribers

Lately my wife and I are binge-watching our way through “Parks and Recreation” for the fifth (possibly sixth?) time.

(“Parks and Rec” is my all-time favorite sit-com—sorry, Seinfield lovers, George Castanza can’t hold a candle to Ron Swanson.)

The other night we watched an episode from season 7.

And in one of the sub-plots city manager Ben Wyatt realizes that he needs to have a government document signed and notarized.

Ben is cringing at the inconvenience of finding a notary, and that’s when Jerry Gergich steps forward.

Jerry is the prototypical “government drone” and the laughingstock of the entire Parks and Rec department.

He’s clumsy, overweight, and makes dumb mistakes. His coworkers won’t let him get 2 words out without telling him to shut up and go away because he’s soooooo booooring.

Jerry, it turns out, recently had a brush with death. And afterward he decided to live his life to the fullest and pursue his dream—of becoming a notary public.

Suddenly it’s his moment to shine.

At one point he’s riding in the car with Ben Wyatt.

And he is SO excited that he can’t stop talking about his passion of being a notary—which of course is stupifyingly, brain-meltingly dull to Ben and 99.99% of the population.

He’s going on and on about how his father and his father’s father were notaries public, and how it takes 2 pounds of pressure to make the perfect impression with a notary stamp.

Then he says:

“And Ben, there’s the notary public newsletter. It’s like a weekly email newsletter for notaries. Oh, it’s a good time.”

Listen up:

The secret to building a deep and unshakable relationship with your email subscribers is hidden in this little anecdote.

Truth is, most of your subscribers feel a lot like Jerry.

They are passionately interested in some topic—marketing, or programming, or building muscle, or gourmet coffee, or tax preparation…

And when they share our passion with their friends, family and coworkers, they get only glazed stares in return.

Then you come along, with your quirky website and email list.

You share their passion.

Even when the rest of the world can’t stand to hear another word, with you they get to escape to a place where they’re surrounded by people who are just as head-over-heels nuts about their passion as they are.

Connect with your subscribers’ “inner Jerry.”

I think you’ll be astonished at how they respond.

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