SHOW TRANSCRIPT

This transcript is automatically generated by Descript.  Any errors or omissions are unintentional.

[00:00:00] Jeff Sieh: Hello folks. Welcome to Social Media News Live. I’m Jeff Sieh. And you’re not. And this is the show where we keep you up to date in everything that’s happening in the world of social media and so much more.

[00:00:10] And, you know, have you ever found yourself wondering about the keys to growing an email list that, like, genuinely engages and converts? Maybe you’re curious about the steps to transform email marketing into a revenue stream. Or maybe you’re on a mission to redefine your email strategies to build a loyal community.

[00:00:28] If those questions resonate with you, You’re going to love today’s show. We are thrilled to host a guest who has navigated this terrain with notable success. She is an email marketing whiz who turned her early efforts into a multiple six figure income. Liz is going to share her journey, her insights, and her top strategies for successful email list growth.

[00:00:47] So sit back, clear your schedule, clear your mind, and get ready for this week’s episode of Social Media News Live. Liz, so excited. I’m so excited you’re here.

[00:00:58] Liz Wilcox: Oh my gosh, that’s the best intro ever. I need to, I need to take Jeff everywhere I go. I was like, dang, I, like, who’s coming on the show? This sounds amazing. Notable success.

[00:01:10] Jeff Sieh: That’s right. She is great. And we got some of our friends stopping by today. Our friend Gary Stockton, Stockton saying good morning, cool people. Gary, you are one of the coolest people I know, so thank you for always watching and showing up. And Footsteps in Barcelona is so thankful for you to be here again with us.

[00:01:28] Make sure you go check This guy out, he is amazing, and so I’m, you’ve changed your name and I’ve always, it’s always like you’re rebranding, but I think it’s really smart because we were talking and he had some YouTube issues, so I’m glad that you have stopped by. So I’m excited, I have to press all the buttons today because Connor is gone, but we’re going to be talking about this email list stuff.

[00:01:48] But I want to tell you guys who Liz is, if you don’t know Liz. So she is the fresh princess. This is an email strategist and keynote speaker showing small businesses how to build online relationships, package their magic and turn it into emails that people want to read and most importantly, purchase from.

[00:02:08] In the span of five years, Liz grew and sold a successful blog. She got bought out of her second company and built the third into multiple six figure party that just won’t quit. In other words. She now teaches online entrepreneurs to simplify the whole email marketing thing and finally master their sales in the way that leverages their personality, vision, and values.

[00:02:29] She’s got this, so your users, your bio said 2000 plus users, but it’s bigger than that now, right?

[00:02:35] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, that bio needs to be updated. I think we are almost to 4, 000 users inside the membership. So, thanks for pointing that out.

[00:02:44] Jeff Sieh: yeah. So, and she’s got this really cool 20 minute newsletter technique and an email staircase framework that she’s taught to tens of thousands of creatives, freelancers, e commerce shop owners, and small businesses across the globe, all with this really cool, unique teaching style.

[00:02:58] And you’re not going to forget Liz anytime soon. So she lives in Florida, one of my favorite places and Liz, once again, so glad you’re here.

[00:03:05] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, I’m so glad to be here. This is awesome.

[00:03:09] Jeff Sieh: raining in Florida? Is it crazy in Florida right now?

[00:03:13] Liz Wilcox: nope, it looks beautiful. A little, a little gray skies, but I’m definitely going swimming later. So, hashtag humblebrag.

[00:03:21] Jeff Sieh: that’s great. Yeah. It’s a, it’s a cool place. I love me some Florida. So we’re talking about emailless growth tactics today, but I do want to give a shout out to our sponsors who I mentioned before, Ecamm. They are the ones who make the show possible. Just Liz and I are both right off of their Ecamm creators camp.

[00:03:37] And I’m telling you when they open this thing up again. You need to get, signed up for it. It was amazing experience. You can find out more about Ecamm at social media news live.com/ecamm. They just rolled out a new, update. It’s got some really cool stuff with overlays and transition, so you wanna make check them.

[00:03:52] You wanna make sure to check them out. Social media news live.com/ecamm. Alright, Liz, your favorite topic we’re gonna jump into today because. you know, all things, she’s the girl I kind of go to for, you know, everything that has to do with email. So what motivated you to start building your email list and kind of dive into it?

[00:04:13] Liz Wilcox: Money. I love money. I need money. I love money. I tend to be a little shameless about it. And I think that you should be too. So, when I was listening to, you know, amazing podcasts and shows like Jeff’s, I kept hearing from people, oh, the number one mistake I made in my business was not taking my email list seriously.

[00:04:36] Not starting my email list on day one, because my email list generates the most revenue. And when I started my travel blog, I knew that I wanted it to be, you know, a revenue machine. It was going to be the vehicle to get me into full time travel life. I actually started my travel blog before I started traveling, but I knew, like I just believed what people said that, you know, for every dollar you spent with email, when you do it correctly, you could get up to 40 bucks in return.

[00:05:06] So I actually started my email list right away, like day one. And I. Launched my blog, on Facebook. I just said, hey, I’ve got this blog now, you should sign up for updates because everybody said just get people on your list, you know, just worry about getting people on your list right now. You can figure out the rest later.

[00:05:26] So that’s what I did. and now I’ve. I’ve owned four email lists. I’ve helped, I know it sounds crazy, but I really have helped tens of thousands of people start their email list. And I just love, you know, seeing those little email addresses come up in my ConvertKit account.

[00:05:45] Jeff Sieh: So that’s really cool. So, yeah, ConvertKit is what I use too, but I wanted to. To kind of talk about like people who are just getting started or maybe they have neglected. They’ve kind of started building a brand like you blog, but they didn’t start building an email list. How did you first get like your, let’s just break it down to something simple for somebody.

[00:06:03] How did you get your first like a hundred subscribers? Was it just like, Hey, I got a list, join it. Or was it, did you have an offer? How did you get those first hundred?

[00:06:12] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so I actually, I started off Collecting email addresses with a free plugin for my WordPress site. ’cause I couldn’t justify, at the time, ConvertKit was $29 a month. They didn’t have like a free feature yet. And I said, when I get to a hundred subscribers, then I’m gonna pay that $29 a month. And so I started with just a.

[00:06:35] And to Jeff’s point, I didn’t really have anything to offer other than Liz Wilcox. I said, hey, follow me on my journey as I start this blog. And so I got my first probably 20 subscribers just from my Facebook profile. You know, not a Facebook page, like my actual profile. Personal profile. You know the one you talked to grandma on, right.

[00:06:56] And . So that’s how I got my first, let’s say about 20. And then I started to get really excited. I was like, oh my gosh, all these YouTube videos I’m watching, like this is real. People are actually signing up. People are actually, you know, opening these emails I’m sending. And so I told myself if I can get to a hundred.

[00:07:13] That’s when I’m gonna get ConvertKit, and so I made an offer, like Jeff said. Sometimes most people have like, they call it an opt in or a freebie, you can think of it as, you know, sort of ethical bribe, right? That’s what they used to call it. You know, I give you X and you give me your email address. So then I can continue communicating and marketing to you.

[00:07:40] and so I came up with this, like, how to declutter your house. I was already, like, I tended to have a minimalist personality. And one of the biggest problems I was seeing as I was getting into this RV travel was that people had too much stuff to put in their RVs. So I created, I think it was like a 5 day email series, you know, over 5 days I’m going to help you declutter 5 areas of your home.

[00:08:06] Hey, that was a pretty good idea. And I just went, I just went into Facebook groups and I, I would search for the word declutter or like too much stuff, you know, anything kind of adjacent, those keywords. And I would start conversations with people and I would say, oh, here are my tips. And if they responded back and said, Oh, thank you.

[00:08:30] You know, and I’d say, Hey, I actually have a five day series, you know, check it out here. So I didn’t just go in and say, Hey guys, this is my freebie. Like, you know, come, you know, come to the gate. I did my due diligence. I, You know, I only engage with the people that started engaging with me. And so it was a lot of work.

[00:08:50] Like, I’m not saying that those first hundred are not going to be work. It was a lot of work. I was staying up late. You know, I had a toddler, so I was staying up late, you know, in the Facebook chats and, you know, asking people to join. I was joining other Facebook groups that, you know, had other bloggers asking them to share my thing and I would share theirs.

[00:09:11] And that’s how I hit my first hundred. I think it took me about two, maybe three months

[00:09:19] of active, I want to say like actively pursuing these hundred people.

[00:09:25] Jeff Sieh: And I think that’s, what’s important is that you, you went in and you didn’t just spam people. Like you went in, you started conversations, they come, came back and you, and then you said, Oh, by the way, I have this further resource that you can get. You just didn’t go in there and start shouting at people that, Hey, I got this, which I think is important for people to understand.

[00:09:43] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, amen. Y’all, we can’t, especially now, this was seven, eight years ago, we can’t go into Facebook groups, you know, expecting just to, you know, hey, check this out, check this out, even for Facebook to show that we are sending an outbound link, right? Facebook wants us to To stay on the page, right? They want us to stay on Facebook, and so they’re not really going to show a bunch of links if you just start spamming, right?

[00:10:10] And now they have spam filters. I even have a Facebook group where I’ll ask people for links, and Facebook will say, Hey, is this spam or do you actually want to approve this in your group? So nowadays there are a lot more filters that Facebook is using, but it’s still a good strategy, especially using your personal profile to say, Hey.

[00:10:30] This is what I’m doing now. Are you interested? And anyone that likes or comments, you know, you can DM them and say, Hey, you know, and this is like with authenticity and integrity, guys, you know, Hey, thanks so much. If you’re interested, you know, here’s the link to sign up for more updates or, you know, I’d appreciate it if you passed it along.

[00:10:50] No pressure, not trying to be sleazy. You know, I’m just really excited about this, and I want, you know, I, thank you for, you know, letting me share.

[00:11:00] Jeff Sieh: Very cool. So one of the things I wanted to, since you mentioned Facebook and you have your Facebook group, do you require people to join the group to give you your email? That’s kind of one of those ethical bribes.

[00:11:11] Liz Wilcox: I don’t require it, but I do ask. Actually, there’s a Facebook group I used to own. I sold it with my last business. It now has over a hundred thousand people in it, and that was my biggest list builder when I had that travel blog. Cause it was very niched. It was called RV Renovations. So now, anytime…

[00:11:35] That’s the first thing that pops up and, you know, I started it just because I had that subset in my, in my email list and it just started growing and I thought, hey, to Jeff’s point, I should add like a, Hey, do you want my 101 RV Renovation Tips? I didn’t have 101 RV Renovation Tips, but I knew I needed to collect these leads, right?

[00:11:59] And so I created that and I got those leads and I, at the time, I don’t know what the conversion is now because I don’t own the group, but at the time it was like 40 to 50 percent of people. So almost every other person would give me their email. And I grew the email list from like 2, 000 to 10, 000. you know, within a couple of years, just from that Facebook.

[00:12:24] I know, it’s insane. It’s so crazy to me that the group now has over 100, 000 people. And I hope whoever owns it now, is collecting those leads. Because, wow.

[00:12:37] Jeff Sieh: Yeah. So on, on that note, I want to talk about, because you said something earlier and one of the things I think that maybe I wasn’t clear about the beginning, most of your list building strategies and what you teach is organic. It’s not an ad based kind of strategy. This is very organic.

[00:12:53] How you got those, just like you were talking about with your RV website. One of the things that. You said, like 1 equals like 40 late. 1 spent collecting email equals like 40 later. and I did not know that, but is there any other like misconceptions about building lists that a lot of new people don’t realize?

[00:13:13] Because when I hear that, I’m like, Oh my gosh, what am I doing? I need to get off this call and start really building my email list, you know, because it’s. Email list sounds boring and everybody wants like, oh, email. We know we’re supposed to mail our email, but, but it really is. You don’t really have a business until you have an email list, really.

[00:13:33] Liz Wilcox: I agree with Jeff. Amen. Like, let’s put that, let’s put that up on the slides. dude, where’s Connor when you, when you need him? But, so. I don’t know if it’s a misconception, but something I think people, they know, but they don’t feel it, so to speak, is you own your email list, right? So raise your hand if you were alive in 2022, and you watched a billionaire buy a social media platform, and then suddenly, you know, it started to implode.

[00:14:06] If you had built your entire audience on that social media platform, You might be screwed. You might be wondering where your eyeballs went, right? What my viewership is down or you know, nobody’s commenting on this. It doesn’t have as many You know, I guess they don’t probably don’t call it a retweet anymore if it’s not called

[00:14:25] Jeff Sieh: an excerpt. I

[00:14:27] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, you know what I’m saying, you know not to call anybody out but you know, we we yeah We all lived through that and who’s to say Who’s to say that that can’t happen with another social media platform, right?

[00:14:43] Like I was just saying with my list building strategy at the beginning, you know, Facebook, the way I was list building seven years ago, I have to be a lot more intentional. You know, fast forward to 2023, because Facebook is just different. They have more spam filters. They navigate things differently.

[00:15:02] Their, you know, privacy policy is different, etc., etc., etc. And so, the only thing we can know for certain… are those email addresses to have them. If we use MailChimp today and we decide to use ActiveCampaign next week, we can take those email addresses with us. There is no other platform, that can do that.

[00:15:27] And so that’s why I’m so passionate.

[00:15:34] Jeff Sieh: I

[00:15:36] Liz Wilcox: I’m gonna give you to spend years building a platform loving on, you know, their people in one place, and then that place disappears or changes their policies. I want you to be able to, you know, own your email list. And you’ll be able to dictate, dictate what you say, when you say it, how you say it, and who sees it.

[00:15:59] Jeff Sieh: think that’s so important. And speaking about loving on people, we’ve got, Jim Fuse saying, good morning, Liz and Jeff. Great to meet Liz at Creator Camp. Yes, she was there. Jim was there. It was great to hang out with him. As well, and one of the things, and there was so much great training there, but, you know, a lot of people were talking about, you know, we create content, we’re doing all this stuff where we’re doing a show, we’re doing a YouTube channel, we’re writing a blog, so. You talked about lead magnets and how that kind of grew your list. You had that one thing, you went into those Facebook groups and talked, about it and kind of gave some advice and then people would sign up for more. What are some other great lead magnets? Because to be honest, that’s where I have struggled.

[00:16:38] Like, I can do all the things, I can give great advice to everybody else, but when it comes to my own stuff, it’s really hard for me to come up with a good lead magnet. So when people in your group are saying like, Hey, Liz, I know I need to have an email list, I know I need a lead magnet. Where do you point them?

[00:16:53] First of all, like what’s the first thing that you, you teach them?

[00:16:57] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so, okay friends, I’m gonna pull out a prop. So, I like, I like to think of, like, my business as a university, right? So, Liz Wilcox University. And one day, I hope each and every one of you is walking across that stage and I’m handing you a diploma, right? And what is that degree in? It’s make money with email.

[00:17:20] That’s my big vision for you. I don’t care about your podcast. I don’t, you know, know anything about anything except email marketing and you’re making money with it. That’s all, that’s my big vision. That’s the degree I’m handing you, right? And so think about your vision. What is it that you want for your potential clients, students, customers, and you know, what is that degree you’re going to hand them?

[00:17:45] Now, as far as the lead magnet goes, I want you to take it all the way back to the first day of class. What is it that they need to learn or what resource can you give them that’s going to ensure that one day they’re walking across the stage and you’re giving them that degree? That’s an excellent lead magnet.

[00:18:09] you know, and then as far as format goes, just think about who your people are. I said that my, first lead magnet was a five day series. So kind of like an email course, right? But my ideal customer was a man in his 60s. A man in his 60s is likely At least halfway retired and his children are out of his home.

[00:18:34] He’s doing nothing but play on the internet all day. He’s loves his email, right? And so that made sense for my student, right? Nowadays, my lead magnet is inside a Google doc. It’s an entire welcome sequence written for you. for you to just copy and paste and kind of zhuzh up, right? So I keep it in Google Docs because I know my ideal client or customer is You know, using Google Docs and is a either part time or full time entrepreneur.

[00:19:08] And the less barriers I can have for them, the more they’re going to actually use it. So think about who your ideal person is, what vision, what degree are you handing them? And what is that perfect first day of class, whether it’s a lesson you’re giving them, Or it’s just a resource to help them get started.

[00:19:28] For example, you know, it might be a quick checklist. It might be a meditation. It might be a playlist of your top three podcasts to get them going. it might be a Spotify playlist. If you work with stressed out moms, maybe it’s just a, Hey, let’s just… Learn how to relax through music first. Here’s a playlist that I use while I’m cleaning, to make sure I don’t rage at everyone, when the TV gets, when the TV turns off, right?

[00:20:00] And so think about your ideal person. Think about them walking across that stage. And then take it back to the first day of class, that’s your lead magnet.

[00:20:11] Jeff Sieh: So, let’s do this, because this is once again, I love having this show because it’s free consulting, right? So, I have a course, and you guys have heard me talk about it before, and if you get my emails you’ll know it’s on the bottom, and that I have been advertising. So, it’s Descript, because I’m really passionate about getting people to repurpose their content, because I think we give away so much stuff and then we don’t repurpose it enough with all the algorithms, yada, yada, yada.

[00:20:32] Anyway, so I’ve got this course, I’m dripping it out, right? So, what kind of freebie should I use for this Descript course? Should it be like a glossary of terms, maybe, in Descript? Should it be a welcome sequence, like, that would finally upsell them at the end to the Descript course? What are your thoughts on, like, a good lead magnet for this?

[00:20:54] I have struggled with this, but I also, I have some ideas, but I want to know what your thoughts are, with being the email maven

[00:21:00] Liz Wilcox: so as your ideal person who knows that I need to repurpose content but never does it because it feels like just another thing on my to do list and I’d rather go out and make money. you know, I’d rather just write an email and, you know. Make a quick hundred bucks or whatever. So for me, what would be helpful like thinking about that first day of class is even just a quick maybe five minute video of you walking through the process of using Descript and how actually simple it can be or even not using Descript and how you know little tricks That you’ve found without using software or, you know, a third party platform of how to repurpose to show me just how simple it can be.

[00:21:54] So, for example, you know, this podcast episode, you might take it. And, you know, make a five minute Loom video, or, well, you’ve got Ecamm, so you could just record it natively, right? And say, you know, hey, this is how I’m going to repurpose my podcast episode for A, B, and C. These are the tools I use, Descript, whatever, whatever, whatever.

[00:22:17] and let me just show you how I actually do it in five minutes. And then you just show them a kind of over the shoulder look, because for me that would help demystify. For me it seems like, oh my gosh, I have all this stuff, how am I even gonna do this, I have no idea. Full disclosure guys, and I need to go buy this course right after this.

[00:22:42] wow, Jeff’s really raking it in today.

[00:22:45] Jeff Sieh: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:22:46] Liz Wilcox: free consulting and a course, purchase. So, I had an interview with someone and they said, Oh, I’m going to send you this interview so you can repurpose it yourself. And I thought, Oh, that’s so nice. Thank you so much. So she sent it over and you want to know what I did with that?

[00:23:01] I archived the email immediately because I knew I wasn’t going to do it. Because in my head… I know that it’s just too hard, it’s not a good, spend on my time right now. So something that shows that it doesn’t take as long as you think it does, or something that can, you know, move the needle a little bit to convince me that it is worth my time.

[00:23:25] Jeff Sieh: Just as I figure out, as we talk about some of these workflows and thinking about it. So then if somebody downloads your RV checklist or my over the shoulder descript kind of walkthrough, do they then get on a sequence to get on, like, is that how it usually works for you? Is that okay? They can download the free.

[00:23:43] The freebie, then you get them on kind of a email sequence, like, okay, I’m going to give you my descript training in five days, like a little snippet of that, or how do you usually like to do that after they get the freebie?

[00:23:56] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so I actually am super lazy, and I like to keep things really simple, and the word For me, for years, was really, really scary, and so I suggest only having a funnel, like Jeff is saying, like, you know, leading them into a course sale, when you have a proven product. So, if Jeff has been selling this course for a year, he’s launched it a few times, he knows why people buy it, or, and why they don’t, then we can, you know, create a very specific lead magnet.

[00:24:31] To, you know, funnel them into some, sales emails. But if it’s a new product, if it’s, you know, something that’s not as proven, what I want you to do is have a regular welcome sentence that goes off your personality. Your vision and your values, and then just send weekly newsletters where you’re, you know, following up, you’re staying top of mind, you’re showing that you’re invested in them by sharing tips and personal updates.

[00:25:04] And throughout those newsletters, you can sprinkle in the sales messages, you know, in a PS. Don’t forget, I have this course on Descript. you know, also you can have something called a super signature. Which is at the bottom, it’s like the footer of your email, and it says, you know, P. S. When you’re ready, here are ways I can help you.

[00:25:24] Or, you know, here’s how we can work together. And, you know, Jeff might say, you know, check out my podcast. Check out my one on one services. Check out my Descript course. So people buy when they’re ready, and it takes the pressure off of having to have a funnel that takes a long time to create, and, you know, takes, A lot of, you know, looking at the metrics often to see if it’s actually working.

[00:25:51] Jeff Sieh: this is why I love Liz is because she, she just kind of cuts through all the fluff and a lot of the, what the gurus are saying and like, this is what works, this is what you do it, don’t overthink it and just do it. So I, I kind of resonate with all that and I know that my audience is too. So, Facebook users, I don’t know why it’s not coming through since I love the degree and the first class metaphor and great idea for the Spotify playlist and they’re going to get on my email list.

[00:26:14] That’s awesome. but there’s a question. Any tips on how to get over the overwhelm of writing a creative email within the complex formatting style slash pages of email platforms? one, get on Liz’s, plan that she has on her monthly thing that’s just amazing for 9 and she has a swipe file that’s awesome.

[00:26:37] But, go ahead, like, maybe talk about like different platforms, like the formatting you have to do like in ConvertKit if you want to. I think that’s the question they’re asking.

[00:26:45] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so, I would say get over the overwhelm by disregarding all of that. I don’t think you need a creative email, you just need an email, that clicks with your people. So, I’m trying to find, so I can kind of visually show you if you’re watching, but you really just gotta do a few different things. So in your emails, and I’ll get to the formatting in a second.

[00:27:17] So in your emails, we are actually following an email staircase. Okay. So first we have a follower, then we have a friend, and then we have a customer. So.

[00:27:31] Jeff Sieh: I just lost your audio Liz. https: www.

[00:27:38] Liz Wilcox: But in general, like with our friends, we’re just real people. So instead of trying to get creative, instead of trying to be interesting, here’s what we can do when we’re writing our emails instead. Number one, just show that you are invested. Show you’re invested in them, and show that you are invested in that vision for them.

[00:27:58] I want you. to do XYZ one day. Here’s how I’m helping you. Whether that’s giving tips, whether it’s giving encouragement, whether it’s, you know, sharing the latest discount on, you know, your Descript course because you know that’s what they need to get to the next level, right? Show that you’re invested and also show you’re invested in your business.

[00:28:19] Yes, this works even if you are not B2B. Your consumers want to know that you are serious. You know, and I say it with love. But it’s for all of us. We are a dime a dozen. I’m not the only email marketer out there. You’re listening to this. You’re not the only you out there, but when you can show you’re invested in your business.

[00:28:41] Hey, I bought a new laptop. I invested in this program called Ecamm, which allows me to do awesome stuff. I, you know, went to creator camp where I’m gonna make better YouTube videos now, right? Showing that you are invested is going to help people invest back into you, okay? The second thing is just share in a relatable way.

[00:29:03] And I think what this user is asking about like, how can we get creative, like, that is so overwhelming, right? That is so like, oh my gosh, this person’s email looks so good, and, you know, I’m thinking about Ecamm’s, emails. They’re beautiful, right? Like, I could never do that. I’m a

[00:29:22] Jeff Sieh: hmm.

[00:29:22] Liz Wilcox: two step chick. If it takes more than three steps, I’m out.

[00:29:25] I can’t format. I am not doing HTML. But I can… Be relatable. I can share in a relatable way. I’m not trying to be interesting. I’m just trying to be relatable. Something like, you know, hey, before the podcast, I walked my dog, you know, and I, I was late for sound check. You know, that’s relatable. That’s not interesting.

[00:29:49] It’s incredibly relatable. And hopefully that will help you, eliminate some of that overwhelm. And the third thing is just stay top of mind. And, you know, little hint here. When you do these first two things really, really well, staying top of mind actually becomes really simple because they know you’re invested.

[00:30:11] So if you forget an email… You know, one week or it’s been a couple weeks, you know, they’ll still remember you because they know you’re relatable. They know you share really good stuff and they know you’re invested in them. So staying top of mind becomes really, really simple. And then as far as, you know, like the, the format of your email, if you’re into a beautiful aesthetic, definitely, you know, look through, the, the different emails that you can send.

[00:30:42] Templates, but if you’re like me, I don’t, I mean, Ecamm is making me look really good right now, but in general, like I, I just hit send on like a standard text only email. Maybe I’ll add a gif or a picture, and that’s it. I’m all about, you know, it’s a newsletter, not a novel. So just get it, get on with it, you know, get to the point.

[00:31:11] Jeff Sieh: So, I think that is awesome, and by the way, Katie S., Katie, thank you so much for letting me know who it was. she, she says, this is so fab, Liz. Love your training. So, as I’m going through, for you guys who are listening to this, on the podcast, make sure that you go check out Liz at lizwilcox. com, that’s L I Z W I L C O X.

[00:31:32] com. I’m serious, it is the best nine dollars you will spend on your business. It’s her swipe files, the her encouragement that she does in there, the trainings, it is so worth it. In fact, I mean, it’s just a great model, of what she’s doing over there. So make sure you guys go check her out. I wanna talk a little bit about, you know.

[00:31:54] So, kind of this initial stages of list building, so let’s say I’ve got like, for example, this is what I have, so I have an email that goes out that pretty much just tells on, it comes out on Friday morning, tells about the show. Liz, I know you’re on there, you’ve given me feedback on it before, is there a next step to that?

[00:32:13] Like I’ve got, you know, this is, it’s a reminder email, it does what it’s supposed to do, it gets people into the show or watching the replay. Should I do another email on Monday or in the middle of the week doing what you’re saying now, which is building that, you know, friendship, I guess, is what I’m, you know, the, the relationship.

[00:32:30] So how would somebody in, in my kind of situation who’s got like, you know, we’ve got the standard, we’ve been doing this newsletter for years, you know, but we want to take our email to the next step. What do we do?

[00:32:41] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, you might add a second email or you could just add a little bit more to that reminder email. Even just expressing gratitude, in your emails is a really great way to re engage those subscribers, and to keep them engaged, and to keep new people, like, intrigued. Just saying, you know, hey, this is a reminder, we’re going live in 20 minutes.

[00:33:08] you know, see you there, P. S., you know, I’m so grateful you’re on this email list, really. Thank, you know, thanks for hanging out with me. I actually did that this morning. I’ve been doing this experiment with daily emails, and I sent out, you know, I’ve sent maybe like 20 emails in a row, and so today I said, The very first thing was, you know, Hey, thanks for opening this and reading it today, it means a lot to me.

[00:33:33] Anyway, dot dot dot, here’s what we want to talk about today. And it was, you know, whatever kind of email. And so even just adding a little bit of gratitude, at least, you know, like once a month. Hey, thanks for opening this. Here’s what I, here’s what I need to say, today. You know, here’s, here’s the show.

[00:33:52] Here’s when it is, here’s where it is, you know, starts in 20 minutes, peace out, right? Just keeping it really, just keeping it really simple. Again, it’s a newsletter, not a novel. So I don’t want you to, you know, freak out like, oh, how do I show I’m invested? A simple, like, little piece of gratitude shows you’re invested.

[00:34:11] Hey, thanks for reading this today. Or saying, you know, oh my gosh, this, you know, this email is really quick because, again, I’m late for soundcheck, you know, you know me, you know, but I, I didn’t want you to miss out on, this live event, so check it out here. So you could add a first email. That goes more into depth, especially if you’re in my membership, I write that email basically for you.

[00:34:38] but I think in those, live reminders, just having a little bit of gratitude, showing a little bit of personality, maybe a little quick one or two sentence update about how your morning is going. Hey, thinking about you this morning as I was, you know, washing my beard. Or whatever, right?

[00:34:57] Jeff Sieh: right.

[00:34:58] Liz Wilcox: and you know, like, ha ha ha.

[00:35:00] Anyway, you know the drill, Friday is here, we’re going live, you know, click here for YouTube. Click here for Facebook. would love to see you there. You know, every, you know, every little live face I see means a lot to me. Peace out. I think that would really, really, boost things for you long term.

[00:35:21] Jeff Sieh: So let’s talk about, ’cause I ’cause that, those are all great ideas and I was even thinking like even more because I have such a great community. Like Katie was here and Jim was here and, even maybe taking it and highlighting maybe a member in my emails too. ’cause I’ve actually brought in, like Gary has been on the show before and that was, I think that was really cool to bring in my community and kind of elevate them.

[00:35:45] You know, to, to my other, inside of the community, so I think that might be something I want to try as an email thing. What are you going to

[00:35:51] Liz Wilcox: I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m. I love that idea. Always, always highlight your community. It shows those people that maybe are new to your community, or found you in a, you know, roundabout way that you even have a community, and that it’s engaged. Another great way to increase, you know, clickovers to your channels, is to say, you know, a PS, I love a PS, I love a good PS.

[00:36:17] Jeff Sieh: what I do.

[00:36:19] Liz Wilcox: you know, P. S., last week we talked about email marketing with Liz. she told me to do X, Y, Z. You know, I did X and Y already and I’ve seen this result. I, you know, I love my guests and, you know, I can’t wait for you to check out this week’s too, you know. Click over here, and then you link out, you could link two things there.

[00:36:41] You could link, you know, Liz Wilcox’s episode, and you could link today’s episode. And, you know, people, variety is the spice of life, so now you’re giving them options, and, you know, they can click on whichever one interests them the most.

[00:36:56] Jeff Sieh: That’s a great idea. Now I have to do it because she said to do it. Dang it, now I

[00:37:00] Liz Wilcox: I’m like, yeah, write that down. I need to…

[00:37:01] Jeff Sieh: that’s homework. so,

[00:37:03] Liz Wilcox: yeah, that’s a good one.

[00:37:06] Jeff Sieh: let’s talk about, you know, you know, when you start email marketing, you start, when you start researching it, you get into like, okay, you need to segment your list.

[00:37:13] What are your thoughts on segmentation? When do we need to do it? Do we need to do it with those first hundred? Do we need to segment them like the first hundred is something or I know you like to keep things simple. So what are your thoughts on segmenting your email list?

[00:37:26] Liz Wilcox: Segmenting your email list is a 2. 0 strategy. If you’re not emailing in the first place, why are you worrying about segmentation? Right? So we’ve got to have people on our list to segment. So I always say, like, yes, segmentation works. If I owned a shoe store, and I had a big email list, and I could segment my list and sell, you know, send flip flop sales to people in Florida in December, and, you know, the people over in Iowa, I’m gonna send boots.

[00:38:01] emails about boots, right? That’s what segmentation is, right? And it works so, so well. But, it doesn’t work well if it stunts you from emailing in the first place. So, if you are… You know, even if you’re emailing on a regular basis, but you’re not selling on a regular basis, segmentation is not for you yet.

[00:38:25] What I want you to do is focus on getting people to click, getting people over to, you know, your content channels if that’s, one of your goals. I want you to focus on getting people to reply. So you know who is on your list versus just guessing who is on your list. and once you can feel, I know this kind of sounds woo woo, but you’ll get it when you get it.

[00:38:48] Once you can start to feel connected to your email list, like I’m sending out an email, this appears to be working, I’m getting traffic, I’m getting a reply or two here and there, people are clicking, they seem to be responding well. Then you want to say, okay. I know I have one ideal customer, but really I know they’re at different stages, so let me segment.

[00:39:11] For example, with the RV travel blog, after a few years, I started asking people, you know, do you already own your RV? Are you still looking? Are you full time? Are you part time? You know, what? And that’s when I started segmenting that list. But it wasn’t until three years later, and I was already making, know, Like, I was making real money.

[00:39:34] I was launching courses. I was having, products. You know, it wasn’t a six figure business like I have now, but in the RV industry, as a blogger, it felt awesome. I was building traffic to get, you know, ad, revenue from that. I was selling my courses. I felt really, really connected. And that’s when I started segmenting, to scale it even further.

[00:39:58] yeah. So you, I mean, segmentation is a 2. 0 strategy.

[00:40:02] Jeff Sieh: gotcha. So let’s talk about something that happens like right from the get go and I wanted to talk about one You know, you’ll, you’ll notice that people will quit engaging with your email. So I want to talk to you about like a re engagement kind of strategy. And second, how do you deal when they unsubscribe?

[00:40:19] Like when you’re first getting started with those first hundred, when it’s like you get the hundred and it goes back down to 98 and 96, 95, how do you handle those kinds of things? One, you know, the people who unsubscribe and then the ones that you need to re engage with before that happens.

[00:40:33] Liz Wilcox: Right. So let’s talk about unsubscribes really quick. Email is so emotional. Like Jeff said, you worked really hard for those hundred people. I said, you know, my first hundred people, you know, I was up late at night while the toddler was sleeping trying to find these people. And yeah, when they started unsubscribing.

[00:40:55] It, it hurt my little heart. It really did. And I know email feels emotional. Number one, a lot of email marketers try to complicate it. and so it already feels slightly frustrating on top of like, I poured my heart and soul into this email and now you’re telling me it’s not good enough and you no longer want to hear from me.

[00:41:17] Like, okay, ouch, that sucks, right? And we can see exactly who it is. Like, Meemaw, you really? Meemaw, what did I say? Why did you unsubscribe? I’m like, you know, this sucks. And so I understand why it feels emotional. But I want you to understand that email marketing is consent based. So I opt in to hear more from Jeff, you opt in to hear more from me, right?

[00:41:43] I consented to that. And we all like to live in a world where we own our consent, right? And so unsubscribe is just somebody saying, you know what, actually I got on this bus, I thought this was the direction I was going, you know, I thought I wanted to earn that degree. But really, I’m not that serious about it, or I’m gonna go in a different direction, and we should let them off the bus, right?

[00:42:06] So just think of it as like, if we’re, if we’re sticking with that, you know, university and degree analogy, the unsubscribe is just them changing majors. And there’s nothing wrong with changing majors, right? And so think of it like that. Hopefully that helps you be a little less emotional about it. And just know with every email that you write, you are leaning further into the business you want to be, you know, the way you want to represent yourself, right?

[00:42:37] We’re going to get better with practice. So with every email, you should feel like stronger about your brand, like, yep, that email. Felt really good to send. You know, that I said exactly what I wanted to say, I gave the tip I wanted to, you know, I wanted to remind people because I need traffic, you know, whatever the objective was for that, and this feels good.

[00:42:59] So those unsubscribes, it’s like, well, I did the thing I wanted to do, and if they want to change their major, if they want to get off the bus, that’s okay.

[00:43:09] Jeff Sieh: That is good stuff. So let’s talk about re engagement. How do you, before we get into that, you know, when they leave, we want to do our best to keep them reading our stuff. So when you start noticing like, okay, these, do you, here’s a great one. Like, I know it’s going to convert kit. You can resend to people who did not open.

[00:43:27] Do you use that feature or is that like

[00:43:30] Liz Wilcox: Nope,

[00:43:31] Jeff Sieh: Okay. Tell us why. That

[00:43:33] Liz Wilcox: use it. I don’t know why, I don’t know why email service providers tell us to resend to unopens. I actually have a blog post about this, that I’ll give Jeff so he can put it in the show notes. what it actually does is, like, okay, you get a, say, ConvertKit or whatever tells you, hey, you’ve got a 30 percent open rate.

[00:43:51] Do you want to resend? And you hit that resend button and then you get a 20 percent open rate, right? And suddenly ConvertKit shows you that you have a 50 percent open rate. But here’s what actually happened. I like to think of, you know, the internet as like the internet gods. So when you sent out that 30%, that initial email, and you got 30%, you told the, or the internet gods were, informed that 70% of your people did not care about that email.

[00:44:22] Right? So let’s say, you know, that 70 percent red flags, right? And then you sent almost, maybe you, you know, you change the language a little bit, you change the subject line, and you send it out again. It got a 20 percent open rate. Now you’re telling the internet gods that I’m going to send the same email, and now only, or, and now not 70 percent are throwing up red flags, now 80 percent are throwing up red flags.

[00:44:50] And it was the same content. So that red flag is a little deeper shade of red than the initial one, right? And so what you’ve done, you don’t actually have a 50 percent open rate on that email. I mean, I guess. Literally, 50 percent of people opened it, but technically, you sent out two emails that were the same and the second one did worse than the first, which signals to the internet gods that you don’t care about your subscribers, you just want to send emails, and that is not a good look for you, babe.

[00:45:25] Jeff Sieh: is, that is really good to know. Thank

[00:45:27] Liz Wilcox: It is so good to know, spread the word, make it a soundbite,

[00:45:31] Jeff Sieh: so

[00:45:32] Liz Wilcox: I’m here for the gospel.

[00:45:34] Jeff Sieh: that’s right, Liz will preach it, and once again, make sure you guys go sign up for her, her, her, subscription is amazing for 9 a month, you get all this advice and more, so let’s, so, okay, don’t resend to unopens, so how do we re engage those people who may have like, you know, they may have thrown it in the, you know, a spam bot or, you know, SaneBox or whatever they’re doing, how do we re engage those people who, Aren’t opening,

[00:46:01] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so number one sometimes you might not be able to re engage them and you have to be okay with letting them go Right. I know email is emotional. I’ve said it before I’ve said it again It might feel very like cringy to you know Un subscribe them yourself to remove them from your email list because you worked so hard on list building in the first place.

[00:46:25] But, again, those internet gods are out there, and they are throwing up flags left and right. And we want as many green flags as possible, right? So what we want to do is, within your email service provider, you should have a way of looking at those people who haven’t opened. Different email service providers identify them as like cold or unengaged, and they have different criteria.

[00:46:50] So you might want to ask them, should be in their help or their support, really easily. But usually it’s like anywhere from 30 to 90 days. This person hasn’t opened an email, they’re not engaging. And so what you can do is send something called a cold scrub sequence. So it’s just a sequence of emails, that, you know, try to reengage them.

[00:47:14] And you want to have some fun or, stand out subject lines in those so they actually see them. And what I recommend is like three or four emails. But send them quicker than your regular frequency. So if you email once a week, maybe send these out every other day so that your name is popping up in their inbox more.

[00:47:36] And so, you know, they’re, they’re more apt to open it. Oh, why does Liz keep emailing me? Usually I only have to, usually I only have to ignore that once a week. Like what’s going on, right? Or they check their spam folder and they see you in there. They recognize your name. Maybe they don’t remember who you are, but they.

[00:47:55] They recognize the brand or the name and so they open it because they see a few different emails in their inbox. So send it a little more, frequently and within those emails, just remind them of who you are and ask them if they want to remain on your email list. You know, Hey, Liz here, that email lady, maybe put a picture of your brand or your face, whatever you think they’re going to recognize.

[00:48:19] You know, I have little gifs that I put in and you know, do you want to stay on this email list? Are you still looking for tips on email marketing? Right, so make, be explicit about what you teach or what you share, what you do. Ask them if they still want to be a part of it and get them to click a button that says yes.

[00:48:38] And then they’ll, they’ll be removed from that cold subscriber because they’re not cold anymore. You know, they’ve since engaged, right? And so, send out a few emails like that, and maybe one of the last ones, you can actually, you know, teach them something. Like, hey, here’s my number one tip. I noticed, and you can even say, like, I’ve noticed you aren’t opening my emails.

[00:49:01] And, you know, by the end of the week, I’m going to remove all the emails that, You know, I, I don’t want to, I don’t want to be annoying in your inbox, but like I, I’d want to leave you with these parting words or whatever, and then you give your number one tip, or you share your favorite podcast or whatever, right?

[00:49:21] And then you can say like, if you still want to be on the list, if you like this tip and you want more. I’d love for you to continue to be on the list, click that button, right? And so, then, I want you to go for a walk, you know, do whatever you, do whatever you do to calm yourself down. And then, you know, after a few days, like give, give it a few days for people to open those emails.

[00:49:45] And then, yes, remove them. Now you can download, you can export, that, what is it, a CSV. And you can later run ads, to those people, or maybe you add them back for Black Friday, but we don’t want to be emailing them every single week, especially if you’re paying for the amount of subscribers on your email list, you want to get them out of there, right?

[00:50:07] So, you know, just… Right, exactly. So export that file, save it for a rainy day if and when, you want to add them back or run ads to them, those, that’s going to be a great resource. So now all is lost, my friend.

[00:50:22] Jeff Sieh: So the one question I had, and I don’t know, with the Can Spam Act and all that stuff, if you remove somebody from their list, and if they sign up again, like they say for some reason, they go, oh, Jeff had, you know, I run some sort of thing online and they see me again, and they try to subscribe, will it let them subscribe or are they gone forever?

[00:50:40] Liz Wilcox: If you delete them from your email service provider, they will then be able to resubscribe themselves.

[00:50:47] Jeff Sieh: okay, just wanted to make sure, because that, that always made me nervous in the, in the past when I was looking at that, so. let’s talk really quick, we only have a few minutes left, but this is a thing that every, I know, it’s been, it’s so fun, I, I could talk about this stuff all the

[00:50:59] Liz Wilcox: Y’all, this is a masterclass. Like Jeff, I don’t know if you got a tip jar, but you should put it out because we are dropping bombs

[00:51:06] Jeff Sieh: this is really good stuff. So, one of the questions I know a lot of people, they want to monetize like right away, like, Hey, I got a hundred email subscribers. I want them all to send me a hundred dollars or whatever, you know? so

[00:51:18] Liz Wilcox: those people.

[00:51:20] Jeff Sieh: how soon. Should an online entrepreneur consider the monetization of their email list?

[00:51:26] Like, is it, as soon as you, you know, you get a hundred, you should say, Hey, I’m going to, I’ve got a course, come sign up. What are your thoughts on how soon somebody should monetize?

[00:51:35] Liz Wilcox: Yeah. So remember we’re following that email staircase, follower, friend, customer, right? And so we want to first understand that not all hundreds. This is right people buy when they are ready, not when you’re selling something. For example, my sister and I have very differed buying behavior when it comes to gas for our cars.

[00:51:59] I get gas All the time, like every other day. I drive a big truck. I never want to be that girl on the side of the road with, you know, a giant Bronco and it’s like, come get me, I don’t have any gas. And so for me, I get gas, you know, at least twice a week. My sister is the very opposite type of fire. She is pushing it to the limit.

[00:52:21] She’s like, you know, the Kramer in that one Seinfeld episode where they’re like, let’s take it to the limit, you know. She’s like, you know, she’s, she’s getting her kicks off that, right? But the gas station is always open, right? There’s a gas station, there’s a 7 Eleven right on the corner of my house. We both drive by it.

[00:52:39] We live in the same neighborhood. I purchase much more frequently than she does, but that 7 Eleven is always open. So think of your email list, think of your offers as that 7 Eleven, and know that your subscribers, they might be like Liz or they might be like Patricia, right? So we do want to offer up Something at the very beginning because some people might be like Liz and say, yep, I’m actively searching for this.

[00:53:06] I need the solution right now. I’ve got the money. You know, Jeff is the one, I’m ready to start, repurposing my content and getting my tech together, right?

[00:53:16] Jeff Sieh: hmm.

[00:53:16] Liz Wilcox: And so we want to have maybe something like a tripwire, you know, so when I joined Jeff’s list, instead of him saying, oh, thank you, check your email, he’s actually sending me to like a one time limited offer.

[00:53:30] Sales page, that’s a tripwire, right? So before I even check the email for the freebie. And that kind of flips the switch. And I know a lot of you might be content creators. So as content creators, especially, a lot of times the expectation is, well you make money from YouTube and like ads, and so I’m not gonna give you any money.

[00:53:51] So when you get them on your email list and you send them straight to a sales page, it flips that switch, it changes that expectation. So people, you know, they’re like, oh, the, you know, Jeff is a real. Business with real solutions, right? Instead of, oh, this is just another free bi downloaded. And so then inside the welcome sequence itself, which you can go directly to liz wilcox.com and get a free one that’s already built for this, you know, you want to see that a, you are a business.

[00:54:21] You wanna say, you know, maybe in the pss of the first email, PS did you get that tripwire offer? I’m gonna offer it to you one more time in this email. Boom, right? And then maybe a couple days later, you want to set expectations. I know I’ve been on Jeff’s show before, and I think we talked a lot more about this in that previous episode.

[00:54:40] but you want to set the expectations of like, hey, I’m a business. I’m going to offer you free and paid resources, free and paid products, free and paid services, whatever is true for you. And then list them. Are a lot of people going to buy from that email? Absolutely not. But are a lot of people going to know you’re a real business with real solutions?

[00:55:01] Absolutely. And then within your emails, within your newsletters, like we talked about maybe 20 minutes ago, You know, be seeding those offers, put it in a PS, write a one off sales email. Hey, I’m, you know, I’m thinking about my Descript course today. Here’s what you need to know if you haven’t gotten in yet.

[00:55:20] Da da da, okay, you know, this isn’t gonna be a sequence. I just wanted to put it out there in case, you know, in case this is, you know, what you need. Right? And so just be, you know, sprinkling those offers, just be showing them off, right? And that is how you’re going to build a list of customers. This is how I do it.

[00:55:39] I just looked at my, customer percentage last week. It’s at 54%. I have over 10, 000 people on my email list. That means at least 5, 400 of them have purchased something from me. So,

[00:55:53] Jeff Sieh: That is

[00:55:53] Liz Wilcox: again, not so, not so humble brag, guys. Like, I,

[00:55:57] Jeff Sieh: knows what she’s talking about. Yeah.

[00:55:59] Liz Wilcox: and I only say it because I believe in email so much, and I believe in you and your ability to make money with it.

[00:56:06] And so, like, for me, my personal definition of success is to be an example of what’s possible. That’s why I come out and I’ve been, you know, Giving this sort of masterclass for a whole hour because I want you to actually go out and do the thing and believe that it’s possible. I’m so excited!

[00:56:24] Jeff Sieh: Yes. And Liz, I mean, she does. One of the things and what I think the one of the things that really, I really loved about Liz’s content when I first met her is I love her humor. Like she will say like, Hey, this is not a sequence. Like that kind of stuff. I think it’s very disarming for people. And I mean, I think humor disarmers people anyway, that, you know, they know that you’re a real person and you have a real business, but Hey.

[00:56:44] We can have fun in life as well. So, you got some people stopping in. Marcus is saying, Hey, Liz, watching over on YouTube and Neil is over there as well. thank you guys for stopping in over at YouTube. So, last question, we’re running out of time. Like this has been a master class and Liz is amazing.

[00:57:04] what is your, like your favorite tool for scaling and growing your email list? Like the actual tool that you use that you recommend to your students.

[00:57:12] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, I mean, personally, I use ConvertKit, but my favorite tool is the one that works for your brain. So, set a timer, go to YouTube, look up ConvertKit, maybe MailChimp, ActiveCampaign, MailerLite, watch some over the shoulder videos, and just pick the one that works for your brain and your budget.

[00:57:32] That’s my favorite one.

[00:57:33] Jeff Sieh: hmm. That’s great. That’s great advice. And Jennifer says, thanks so much Liz. Awesome as always. Yes, she is. Liz, I tell you what, it’s been an amazing show. Let people know where to find you. The stuff you’ve got, you mentioned it throughout the show, but I want to make sure you have, everybody knows who’s listening and watching where they can find the amazing Liz Wilcox.

[00:57:51] Liz Wilcox: Yeah, of course, I’m an email marketer. I would love for you to join my list. You can get that welcome sequence I talked about along with three newsletter samples from the membership and 52 subject lines all for free at lizwilcox. com. There’s a hot pink button on the right side. You cannot miss it, and of course, if you’d like to join the membership, I hope Jeff has an affiliate link that he can put, in the show notes, and if not, you can go directly to lizwilcox.

[00:58:17] com. There’s a yellow stripe at the top, and it says, Are You Here Because You Heard About Email Marketing Membership? Click that button, you’ll get all the details. I’d love for you to try it out. Nine bucks, cancel anytime, why not try it out?

[00:58:30] Jeff Sieh: And it is amazing. There’s so much great content in there. And listen, you probably spend more on coffee a month than you would on this, this membership. And it’s, it can grow your business so, so much. So make sure to go to lizwillcox. com and check her out. And once again, I want a big, big shout out to our friends over at Ecamm that makes this show possible.

[00:58:50] you can find out more about them at socialmedianewslive. com. Amazing tech, amazing people, amazing community. And they do email, very, very well, very, very well too. So with that, we thank Liz for showing up. I thank all you guys for showing up. Marcus, Katie, Jim, all the, Gary, all the people who stopped by today.

[00:59:08] This has been an amazing show. Let Liz, know in the comments how much you appreciated her. Because once again, since it was a masterclass, it was so much fun. I love this show. Thank you guys for joining us and we will see you guys next week. Bye everybody.