Hey, ewe!
We're changing things up this week. This issue is shorter, tighter, smaller.
Why: I've been on the road almost constantly since I last wrote to you. I've made a lot of new friends. (Including you? Hi there 👋! Welcome!)
Writing to you is my favorite thing I do. But some weeks I am challenged with "scaling." I struggle to find enough hours. I struggle to make room for personal projects. Like most of us.
Life gets in the way. Red-eye flights destroy me. My party-dog turns 15 and has her friends over for a rager of a
birthday party.
At both marketing events I attended last week, there was talk of scaling marketing.
There always is that kind of talk. Because in Marketing there is always pressure to do work that's scalable. Meaning: able to reach an increasing number of customers efficiently and cost-effectively and in a manner easily replicated.
Less hand-crafting. More technology and automation.
Scaling isn't bad. The trouble comes when Marketing wants to go bigger before it gets better. We try to scale before we get to something we're really proud of. We outsource too readily.
Too often, scaling means we lose the magic that made something special to begin with.
What if we flip things around? What if instead of trying for scale... we first try to create things that are 1000% unscalable?
Craft first. Scale later. (Or maybe not at all.)
What happens then?
Would that change how we create? What we publish? How we market?
* * *
Here are 5 things on my radar this week.
1
Thinking Map 💭
The people most skilled in content marketing aren't the best writers. Instead, they're the ones who have the most empathy.
I'm paraphrasing the key message from Linda Emma in this fantastic piece on MarketingProfs.
How do you understand your audience and what they care about? Try an "empathy map." Think Google Maps but for Marketing, connecting you from A to B via the HOV lane.
2
Everybody Writes Tip of the Week: The Cold Open
A "cold open" in TV and films means that you jump straight into a story before the title or credits roll. Do the same in your writing: Put your most important words and ideas at the beginning of a sentence. Avoid beginning a sentence with...
According to...
There is a...
It is important [suggested, critical, etc.]...
The purpose of this [email, post, article]...
I think that...
Why: The first words of your sentence should skip the throat-clearing and get right into what you're talking about.
Create momentum. Lose the qualifiers and modifiers. Be direct: Open cold.
3
Pro-Voice
I spoke in Boston this past week about where Marketing should double-down in 2019. (And what Marketing should stop doing, for the love of Pete!)
4
My Letter Half
Please send your brand emails from a person! 68% of Americans say the "From" name plays a big role in their decision to open an email. Are Americans all that unique? NO.
From Emma:
HubSpot tested this and found that when they sent out an email from "HubSpot," their click-through rate was 0.73%. Switching to sending their emails from a member of their marketing team (a real person), resulted in click-through rates of 0.96%. That may seem like a small jump, but when you consider that it resulted in 292 more clicks, it definitely is worth it.
5
More Pages, Fewer Screens
I swear this is going to sound like an ad.
I swear it's not.
If you want to read more in 2019 (like me: #goals), check out this service. I've never seen a book-subscription service *this* personalized to a reader's preferences. I love that:
- It's from Book Riot, the largest independent editorial book site in North America
- It's fulfilled by Print, an independent bookstore in my beloved Maine
- Reginald the Carrier Pigeon delivers your tailored recommendations with a personal note from your own book-selector (or "bibliologist") (Reginald! A carrier pigeon! He writes you a note!)
TOOL'S GOLD
Two tried-and-true tools I use every darn week.
🛠️
Related Words: Type in a word or phrase. Get words related to it. A fantastic go-to tool for copywriters, writers, marketers, bloggers.
I use it daily.
🛠️
Answer the Public: A clever, slightly weird tool that aggregates searches from Bing and Google into useful insights for SEO and content creation. I love how results are categorized to surface problems your content might address.
DEPARTMENT OF SHENANIGANS
Native Advertising from 1477
The world's oldest known printed ad in English is
this piece of native advertising. It's tucked into a handbook for priests with a call to action urging targeted priest-personas to buy their own copy of the handbook.
See how it's printed in the same typeface as the book itself and not clearly labeled as an ad? Egregious. I've alerted the FCC. 🚨 (h/t Open Culture)
LOVE LETTERS
💌 To you, for reading this far. You're wonderful. Thank you.
NEXT TIME: A special letter I got that changed my mind.
See you on May 19!
XOXO,
