Getting Emotional

Nikki Elbaz: When I first started in marketing, I definitely skewed negative more than I
had to. It took a lot of listening to my clients to understand that, no, for customers to
experience the brand in a positive way, there is a place for negativity, but that place is
much more limited than the overall marketing world would have us believe.
Nikki Elbaz: Welcome to email swipes, where we peek.
Nikki Elbaz: Behind the scenes at the emails that.
Nikki Elbaz: Catch your attention and earn their place in your swipe file. Every other
week, we’ll talk to an email expert about an experiment they ran, and in the following
episode, we’ll dive into the strategies and methods used in email so you can inform and
inspire your own email work. I’m Mickey Elbas, the copywriter behind winning emails for
eight and nine figure SaaS and ecommerce brands like Shopify, Four, Sigmatic, and
Sprout Social. And I know that hearing the background stories to these emails will help
you turn pie in the sky insights into plug and play actions. Ready to make inspiration
tactical?
Nikki Elbaz: Let’s go.
This week’s episode features smart ideas from Rai on copywriting
First, a quick recap of the email we discussed last week that we’ll be digging into today.
Nikki Elbaz: You don’t want to read another doors are closing email even though yeah,
the hinges are indeed squeaking closed. So this isn’t your usual closing time email. This
is an email with a song. Tap this shift to hear the whole thing. So while the big savings
on copy school forever eva are indeed coming to a fast close, we opted to forgo the
mandatory OMG act now email and invite you to sing along with us. Or at least enjoy
knowing youre not the only nerd on the planet before singing your way into copy school.
It is officially closing time. Jill P’s so, we wont be quitting our day jobs anytime soon to
start a semisonic cover band. Some dreams well just have to wait. Likewise, if youre
planning to lock in your status as a well paid and highly performing copywriter for the
long haul, this is your best chance to secure it. Pps if there are only seconds left on this
countdown timer as you read this, skip the song and pick your plan here.
Nikki Elbaz: I think I can safely say that this episode is the one that I learned the most
from. Rai is the best teacher. I just love his perspectives on how humans work and how
he unpeels his copy to reveal really smart ideas that go much deeper than fun or
smooth wordsmithery. Okay, so let’s get into all the smart ideas. I was so, so grateful for
the AI conversation.
I was on a brainstorming mastermind style call about outsourcing
struggles
I was on a brainstorming mastermind style call once and the topic was outsourcing
struggles. Everyone always says outsource, outsource, outsource like it’s the solution to
all your problems. But the truth is, is that managing people is its own skill and comes
with its own set of challenges. Anyway, Avital Oitsgeld was on the call and she said
something so thought provoking. She said she had always learned to outsource the
things youre not good at. She runs a branding agency and loves the strategy side of
things. So she outsources the copy, outsources the design, but she does the overall
strategy. Shes running the chip. She heard us a bunch of boutique copy agencies all
trying to hire for copy and she was so confused why we would do that. If that was our
secret sauce, our enjoyment even, why were we outsourcing it? I’m not 100% sold on
not hiring copywriters, possibly because I think the strategy side of things is more
important than the actual copy, but also because unlike a branding agency, there’s just
not a lot of other things we can outsource. It did however, get me thinking if we could
expand our services and outsource those things. And so we are actually now offering
design and implementation services as a growth experiment. All this to say that
outsourcing has to work. And like mentioned in the episode, it has not been working for
me to outsource the writing to Aihdenkhdev. I use AI for plenty of other things,
especially in the planning stages or the polishing stage, and that works. But for me to
continue to dump time and energy and effort and guilt into something that clearly isnt
working just because theres so much hype about AI being the next frontier and needing
to embrace it to stay relevant. Well, not so in this particular aspect of my work. Oh and
by the way, we didnt dig into Rais actual tweet in the episode how humans have to
become more divine to combat AI becoming more human I think most people would
define becoming more divine as being more kind, more generous, emotional,
connective, relationship type stuff. But I’m actually thinking to become more divine
means to become more like a creator, to tap into our creative side more, to not just
churn out that first headline that comes to us, but to push harder on creativity and
innovation to do what AI can’t tap into because it doesn’t exist yet to add to their
learning models. But hey, it can be both. So anyway, takeaway number one, I am
officially giving you permission to use AI, or even your real live human workers for that
matter. The way that works for you. You won’t become obsolete just because you want
to do a part of the process yourself. You may have to adapt down the line, but by then
it’ll feel natural and AI will hopefully be good enough too. I’m m pretty sure you don’t
have to prepare for the worst in
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advance, just in case.
Chris Voss recommends switching everything to elicit no answers
when writing scripts
Next, Rye or Ryan, really, I’m, still getting over that one. Said that one of the criteria for
things that he writes is, would I say this to someone in real life? I’ve been feeling this a
lot lately because I finally read Chris Voss’s never split the difference. I liked it. I think
there was a lot there that makes a lot of sense, and I’ve even seen it generate some
great results. Where I’m struggling is with some of the things that don’t feel right for my
personal style. It’s hard to differentiate between discomfort from newness, or is it
something that I’m genuinely uncomfortable with as a person when I feel that sense of
unease? Is it just hard feeling a little scripted, speaking slightly differently than usual?
Or is it something that I don’t agree with? One thing that helps me for this is
understanding the strategy behind the scripts. For example, one of the Vos scripts that
feels uncomfortable for me is switching everything to elicit no answers. So instead of
saying, is now a good time to talk? You say, is now a bad time to talk? He recommends
this because it’s a lot easier for us as humans to commit to a no than it is to a yes. We
have more emotional bandwidth for no’s. You get answers more easily when you try to
get a no instead of a yes. When I first started incorporating some foss stuff into my
language, I attributed the discomfort to the newness of the script. And so I did cross the
line once in some pitches for this podcast. A follow up email that I wrote to no repliers
came off harsher than I would like for my relationships. If I had paid more attention to
the why behind the script, I could have still freezed the email to elicit that no answer, but
in a softer, less aggressive way than the original script felt to me. So, yeah, I’ve been
cognizant of that idea of would I say this in real life. On the other hand, I’m also
wondering how this fits into copy when you’re not writing for personal brands. I know
there’s a lot of talk about how b two b is really people to people, and we have to treat b
two b marketing the same as b two c marketing. But I think there’s a lot of gray here. I
think there is still 100% room for differences between b two b and b two c, and one of
those things might be saying things that we don’t say in real life. I kind of laugh when I
see LinkedIn posts ranting about how annoying it is when people say corporate y
jargony things like circling back or let’s do a raincheck. Yes, there’s jargon that’s vague
or trying too hard and definitely does not have a place in copy that needs to clearly
communicate value. But in conversation, when the meaning is very clearly understood
but just isn’t in the lexicon of non business, normal people talk. Can we just admit that
corporate culture has its own dialect and that’s okay? Just like it’s okay to dress
differently for business, it’s okay to speak differently for business. Sure, not everyone
does dress differently for business, but it’s an acceptable thing to do. Same thing for
language. Shout out to Safiya, who we featured in episode eleven, for helping me clarify
why I roll my eyes at these posts.
Nikki Yalbuzz’s ecommerce playbooks are incredibly helpful
So, takeaway number two. If you’re feeling that tension of would I say this in real life?
Dig into the why. Sometimes it’s okay to say things that you wouldn’t say in real life.
Sometimes it’s not. It’s all about the why.
Nikki Elbaz: If you love email swipes, you will love my playbooks. They are chock full of
inspiration with dozens of examples, color coded breakdowns, and all the whys and
hows and wheres and whats of, all the different ecom flows. Even better. Theyre
affordable, one anonymous copywriter said, in a world full of $1,000 and $2,000
copywriting courses, being able to learn a sequence for $52 is amazing, by the way,
you can learn them for even less if you get the whole bundle. Another piece of feedback
that I loved. I purchased the welcome sequence playback and loved it. It’s an easy,
flowing read, and following it is a breeze. I love how it’s so actionable. It takes you step
by step through the process, but you don’t end up with a templated sequence that
sounds the same. I also love how you brought in relevant examples to prove the point
you were making. I pull it up before every welcome sequence I write. That’s a big point
of these playbooks, that you don’t end up with the same thing every single time that you
understand the strategy. Just like copywriter Paul Melrose says, since using Nikki’s
playbook, starting work on an ecommerce email sequence without the playbooks would
feel like jumping out of plane without a parachute. And these are not copy and paste
solutions either. They work because Nikki gets you to understand the essential
concepts at play so you can solve your own or your clients email problems. Big love and
appreciation for what she’s given us. Thanks Nikki. But don’t think it’s all theory. Hallie
Williams says had a quick turnaround deadline on an email sequence I hadn’t written in
a while, but I didn’t even sweat it. I pulled up one of Nikki’s playbooks and voila. I had a
winning sequence in record time. Nikki’s playbooks give you the perfect roadmap for
using the data. You have to craft email sequences that perform well every single time.
Thanks Nikki. I love your playbooks. And one last one. This one from a founder I put into
action faq email and the twelve hour warning email you suggested, along with two other
emails and two texts. And I got over $105,000 in revenue in the weekend from the
promo. Pretty neat. Never made so many sales via email. Your book helped me save
time to get this done. So whether you want to save time, understand things better, or
just get some amazing inspiration,
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Nikki Elbaz: go grab a playbook or two or twelve at ah. Nikkiyalbuzz.com email
playbooks. And yes, that link is in the show notes. Wish you were an Ecom just so that
you could grab my playbooks. But you’re in sass. Don’t worry, I got your back with the
sass success pack.
Nikki Elbaz: Say that five times fast.
Nikki Elbaz: Okay? Don’t just head to the show notes, you’ll find the link and grab it
there.
Rye’s conversion copy is genius, and AI will struggle with it
Nikki Elbaz: Okay, back to our show next. I’m not going to get into the whole lightening
the mood on a cart close date because Rye unpacked it absolutely perfectly. I have
nothing to add, but I do want to just give a nod to how genius it is. This is what I love
about conversion copy. Not just the funny or fun or quote unquote brand voice stuff.
There’s always something deeper, so much behind the words that we write. And I’d
venture to say that this is where AI will struggle. This is even where copy by committee
struggles. The strategy stuff, the whys, the human connection.
So takeaway number three. Are you shifting things to control emotion
when they read
So takeaway number three. Remember what Rai said? People read in a neutral tone of
voice. Are you shifting things to control the emotion when they read? By the way,
because I mentioned Vos earlier, he actually says the opposite.
Nikki Elbaz: He says that people will skew negative.
Nikki Elbaz: Non neutral, that they’ll read whatever you write in the worst possible
interpretation, which is why you have to be so careful. Either way, it’s our job to take the
reins and shift things as we need to.
Every email you send is a branding opportunity, Rye says
When I mentioned what a good move this email was from a branding perspective, not
just from a conversion perspective, Rye posited that the true definition of branding is
that we should come away from every touch point with a brand better for it somehow.
And I think this is why marketing can sometimes feel sleazy. Yes, sometimes you see
outright lies that give us that sleaze reputation, like AC now offers that don’t actually
expire or re emails from people you’ve never had contact with previously. But
sometimes there are no lies. But it still feels sleazy. And I think this is the defining point.
Do we come away from a brand touchpoint for the better? And I don’t necessarily mean
make the world a better place better. It can even just be emotionally better. But when
brands use fear tactics or desperation even, it just feels icky when they push you to feel
a negative emotion, or even just an overly hyped up emotion. That’s what gives it that
sleaze factor. We don’t enjoy that. It’s a branding hit, not a win. When I first started in
marketing, I definitely skewed negative more than I had to. It took a lot of listening to my
clients to understand that no, for customers to experience the brand in a positive way,
there is a place for negativity. But that place is much more limited than the overall
marketing world would have us believe. So takeaway number four, every touchpoint is a
branding opportunity, which means every email you send is a branding opportunity. Cart
closed emails are always conversion focused. That’s their job, to get those last sales.
But even still, they are without a doubt a branding opportunity. By the way, stay tuned
for next week’s episode where we feature an email that uses re, but in a different way
than you would expect. Thanks for geeking out with me about that email story.
Nikki Elbaz: If you enjoyed either of these episodes.
Nikki Elbaz: You’Ll probably enjoy getting my emails. Plus, you’ll never miss another
episode. Sign up@nikiellebus.com subscribe and yes, that link is in the show notes.
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