Evan Carmichael hired a copywriter to fix his website and newsletter. He argues that even a confirmation email matters because 80% of startups fail, and every message must show empathy and urgency. He made $300 a month starting out and now sees his newsletter as a life-changing resource, not a sales pitch.
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Hey, it's Evan. I'm a little worked up tonight and I wanted to share with you what's going on. I recently brought on a new copywriter onto my team and I'm really psyched about her. I think she's got mad skills. I think she's going to be able to really amp up the copy on the website and let us have a bigger impact. And one of the first things she's working on is my whole newsletter campaign sequence, so The first thing she sent me recently was the email confirmation message. So this is the email that you get when you say you want to join my newsletter, but in order to get it, you got to click this confirmation link, right? Pretty simple email, and most people have a really basic message. And I went off on a really long philosophical message to her and probably went way overkill, and I didn't chew her out, but The problem here is most businesses will fail, okay? 80% of companies are going to fail. And I know what it's like to be there. I was making $300 a month. I was in a situation where most people looked at my company and thought it wasn't going to take off, and I didn't have the resources, and I didn't have the rich uncle to guide me or the big angel investor, right? I was grinding it out. I was hustling it out in a field that I thought was great at the beginning and realized, hey, this is way harder than I thought it was going to be. And I was too afraid and embarrassed to tell my friends that I wasn't making it, wasn't doing as well as I thought I would. And I couldn't afford $20 to go out and have dinner with them. It's hard, and I was one of the guys who got out. You know, 80% of companies fail, 80% of entrepreneurs will fail. I made it through, and I almost gave up many times, and there's so many moments where it could have gone the other way, you know, where it could have just been one of those numbers, and luckily somebody or something saved me and helped me to keep going one more day. And now I share that with people. And the newsletter is one of the best ways that I do it. It's not just a newsletter. I don't just jam product down your throat and say, "You have to buy this crappy product that's not going to help you." It's not just sharing a bunch of stuff that's on my website hoping people will visit. It's not your normal typical newsletter. I almost hate calling it a newsletter because that's not what it is. If you could see the comments that come back every time I send one of these out, it's changing people's lives. It's showing them how to get past that block. When all you see is darkness around you, where you feel like you've tried everything and nothing is working, I help you get through that because I had to go through that. So the newsletter is so critical, and I need that reflected in the message. And you might think, you know, an email confirmation message, how stupid is that? How— why is Evan getting so worked up about a stupid email confirmation message? Why don't you just use a standard one that comes with your email template? But that's not what I'm about. Because if I don't have a great email confirmation message, I'm going to miss out on being able to help save some people. And you know what, if you are trying to start a business, if you're not having success, if you don't follow through on the things, something as simple as clicking confirm on an email message, you know what, that's on you, okay? That's on you to follow through on the things that you said you were going to do and invest in yourself to be a better entrepreneur. But it's also on me. It's on me because I know I can help you. I know I can save your business. And if I don't have a powerful enough message to get through to people, to get through to you, then that's on me for not doing my best. And so the email confirmation message, it has to reflect this. It's not just one simple email, it's everything, it's everything that we do. Everything I do has to have that importance, has to show that I can help you because I've been through it and I almost gave up and I came out on the other side and now I know the systems, the tools, everything you need to be able to get your business off the ground and to the place where you're living a life that you're happy with. If, you know, with your business, it's the same thing. You should be starting a business because you have a powerful ability to help somebody. And you need to make sure that that message comes across in everything that you do, in everything that you do. In something as simple as an email confirmation message. It has to come across because people are coming to you, they have a problem. They don't know how to solve it, and so you have to take them on a journey. You're going to have to take them to places that they're not comfortable with to help them solve this problem. And not everybody's going to want to take that journey. And as a result, they're not going to get their problem solved. They're not going to live the life that they deserve to live. And that's on them for making a stupid choice, but it's also on you for not clearly communicating to that person why they should take that action. And it's not a sales tool. It's not, "Here's why you need to do this." It shouldn't be salesy at all. It should be powerful. It should be painful. It should— it should be so obvious that this is the critical next step for them to take that you don't need to sell them on anything. And that has to come from a place where you're so confident in your ability to help this person, and that if they don't follow through, they're going to make a huge mistake. Anyway, it is a simple email, and for those of you watching, you may be thinking Evan's crazy, Evan's going off on one stupid email, a confirmation newsletter email, are you kidding me? But it's true, it is everything. Because this is so important that everything that I do, everything that you do, has to have that importance. I didn't ream her out. We'll see what she comes back with. She's a great person, and I'm looking forward to having the best email confirmation newsletter message ever. Anyway, if you guys like this video, if you guys have standards, if you guys are really trying to do something to have an impact, leave your mark on this world, let me know what you think. Leave a comment below, give it a thumbs up. Thank you guys. I love talking to you, being able to vent, share my frustration through YouTube. See you guys. I'll talk to you soon.
