George Kao deleted 90% of his 10,000-person email list because most subscribers were inactive. He argues creators should focus on serving the small group of people who actually care, not chasing follower counts.
Aim not for fame, but for deeper service. This is a lesson that I wish I learned in the first five years of my business, but I didn't learn it until at least year six or year seven. And let me explain the first two years in my business, I already grew my email list to 10,000 people. I did a lot of collaborations. I didn't know yet about ads back then or would have been even bigger, but I grew my audience quite quickly in the first couple years. And guess what? I kind of regret it. I do. Because a couple years Later, I removed 90%, more than 90% of my email list because why? Most of them didn't really care about my content or my offers. And how do I know? It's because they have not been opening my emails for months. And a lot of people who grow a big email this quickly have that same experience. So I'm hoping I can save you some years of frustration and going down a path that's not quite fulfilling, which is right now, if you look at the people who already follow you, look at your Instagram, look at your Facebook friends, look at the people who are subscribed to your email list, even if it's just 30 people or 50 people subscribed. My question to you is, do you know each of them? And if your answer is yes, then I'm like, that's amazing. Please get to know them even better, especially in terms of what your skills, how your skills can be applied to help them or someone they know right now. Because if you do this kind of genuine caring and alignment between what you have, your skills, your presence, and what they need and want at this time with each person, you'll probably get a lot more client inquiries than you currently are getting. And this is the counterintuitive path that I didn't learn, and I don't know about you, but I didn't learn this. And right now I'm looking around and I still don't see this being taught. Usually when it comes to marketing, they teach you get a bigger audience, grow more followers. And usually it's just the assumption, like, why would you want anything different? Of course you want a bigger audience so that you can have more sales and customers and clients and whatever, but they don't tell you, oh, if you grow a bigger audience, the bigger your audience grows, the less you are in touch with each person and actually the less you're able to really care for your audience. Because we can ever only really care for one person at a time to say that, I love you, I care about you. By the way, be careful when someone says that who is like saying it to you on video or in an email newsletter. The love letter, I love you. Whatever. Signing off. When I see that, I'm like, you are gaslighting me because you don't even know me. I'm just a subscriber. I'm just a viewer. What do you mean you love me? You are giving me, you're giving me a few words that suggest a level of commitment that you don't have towards me because you can't. How can you have that level of commitments towards a thousand people or 10,000 people or however many are in your audience on your email list. So this is what I mean. Like the bigger your audience, the less true it is when you say, when you even think I care about them, I love them because you don't know them. So right now, for those of you who have a small audience, again, I wish I heard this in year zero, year one, year two of my business right now, you have the opportunity that I don't have any more. Or at least I feel the pressure now as I look, oh my Gosh, I have 8,000 followers. What am I going to do? Even if I try once a day or three, three people a day, it's still going to take me years to reach all 8,000 people. So right now, while your audience is small, you have the opportunity that I don't have anymore. And many, many, many influencers so called don't have this opportunity anymore. And if you use this opportunity to actually demonstrate real care and service toward each of your Now I'm not saying everyone will respond to you, of course not, but you can at least try. You can at least be genuine in looking at their profile, learning a little bit about them and when you message them with genuine gratitude that they are following you or they're subscribed to your newsletter or that they're your Facebook friend that you added five years ago and you don't know remember how right when you message them, they're already following you for some reason. You can thank them for it and say I connect with what you said on your I took a quick peek at your profile and saw this and I connect what you said there. I, I feel the same way or find something of actual alignment connection with that person and come from the heart and say that you have the opportunity now to actually help people feel cared for in a way that influencers can never make them feel, even however much illusion they throw at them. Love bombing. Oh I love you I care about you. Dear audience, they're just using words to try to seduce. And sometimes I fall in that trap too. So next time you hear me say I love you or I care for you, say george, remember what you said, right? Next time you hear any influencer say that right to say you're suggesting a level of commitment that you, you can't. It's impossible to have that towards your so right now you can. Those of you with a small audience and those of us who have a bigger audience already, we can just do the best we can do, which is we have to care for our clients, care for our students, care for our the members of our program, the members, our patrons, or whatever it is that like, we have to just shrink our circle down to those that we can care for the most and then try to stretch it as much as we can. But whatever size your audience is, you can follow the path that I wish I followed from the beginning and now I'm learning again and again that how important it is. Aim not for fame, but for deeper service and greater truth of expression. Thank you for being here and I hope this is helpful. As always, I appreciate any comments you want to add below. Contribute anything else for others to see or to ask something. So either way, I wish you a wonderful day. Thanks.
