Understanding Sales Email Strategy

NOTE: This podcast was transcribed by an AI tool. Please forgive any typos or errors. Erin Ollila 00:00 hello friends today we are here with Kyla Roma. And what you might not know about her is that when she first started out doing pure strategy with her clients, she used to wish that she didn’t have to deal with their feelings. She think about them as scared passengers on an airplane that was experiencing turbulence. And it was her job to use a calm, Smooth Jazz Radio announcer voice to keep them calm and relaxed. But eventually she realized that feelings are the only reason that people do anything. So she started learning about life coaching, trained as an ADHD coach. So that really, she could show up and better support her clients, no matter what came up for them, be it strategy or feelings. I love that about you. Welcome to the show, Kyla, thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me, as a person with ADHD, I actually really appreciate that you have made some adjustments so that you can better show up for your clients. 00:59 Oh, that’s so lovely to hear. Thank you, I was late diagnosed in gosh, I think it was 2021. And then just dove in and kind of hyper focused in and it’s been, it’s been so supportive, because, you know, like I like you had said, I used to do work with clients, and we get these beautiful plans set for them. And then they wouldn’t be able to execute. And I you know, and even I’ve had that problem in my own business as well. And looking at like, what’s going on there, it’s been a, that has been kind of a really fun place for me to dive in. Erin Ollila 01:31 Yeah, I find that so interesting. I mean, especially I’m gonna segue this about what we’re talking about. But what makes the actual tie in here is, you know, when it comes to sales and things that people launch, there’s so much excitement about building the actual product or the service or the offer. And then even when it comes to writing sales copy, I think the excitement and motivation is still there, because you’re finally getting to have like a voice to what it is that you’ve created. So you can showcase it with people. But then once that works done, I mean, that is a lot. There’s a mental load. So by the time that work is done, it’s the sales email time and everyone is like, oh my gosh, what do I have to write like, all of this. So tying that back into the ADHD of like fizzling out, I can see why people are overwhelmed with writing the emails that go along with the sales that they plan on doing in their business. 02:23 Absolutely. And with ADHD, the things that we procrastinate on are the things that matter the most to us. So the more that something matters, the more emotionally relevant it is, and this goes for it as well for you know, for people who are neurotypical as well, you know, it’s the more that we’re really putting pressure on ourselves. It’s icky, you can cross that line I from it being you know, I’m gonna motivate myself, I’m gonna get this done, too. Now, I’ve turned this into coal mining very quickly. Erin Ollila 02:52 Yeah, and I think one thing people don’t consider when it comes to this online business world is like we’re fed this story about how we should be able to do all of the things. And I do get that in a small business online, physical, like small town, whatever it is, of course, in some ways, you do have to do all the things, at least a part of them, you need to at least be able to oversee the things if you have the employees yet, what people don’t factor in is like, there are also skills that are trade skills, right? Like could be wrong on this. But I vaguely remember when you first started working for yourself, you were doing graphic design, am 03:27 I right? I was Yeah. self taught web design. Yeah. Right. So like, that’s not Erin Ollila 03:30 my skill, my skill is writing. And sure, I mean, I’ve made my own websites before I can do it, but it’s not going to look the same as something you would do, because that’s your skill. So when we start thinking about like, Oh, we’re taught, we have to do the sales emails, the sales pages, create the offer, like ID, the strategy behind the launch all of these things, whether you’re neurotypical or neurodivergent, they are things that are not in your wheelhouse that you have never been trained on that you actually need some skill to be able to do. So I kind of feel frustrated in the, in the grand scheme of things with just like, again, we’re fed to believe we can do certain things. So a small business owner who does not necessarily have the writing background might sit down and look at that blinking cursor and feel so overwhelmed, so frustrated, and like lots of mindset issues of being like mad at themselves, and that causes them to procrastinate even more when really it’s okay, like we don’t all need to have the same skills like it, we all have a different approach to how we get things done. 04:34 Absolutely. I was I’ve literally been having this conversation with multiple clients this week, you know, there I had somebody asking, like, why is this so hard? And that’s why, you know, I take a very bespoke approach with my clients, I you know, I help them figure out the underlying strategy that they need the kind of out strategy, strategic foundation that they can build off of, and then we really look at what do they need to accomplish is that they need to have you know, But often it’s something like a lead magnet that’s finished, or they need to have their, you know, their website. It’s just things aren’t working, and they’re not sure why. And then so much of that the next steps are going in and assessing, where are the not like, what’s not working strategically, you know, from a conversion optimization standpoint, which is my, you know, I’m such a geek for that. But then also, where are their knowledge gaps? Because that’s a real thing. Exactly. Like what you were saying, you know, it’s the, it’s the same thing, as you can see, show somebody, you know, here’s how to do an amazing, you know, and here’s how to do it amazing dance moves, and you can watch somebody do them and say, gosh, like, yeah, I’ve got a body and I can move it around, and these, you know, and these things, and you can watch a video or take a course like that. But the the reality is, is that if you are doing them, and you’re comparing yourself to somebody who maybe is a trained figure skater, and has like a tremendous amount of transferable skills, or as a modern dancer, and you know, had, you know, decades of that, but then hasn’t done it for a little bit. You’re not all starting from the same starting point. And that’s where I think the frustration for folks comes in. It’s like, Why isn’t this working. And the reality is that there are other like other people, these, you know, they’ve got transferable skills, and, and they’re just, these are learned skills that need time and effort and energy put into them. And doing that in a place where they’re fun. You’re yourself funding all of this, is that’s a high stakes place to be. So it’s okay for it to be hard. And it’s okay for it to be emotional. And doing it all yourself, you can doing it all yourself, you can be the one who hires it to be the one who brings in other support, even if it’s just from friends. Erin Ollila 06:42 You know, it’s so interesting, the example you gave about like watching someone dance and seeing if there can be like, you know, if you can replicate that dance without necessarily having the skills and the practice, I think it’s a really great starting point for our conversation. Because while you know, we’re talking about this being a skill, and it’s okay to have feel overwhelmed and go through this prep, the process of it is still something that you do in a baby step approach, right? So like, someone teaches you that dance, you’re not going to watch the entirety of the dance and get up and try to do the whole choreographed dance, right? Well, at least I can say, for my children who are in dance right now, like when their teacher teaches them something, it is like one movement, it is the movement of maybe the leg and from the knee down to sometimes as simple as that, right. And they practice that. And then eventually, there’s that next movement until they put together like a two second part of what could be a four minute dance. So it goes like that, for writing to you know, like, maybe it’s just a quick, a brain dump of what’s in your brain. And you know, you want to make these points, so you jot it all down on paper, then maybe you start to organize it a little bit. And after the organization, then you look at it strategically, like it is a baby step. And then if you can commit taking all of those baby steps, then you’re going to be the benefit from the from the fact that you have a full fleshed out sales, email strategy, sales emails that are completed and an approach to selling in your business. And that feels good for you and aligned with your own business goals. Before we jump into the words and all of that, like let’s talk about the overwhelm for a second, where do you suggest people even begin when it comes to sales email strategy and approaching just emailing their audience about what their offers? 08:30 Absolutely. So that place, I think the the best place to start is really with a deep understanding of what their audiences priorities and goals are. So I love to go back to, to research to having sent out polls, it’s called Voice of Customer data. So being able to do surveys, ask people, what they’re looking for, what they’re struggling with, what are the challenges that they’re experiencing? Right now in their business? Or even better talk about, you know, what, you know, what are the what are the challenges that they have been trying to solve in the last 90 days, that kind of a thing? I find that asking future oriented, you know, we’re always we think we have big dreams and, and you know, and we were so positive. And, and so people are very ambitious as well. And so we’ll talk about the future and say, like, Oh, I’m going to accomplish all these things. But getting a sense of what have people actually been doing to solve their problems, what are the problems, they’ve been investing their time and money and over the last 3060 90 days, gives you a very good indicator of what is actually happening for them. So I like to keep my surveys focused on what has been true for them and what’s been happening for them. And then looking at what are those themes? What’s coming up in those themes, pulling that together? And then really taking the lead from them. And I think this can be a beautiful place to to again, take pressure off of yourself, because I think it can you can easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you have to be this, you know, this creative, like fountain of information, you have to come up with cool like angles and ways to talk about it. And you got to, you know, bust objections and all this stuff. And if you know if you’re even just if you’re picking up, like if you’re following folks online, it can be easy to internalize those ideas. And I really like to look at, you know, myself as being in service of my audience, or, you know, my clients being in service of their audience, and looking at what are their priorities? What are their challenges? What are their goals? And then focusing in on now, how can we have a conversation with them about this and connect what those goals and challenges are? To what it is that, you know, that we held in a really genuine way, like, help them to connect the dots from one to the other? Yeah, that’s Erin Ollila 10:54 so that’s so important. And I think, you know, sometimes when I’ve heard people describe things like that, I think he did it very clearly. But I’ve thought to myself, like, what is this conversation? And I think, as a marketer, it’s easier for me to understand what that means, but just writing it in a little if there’s small business owner who’s listening to this, and they’re like, Yeah, I want to have a conversation. But what do I talk about in this conversation? Think about the research that Kylie told you, you could just get right. Go through it, sort through it and think to yourself, Well, how would I actually talk to someone about this face to face and I know that is so rudimentary what I’m saying. But I think it’s sometimes it’s hard to translate what you’d say to someone when you’re discussing it with them to what you sit down and write to them. But it really actually is that easy. And if this is something you’re DIY, in, a good approach I learned in graduate school is just to record yourself. So maybe you hop on a zoom with your sister, you hop on a zoom with a friend, or by yourself, and you just record it and you talk it out, like talk out that conversation related to what it is you’re trying to offer to your clients and put it into transcription, see what it says take the like little you know, diamond parts of that, that you find and pull it into your document, and then you start adding around it. But I love the idea of just being a human and talking to other humans, like you’d like to be talked to, if you are the 12:17 consumer. Absolutely. And if you’re you know, if people are feeling really stuck as well and they’re dry, you can put out a call, you know, if you have social media, or if you have best clients or best customers, you can say, you know, I’m looking to have, I’m looking to, you know, check in and get a sense of, you know, just have a conversation around this topic, and hear what matters to you around it. And I think again, because we were always coming at this for we’ve got our lenses because we’ve built you know, we’ve built the thing or we’ve you know, we’ve created the offer, we know it inside and out. And that means that we’re seeing it from a different standpoint. So if we can, you know, talk to we can talk to real people, or even if you just think of your what those goals are, what their challenges and goals are, just keep them on a posted on your desk. And notice them coming up in conversation with people notice, like with clients, notice what they say about it, and then just make some jot notes Exactly. Like you said, I often think of it as like paid warm up, you know, if I’m doing client work, and I see a theme, I’ll like have a spot just to grab all of that loose material and be able to pull it in. So you can start to notice, okay, what is actually really resonant for them, what’s what’s feeling. And what did I say that made their like made them laugh, or that made them like feel seen, or that slowed the conversation down a little bit and it got a little bit it got deeper and more real, even if that’s just you know, a conversation at the till, you know, if you have a physical store, those are places where you can really be able to start taking those things and start writing them down. Erin Ollila 13:52 Let me ask you a question. Another question about strategy. Before we jump into the actual copy part? I know the answer is really going to be it depends which I’m pretty sure this is the like 100% of the episodes, I’ve said the word it depends on it. But when it comes to strategy, is there a better approach when it comes to like the amount of emails that you send the time between emails, anything like that, when we’re trying to take a you know, strategic approach to how we create a sales email sequence? 14:23 Definitely going to do the the consultant mantra of it depends. But what I try to think about is, what’s the normal cadence or the normal rhythm of what emails have been going out? How, you know, how does that normally feel? And then what I like to try to do is, you know, we want to indicate that there’s something exciting going on, indicate that there’s that there’s kind of more energy, an ongoing conversation. So we want to go we want to increase that frequency and be building that so I you know, it depends, again, it depends, but I like to, if we’re thinking about a traditional launch, like, you know, be leading up to that with maybe a like a week before, like, we’ve got an event maybe or a lead magnet or something that’s related to that, where you’re giving people an opportunity to raise their hands and show that they’re interested before the before the open cart, that’s been really successful. For my, for my smaller clients as well, it gives you an automatic pool of really warm leads and people who are very interested. So we like to build up to that. And then from there kind of go into more of a like more of a traditional sales sequence. So where you might be emailing every day for, you know, for a week, and maybe the week before that you were emailing like every other day, that kind of thing. The truth of Erin Ollila 15:49 the matter is, it really depends on everything. What’s the offer? What’s the price range? What’s the nurture, like? Approach? Like? How have you been talking to people about this? How warm are these leads? How cold are these leads. So I would say don’t stress about that, like, get the message out first is great to go from a strategic approach to what you’re going to say. But know that you have a general idea, even if it’s like you pick an arbitrary number, just like, Okay, I’m gonna write four, I’m gonna write 14, whatever it is, give yourself a number, sit down, start to make some notes. And then you’ll see maybe your goal of 14, you’re gonna realize, oh, you know, what, I don’t have enough to say, I’m going to now do 911, whatever. When you do four, I guarantee if you’re trying to write for C sales emails, you’re gonna find the emails that you want to write end up being very long, because you have a lot to say in those four emails, and you can break them apart. But don’t force that strategy, when it comes to the message, allow the message to kind of come out of the strategy. All right, so it’s time to jump into writing. Are you ready for this? What is your best advice for people who are staring at a blank page and a blinking cursor? 16:59 My best advice is to really check in with how you’re feeling before you write. So you know, no one is going to be more enthusiastic about this, then you so getting a diet like dialing in on how are you actually feeling about this, I like to sit down and journal a little bit, either in a notebook or even just in a separate document, and write about, you know, how valuable do I believe this offer is? What like, what is it that I do? I think that it’s going to be easy to sell, you know, why is that? Do? What do I believe about the people who need it? Why do they need it, you know, really focusing in for me focusing on service is really helpful. So getting centered on those things, and making sure that I’m giving myself the time to be get energized, go for a walk around the block maybe have like a nice little baked good, and that I’m writing from a place that is reflecting the you know, the the energy level that I want to be, you know, to be sharing with the, with the folks that are going to be reading. Yeah, Erin Ollila 17:58 that’s a great point. And I would also add to that to say that, while you’re writing, if you find that you do start to get a little overwhelmed, whether it’s because you’re at a point where you know, you’re not saying things or you’d like to or you don’t know how to finish the email, whatever it is, then take a break, right, like come back to it later. Even if it’s that you write half of an email, and you decide you’re gonna go on to a different one, because you’d be a little bit more excited about like the outline that you know, you want to share there. And this one you’re struggling with, try to get the most momentum as you can, and then come back to things later. Because if you start excited, and you find yourself frustrated, it will also come apparent in your emails that maybe you’re just kind of fizzling out toward the end. And you don’t want that you want your clients to know you’re excited throughout the whole thing, not that just you know, you have a great entry point. And then they’re getting lost in the emails as well, because you’re getting lost in the emails, 18:50 definitely. And then just a really practical thing that I learned from, from connecting with other folks who are doing their own content marketing, for their business and who are writing for others as well is literally having a document called scrap copy for any you know, any project that I’m doing. I have like, if I’m writing a specific launch, I’ll have a document that’s called just scrap copy. And then when I’m going through and I I’m trying to pull if I get to the editing stage when I get to the editing stage, and I see if there’s something here, it’s fun is really fun. It’s interesting, like mine is often just very colorful, but not at all related to what it’s supposed to be talking about. I can take that, like pull it and pop it somewhere else. I know that it’s safe. It’s been it’s a little home. It you know, nothing’s bad’s gonna happen to it. But it makes it a lot easier for me to be less precious with my ideas and less precious with trying to get everything down. Erin Ollila 19:47 Yeah, I love that and I use that and I recommend it to my clients as well as you know, it could be as simple as when you’re editing your stuff. You know, they say kill your darlings. Well when you’re killing Well, if anyone doesn’t understand what that means it’s like cut out the things that you might like, and you might really love in a story or a copy that you’re writing, but just don’t necessarily belong there. Well, you don’t have to kill them completely. Like you could just like move your darlings, like send them from one home to another home and that home is your scrap copy area, and then pull from it later, it’s going to be relevant later, like whether it’s relevant next week or next year, it really doesn’t make a difference. It’s a great way to not have to stare at that blinking cursor. You can just pull something else in from elsewhere and add to that question here because I like this idea of having copy that you can always you know, take from is how much of your sales email sequence needs to be store FIDE versus like salesy and I know that is another it depends answer. But I think that one thing that frustrates me as a copywriter is I and I love story. I love building story into marketing. I think there’s it’s so relevant. But I think that when the average person listens, whether they’re the DIY or or someone who wants to hire things out, it’s very confusing to them to hear, turn everything into a story like, because that’s just not natural, right? Like we as consumers do not read a 1200 word document before making a decision on every single thing like at the grocery store, if we’re going to buy Parmesan cheese, we don’t have to read a story about how that cheese came to be. So when I’ve worked with clients to do editing of things that they’ve created in the past, sometimes I have to say like, let’s rein you in a little hear like, these stories are great, but like, why are you telling them like, how is this related to your overall goal. And the opposite spectrum is sometimes I will work with clients who every email or every the whole sales copy is just so by by by that I tell them like we need to make this more about the consumer. So do you have any approach to that and how to kind of toe the line between story and sales? 21:57 Yeah, this I think is a lot about the feel of the piece. Overall, I like to try to read especially for sales emails, I like to try to read the sales emails overall. Like if I’m thinking looking at them as a set, you know, kind of looking at them as a set. I actually, I’ll circle back to that. For each specific document that I’m writing, one of the first things that I do to make sure I’m not starting with a blank page is I literally start with say, you know, what is my goal here for this specific piece of writing? What’s my goal? And then who is my audience? And then I’ll make up often a couple of notes about what’s their level of awareness at this point. So what did they understand so far about what we’ve talked about? What are they considering? What are they thinking about? And then those things, for me, are really helpful to kind of to rein it in, and to be able to dial in, what should I be? What should I be talking about here? What makes sense what’s relevant, because this is, you know, nobody wants to go to a dinner party, where the host just keeps telling unrelated stories about themselves, monopolizes the conversation and is off topic, you know, and then you’re here for four hours, and you leave, you know, everything, you haven’t had a meal, you’re frustrated. So we don’t want to do that. And I like to look at what’s the stage of the, you know, the kind of the campaign that we’re in, or that overall conversation that we’re having, especially at the beginning, I think stories we want to be connecting them always be connecting them back to again, those primary goals and challenges that the that the audience has, what is it that they’re trying to accomplish? What matters to them, you know, this is I also remember, this is a compute, these are things that are, that are present for them, but they’re competing with other real interests in their lives. Maybe they’re caring for family members who you know, that need their support, maybe they you know, they have other external stresses that are, you know, that are, you know, part of us, maybe it’s just that they’re training another have to go to, you know, pick up their kids in 20 minutes, and they know, the rest of the moms are going to be there. So they have to figure out like how they’re gonna present. So they’ve got full lives going on. So we want to tell stories that help them to understand how this is going to accomplish what they need. And then from there, what I like to do is like you were saying, have a mix. So cast a vision for them be painting a picture, especially at the beginning of the campaign for them to understand, how could this help them? What could that look like? What could it create for them, you know, realistically, but then as we move towards actually talking about, here’s the opportunity that’s happening, here’s when, you know, here’s when you need to make a purchasing decision by to participate in this. That’s when we need to be talking more about sales. And for those emails, it’s totally appropriate to be talking more about what is included what what do we need to be taught like thinking about how much time is it going to take from your day or you know, how long will you have access to it and to be speaking more about those just sticks. But really, I think that that it’s all about moving from, from helping them to picture what this could make possible for them in a realistic, you know, non manipulative way to understanding that purchasing decision that they’re making, and then kind of more into, like helping them, you helping them again, kind of shifting back into remembering what they would like to have happen and helping them to connect with how possible that is for them, I really come back to self belief on a lot of this, so much of the conversation around any purchases about the client’s self belief, will they be able to make a change with it? Will they be able to accomplish it? And and that that’s you either we’re talking about features and benefits or or you know, what’s included in the package? But a lot of this comes back to will they be able to do what they want to with it? Or will they feel disappointed. And so I try to always come back to the heart of that for them. Erin Ollila 25:56 That’s an excellent point. And I think that’s a really great way to say like the difference between the sales copy on the sales page and the sales emails, you know, if you look at the, this, like a tiny section on a sales page, it’s like what’s included, and it’s like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, bullet point, here’s the like, you know, seven things included in this package. Well, when you bring it back to the sales emails, here’s your opportunity to showcase what’s included, because that’s where people make their purchasing decisions. But if you tie it into how those inclusions are going to help the person or how that inclusion is going to move them forward, or why making that decision at this point about this specific inclusion is the right time. That’s one way that we can approach copywriting from a more a sales related but still ethical and you know, feel good standpoint, while kind of bringing story in without having to go down that more creative writing road, right? Like you’re talking to them. So there’s that human approach, you’re showcasing why that inclusion or of the deliverable of the course whatever it is, is important and valid for them. And you’re doing it in a way that feels good. And that feels readable, right? So it’s not just like your standard high school essay, where you’re like you should buy here are the three reasons I’m going to follow up with paragraphs. Nope, that’s not going to work. But it’s also not going to work again to have the story about like, you know, Rapunzel, and the TAT and the tower and her long hair, and you finally get to the end of your story. And all of a sudden they switch from Rapunzel in our hair too. And that is exactly why you should buy my, my my course on how to DM people in Instagram to make sales, right, like it’s not related. It’s refunds all factors that have to do. And I think people are consumers in this online age, especially in the last five years are becoming really smart to sales tactics. And I think that’s why this huge shift is really happening, at least in the past year or so of marketers wanting to do better and be better. And whether you are DIY and or hiring someone to do this for you, you have that option, you know, like you have the option to make this feel better for you as the seller, and better for your clients. And if they’re feeling good about the sales process, the whole client experience or customer experience is going to start from a place of like a really great place. And who would want anything more than that, right like to have someone who’s already feeling good about working with you, before it starts. Now one more question before we kind of move away from this is how do you audit what you’ve done? Like when you’ve got your first draft done? What can you do to make sure that like the approach that you’ve created, the stories you’ve told the selling points that you have are actually strategic? 28:41 Definitely. So a really practical, a really practical move is simply similar to what you said, read them out loud, record it and listen back that I find to be really, really helpful to be able to get a big picture sense of what you know, what’s this arc that we’re talking about? Where am I losing interest? Where am I zoning out? You know, that kind of thing. So that I think is is really helpful, but in a big picture sense. I really like to think about building a shish kebab with my message with our messaging and I think I think about this from in terms of you know, from social media to lead mag like it leading to lead magnets leading to the you know, leading to an offer, included and but then also from sales emails as well. So we want to, again, make sure that we are really dialed in on foot and solving a specific problem for people helping them to understand how we’re solving a specific problem for them how we’re, you know, removing a pain point, relieving a pain point or helping them to accomplish a goal. And so having that kind of overall strategy of saying, This is what we’re here to do. We’re here to help this specific person with these specific goals. And then going through and looking at are the stories that we’re talking about already. They really helping even little tiny shifts like, am I actually do I need to include this? You know, this paragraph about, you know about like what their well how their relatives used to make breakfast? Can I start closer to the action? Where can I, you know, how can I dial that in, but just making going through and after listening to them through kind of speaking them out loud, making sure that you like the flow of it, then going through and looking at is everything that I’m doing serving that goal, is there a different way or a more effective, more succinct way that I will be able to help to be in service of that goal? That, for me has been really, really helpful. Erin Ollila 30:41 That’s awesome. And my final question, when it comes to sales email strategy is could you give me a little overview on what the differences between writing an evergreen sales sequence and a lives like launch sequence because, you know, there really is a different approach, and in some ways you can borrow from each other. But in other ways, they have important things to their own. Right. So what are your thoughts on that? 31:06 I’m curious to hear like to hear your take on it. Honestly, my like my experience with it, I’ve done I’ve done both for myself, like for myself, and for my clients, I approach them, I approach them very similarly, with looking at, like, same strategic approach of what is this, you know, this problem that we’re trying to solve for this specific person? What’s the conversation that we want to be having? And then how can we make sure that that’s, that’s relevant, that it’s coming at a time where it makes sense? So the extra calibration that you need to do with with the Evergreen, with Evergreen sales sequences? is understanding where in the we’re in the machine, does this fit? Depending on how elaborate the, you know, if you’re writing for a client? How elaborate this is? Is this the is this going to be the fifth time that they’ve received a sales sequence that’s related to this, like this one primary offer? That’s the one thing that they sell? And it’s always on Evergreen? And that’s always on sale for them, you know, on, you know, in an evergreen way? So have they seen that? Have they seen a whole bunch of different offers for this before? Is this? You know, how aware of basically awareness? How aware, are they of what we’re looking at? And where is it coming for them? So that for me, is that kind of dialing in of understanding? And that’s really just understanding the audience and understanding what is it that they, you know, what is it that they already know? And what is it that they need, so that we can speak to that? And then then the other piece as well is how are we creating urgency and doing that in a way that’s ethical doing that in a way that fits for the offer? And that makes sense for the business owner? You know, there are people if you’re relying heavily on some tool, like deadline funnel, and you have a whole bunch of timers that are going to be everywhere? How are you deploying those? How are you doing that in a way that, again, feels good makes sense? And isn’t, you know, hitting them over the head with, with, you know, the, with this imposed timeline? What, you know, how are we stirring, urgency, and reminding, you know, reminding the people who are reading it, of what their actual urgency is for them, you know, really focusing in on what is the situation or real world situation where they would feel that urgency, and and helping them to remember that? Yeah, maybe that’s not happening right now, for them. Or maybe it is, but that that’s an actual need that they, you know, that they would like to solve and helping them to reconnect with that. Erin Ollila 33:42 Yeah, that’s really helpful. I would say my take on it is pretty similar. Urgency is definitely important in both of the different like sequences, right? So you have to build an urgency within a live launch, because it’s happening now. And if you’re not taking part, you’re missing out. I mean, an AI that comes from an ethical or not ethical standpoint, right? Like however you approach it, it time is time. And if you’re not taking part of a live launch, you’re just not going to see what’s going to happen. When it comes to the opposite of the Evergreen funnel when it comes to urgency. There’s no intrinsic urgency in that moment. Right. So then how do you encourage them that now is the time now’s the time for them to buy and why it is. So I’m echoing what you said here. But what I’ll say from my standpoint is many people that I’ve worked with, especially clients who have hired me to do this, a lot of the times what people do is they start off with a live launch. And I absolutely think that’s the best approach, right? Like, even if you’re doing that for multiple rounds, everyone wants to Evergreen things because they want to kind of fall into this passive income world of like, let me just create and sell forever. I know Kyle just through some air quotes and I’m like echoing those air quotes 100% It doesn’t really work like that. And it unless you know your client so well through the VOC work that you’ve done. And from the offers, you’ve sold being in business for a very long time. You You need that experience, and you need that information to be able to sell on cycle regularly. I think when we look at our evergreen launches, we need to consider the urgency that we’re putting for the people, the ideal clients who might need it at that moment, but also approach the story approach the strategy, from the perspective of you’re nurturing an audience that will potentially buy from you in the future. So you might need to rain in a little. Whereas the urgency is going to be a lot higher in that live launches. From a very obvious standpoint, when you’re doing live launches, you might also have more emails, because you will be emailing people about like workshops to attend for let’s say, you’re doing like a five day challenge or something to that effect, you know, you’re going to want to be like, here’s the time, here’s the replay, here’s what you learned, here’s your work, workbooks, you’re not going to have all of that in an evergreen funnel. So you’ll have a little bit less emails. Also in an evergreen funnel, I would say you have a little bit more opportunity to be heavier on the story. Because you are you creating a scenario in an evergreen launch. Whereas for a live launch, it is still based on events, if that makes any sense. Even if the event isn’t like a five day series, maybe it’s a masterclass or whatever it is that’s leading up to the offer. It’s still a little bit more event based. But I would absolutely say if you’ve created content for one or the other look at that content and and audit it to say how can I use this for the other you know, when you move from live lunch to Evergreen, a lot of what you’ve already said is still relevant, you’re just maybe saying it in a different way. That would be my my approach to Evergreen versus live launch. 36:51 The other thing that came up for me as well, just as you’re speaking is that and I think this really applies to smaller business owners is that remember that for live launches, you’re you’re likely touching people on multiple platforms. So they’re the emails are part of what you’re receiving. But they’re just one part. So there are people probably also seeing your sales emails, or sorry, your is your they’re seeing your sales emails, they’re probably also seeing your social media posts, they may be seeing if you’re going live, they might see that they may also then be having these event notifications, they may you know, if you have a podcast, they may see a podcast, none of none of this to say that you need all of those bells and whistles to have a successful launch, but that your launch emails are part of a greater ecosystem. And so with the Evergreen sales emails, you need to I think of approaching them as part of a nurturer. You know, as part partially nurturing folks is a really strong perspective to take, and like a helpful one. But also, we need to remember that we’re trying to create a level of excitement, a level of urgency, a level of, you know, just a level of UI, there’s like something happening here. And it’s important to pay attention. That is that we’re we’re trying to capture that probably just in those emails. And that weren’t, they’re not being supported in other platforms in this like, in the same way at all. So I really try to like to think about that as well, when I’m coming out an evergreen sequence, because it’s that piece of evergreen is a bit of a different ballgame. You know, Erin Ollila 38:29 I’m going to be really practical here for a second. And I think this is mostly for the DIY errs. Because if you’re hiring this out, while strategy, I would say is going to really be involved in that and that might adjust. Your copywriter generally knows the approach that they need to take. So if you are a DIY er and you’re listening, I’m going to give you a cheat right here. When I was in college, I well actually my graduate school was creative writing. So I’ve read all of the writing books, one of my favorite authors is Anne Lamott. And she has a book on writing called Bird by Bird. This is what I learned in school and I will say I have taken it into my content writing and my copywriting every single day since then, it’s been over 10 years it is write a shitty first draft period. And what I’m why I’m introducing that now at the end of this conversation is I really want to encourage people and I guess maybe this is even done for you copied right? Know that every single time you launch every single time you do a live round or you’re moving to Evergreen, and then after evergreen, when you can review the data on your launch, you’re going to change these emails, right? So if this is the very first time you’re launching a product, make it like get it out just it might be horrible. Who cares? Right like if you get your a few people to sign up, you’re going to learn information. You can ask them questions like what was helpful for you like what of my content felt relevant what felt wrong, like people love to give feedback like I think we as business owners tend to be have anxiety or fear about asking for feedback. But if you take it from the perspective of being the consumer, I think consumers should love to share their feelings. And if they’re asked from a human approach of like, can you help me like, I really want to make this better for you and other people moving through this, they’re going to want to help. So get that really crappy, like sales email launch out there, then when it’s over, look at it and say, like, what felt good? Like, did I have a lot of unsubscribes on certain emails like that I have a lot of clicks on our their emails, and then you can start to make decisions on those. So again, even if you have hired this out, those are the things you’re going to want to look at after the launch. Data is such data is the best friend of a strategist and a copywriter. People like to think that we choose pretty words, and that’s what makes things happen. But it’s really the research and the information that we have. So you have my full permission to write your sales email sequence, whether it’s live or evergreen, and know that it’s not perfect copywriters, right? A lot of things that are very imperfect, right, and we learn from them, and we just make them better. And that’s, that’s your strategy there, right? Like, you have to get it out there. You have to learn from it, and then just adjust over time in a way that feels good for you and your clients. 41:18 Absolutely, and I think looking at the adjustment piece, as part of your process is really helpful. It doesn’t mean that you, you know, you complete the final thing, you schedule it all and you send it and now you’ve finished viewing that and then you know you adjust things if you failed, which is how you know a lot of the time with the internal monologue will tell us really viewing that adjustment and recount like kind of recalibrating as part of your process is a really healthy approach to take. Great. Erin Ollila 41:46 So Kayla, this has been such an informative episode, I’m really excited to share this my audience. Now before I let you go, though, I always ask people a few questions. And the first is, if you could give a homework assignment to someone who’s listening right now. And they’re thinking like, I love everything you guys just said, but I still don’t really know what to do. What would your homework assignment for them be? 42:07 I would ask them to start to coach themselves a little bit or even just journal, if that’s a more comfortable way of thinking about it for yourself before you write. So get a piece of paper and just write down a little bit about you know, what do you believe about the person that you’re writing to? How easy is it to help them? You know, what’s your, what’s your relationship with them? Do you really love to talk with them? Is it like, what is? What’s that feeling that you have? And then what do you want them? What do you want to help them feel a little bit more of in their in their life? So coaching yourself through that, doing a little bit of just setting some intentions there and getting into the right mood before you start can be really phenomenal? If you Erin Ollila 42:53 could be connected with anyone in this online business world, this great business space? Who would it be? And why? 43:01 Ah, got I would say I mean, ADHD years for sure. You know, we’re fun, folks. Absolutely, I’d love to be connected with more copywriters, and content writers, I often have clients and friends who are looking for them. And I would love to know more, my little black book is not very full in that department. So I’d love to know more of those. And those folks and then, you know, obviously if anybody if any of them, you know have clients who are running without an underlying business or marketing strategy support, or have bigger parts of their business that just aren’t working properly, and they’d like to get that support from someone who has no interest in writing from them then I’d love to connect with them. Erin Ollila 43:45 And I have a little black book of content and copywriters that I will be the first person to send you all of my favorite friends who do great work. My question for you is if you look at having ADHD as a superpower, where does it come out in your personal or professional life? 44:01 Definitely. So I think the like the enthusiasm the endless curiosity for me is definitely those are the places where where it comes up. Gosh, like being an idea generator and you know, there’s being able to come up with like a million different ideas and different scenarios is that is tremendously tremendously useful and helpful. I’m really good at thinking at my phone, my feet, and speaking is really easy for me. And that is that for me has been really tremendous. I’m also autistic and really thinking about for me that piece of having the like the real deep interest and that deep curiosity and learn I’m really fascinated by people and and and that’s where my kind of conversion copywriting interest has come up. So for me, the the pairing those two I’m able to like, you know, find the routines that work for me And like fall into those grooves and really love them. That’s going to be more the artistic piece of me and then the, the ADHD or is just like, all of the ideas all of the time. And, and being able to see all kinds of possibilities for you know, for myself and for other folks that that they can’t see and being able to speak into that and sharing that for them is really, I think, tremendously supportive. Erin Ollila 45:27 Awesome. What Kyla, thank you so much for your time. You’ve been so generous with your ideas today. So I really appreciate that I will share all of the ways to contact you in the show notes and again, just thank you so much for being such a wonderful guest. I’m so happy to have you on the show. 45:41 Thank you for having me.