Email Marketing: The 3 Most Important Email Copywriting Tips with Copywriter, Danavir Sarria

And I'm here man. What's up? Hey, man. How's everything going? I'm doing well. Thank you. How are you? I'm doing great, right? Good Yeah, I know we're recording this on the Friday. So happy Friday people listening are probably gonna listen to it on Monday or another day So anyone listening happy whatever day it is, but they're gonna be a really excited to talk email copy with you Do you mind kind of before we dive into three topics that we're gonna go through sharing a little bit about your background at a high level Yeah, man, so I've been a direct response marketer digital marketer for the past 10 years Got my start with Copywriting and specifically email copywriting with my first client being he sold Street Magic DVDs online like the David Blaine style Street Magic stuff And eventually he sold his own cards like, you know playing cards or whatever and that's pretty much how I got started I knew nothing I was back and I was way into those hardcore direct response like Frank Kern I've been pagan, you know Russell Brunson s internet marketing world And I was in that world for like eight years the copywriting marketing all sorts of things throughout that time and eventually in the past Maybe two years two three years two years. I'll say I've been going hardcore into just e-commerce and stuff So again with a same copywriting marketing ads ad creative and stuff like that Sweet, man. That's awesome. I'm pumped up. I'm to learn from you. Let's let's dive into the first kind of topic then So really I know one of the things that you were excited to share a bit about How do you write email copy and kind of strategize flows based on customer awareness Right. So this is something I don't see talked about very often in e-commerce and but it's talked about a lot in direct response because awareness is almost everything because that's like a Lot of people talk about the customer journey, right? And there's some people how like I know digital market has their own version of a customer journey and stuff like that They buy this and you upsell that whatever but there's a difference between that and the customer journey of you know Someone's mind your thought process as they go from stranger to buyer And so the way the way I thought I follow basically Eugene Schwartz model of customer awareness Which is you know, you'd have the unaware market you have problem aware solution aware product aware and very aware And then your goal is especially with flows But pretty much all email marketing in e-commerce is you want to take someone from one step to the other, right? And also you never you want to target someone who's earlier in the awareness phase How do you write copy in a way that says, okay, you don't understand this part, but you understand that How do I get you to buy from here to there like as fast as possible? alright, and so For example, the easy example is like the welcome flow welcome flow normally Oh, actually, let me take a step back actually starts even before the welcome flow, which it starts with The pop-up they're using to get people into the flow in the first place Usually e-commerce stores will do something like 15% off What does that mean someone who signs up for 15% off to get some shoes Let's just say they're minimalist shoes for CrossFit or just something like that. Well one they already know CrossFit right there. We know what minimalist shoes is at least for the most part. I get the idea and they're very They might not be ready to buy but they're they're there. They're pretty aware Okay, so once they sign up and get to the welcome flow. All you have to do now is Figure out where do you want to be in that awareness spectrum problem where solution where? Product aware or very aware and then take them From the beginning of the welcome flow to the end of the welcome flow all the way to the end of it so using that same example of someone signs up for 15% off I Would probably start with solution aware And then go by the end of by the end the whole thing very aware, which is solution where just like hey You You want to strengthen your legs or something, you know, whatever the benefit of minimalist shoes are and then goes Okay, our shoes have X Y & Z. This is why we're different and then by the end the welcome flow. Hey Get our shoes now for 80 bucks or whatever the thing costs. And so that's a really quick example of how Customer awareness works within the email flows and then you're just doing the same thing But for every other flow post-purchase flow is gonna have a lot more awareness than the welcome flow Abandonment flows gonna have more than the welcome flow as well quiz might be a little bit different it just depends on how are people getting into the flow in the first place and then just moving them up as You go along Got it. So within the welcome series and are you basically digesting it? Where it's like email one hits this awareness and then email to go to this awareness Is that how you think about it or if you don't really necessarily have each email tackling a different solution But in your mind, you know kind of what you're doing That makes sense. Like how do you think about each email within the flow? It can be it can be one email per thing I'm the best way to think about it though. At least when you're more advanced and you actually get the concept is that They you want to give people the information they need to make a purchasing decision So it can be a one email especially if you are in like a peril or something where people only really need to see the product then That's really quick. You just show them the product you show them a couple of featured benefits and then you can move on to the Next next thing but if you are in a much more Difficult much more complicated market for example supplements like even something as basic as protein powder can get really scientific really fast And so you want to spend a little bit more time whether that means longer emails Or more a higher frequency of emails to educate them throughout the entire process So if you say just to give example of the supplements say someone starts that problem where you know Are you struggling to build muscle? here's why you're struggling to build muscle that could be one long email or it could be it could be like The three things that keep people small for the rest of their lives, you know And that could you could do that. I usually wouldn't for me. The welcome flow is gonna be pretty short It's gonna be like five ish. Maybe a little bit more emails and then the rest you just repeat it about the actual campaigns but that's basically The idea as long as you give people the information they need to actually a person purchasing decision then you're good to go Awesome, and this is a little bit kind of a sidestep, but I know you mentioned direct response But I think direct response I only think about right like long form, you know text and copy I don't really think like visual or graphics or HTML What's your stance on kind of plain text versus HTML you do both you lead towards one Is it a mixture like where do you fall for that? Yeah So it's funny because when it comes to client work and you go more on the visual side because that's what people think they're paying You for but when it comes to like actual, you know your own brand or stuff It depends again on the category. It depends on what what information that people need to know to buy So if you are in a more lifestyle category like apparel then it's gonna be more visual because that's what they need to know Right, but if I'm selling again a supplement if I show you my bottle my supplement bottle I'm not gonna like you look at the bottle. It's like cool, but like I still don't know what you're giving me You know man, so give me more information So it depends on both and honestly again as you go to more awareness, right you go from problem Where it's gonna be more text heavy, but as you go higher and higher and higher to very aware It's more graphic heavy because at that point all you're saying is hey get at 20% off Awesome. Yeah, thank you Anything else that you want to mention kind of on the first question. Should we go to the second question? um, I guess the the most important thing is especially Again, there's the way direct response people do is completely different especially direct response e-commerce is Still completely different from you know, DTC world in Twitter or or stuff like that. So I'm in the camp of where you should combine both of where you need to have very compelling copy the problem a lot a lot of e-commerce Not copyright the e-commerce marketers have in DTC world is that they go It's too soft and it's too it's too brandy like they don't like Not brandy as in that brand is bad But that they've mistaken the mistake that brand is actually your position is actually your sales argument Actually the claims you make like hey, like if you're gonna sell a protein powder, for example Don't just say are your protein powder has 24 grams of protein. That's cool That's important to know but it's a better you have like the headline that says hey skinny Here's the secret to getting you know rips in in 30 days, you know Like make like be aggressive What you're doing and then you follow that up with the proof and the logic stuff like get people like emotionally wild up About what it is you're selling that's like it's you have to be exciting about it throughout the entire awareness cycle So what I understand and correct me if I'm wrong is basically you're saying it's like when you to see brands approach Marketing or email particular they're not really compelling enough. It's just like hey, we're over here You know look at us versus like hey, you need this Here's why and really focusing on conversions that kind of what you were getting to pretty much because Because a lot of brands they They have this thing a lot of people in general Those brands are obviously the result of other people's biases and that bias is that direct response is icky It's salesy. It's like it's like yucky basically and then there's a nice legit way to do it There's no such thing. In fact, what I believe is that the more your emails sound like infomercials the better you're off It's gonna perform better You you don't have to say the exact words you don't have to literally say but wait, there's more I mean you could but you don't have to say it like that But the idea the concept has to be there because if it's not there Not all you're doing is just is you're putting your own biases into it instead of worrying about what the customer Actually wants they want the bonus. So that's why the infomercial say but wait, there's more It's not because the weight is more to something about that phrase It's just that you know, this just works and that's what people want And so that's the way you think about and really you think about any type of copywriting whether it's emails ad creative anything So, yeah Interesting. No, thank you for that So on the second kind of topic that you've mentioned talk through is how to write email copy hyper competitive markets using market sophistication So I'm really kind of curious what that actually means Yeah, so market sophistication is It's basically like it's it's very similar awareness frame. Actually, it's it's actually built on top of awareness and It's a way to basically advertise your product When as as the market matures and basically as the market matures making meaning there's more competition Okay, so Market sophistication has five levels similar to the five levels of customer awareness Level number one is where you make a claim, right? Let's just use supplements supplements are easy for this Let's just say you're doing a fat loss supplement. For example, the fat loss supplement the level one market sophistication means Take this pill burn some fat. That's it. That's level one. Super easy. There's no one competing with you You just you're the first one so boom that's all you need to know to get people's trust Right step number two the market sophistication level two. This is where you amplify that original claim So instead of saying hey take our pill lose weight. It says hey take our pill lose 20 pounds in the next 30 days Okay at that point because people are already saying everyone else is saying take this pill burn some fat You have to take up to the next level. Okay, there you go That's step two and then market sophistication level three This is where things change all of a sudden people are already super like jaded about hearing everyone saying You know this stuff works. It burns 20 pounds in 30 days and all that stuff people. They don't believe it any so What do you do you switch the focus? From the product from from the from the promise to how that promise works. How does that happen? Which is called at least in direct response is called the unique mechanism It's similar to a USP but the difference between is a USP and unique mechanism is that the unique mechanism is How the product actually works the most famous example this I'll give two examples The most famous example is P 90 X when it first came out It was like, you know burn weight with with muscle confusion, right? That was literally like it became so popular muscle confusion is I'm pretty sure muscle confusion still more popular today than the actual P 90 X workout program and that's how that's how it was. So it was get rips with muscle confusion That's how that's why P 90 X became so so big another example more e-commerce friendly is proactive Proactive you look all their infomercials. It was the three-step proactive system, right step one You put this thing step to you put that thing step three put this thing boom All of a sudden you have clear skin, right? That is a system you want and so focusing on that Instead of the promise makes you more believable now what happens when everyone copies your promise You go on to step four market sophistication, which is when you amplify the promise. So going back to the supplement example Step three would be first, you know Lose weight with the something that has garcinia cambogia, which is the ingredient that a lot of fat burners have at step four you would say lose weight with this Pharmaceutical grade Garcinia cambogia or some other like old-school ads like like I remember old cigarette ads is like, you know The cigarette doctors recommend like the dumbest thing ever but still like that's the idea like you ideal you have some type of proof that makes your Your unique mechanism seem more legit than everyone else's like this is a better version of whatever you got That's amplification and then step number five and the step number five is the by far the hardest route to go it's It's usually called the dead market because at that point people don't believe your promises neither Do they believe your your unique mechanism how your product works all they care about at this point is the person Identification like who this who this is for this is when you start seeing like Nike They go all in on the whole athlete Angle because at that point it's not about the shoe anymore. It's about who's wearing the shoe, you know and that's again, that's super that's super hard and you generally want to stay away from there if possible, but yeah, right and then like to see then there's then you can go more advanced after all those five phases like the like usually this if you want to read more about it, you can always get a book called breakthrough advertising by Eugene Schwartz and Like for gum one of his many many secrets in there that very few people realize is that as You get more into from level one to level two to three four and five If you get to like level three or four The trick idea that you can do this is to take that product Reposition it so that you're back at market sophistication level one because there's no one else doing it aka the blue ocean market So I know that's a little complicated But yes, pretty much what market sophistication is Yeah, that's interesting This might be a hard question to answer but like in kind of what you've seen in your experience How long does it take for this market to kind of become, you know saturated competitive like is is going from steps You know one through five. That's something that happens in industries or six months There's something that happens every year is like how quickly the brands typically have to move through these stages. Do you think? Yeah, it completely depends on the market. It definitely I would say takes a few years For example, like like keto keto is huge But it didn't it wasn't It was there for years before it took off like it really took off and so You could have stayed in that market sophistication of a one level two for a while But today if you come out with a keto product, you know, you know supplement or something You're not gonna get away with the basic stuff anymore right at this point anyways And so another example that I remember I remember this very clearly was the was VR when VR first came out No, no, everyone had the goggles and stuff at the beginning. Everyone say hey you could do VR now. This is super cool You could see everything 3d and whatever and then but now today it took a couple years, but now today is a little bit more Complicated so early because it's just so damn expensive to be in that space and stuff to pour slow whatever but yeah It definitely takes a couple years, but the best way I wouldn't really worry about it to be honest The only and the only real way you can tell is if you look at your competitors, so that's another thing competitor research is Probably the best source of research you can ever have when you write any type of copy but especially when you're trying to write copy based on people's awareness and people's You know the maturation of the market itself. And so if you look at other people and they're saying This is our product. Here's how it works, you know, and they give it like a name or whatever then you need to do the same Yeah, great great ways to monitor your competitors right sign up for their newsletter buy their products right go to Facebook ad library Look at what they're running their ads, right? Also look on a more I guess on a broad scale at like Google Trends, right? Like what keywords are picking up basically keep an eye kind of on the micro macro level It's kind of the best way that you'd say to monitor what's happening Is there anything kind of outside of like signing up for a newsletter? Looking at their ads and kind of looking at like keywords that you recommend people do to stay up to speed so I have a I have my own biases and that's that it's If you only do that within the regular Ecommerce space you're gonna miss out on a lot of things because a lot of people don't know this So I always think you should be 100% being paying attention to anyone who does this in a more direct response fashion Because if you because if you look at a lot of for example supplements look at a lot of supplements Now it's getting now people are getting a little bit smarter with supplements. But even today they'll still they'll still say Our product is all natural, you know, no No sugar, no, whatever right and it will help you, you know build muscle But none of them have a unique mechanism. None of them have a very specific ingredient that they focus on or a good Position but if you go into direct response world now you are in the completely different space where you are That's all they talk about Like they only talk about that this secret ingredient came from the Himalayas or something and all sudden it makes you rip in 30 days Hey, that's the opposite route And so you where you want to be is in the middle right and and the way you would find these it's harder to find These but it's possible once you pay attention to regular infomercials, right? Two is to sign up to more direct response heavy e-commerce businesses, which there's some so some examples of more direct response heavy is a supplement space as well as I would say skincare like women's skincare and just for general like Education of how this looks like you can go into the more hardcore Info product space which that's literally all they do because that's super, you know Super saturated in there. No one believes that you can make money in 30 days, but it does the way that they do Promote it is is great the diet space proof. That's the space you want to look at no matter I don't care what you sell it's gonna work. So for example, I'll give an example I it was a failed business, but I originally started a a Luxury sportswear brand called stunt double those we luxury sportswear for men Okay, and I came out with a shirt, but I knew that the shirt you're there's a million and one different shirts How do how do I like differentiate my shirt? well, it turns out that you can actually make a sportswear shirt with a Silver fiber within the actual fiber itself that if you use it, it stops It stops the shirt from smelling right? and so That in itself was unique mechanism now that unique mechanism already existed brands like Roan and Lululemon already have it have that same exact thing, but The awareness so few people know that it exists, especially guys guys don't know what that is I don't know you just so you just repeat it and you just say to more guys and now they don't know and so what? I did I forgot what Roan and Lululemon call it. I think Lululemon calls it like silver scent or something like that I was looking for guys. So I went more hardcore. So I called it, you know Introducing I called it a silver silver force right to sell it more military style And so and I called the strip the ghost So I was like, you know Check out the ghost is the only shirt with civil force technology and I went with the military route because the because the company That made the silver The US Army actually bought uses their silver for their some of their gear Now you could take now you can borrow that proof and say You know, this is the only shirt with civil force technology the same technology that used in the world's most Dangerous conditions used by the US military now all of a sudden that sounds like a good damn, you know pitch The business didn't work not because it didn't sell well because it was because the cost the cost to make these shirts are ridiculously Expensive and stuff. It's crazy. The economics of apparel are awful But the pitch work people love that angle so much it was just like, you know It just it just worked and so that's the way you want. It's definitely more advanced Copywriting and at that point I was way hardcore into directive response even more than I was today But yeah, that's it's a little difficult, but that's kind of the way you want to think about it Yeah, man, this is so awesome before we go to a question three I really want to point out the fact of what you just said We're out studying other brands not necessarily that are apples to apples, right? I think you know, I do this a lot of us make this mistake where we're running a beauty brand We're looking at the five ten top beauty brands in our space right and other brands that we get ads for I mean we try to see other people in our space But we are so looking at people that are doing the same style Right and are all kind of copying each other to some degree and to your point, right? Trying to find a brand I've been doing this for a while and really successful in the direct response or some other kind of world I think is a really great one to do and I don't think that's something that a lot of people are currently doing So I think that's really really important. I really appreciate that And the last one again, I really appreciate all the insight here is you know, how to write copy that turns You put in quotes vitamin products in the pink. It's really curious kind of what you have to say here Yeah, so this is definitely much more advanced copywriting and that's that So a lot of products aren't by nature They're vitamin products like the whole vitamin versus painkiller thing vitamins are nice to have and painkillers are you know? Your head hurts so you want to solve this problem as soon as possible. The problem is most products are naturally Vitamins like this shoe is a nice to have this belt is a nice to have this wallet is a nice to have So what you want to do is you want to position it in a way that it's a must-have that I need it now So, how do you do that? So this is an example in the in the direct response space, but you see it sometimes in regular DTC world It's supplements again. It's a Greens right greens. I actually well athletic greens used to do this I think but Greens normally what is it? It's just a it's just a tub of powder made of you know, like 50 different vegetables What's the normal pitch normal pitch is? Get healthy, you know drink this be healthy. That's essentially what the pitch is, but who wants to be healthy? No one really wants to be healthy, bro. So what do you do? you reposition to to find a Urgent problem that the greens solved. So what is that urgent problem? The problem I think the that did not that they normally use is something like like like blood pressure or something like that I forgot the exact problem, but let's just say it's blood pressure They say this product helps with blood pressure basically and all of a sudden now now you need the product because if you have You know, if you have a problem with your blood pressure you need dreams That's how and that's how they do and that's when you start going to the unique mechanism and stuff And going to the actual full pitch, but that's what vitamins to painkillers are another example It's much harder to do this in more lifestyle products, but it's still possible So for example, say you're trying to sell a really expensive wallet, right? The wallet in of itself is a nice to have for most people. It's just a gift, right? It's a nice gift But what does a wallet give you right? like like like is there a Problem that a wallet solves that you could turn that you focus on that wouldn't make someone really really need it right one is Some of some apparel brands uses pitches like, you know, throw away your high school wallet, you know Grow up be a man type of type of thing type of messaging another one could be You know, are you embarrassed to take out your wallet in front of your girlfriend or something like that? Like like that's another way to think about it. Like for more that guys can handle more shame ish shame, you know messaging but that's essentially what what what that means like you want to find a problem that your product or these Ingredients in your product or materials that solves that that solves or for example another one just remember right now I came to wallets. I remember seeing this somewhere which by the way Kickstarter is a great another great place to find you know, they do a lot of direct response heavy stuff in Kickstarter and that's that like fat wallets when you a lot of guys They put on their back pocket And so what happens that they they'll their back like tilts or whatever like that And so you could have like literally a picture that says here look this most guys They have these fat wallets and now their spine is like, you know, they basically have scoliosis and so here's how to fix it and then and you get the skinny wallet, you know, the Skinny wallet that they sell now. I think the original wallet does something similar or something like that I don't know, but that's definitely that that's that's an example of how to turn painkillers. I mean vitamins the painkillers It doesn't work all the time but whenever you can you do it and you don't have to like Focus the entire brand on it. It could be One specific campaign that you do once every two months. It could be one specific flow It could be one specific thing. So something even if you don't want to go hard all in on it Just you know sprinkling it in there is definitely one is another angle to test But to like it's definitely like, you know, it's gonna be Jerry's stronger message. Yeah, this is awesome So in my mind the way that I've interpreted this is basically like positioning the psychology of turning a lot into a need, right? You know instead of saying oh, I want this wallet. It's saying I actually need this wallet, right? So is it kind of like that messaging that makes someone go from I want this but maybe I don't need this I'm not gonna get it. So I want this and I need this so therefore I'm gonna buy it today Yeah, exactly like like the way I think about it is more of a problem Like how do you turn like a like a soft problem into a hard? Urgent problem. So like it's even because even if something even though if a problem is important to people They still won't act on it right again. I'm healthy like it's important to be healthy, but it's not urgent Right, so you want so you want a more urgent problem and this can be done and even Places like luxury because luxury is based on status like, you know What's the worst thing that you could have when it comes to social status is you want to be you know? Scorned from the group don't be you you want to be part of the group So yes, you can use that by Dan that dynamic to sell I mean, you don't want to do too much on luxury products, but more on the mastige High-end premium price products you can definitely do that kind of messaging Awesome dude, this is fantastic for anyone that's made it this far that kind of wants to follow you or learn from you Ask you any question. What's the best place to connect it is it Twitter? Is it LinkedIn? Is it your email? What are some places that people can kind of follow along and connect with you? Yeah, for sure Two best places is my website Dan of your Saria comm or you can contact me through Twitter at Danny Cool and I'll drop your website in your link in the by list of on YouTube. So hey man, this was this is fantastic I know I learned a lot. I'm sure people that are listening to this as well. Well, so so I really appreciate your time No, thanks for having me man. Thank you