Ben Settle

An Email Players subscriber (not sure he wants me naming him) asked me about “unengaged contacts.”

Like, for example, people who haven’t opened or clicked an email in 3 years.

The question is what do I do, delete them?

My advice to him:

“No, I don’t do any of that. People don’t even know who is really engaging or not, as tracking is extremely unreliable — not just open stats but even clicks. Bots literally scan emails and register as clicks these days in some cases. What I do is, I keep them all on, and do periodic list scrubs. A good list scrub finds the problem emails a lot better in my opinion, without getting rid of people, customers, buyers, on your list, throwing them out with the bathwater. For example: I just bought $300 or so in product from a company, in bulk, that has sent me emails saying I never engage and they are taking me off the list. I just didn’t buy anything from their links, and I have images turned off, so I am not tracked as opens. But I’m a buyer and I guarantee I’m not the only one. We live in crazy times.”

To which my subscriber responded:

That makes sense. My Stoopid CRM recommends not sending to anyone who hasn’t opened in 60 days and counts them as “unengaged contacts”. 

That’s like HALF the flipping list. 

I had the toggle turned off for this “feature” but was toying with the idea of not sending to people unengaged for 3+ years. 

But then, I know from experience sometimes people buy from me after ignoring emails and not engaging for years. 

Crazy times indeed. 

This is why I ignore what ESP employees say about email.

The only exception is if the guy giving advice uses email every day in their own business, to sell their own offers, to their own lists — not their clients lists, or parroting data from someone else’s list, but their own lists.

i.e., Post Bizeek.

Otherwise you very well might be doing the equivalent of taking health advice from a fat, wheezing doctor who has to hold his breath to tie his own shoes.

All right, so that is that.

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Ben Settle

Here you go, in 7 simple steps:

1. Drive your social media followers to opt-in page

2. Send useful & engaging emails each day, building an asset (your list) you own, unlike your social following which you don’t own

3. Call to action in emails to your social when their algorithms ignore you

4. Algorithms see engagement as your list starts engaging with you on there

5. Algorithms more likely to make you more visible, which is more likely to get you new followers..

6. Shamelessly bribe those new social followers you get to opt-in to your list

7. Rinse & repeat over and over and over

Even on a very small scale you can do this to start making big tech algorithms chase you, instead of you chasing them like everyone is always doing, running to and fro, freaking out when their favorite platform tweaks something and they suddenly get less engagement. But beyond that, this is a way you can build an asset for your business that you own (emails list), can grow, & of course monetize forever no matter what algorithms do.

As for learning the mysteries of email?

See the paid Email Players newsletter here:

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Ben Settle

Many years ago, I first had one of my sales letters reviewed for legal compliance.

It was quite the education, too.

In fact, while I am certainly no expert on the subject, and I very well may be wrong… going by what he told me, it’s rather astounding how many sales letters — even by so-called world class copywriters with legal departments reviewing their copy — look like gigantic “fed bait” targets to me now.

Anyway, I quickly went to work fixing the compliance “holes” in that ad.

And, soon after that, I ran it. Then something interesting happened. Even though I thought for sure the changes I made to my sales letter to make it more compliant with its claims would have made its response significantly weaker… just the opposite happened.

Response, engagement, and sales were way higher than expected.

The quality of customer was also way higher than expected.

And my knowledge of copywriting soared higher than expected, too.

The reason?

My theory is three fold:

1. The more compliant my sales copy, the more believable it is.

2. The more believable it is, the more likely it’ll sell the skeptics.

3. And the more it sells the skeptics, the more sales from the higher quality customers I tend to get — probably because skeptics are often a 2-5 x’s bigger market segment than the hyper buyers sitting around in their moo-moos drawing welfare each month that are attracted to the screaming claim & exclamation mark-ridden copy are. In fact, it was such a valuable experience I invested a pretty penny in having a bunch of my other various companies’ sales letter analyzed a few months ago, and am having even more done today. I probably have invested nearly $20k in these reviews over the last 6 years or so, and it’s always worth every penny.

It could be that one the greatest copywriting “hacks” is having it legally compliant…

Something to think about.

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Ben Settle

Not long ago one of my customers was speculating about why it is someone like me has but a pittance of a social media follower count vs many who learn from me, maybe even bow at my righteous email altar, and yet have 10x the size audience I do.

There are obvious and not-so-obvious reasons for this.

The obvious is, I’m not a social guy as it is.

I had my fun on social about 8 years ago in my old elBenbo’s Lair Facebook group, got burned out on the attention and chaos and drama, and realized that is not my game at all. Nor do I play today’s game of chasing clout or trend-of-the-day topics. Social media algorithms tend not to like those such as me.

But there is another reason that is maybe not so obvious.

And that is this:

In a day and age where everyone’s a celebrity but nobody’s got talent, I’m more of a 4 quarters vs 100 pennies kinda guy than ever before. I also have simple tastes and who enjoy my privacy above all else while writing emails and books and newsletters (and the occasional pulp horror novel) from my oceanside lair, while investing my profits in companies I think are cool.

No lifestyle pics or selfies.

No world traveler exploits.

No rockstar lifestyle full of booze, drugs, and indiscriminate hookups.

I’m too crotchety for that shyt.

Instead, I prefer my day be to wake up, write, play with Willis rest of the day, and refuse to travel at all. That’s probably the polar opposite life of what probably 99% of these guys on social media want, and that the algorithms reward due to their inherent engagement from the proles who are impressed with it. I neither sell to or cater to the proles, the clout-chasers, or the people pursuing the lifestyle instead of pursuing the excellence first which, ironically, is required to get the lifestyle.

The result is much fewer, but far-and-away better, customers.

As for these people who learn from me with 10x sized audiences?

Some of them are extremely good at building audiences. Or so it seems, at least. Although I suspect there are quite a few bots amongst those followers, but be that as it may. And a scant few (I can probably count them on one hand) of those guys are also wise enough to put as many of those people in their audiences on an email list, which is the way to go.

That way they own their business, not Elon or Zuck or Google.

That is what I want for all my boys & ghouls at the end of the day:

To stand on their own two feet, no matter what happens, with an asset (email list) they own.

But alas…

An awful lot of them are hopelessly 100% reliant on social media and don’t have a business as much as they merely have an audience on a platform they have zero control over and that could boot them at any time, taking their audiences from them. That is why it works only until it doesn’t. It’s especially bad for the ones I know of who are completely financially overextended, terrified their audiences will find out they aren’t what they say they, and will be revealed as buck naked when the tide goes out in the coming months and years.

A lot of the things people are impressed by on social media are a fugazi.

As elusive and as much a facade as the algorithms they rely upon.

And it’s all a big bubble that’s already hissing air.

All of which is why I wouldn’t give a trough of horse pucky for the futures of most of these guys who have to constantly churn out content, chase algorithms, and 100% depend on platforms they have zero control over, while refusing to grow and write daily emails to and develop a relationship with an email list like I tell them to do.

Most won’t though.

And even when they do, it’ll be too late.

Not unlike March 2020 when the lockdowns hit.

Suddenly everyone was asking me how to grow an email list at that time.

No.

The time to do that is BEFORE you need it, not when.

And so it is now.

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Ben Settle

Comedian Owen Benjamin (ooh) tweets:

“Yeah. Being ahead of the curve will always be attacked. But in 4 years I’ll get letters and stories of triumph and trust and respect. And that’s how a strong community is propagated.”

A lot of people despise Owen and/or think he’s practically the devil.

But he’s absolutely right about being ahead of the curve getting you hated. This is nothing new of course. People have literally been executed — probably even beheaded — for being ahead of the curve, accused of heresy, etc simply for putting out differing theories/ideas/solutions about whatever, right, wrong, didn’t matter. A lot of people I know up in this business who are reading this right now can probably relate even on a small level today. We have seen a bunch of blue flame specials on social media spazzing out, for example, even with something as non-controversial as BerserkerMail since the day it launched.

How have we been ahead of the curve?

1. Talking about the low importance of tracking open rates — those bots sure love to open your emails, but they ain’t buying. Ditto with a lot of clicks now, too. Not to mention more and more inbox clients across the board bragging about their ability to block tracking.

2. Not caring about soft metrics over ROI — only people online brag about their soft metrics, because there are admittedly still sufficient numbers of make muney online guys and would-be clients who are easily dazzled by bull shyt. But soft metrics are just vanity metrics akin to valuing yards run over points scored in football.

3. Teaching the realities of online sales attribution — copywriters love pounding their chests about how much money their copy or emails made. But attribution online is a lot more complicated than that, with many more moving parts, and much of the credit belonging elsewhere. Goo-roos running around claiming their copy or their emails made all the sales from a launch or whatever are simply full of shyt.

4. Focusing more on building the email list rather than the social media audience — all roads should lead to the list first that you can export and backup, not to the 3rd party platform owned by someone else, in our way of thinking. That is literally direct response marketing 101. But in 2024 it might as well be an advanced direct response marketing 400-level concept.

5. Images in emails hurting deliverability — which more and more marketers are coming around to finding out for themselves. We barely even have to waste time talking about it anymore, and even other ESPs are begrudgingly (since they cater to people who think they need pretty templates, etc) admitting it.

6. Daily email — I have yet to see even one other major ESP advocate daily emails probably for two reasons: 1. They don’t mail their own lists their own offers, and are run by managers, bankers, and social activists, and simply don’t know the relationship building, lower spam complaint potential, and upside sales daily can grant a business. 2. Their clients sending daily emails costs their platform more money. Email ain’t free, and you get what you pay for, but instead of working their economics around it, they would almost prefer you send no email at all while paying them each month like a good little soldier.

7. Mobile apps — we’re still a few years ahead of the curve on this, and admittedly nobody really gives us any flack over it. But most online marketers are still waiting for a guru to grant them permission to use mobile app tech. And even those who do use mobile apps are foolishly using big tech they have little control over and that does not integrate with their back end email, marketing, or offers like Learnistic does. But something like 90%+ of customers are on their phones most of the time, and are in an app when on that phone nearly all the time they are on the phone.

i.e., go where you customers are — which is in an app.

Anyway, those are a few examples.

All right so enough of that today.

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Ben Settle

Recently one of my pals was telling me about some of the bigger and more successful business owners he knows who are seriously worried about their lack of engagement, sales, new customer acquisition, low quality leads, and the list goes on this year.

A lot of them had been cleaning up for years.

Now?

They are losing ground – and fast – just pitiful numbers compared to what they’re used to seeing.

And it got me to thinking about what’ll surely be the paraphrase of the decade:

“Everyone’s a marketing guru during a bull market”

But now that things are tightening up across the board?

You’re going to see just how many of them goo-roos out there who have been pounding their chests on Facebook and Twitter and in masterminds for the past 10 years really know their stuff… or are just posers , or else who happened to have gotten in the right market, with the right offer, with the right people, at the right time, and don’t really know how to repeat it or adapt to what’s coming down the pike.

Those who been around the block have seen this cycle repeat itself.

It’s the exact same thing each time, and this time will be no different.

Except, in many ways, I think, it will be far more intense.

The reason:

I touched on this in detail in this past January’s tripe-sized 150th Email Players issue. And it’s because, I believe, the credit deflation is already starting to happen. You may not believe that because all you’re hearing on the news is about inflation. And despite what the lapdog media is insisting otherwise, the evidence of most peoples’ eyes and ears are showing inflation is not at-all the optimistic 3% they claim. Especially when you factor in things they leave out like, you know, food, gas, and things people actually need.

Why anyone believes a single word the corporate media says is beyond me.

Especially after the last few years alone.

But people much wiser than myself – and certainly wiser than the shills in the media, who can’t even give a weather report without inserting some obvious bias or propaganda into it anymore – about economics have been saying this whole time:

There is a LOT more credit/debt than there is cash in this debt-driven economy.

And eventually that debt can only either be repaid or written off.

And while everyone is (understandably) nattering on about inflation, there are many other stories talking about how younger people especially are not only not repaying debt, but literally can’t repay it. They can’t even keep up with their minimum payments even as they are borrowing more of it. And eventually, a whole lot of that debt will be written off because it ain’t gonna be repaid. Maybe the powers that be know this is inevitable. And maybe this is why they are trying to act like superheroes to court voters by forgiving student loan debt and, most recently, Kamala talking about forgiving medical debt – both of which are almost certainly inevitable anyway, as far as I can tell, at this trajectory.

Deserves got nothing to do with it, either.

But unless we go back to indentured servitude, debtors prisons, etc, who knows?

This is all speculation, obviously, so take it for what it is.

But, running with this speculation:

Perhaps a time is coming when you might be considered lucky if you have even a $1,000 limit on your credit card or can pull out more than $100 at a time from the ATM. Then all those expenses you just “slap” on a credit card now, without thinking about it, become a whole helluva lot harder to pay for without cold, hard cash in your pocket if you don’t get your act together now, while you still have some time, and start growing your email list, mailing it offers they want to buy, and selling those buyers something else — every day, day in, and day out, and, yes, starting today.

It’d probably almost be Faustian if that happened:

Everything on sale from the deflation, but not a lot of cash or credit for most to buy it.

That’s my admittedly non-expert advice.

But going by how wrong nearly ALL the so-called experts have been about just about everything the last few years, I’m probably more likely to be correct than they have been. Admittedly, I get my info from some people most consider “fringe” (but often correct on such things) and time will tell either way. I was also admittedly a couple years off on when the inflation kicking in would hit us to the degree it has. I expected it a year ago. I also expected what a lot of marketers are experiencing now to have happened not long after Jen Psaki was on TV telling the wine aunts to kick back and relax with a margarita because the inflation was merely “transitory.”

Anyway, end of speculation.

Whatever happens:

Focus on the fundamentals, do the work, and write like your life depends on it.

Because in many ways it does now.

As far as using email goes?

You can learn more about that in my paid Email Players newsletter here:

www.EmailPlayers.com

Ben Settle

In which a fine question is asked:

“Ben, if you were in your 20s – what would you read more? Which movies/shows would you watch? (if any) I know you’ve said in your emails you’d rather read & go to the gym than sit in front of a television. Apart from this, which other activities do you recommend to keep the brain engaged and active in leisure time?”

My answer:

Lots and lots and lots of walking.

It’s the greatest business and marketing ‘secret’ I can possibly recommend.

Also fill your head with as much info you find interesting as possible.

And avoid ALL woke movies/TV of all stripes.

Avoid social activist types, too, they’ll bring you nothing but drama and make you dumber.

I’d also watch the show “24” for learning sale letter and email pacing. Watch LOST for world-building and creating intrigue/curiosity. Watch Seinfeld for infotainment. Watch documentaries (not Netflix documentaries, they’re nearly all so backasswards it’s become a trope of itself in recent years) about men who’ve accomplished great things: “King of Late Night” about Johnny Carson, “Chris Claremont’s X-Men” on Amazon about relationship-building, “Eye of the Beholder art of Dungeons and Dragons” about craftsmanship and branding, and the Special Effects Titan documentary about Ray Harryhausen for creating drama, craftsmanship, storytelling, World-Building, product design, and a lot of other things I teach.

I may not have exact titles accurate above, but they are on Amazon.

That’s a very short answer to a question I could write a book of its own on.

But I daresay the above is more than enough to keep people busy for a while.

Besides that?

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Ben Settle

Reader Parker Worth gets frisked by the zombie cop… and “it moves”:

I’m a foaming at the mouth fan of your emails and products.

Even better?

The Enoch Wars makes me feel like Howard Carter discovering King Tuts tomb.

How?

Look, the fiction book market is stale.

And frankly, Zombie cop gave me the ol’ rush of a 3,000 year old rotten mummy curse. A hit so strong I’m digging graves for more (especially after finishing book 7 with Azriel escaping a furnace)….

I know practically nobody joined this list to hear about my fiction.

But, that doesn’t stop me from talking about it..

The book referenced above (Zombie Cop) is the first of a 9-book series of novels I wrote between 2013 and 2023 called The Enoch Wars. And if you want to see if they are worth your precious time and the psychological damage that is sure to ensue if you do… then you can read that first book Zombie Cop free in the Enoch Wars app — where it is in eBook, audio book, and even screenplay (Yes, I wrote a screenplay for it) format. That particular book’s introduction was also written by the great, and esteemed A-list copywriter Bob Bly who also quite enjoyed reading it, as do its many copywriter fans, I have noticed.

And the book is “for real” free to read.

There is not even currently an opt-in required.

The only requirements are a smart phone or iPad to read it in the Learnistic app.

Here’s where to get your lovin’:

https://www.EmailPlayers.com/enochwars 

Ben Settle

One of the single most valuable books I’ve ever read for business is Dan Kennedy’s:

“NO BS Time Management”

My favorite part is about what he calls “Time Vampires”. These are people that suck up your time like a traditional vampire sucks up your blood. They basically tap a vein in your time and take as much of it as you foolishly allow because you’re too nice to stick a cross in their face and rebuke them… leaving you a pale, withered husk of a schlub — dried out of all energy, patience, and desire to work.

Anyway, Dan identified several of them.

But over the past 22+ years since first reading and as my business has grown, with my time becoming far more of a novelty it is now vs the commodity I originally allowed it to be…I’ve identified several more that try to scratch at my office window, thirsty, and begging to be let in. And each of them are particularly gruesome, dangerous, and blood-thirsty.

They are:

* The Debating Dracula – who always wants to debate you online or via email

* Bride Of Debating Dracula – who also always wants to debate you online or via email

* The “I’ll Be Back” Barnabas Collins – who has something you require, says they’ll be back, never returns, so you have to waste time chasing them all round hell and gone just to get whatever it is they were supposed to do or give you

* The Always-Late Lestat – who is always, without exception, late disrespecting both your time and theirs, always with an excuse of course (one of my friends is like this, one day a mentor told him, “if you’re late that means either you don’t respect their time or you don’t respect yours, either way you’re being rude and disrespectful…”)

* The Nagging Nosferatu – constantly nagging at you, sucking up your time drop by drop with their pedantic & pointless nagging

* The Count Of Chronic Texting – always texting you and demanding replies immediately

I’ve dealt with all these evil things.

And nowadays the second I so much as see one of their ghoulish shadows growing on the wall I immediately turn and stake them through the hearts, cut off their heads, and stuff garlic down their miserable throats. Then I set their bodies on fire and salt the ground in a circle around the ashes just to be sure.

Once I started ruthlessly doing that my income dramatically increased.

So did my productivity and enjoyment of my work.

More:

These time vampires are filthy, nasty, unclean… and totally worthy of contempt. And while you may foolishly think you are immune to their hypnotic gaze, I would bet someone else’s left testicle that at least 2 or 3 of these vile, “revenue revenants” have long ago tapped one of YOUR veins, and have been mainlining your time ever since… with you so used to it you no longer even notice it and are none the wiser.

My advice?

It certainly won’t hurt to have as much contempt for them as I do.

And the way to do that is to get Dan Kennedy’s NO BS Time Management book.

It’s like a time vampire hunter’s field manual. He walks you through how to valuate your time amongst other extremely practical and profitable tips. The chapters on self discipline & patience are especially valuable. Probably the two most valuable chapters of any business related book I’ve ever read in some ways that have lead, guided, and instructed me for over 20 years to accomplish more than my lazy bum competition.

I will also say this:

Once you understand your time’s value the way Dan shows in the book, you will likely never look at a time vampire trying to suck up your time ever again. You will see, as I saw many years ago, that a time vampire feasting on you is literally stealing money right out of your pocket.

The book is just incredibly useful.

And it changed everything, early on, about who I do business with.

Frankly, don’t even think of it as a “book.” It’s a sharp stake dripping holy water. And by using it you will have that much easier of a time identifying and dispatching these evil creatures of the night wanting to steal all your time and money and energy.

To get the book simply do this:

1. Go to Amazon and type in: “Dan Kennedy Time Management”

2. Look for the new 2024 version he wrote with Ben Glass

3. Add to cart…

Obviously, I have no affiliate or JV arrangement.

I just want everyone in my horde to possess it, use it, benefit from it.

Even if just makes you more likely to respect MY time…

Ben Settle

P.S. Since we’re talking about vampires:

If you want to see my own take on vampire lore, check out my Enoch Wars novels on Amazon too, while you’re there. Or, if you want a free, uhm… “taste”… of them without paying any money, I have the first novel (Zombie Cop) in the Enoch Wars mobile app free. It’s in there as an eBook, audio book, and even the screenplay if’n that creams your righteous twinkie. I also have writing tips, business tips, and fiction tips in there, too.

All free, with no email opt-in required, yours for the taking:

https://www.EmailPlayers.com/enochwars 

(You will need a mobile device or iPad to access the app)