How To Make More Sales With Email Without Having To Email Every Day With Allison Carpio

TRANSCRIPT AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED [00:00:00] Diane: Hey, today's guest. Alison copier is an author speaker and copy coach, who is all about creating eager prospects with your emails instead of needing to rely on high pressure sales conversations. So long sleeves. Hello. sales. I am down for that. Hey, Alison. Welcome to the show. [00:00:14] Allison: Hello. Thank you for having me. [00:00:16] Diane: So let's kick off with a quick intro to you and your business. [00:00:20] Allison: Yeah. So I'm a former copywriter and now I'm an email and copy coach. And when I was learning copywriting, I was when I call, I was really deep in the bro world. So I was around these circles, wherever these, all these bro marketers, a lot of like copy, quote, unquote, legends. I've got some air quotes when I'm saying that. And there are a lot of these old school. Sleazy oppressive tactics that we were learning in copy school. And I remember I was in a mastermind with, you know, a lot of bros. Some of them you may have heard of, and I was in this mastermind and there was this this session about upsells and an upsell is kind of like when you ask, you know, would you like fries with that shake kind of thing? So, it was about upsells. And I remember the guy saying. Make sure you're always upselling because you never know when you're going to see their money again. I felt this like visceral reaction, like this drop in my gut and I was like hunched over. And I was like, this feels really wrong. And I remember this was two, three years into being, I'm a copywriter and I almost left the copywriting world because of that. And I was kind of at this crisis point, like, okay, I could either leave the copywriter. Do something else, or I could change the way that this is being taught elsewhere. And of course I changed the way it's being taught elsewhere. I chose that path instead because I really believe that you can you can sell with more that authenticity without having used those, that fake scarcity and urgency. And, you know, a lot of that desperate bro boss bay marketing tech that's really sold out there. So, and I found that email is very powerful. So I love helping people with email and especially with creative entrepreneurs who are really active on social media, that email is just so misunderstood. So I love helping my clients. [00:02:03] Diane: That's so interesting that like you are upselling someone because the thing that you're going to sell them, either sold them. Something they don't need, or you're going to do such a bad job at delivery that the person's never going to want to buy from you again. And like that is just a scary place to really be starting from [00:02:20] Allison: it's crazy. Cause it's like, I think what people think, what people don't understand is maybe that works in the short term. Maybe if you, but you know, people are smart and they know like, okay, this feels wrong. I'm not going to buy from you. But let's say they take that upsell. They're still going to feel really crappy about it. They're going to feel that bias for Morris. They're going to feel bullied or pressured into it. And then they're not there. They really won't buy from you again. He's right. Like like the I guess it's sort of like a self fulfilling prophecy at that point. [00:02:46] Diane: Yeah. He's proving his point by selling something really horrendous. So I have this like hate, hate relationship with email and I find it really easy to be conversational on social. I generally have a lot of personality and a lot of opinions, but like all of my corporate baggage shows up when I open up my email or to write a newsletter or a sales email and get really formal. And then it gets super awkward and there's a lot of here, two fourths and where we're falls and the like, and I'm probably not alone. I think a lot of people are having a bit of a hate, hate relationship with email at the moment, because we're flooded with so much. So we know we don't want another email, but then we're trying to get people to also open our emails. We're trying to stand out in the noise, but we don't want to be a bother. And there's this feeling that you have to keep going because if you stop then email them in a months time, they might not open. And then how will you ever get anyone to open your email again? So how do we make sure that we're actually getting some ROI? From those emails at least compensate for the amount of energy effort, mental space taking most of us to really write them. [00:03:54] Allison: Yeah. So let's address the energy piece. I love what you said. And I said a lot of the corporate baggage shows up because that is very common. You're certainly not alone. I remember one of my best friends when she was writing her website for the first time, years ago, I was like, this sounds nothing like you, like, you never say that. I love how you pointed out the hens for us in here too. It's because no one ever says that in conversation. So the way I like to think about email is like a one-on-one. Private dinner. It's very intimate. It's just you in that person. And it's just a, it's just a dinner where social media is more like a party where you can meet other people. Everyone's joining the conversation. It's, you know, you can pop in and pop out. You can see who's there, et cetera. But email is that private, intimate conversation. In a way it's similar to social media and that it's still casual. It doesn't need to be formal. It doesn't need to be a certain way. And I think like we've been really conditioned because we've been getting a lot of really bad emails from retail giants from e-com stores. Frozen boss babes. I was talking about they're really, they really conditioned us to what we think email should look like, but it does not have to be that way. So, I always say with my clients, if you have a lot of content on social media, it could really easily be repurposed into emails. And when you're repurposing, it's just really smart. It's kind of like you're taking leftovers from Friday. You're adding a BR an egg to it for brunch on Saturday. And then you've got brunch and it's delicious and it's just, it's the same thing. So one thing that I love to do and I help my clients do too, is like, if you find yourself if you're able to write content very casually for social media, but you can't do it for email. What I love to do is just talk into an Otter app. And I imagined that I'm talking to someone and it transcribes it for me. And then I just edit that and it that's, those are my words. It sounds very conversational, et cetera. The other thing too with email is there's this common misconception probably with social media too, that you have to be emailing every single day. And that's absolutely not true. That's not true. And also one thing that you mentioned, Diane is like, you have to keep emailing rules people aren't going to open it later. To an extent. That's true, but I like to, you know, when you ha, when you're building relationships with people, if you take a month off from that, they're not going to forget about you. Like, if you're emailing them and you send something that they're interested in, they're going to open it and they're not going to be upset. They're not going to forget who you are. They're not going to be offended or anything. It's what it is and you know, you're human and people understand that. I think there's just a lot of fear instilled into us from a lot of the experts in gurus, quote unquote to keep doing that. And I think like, yes, being more frequent could help, but it's, I think when you're showing up in a way, when you're writing from a place of, I have to do this, it really shows through in your copy. Whereas if you show up in, I want to do this, I want to help my people. I'm here for service. Then it shows through, in your copy as well. The thing that I think about when I think of email as a whole, not about sending more and sending more frequent. It's more about having what I call an email conversion system, because emailing everyday is only going to serve you only so long, and it's not even realistic for most of us, have that email conversion system, when I'm, and when I'm talking about email conversion system at a high level, it's building out your email lists, really nurturing that new subscribers. And then of course having your sales pushes your sales events, whether that's a webinar or challenge, et cetera. That's what's really going to, that's really how you're going to get that ROI out of email and email really highly supports that. And, email is so powerful for your sales events and sales. [00:07:39] Diane: so I would definitely want to talk more about the conversion system, but I want to go back to. The analogy of like the email is me sitting down and an intimate dinner with someone. Now, if you've ever spent any time with me, I love a good story, so I can totally see flicking on Otter and being like, oh my already. But I'm really what happened in more and telling that story. But what I find that copywriters are really good at that the average human AKA. Just can't do without it being so awkward. Is that beautiful segue into that conversion thing into I've told you the story, not come to my webinar. I've told you the story. Now download my PDF. I've told you this story now buy my thing. Right. So I think for me, that's where that kind of breaks down and that I can see what you're saying. how I would show up in an intimate dinner with someone. You're speaking my language. When you say, speak it out loud and it will come out conversational. But then as soon as I have to like twist back into, okay, here's my CTA or here's the reason for my email. I get super awkward. And I think then here comes the here two fours and the therefores and 27 step process for the reason that you should do the CTA, right. how do we naturally have that conversation in an email while still strategically hitting the point that we want to make? And I don't know if this is something that you can answer off the top of your head on a podcast. [00:08:58] Allison: Yeah, I love this question. So there's a couple of ways I think about it. The first way is like, I imagine that I actually am having that conversation with someone. And when you're having a conversation, it's not just you talking the whole time. Right? So like, let's say you told a story and then I imagine what that person would say and how I would respond to it. And I literally have that conversation in my head and guide them to the CTA. It's not like. Oh, well, yeah, I ate this thing and it was really delicious by the way, you should go to the, my webinar, you know, that's not how the conversation would go. So I play out that conversation in my head and that's that still gets me to smooth out that transition. But if you're not able to do that and a lot of people, aren't one thing that I have that I teach in, what I call my email recipes is like, when you tell a story specifically, there's usually what's like a teaching moment or a takeaway from there. teaching moment and takeaway is usually directly related to. Your webinar, your PDF, whatever that is. And that is how you're transitioned to it. Cause you're kind of bottom line. What that teaching moment is from that story. And then you're like, oh, well I either you're going deeper into it in a webinar. Or maybe it's like, the story was about, you have to learn how to Reframe your mind when it comes to sales. And by the way, I that's exactly what I'm teaching in my webinar kind of thing. So you can see how that, like, that really connects the dots between your lead or your story. And the thing that the call to action or the next step. [00:10:24] Diane: So, what I'm hearing is that we need to be strategic without emails, rather than just going, oh my gosh. I need to send an email tomorrow. Cause I haven't sent an email in a while. Panic vomit out. Some words, send it out. Wonder why nobody is like opening, clicking. Right [00:10:40] Allison: I mean, that's fine. No, once in a while. [00:10:43] Diane: I mean, sometimes it's a really good thing. [00:10:45] Allison: Yeah. [00:10:46] Diane: and you want to talk about it, but I mean, [00:10:47] Allison: Yeah. [00:10:48] Diane: strategy, that's probably not ideal. Okay. understand. let's go back to conversion system. So we had, first of all, let's get the lead, then let's nurture the lead. And then I assume there was a convert them. [00:11:02] Allison: Yes. [00:11:03] Diane: Okay. Do you need people to go through the lead generation piece? Is that only for people with small lists do you like people to think about that as part of the conversion system? Even if they've already got a fairly healthy list or can they skip [00:11:17] Allison: It kind of depends where you're at. The people that I work with usually are already are building out their email list or they're pretty early on. And really what I help them do is kind of refine and tweak it because sometimes they put up something just to put up something and it's not really directly related to their offer as much as it could be or. Maybe they changed their offer, and then we need to do that little tweaking part. one thing I'll say about this is like, there's this common misconception that all you have to do is just post on social media and you're going to get a ton and a ton of subscribers don't rely on that. Don't rely just on posting on social media, just to get opt-ins like definitely do it. And I do it all the time. But, you know, when you show up on things like podcasts, like when I'm doing right now, you speak at summits, you do collaborations. That's going to be the biggest bang for your buck when it comes to building out your email list, especially if you know, the audiences that you're talking to and the people you're collaborating with are really aligned with who you want to reach. So that's the one thing I'll say about that, because I think like, like a lot of my clients were like, oh, I'm just I'm posting like four times a week about my lead magnet, but I'm only getting like a couple of options. It's like, yes let's go for the bigger Frisch. You know, and let's not make sure that you're grinding all the time to only get a couple of subscribers. [00:12:31] Diane: Yeah. that makes total sense. Let's think people on social they're often not looking is going click a link and do something else. Right. Great for awareness, not as great for their, like opt-in for my thing. Okay. So let's say we've got a fairly healthy list. What are we doing in the nurture piece of this? [00:12:49] Allison: When it comes to, okay, so let's say someone joins your email list for the first time. So when someone joins your email list for the first time, like building off of that dinner analogy, It's like, they're coming to dinner with you for the very first time. And when you're not nurturing [00:13:04] Diane: How many times do I need to email them? About how many things like get specific with me? [00:13:10] Allison: that's the question behind the question. Isn't it. [00:13:12] Diane: It's like, this is like, can we let's do email 1 0 1 [00:13:15] Allison: Okay. So the first thing when you don't have what I call a BR guests welcome sequence, which we'll get into, it's kind of like someone sits down at the restaurant and you know, they're hungry, but no, one's really checking up on them. There aren't any menus anywhere. You're sitting across from them, but you're not seeing anything in the kind of like what's going on here. I wanted to go to dinner with Diane, but I'm hungry. Diane's not talking to me. I don't know what's happening. So. [00:13:41] Diane: I been stood up? [00:13:42] Allison: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Is this restaurant even open, like what's going on? So, when you have what's, I call it be our guests welcome sequence. You're really starting that relationship off on the right foot. Because I think people think like, oh, if I email them, when they send it from my list, like I'm bothering them, but it's like, no, they want to hear from you. And you're building that relationship. It's Like in beauty and the beast Lumiere Cogsworth, and Mrs. Potts, they really made her feel at home. But if you remember only moments before the beast came to her door, like can bang on her door. I'm telling her to come to dinner. Like you want me to for dinner, that's not a request kind of thing. And she was like, absolutely not. I'm just going to starve. That's fine. But instead, you know, when they made her feel at home, she enjoyed all of the, you know, the food, the whole buffet of food that they gave to her. And that's what you want to do with your PR guests welcome sequence. And. How many emails. That's, you know, if you're just starting out, start with as much as you can. There's no, like I'm always adding to mine. I started off with five and then now it's somewhere in the fifteens and twenties. I'm pretty sure it could be even more, cause I haven't updated it in the past month or so, but. What you want to be doing is a couple things. One, you want to be very clear on what your values are. And I love doing this because what I've noticed is the more clear you are on what your values, what you stand for, what you believe in the more you're going to attract the people that you are so thrilled to work with. Cause they're going to be so aligned with you. The second thing is. The origin story and your origin story is really what gets people to really relate to you? And it really shows why you're doing what you're doing. I kind of went into mine earlier than this episode, where I talked about, you know, that mastermind about that guy who said, you know, do upsell or you'll never spend the money again. Whenever I tell that story, people are like, oh yeah, I know. Like either, even if they haven't learned from that, they're very much like I know that they are so against that way of thinking way of doing things. And that just really, it really resonates because, you know, I'm really against that. And it's less hard to find these days, but it's still really refreshing to people who want to learn what I am teaching. The way that IMTS. So, just to recap so far, we've got like your values. I call it like values, declaration emails, you have your origin story. And then of course I have, what's called the proof pudding. So if the proof is in the pudding, you want to serve up that proof pudding. And I love telling it like weaving in a lot of, as many client stories as possible. So one of my clients she's a stylist. And when we worked on our welcome sequence to. She incorporated so many of these clients' stories, cause she just had so many transformations and we really dove deep into it. So with something like a stylist, it's really easy to go. This is what she looked like before. And this is what she looked like after, but really dove into the mindset transformation that someone went through when they transformed their style and really dove into the heart of it and the emotions of it. And when I say emotions of it, I'm not talking about like what people are calling, twisting the knife. Sticking your knives and people it's really just, you know, showing how she was feeling before and then how she was feeling after about it. So the more you have of those, the better don't hold back on them. People love hearing transformation stories, because it really gives them hope and you're really showing them what is possible out there. And they really need that. They really need that nudge or that, that little sliver of hope, wherever they're at in their journey. [00:17:05] Diane: Are you sending like 15 emails each day in a row? Or is this here's a few emails and then you stay in my welcome sequence for a certain number of weeks. And then you move into a more generic newsletter. [00:17:18] Allison: So I'm what I do. What I will say about the cadence is what I tell my clients is start with how often you already email. So if you're generally emailing once a week then make it once a week. You know, you don't want to want it to be. Three times a week. And then, you know, all of a sudden, you know, it's kind of changed, so start where you're already at and and keep that the way. The way I do it is I have like maybe four, no six weeks of a welcome sequence emails. And at the end of it they do go into a general newsletter, but they might be receiving some in between because, you know, maybe having a sales event, but what I'm going to do. And I think that I want to be testing out is at the end of say the welcome sequence. Like, do you want to hear do you want to be added to my general newsletter just to have that form of consent? And I haven't tried it yet, but my, when I mentor does it, and I really love that idea just of getting that kind of consent to be adding to that. And especially because I'm running ads right now and the people who, who joined my. Through my ads, they get a very different welcome sequence. And therefore I want to be like making sure that the people who specifically want to be on there do want to be on there because that's just going to be good for my engagement. [00:18:33] Diane: and I guess that manages that [00:18:35] Allison: Yeah. [00:18:35] Diane: of slight tone change in that, like your nurture sequences is built to build on each thing and really strategically thought out. And then if they suddenly jump into newsletter sequence where you're suddenly. Like almost a little off topic from what they were expecting. That's a nice bridge for that to not feel so surprising. [00:18:56] Allison: Yeah, exactly. Think of it. It's like a dinner experience. It's a Michelin star experience. You know, there are everything has its purpose, everything transitions the way it does and exactly. It's exactly. [00:19:07] Diane: so if them joining our email list is them coming to dinner with us. And that nurture sequences, that first dinner where, you know, we're showing up at our absolute best is your newsletter sequence. Then a bit more like dinner with an old friend. Slightly more. casual. [00:19:25] Allison: yeah, exactly. They've gotten to know you already you're already familiar with each other. And you know, you've may have had that conversation. Oh, the other thing I'll say about the welcome sequence that I love. Is, I love to have a conversation starter. So when someone downloads one of my trainings, it's like, Hey, I'll say, Hey Diane, I saw you downloaded my my, how to make more sales with email training. Are you already emailing your list? And I have a series of questions, like if they respond and they could just reply to it. And it looks just like a really, you know, a plain text email, and people will respond that saying, yeah, I'm emailing or like, no, or I want to et cetera, et cetera. And they'll ask them, you know, things like, are you building out your. What are you selling on your email lists? You know, et cetera, et cetera. And I just start that conversation with them. So what I love about that is that it just brings that human element to it. And the people who are willing to engage with you will, and it's like really refreshing for them. Cause they're like, oh, Allison's. Emailing me and she's responding to me like this is pretty cool. Even then they know that part of it's already automated. So when they've gone through your welcome sequence, they have a good idea of who you are and maybe you've conversed already. And then, you know, when you're when it's a newsletter, it's you're just, you know, having a spontaneous dinner here, like, Hey, like let's go out for dinner right now. Instead of one that's been sort of scheduled already in the books. [00:20:38] Diane: I really like this analogy it's working really well for me that, and helping me take it out of that kind of like formal communication vibe. Here's my question. [00:20:46] Allison: Yes, [00:20:47] Diane: from like casual cocktails and dinner with your friend to okay. Time to buy my thing without being that person who's like, Hey girl, have you heard about these leggings? how do you pivot from this beautiful relationship that you've so carefully from putting your best foot forward to not hanging out casually to not being that person? [00:21:10] Allison: So, all throughout the welcome sequence you already have those CTS there. They're a little softer. There are what I call the dessert menu. So when you're at dinner and you've already finished your entrees and the server's cleared your plates. The server comes down and they place the dessert menu on the table. So if you're hungry for dessert, you're like, yes, I would like the creme de LA, if you're not hungry for dessert, you're like, no, thank you. I would just like to check please. And maybe you weren't even thinking about dessert and who approves and you're like, yeah, I'll have the creme brulee. That sounds great. And you, the pur you, the diner don't have to ask for the dessert menu because that person has already given it for you. And that's exactly what having a CT at the end of your emails is you're just providing the dessert menu. People can decline, they could accept, they can ignore, they could peruse, but it's just there if they need it. And one way I like to do this is like at the end of my emails, especially in the beginning, I'm like, Hey, by the way, when you're ready, here are a couple ways I could. Download my training apply to work with me and I there's like a mixture of high commitment and low commitment and like a free offerings, just so that, you know, wherever they're at, there's something for them. when there's a free training or a PDF, or if there's like some kind of quiz or something, you know, there's a CTA at the end. So all paths really lead to a CTA, just some are more indirect than others. And they could choose whatever wherever they're at, or they could just ignore the whole thing altogether. So it's not like, you know, when I do have a CTA, it comes out of nowhere like a month after, because I was already CTS all throughout. And then sometimes throughout the welcome sequence, there's, it's a very. In the the email itself, you know, like I'll tell the whole story. And it said like, if you know, transition, blah, blah, blah, here's the CTA kind of thing. It's not necessarily in the PTs or the BTWs I call it. that, all that to say is like, you're already doing that before. And then when it is time to, to sell more directly I call that the invite email and. It's basically a sales email, but instead of like trying to convince someone to do something, you're just inviting them. And when you think about it more as an invitation, the tone is so much different. You show up differently and people like invitations, even if they'd like, if even if they can't make it, they still like invitations. I like declining invitations. People love that. So when you're inviting people to work with you, you're not saying. Hey girl, do you want to buy these leggings? You're like, Hey, I'm having this thing. I would love for you to be there. I would love to work with you, blah, blah, blah. Here are the details, et cetera. And that's all it is. So, I'm just talking about the welcome sequence right now. So you're still like you're doing that inviting, you're placing the dessert menu at the end of the meal, et cetera. And then when it comes time to say like a sales event that you're hosting, like let's say it's a webinar you're still doing inviting. You're still saying, Hey, I'm hosting this free training. It's about this. I'd love to have you there, et cetera, et cetera. So there's that CTA. And then in the follow-up that's, when you're doing more of the, you know, the selling the selling from a place of service, of course, and that's less out of nowhere cause it's like, you know, they registered for the webinar, they might've attended it, et cetera, et cetera. So you can see it's like, it's not just like a hard pivot. It's like we've taken them through this journey. And you know, they're not really surprised when we get there. [00:24:28] Diane: So it's kind of like the dessert menu just becomes like a natural part. So they're used to seeing the menu and then the more solid invitation is almost like, well, Hey, I'm having this thing at my house. Do you want to come over? [00:24:42] Allison: Yes. [00:24:43] Diane: and this is what we're going to talk about. it's kind of that just, it's almost like. Increased intimacy as you go along [00:24:50] Allison: Yes. Yes, exactly. Exactly. What I will say is that email is so powerful for your sales event. And I recently hosted a challenge. Back in September, it was called the great email bake-off it was really fun. And I promoted it on both social media and email, and this is not to knock social media. I love it. I still show up on. Social media and email work really well together. So make sure you're doing both. This is not to say digital social media. So what I did was I sent out five emails, inviting people to join my challenge. And then I posted on I made five IgE posts promoting the challenge and maybe like 15 plus IgE stores promoting the challenge. And I got a 101 signups for the challenge. 81 of those signups came from those five. The other 20 came from the five IgE posts and the 15 plus it stories. And that just tells me like, so when you're hosting a challenge, when you're hosting webinar emails are so it's so powerful. So when you were saying Diane, you're like, you know, how do I, you know, I'm pouring all my energy into this. How do I make sure I get out of it? Email was so much less energy. It was a lot less energy. You know, it was an honestly Diane like the copy for the emails and the social media posts were like 80, 90% the same. Like I didn't have to rewrite them. They were almost exactly the same thing. So, all that to say is like, email is so powerful. Did I, you know, was it worth showing up on social media? Yeah, of course it was. I still wanted those 20 sign-ups. But when you think about when you think about IgG and the way it works is like, if, for them to take action on something, they have to go into my profile, they have to go into the Lincoln bio. They have to find the link. They have to click the link and then they have to sign up this. I will also say this is before I got the link sticker on my ID stories. So, you know, there will be a round two of this, and I'd love to see, you know, how that plays out. [00:26:50] Diane: love to know how those steps go in next time around. [00:26:53] Allison: Stay tuned TBD. But you know, there's just so much more steps. It's you know, you're it's all the way at the back of the store. Whereas, you know, an email like at the front of the store, that's where the samples are. And like you just grabbed that sample, you know? email. Email we'll help you with your sales events. And like when people think of selling an email, they probably think like, oh, just send a ton of sales email, and people will like, I like, I'm going to send an email and then people are going to buy. I'm going to make it rain, quote, unquote. But actually what it is, it's like, it's supporting your sales of it's driving people to your sales event. And then it's like following up on those things. [00:27:24] Diane: Yeah. that makes a lot of things. And I think it's also speaks to the strategy behind your conversion system, in that you are inviting people who have already had this experience with you to something else. And they're like, well, I had so much fun with you and everything. yes, I want to go to the next party or whatever with you. Whereas social, you have no idea. Really. Who's looking at your social media posts, right? They could be complete strangers on the streets. So it makes sense to me, like I know logically that email makes sense to me. It's just not the easiest space for me. And I think we're only going to see people get more up in their heads about email when all the latest updates come through. And now you can't actually see if someone's opened in. So, you're only going to be able to see clicks and suddenly now your emails look like they're dropping off and now, you know, whereas I think your journey is giving them a lot of options to click and to respond and to engage versus just being that kind of one-sided. [00:28:24] Allison: And that's okay. Let's say open rates completely disappear. I mean, open rates only tell us really. The only thing that open rates tell me is if my subject line did a job. You know, it's telling me if the email was totally effective. Like I'd rather know what the click through rates are. And that tells me more. And then of course, you know, your conversion rates too, [00:28:44] Diane: you're a hundred percent speaking my language over here If somebody like me and they're like, okay, well, we're going to give this a go. And they've got an email that scheduled to go out, like in a few hours, hashtag asking for a friend. What would be the thing that you would say, like the emails written it shoveled, what's the easiest thing for them to put in or take out or check for to just start that process of actually sending a better email. [00:29:08] Allison: Read it out loud, read it out loud. And if it sounds like you were for tripping up on it and you're like, I forget what word you keep saying here to, or here for, to whatever. Yeah. I've never heard this. Of course. I can't remember them off the top of my head, but if you read it out loud and it does not sound like you and you sound like you're scripted and you find yourself even dozing off while you're reading it, then I would consider taking out those parts. And you know, that's like, that's a good stress test. Like if you read it out loud and it just, you know, it sounds very formal. Take that out. If it's, if you read it out loud and sounds really clunky, or it's not as smooth as transition, or there's a part that, you know, you feel like you're, you know, kind of going on a tangent that doesn't make sense and take that out too. But otherwise, you know, it's sort of like building a muscle and you know, when you keep on sending them out, like it's just going to feel better and it's going to feel less like this big thing, you know, I mean, I think that's the easiest thing to do. The other thing I'll say is like, especially when you're telling stories and the same thing is true for social media. So I'm, you know, I'm not teaching something brand new. It's just, you know, we're kind of putting in the frame of writing. But I've noticed a lot of my clients doing in emails, especially when it's telling stories is they kind of bury the lead. And it's very like a journalism thing. Like I usually cut out like the first two paragraphs and it's like, okay, start here. And I like starting my emails with what I call the Cinnabon hook. And I don't know if you have this where you are, but Cinnabon is like this it's a cinnamon. Yeah. So when you walk into a mall, you know, and you smell the cinnamon sugar, you're like, oh my gosh. And it just sent me enroll right now. And that's what we want the very first line or the subject line of our email to be is like that hook, that Cinnabon hook that really magnetizes people and really wants that cinnamon roll to keep on reading. So I'm a really good example of one is my client, Ashley she's an air table systems person. Her Instagram is do the damn thing. And for her origin story or Hurst and about hook was just so good and it makes you want to open up that email. And it was I was maxed out and making $500. So immediately you want to know, like, why was she only making $500 a month, which in the states is not enough, unfortunately. And why was she maxed out? Like the implication of being maxed out is that you're making, you know, a good amount of money. So you immediately want to hear, you know, what the context is around that and then how she overcame it. Because obviously if she was telling the story, she had overcome it. So, And, you know, you see it in Instagram all the time. It's just that crunchy first line cinema hook, and, you know, it cuts off and then you have to, you know, click the read more kind of thing. So it's the same exact thing with email. [00:31:44] Diane: I feel like we could talk about this for like another three hours and you would still have more to tell me is there a resource or something that people can go and, you know, use as a checklist or learn more about it? Cause I cannot be the only person who thinks their emails suck. [00:32:00] Allison: So I have a training it's called how to make more sales and email with more ease and no sleaze. And I really dive into the different parts of the email conversion system. I dive into examples of emails and it really just shows you like what that looks like and then how you could build one out. [00:32:17] Diane: awesome. I will be sure to link that up so that people AKA me can attend mine. So to finish off, I always like to ask my guests the same couple of questions first up. What is your number one lifestyle boundary for you? [00:32:33] Allison: Ooh. So depending what time of year it is, especially right now, when the sun is setting, I stopped working, but also I love taking naps. I have to take a nap almost every day. Sometimes they take two naps so I really have to work around my schedule around that if I'm writing and I'm like dozing off, I'm like, eh, whatever it is, it can wait. I need to take a nap. And then it's on like a 20 minute nap. And that could pretty much nap everywhere. I used to nap in my coworking space on this couch where everyone was passing by. It's a magical power that I have, but naps, definitely naps. [00:33:07] Diane: I liked that one. I can nap on any form of transportation. Anything else? Not so much, but any form of transportation, I'm the worst person to do a long haul flight with because I'll fall asleep as we take off and someone will wake me up. Worst [00:33:21] Allison: that's a gift. That's such a gift. [00:33:24] Diane: Okay. Finally, what's the worst piece of cookie cutter advice you've been given as an entrepreneur? [00:33:30] Allison: Oh my God. This could be a whole episode. I could just list them off. One, you have to email every day, you don't have to email every day. Also those people have teams doing it for them. So, you know, and you probably don't you have to twist the knife in your copy. Also people that are just implying that there's such thing as perfect copy. There's really no such thing as perfect copy. And that's what gets, you know, people that blank page syndrome, like you were saying this isn't necessarily advice as much as it is. I don't like it. I don't love email templates because while email templates like help people get words on paper, it makes people sound like all the same. And you know, it's just, it's not going to help them in the long run when they're writing their emails, because they're not going to be writing the same template over and over. That's just not going to happen. Instead I like to, I have what they call email recipes and even recipes. Really. You just they walk you through the different pieces of or the different ingredients and help you put it all together. So you don't have that blank page syndrome, but I swear I could go on and on about bad advice, but I think the biggest one when it comes to email is that you have to be emailing every day or else people are going to forget about you and you won't make any sales and that's absolutely wrong. [00:34:36] Diane: Yeah. I think email is definitely one of the places where like that broey cookie cutter do it this way kind of vibe is rife. And it's probably why so many of us hangups about email because we don't want to go that broey route, but that's kind of. Only really been shown. So think today has hopefully expanded everyone's view. Like it certainly has mine around what could email look like, have to put like a little email, 20, 22 project to go and rework my nurture sequence with the view of okay, someone's at dinner with me. am I best stories? Here we go. But this has been fab and I know people are gonna want to ask you questions. They're going to want to connect. They're going to want to tell you. They're terrible bro advice. I'm sure the best place for them to find you on social and slide into the messages. [00:35:23] Allison: Yeah, a slide on, in my idea of I'm at Instagram I at Allison Carpio, which we can link up in the show notes because it's easy to spell wrong. [00:35:34] Diane: perfect. And like no Hagle by my leggings, whatever you [00:35:37] Allison: Yeah, no essential oils. I promise. [00:35:40] Diane: Thank you so much. This has been amazing. I'm sure people will reach out to you and continue the conversation, but thank you for sharing and changing my ideas about email. [00:35:49] Allison: thank you so much. It was so fun chatting about this, and I hope to see you all online.