I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – the most common missed marketing opportunity I see with small businesses is that they don’t have an email newsletter. Maybe the message is finally getting through. In the last few months I’ve received emails from many contacts who’d never sent anything before.
Exciting that so many business owners are waking up to the power of email. A little sad that so many of them launch their email newsletter so poorly.
But learning from mistakes is often easier than learning from good examples. So, today, I’m taking a close look at one campaign and sharing how to launch an email newsletter wrong! And what you should do instead.
Before I start, let me say I admire and support this person for trying email. I’ve suppressed his name because I don’t want to beat anyone up, least of all someone who’s trying. But I do want to share the learnings, so that everyone can do better next time!
I’ve included the full script of a real-life email in this post. It’s pretty long. If you don’t want to read the whole thing, use these links to skip to the learnings:
Content | Personalisation | Spam Act Compliance | Frequency | Summary
A real-life first email newsletter
This is the very first email which landed in my inbox. (I’ve copied and pasted the text, then put it in italics so you can tell where it starts and finishes. You can also check out the screenshot here. Spoiler: it’s not that different. No pictures. No fancy formatting.)
Hey Friend,
I still remember that night.
Sitting in my car.
Shaking.
I had just walked out of a performance management meeting.
One step from being fired.
And honestly?
I deserved it.
I was messing up.
Hard.
I was addicted to distractions.
Numbing myself.
Self-sabotaging everything good in my life.
And worst of all?
I knew it.
I was about to get married.
I was supposed to be a man.
Supposed to lead.
Supposed to provide.
Instead?
I was failing at everything.
And my fiancée saw it all.
She knew I was drowning.
So she did something I never expected.
She bought me a ticket to a Tony Robbins seminar.
Probably hoping it would knock some sense into me.
I didn’t want to go.
Didn’t think it would change anything.
But then I heard something that hit me like a truck.
“Your past is just a story. And if you keep telling yourself the wrong one, you’ll keep getting the wrong results.”
That was it.
That was the moment I realized…
I was telling myself the wrong damn story.
The story that I wasn’t good enough.
That I’d never make money.
That I’d never be a real man.
But none of that was true.
So I changed the story.
And my entire life flipped upside down.
I stopped sabotaging myself.
I got clear on what actually mattered to me.
I aligned my actions with my values.
And for the first time in my life…
I finally felt like I was in control.
Now, I see so many people stuck in the same cycle.
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- Business owners pushing hard but struggling to stay motivated.
- Students overwhelmed by choices, unsure of their future.
- Leaders & managers frustrated that they don’t fully understand how to lead.
- Personal development junkies who’ve read all the books but still struggle to make real change.
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And they all have one thing in common.
They don’t deeply understand their own values.
Because if you don’t know what truly drives you…
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- You’ll keep chasing goals that never fulfill you.
- You’ll stay stuck in cycles of self-sabotage.
- And you’ll wonder why nothing ever really changes.
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That’s why I’m running a free live workshop in Sydney—to help you understand yourself on a deeper level than ever before.
This is the last time I’ll ever be running it for free.
Seats are already half booked—so if you’re curious, you can check out the details here:
👉 Check it out here
Talk Soon,
[then the sender name]
So what’s wrong with this email?
Just a little bit of context about this email before I start:
- The last communication I had from this sender was 20 months ago. From a different email address.
- The last message I sent to him was 5 years ago. To yet another different email address.
So we’re not exactly bosom buddies. In fact, I only remember his name because it’s unusual. If he was John Carter or Tim Brown I probably wouldn’t have recognised the name on the email at all!
Content
I see three main issues with the content:
1. It’s too personal for an email ‘out of the blue’
The email starts off with a highly personal story about the worst night of the sender’s life. I feel like a complete stranger has walked up to me and started sharing their deepest secrets. Distinctly awkward. Uncomfortable.
When you launch a newsletter, the very first email is always challenging. Some (many?) people will have no idea who you are. You need to give them context.
I find this story too personal for a first email, but if you really want to dive in, give people context and a reason to read on. Start by raising curiosity about what comes next. For example:
- When people ask why I became a coach, there’s this one night I tell them about. (Teaser – a major career decision)
- Some years back, one simple insight turned my life around completely. That kind of turnaround is my goal for every client. (Teaser – what was the insight?)
Or try something completely different – less personal, less salesy, more informative.
- One of my clients has just bought out his long term partner. He’s now investing in marketing, including launching an email newsletter. He’s got a perfect story to go into a first email to the list. He can update them on changes at the company. He can also let them know there will be more emails in the future, and invite them to opt out if they want to.
- If you don’t have a neutral news story, try telling people you’re doing some database cleanup. Ask them to confirm their details.
This can actually help add data for some clients- industry, state, kind of content people want to receive and so on.
2. Broetry
Oh my goodness, broetry! What the heck is that, I hear you ask.
Broetry is a specific style of copy. Single sentence paragraphs. Single word sentences. Lots of white space. Everything. Short. Everything. With the same amount of emphasis. It’s hard. To tell. What’s really important.
I would write a longer critique of this, but writers have been complaining about broetry for years.
Nothing wrong with single sentence paragraphs, or single word sentences – but not all the time, please. Mix it up a bit. Make it easier for the reader to spot the most important parts.
3. Length and focus
This email is 411 words long. It feels much longer. That could be a side-effect of the broetry style. It could be because I knew very early on that the story was going to be ‘problem, salvation, sale’. (‘It worked for me so it will work for you too.‘)
Seriously, it was hard to read the story from start to finish – and I like reading!
The payoff is missing, too.
The sender tells me he ‘finally felt like I was in control‘ – but that’s all. What difference did that make to his life? What changed? If you want people to give up their time, what’s in it for them? You need to offer a more compelling benefit than just feeling in control.
Personalisation
The email starts, ‘Hey, friend.’
Um, no. We’re not friends. My friends know my name, and use it.
I’m guessing that in this email, ‘Friend‘ is a default value for a personalisation field. That is, if he had my first name in his database, he’d have used it, but when the first name is missing, the email says ‘friend’ instead. But if he’s emailing me, why doesn’t he have my name. He tells me himself (in the footer) that I’m in his contact list. He sent it to bridget@nobullmarketing.com.au – the first part of the email is literally my name!
Two lessons here:
- Clean up your database before you launch an email newsletter. That includes not just checking email addresses, but actually looking at the data!
- Pick your default values for personalisation carefully. Some alternative ideas:
- Hey from [sender name]
- Hey there
- Hey and happy Tuesday
- Hey, hope you’re doing well
Spam Act Compliance
ACMA has handed out million-dollar-plus fines for breaches of the Spam Act. As a smaller company and a first-time offender, you probably won’t get that amount of grief, but you could.
Compliance is relatively simple, and actually good business sense too:
- identify yourself
- have consent to send emails or other ‘commercial electronic messages’ such as SMS or WhatsApp messages
- let people unsubscribe
This sender identified himself. And he gets gold stars for including a functional unsubscribe, which you can see in this screenshot.
Two out of three ain’t bad. But it ain’t perfect either.
The third requirement is consent – which turns out to be as difficult in email marketing as it is in other areas of life. Have I given consent to receive these emails? Why am I receiving them? Here’s how the sender explains it:
You’re receiving this email because you’re on my contact list. If you’d rather not be, you can unsubscribe below.
Certainly no indication of explicit consent. No ‘signed up’ or ‘downloaded from website’ or even ‘are a past customer’. So this must be inferred consent. Except, here’s how ACMA describes ‘inferred consent’:
In some circumstances, you may infer that you have consent to send marketing messages if the recipient has knowingly and directly given their address and it is reasonable to believe they would expect to receive marketing from your business.
I don’t believe this sender had express or inferred consent.
But he’s got a functional unsubscribe, and he’s trying to do the right thing. So I’m not going to complain to ACMA. Most people feel the same – if you let them unsubscribe, they won’t complain. That doesn’t change the fact that you’re breaking the law, with all the risk that entails.
Frequency
Please note, I have nothing against daily email newsletters. A couple of my favourites are daily – and I read them almost every day. But I consciously chose to sign up for those – express consent. They didn’t suddenly appear out of the blue, with inferred or no consent.
Summing up: how to launch an email newsletter wrong right
Email marketing is a fantastic way to promote and grow your business – but you have to do it right for that to work. I hope you now have a better idea of what to do when you launch an email newsletter. Here’s the summary list:
- Content matters, and the content of your first email matters even more than most.
- Make sure people know who you are.
- Give them a reason to read.
- Don’t be too salesy.
- Comply with the Spam Act.
- Clean up your data.
- Use personalisation effectively.
- Think about how frequently you send, in relation to your audience, your relationship with them, and what they will accept.
Simple, right? The basic principles always are, until you try to put them into practice. If you find things get tougher at that point, feel free to get in touch and I can help you work through it all.
