I was having a conversation with one of my proteges awhile back during the Q & A session I hosted, and an interesting point came up. When it comes to mini-courses, how much content is enough?
Though my immediate answer is “there is no such thing as too much, just be sure to make your point (get the click) every time”, I’ve been thinking about this, and I want to share something with all of you – my loyal readers.
In email copywriting, believe it or not there are four distinct styles – and only 4. I’ll use some popular gurus to illustrate the styles…
Mike Filsaime & Gary Ambrose prefer the personal touch, telling you how they think and feel about products & giving good nuggets of info. Their emails are always engaging – like a sales letter in email format.
Clayton Makepeace is the hard-sell, personal approach. He doesn’t tell you how he thinks or feels about a product, because the only ones he promotes are his own. Instead, he sells you on the product using hard-sell tactics injected with his personality (which, if you’ve ever read his emails or heard him speak, is hard to resist!)
Myself and some other marketers like Rick Butts use the “hey, its just me” approach – we talk like its just a couple of friends over a casual dinner. We expose our personalities, and make you feel at ease. For example, the subject line of an email I sent out yesterday was “Pobody’s Nerfect!” – because the teleseminar I had scheduled for yesterday evening had to be canceled (John Taylor, the guest speaker, was stuck out of town).
And finally, there are those like Tellman Knudson (now), Bill Thorn, Cody Moya, etc who essentially copy & paste their promo emails from the affiliate area of the product they are promoting. I imagine with an hour or so of extra effort, they could double the pulling power of those promotions – but thats just my opinion 
The bottom line is, there are really only a few ways to go – but all of the high-performing styles use personality. Don’t hide behind your email. In today’s high-tech low touch world, being yourself is to your advantage. Just ask Mike Filsaime!
- Cherilyn Woodhouse
