Summary of the Copyhackers 10x Emails course

Course description 

All the Copyhackers courses are internet marketing centered. Which is great. Because you are or will most likely write copy in the online space. Joanna, as a copywriter, novelist, and online business owner has practical experience in all that she does. You will learn everything you need to become a conversion-focused copywriter with the Copyhackers courses. 

Joanna Wiebe

Joanna Wiebe is the original conversion copywriter. And probably the top copywriting teacher on the internet. She is the founder of Copyhackers, an online school, and a blog that has made thousands of students better copywriters. 

She has written copy for BT, Canva, Glowforge, Intuit, MetaLab, Prezi, SAP, Sprout Social, and VWO. She has helped 70,000 people at early and growth-stage startups, small and huge businesses, international agencies, and indie establishments with their copy. 

Get a full summary of Copyhackers 10x Emails here.

Intro to 10x emails by Copyhackers

The 10x email course starts by mentioning some core aspects of email: 

• Narrative emails work better. 
• Every email is a sales email. 
• Copywriters are essentially salespeople. 
• You need to plan before sending emails. 

Emails have three S´s: 

• Segmentation: Email the right people.
• Stories: Storytelling is what makes prospects eager to open and read your emails.
• Specificity: Every email has a purpose. 

The power of email 

For every $1 spent on email, the average return is $44. Making email the most profitable online channel. 

You have to reset your thinking when it comes to email. Every online business is an email business. Most business owners and marketers put tons of resources on social media, web, etc. But not on email.  

Email has a bigger impact than any other internet actions. And It usually gets the least attention. 

But why? 

My guess is that they don’t know how powerful email is or they don’t know how to take advantage of it.

Well. Now you will know. 

Email is pure direct response. Not cool. Not creative. But very profitable. 

The commandments of email 

• 3 to 1 rule.
• Don´t blast. Segment.
• One call to action per newsletter.
• Don’t come off as creepy.
• Unsubscribes are normal.
• To understand email think about your goal, where your subscriber is at, and how can you bring the two together. 

Email segmentation 

The more you know about your subscribers the better your offers can be. Segmenting emails means sending emails to people who have something in common. You do this to be more relevant. Relevancy sells. Irrelevance annoys. 

With segmentation, you can write more specific stories. Which are meaningful. 

3 paths to segment your list: 

1. Referral source: how did they get to your list? 
2. Self-selection: getting them to tell you who they are. 
3. Tagging based on where they clicked 

Drip campaigns

Drips are cash machines. You can set them up and they will do the selling for you. A drip campaign is an automated email sequence that is activated once a prospect gives away his email or by any other action such as a subscription or purchase. 

How long should a drip campaign be? As long as it needs to be to make them act. 

It can be 3, 5, 7, 10 emails. Even longer. Your results will tell if the length of your drip campaign is working. You can test different lengths and see what works. 

PASO formula for email

Using a copywriting formula you will know what to write and your writing will sell more! 

Common copywriting formulas are AIDA and PAS. 

The steps of PASO: 

1- Present a problem 

2- Agitate it 

3- Solve it 

4- Have a tangible outcome and then follow up with the next problem. Do this so they open the next email and the next one. 

How to structure content in your drip campaign 

1. Educate your prospects on what they signed up for. 
2. Apply a copywriting formula to educational emails to make them more powerful. 
3. Educate on the solution, then show the outcome. 
4. The cliffhanger is very important in all emails. Because it will get users to open the next email. (Like a TV series). 

Examples of emails you can use

These are templates you can use for your drip campaigns as well as your email blasts. 

If you are low on email ideas you can use these immediately. They are tested and reliable. 

1. The segmenter
2. The “It’s not your fault” email.
3. The anticipation builder.
4. The ideal-for email.
5. The special case.
6. Email from the CEO.
7. The FOMO.
8. Align with us.
9. 5 inches, 5 miles.
10. The FAQs email.
11. The non-buyer survey.
12. The buyer survey.
13. The ego booster.
14. The closer.
15. The possible impossible.
16. Little nudge, little payoff. 

Why should I read your newsletter?

This is answered with a unique selling proposition (USP). Your product needs to have one, your newsletter as well. A USP explains why they should subscribe to your newsletter and not to others. What wonderful outcome will she find in your newsletter that she won’t find anywhere else. A newsletter needs to provide a specific value. Subscribers have to value that reason. 

Rule of 1 for email 

The rule of one is the first commandment of copywriting. 

Every piece you write needs to have: 

1. Your one reader: Who are you writing to? Understanding your reader is a crucial part of the rule of 1. 
2. Your one offer: What your reader is going to get in exchange for their money? The one happiness inducing thing the prospect will get once they buy your offer.
3. Your one idea: The idea that will drive your reader to the one big offer. It has to be compelling. It has to be original. 
4. Your one promise: Your guarantee that they will get the offer. 

AIDA for email

You’ve most likely heard about AIDA. The most used copywriting formula. 

AIDA stands for Attention, interest, desire, and action. 

Attention: Grab your reader’s attention by breaking a pattern. 

Interest: Get people interested enough to take action.

Desire: Make them want what you sell using social proof, measurable outcomes, and demonstrations. 

Action: Compel your reader to take action with an attractive offer. 

Every email is a story

The difference between emails that are ignored and emails that are read is story. You need to use stories in email. People love stories and they are persuasive. All your emails should have a story.  

A compelling story is the most important aspect of email writing. 

3 things great stories must have: 

1- Break patterns: Be unexpected. New directions that your readers didn’t see coming. 

2- They feature heroes and villains: The villain could be the solution your prospect is switching from. 

3- They show risk or adventure: They build with conflict and have obstacles. 

Copywriting principles and hooks for email 

A strong hook works better than a slow start (warm up copy). A hook drops people into the action immediately. Skip the warm-up copy that doesn´t lead directly into the story. 

Your readers always have to think: what´s going to happen? The question underlying every great hook. A hook should be positioned at the very opening of your email. 

A good way of finding your hook is completing this phrase: “ I never thought it was possible but… “

Storytelling voice 

The #1 thing new writers want to learn is how to find their voice while writing. Voice makes readers feel like you get them. You need to find a voice that works for the audience that you most want. 

If you are still not sure what your voice is, research your market. That will give you the answers. Observe their mannerisms, how they speak, their tone. Use the same phrases they use. 

The battlefield principle

This is a copywriting technique borrowed from fiction writing. With the battlefield principle, you cut out all the fluffy words and land the reader right into the middle of the action. You skip everything the reader doesn’t care about. 

The superman principle

People love to feel important. Nobody gives a damn about anything else but themselves. Carnegie said this in his famous book How to Win Friends and Influence People. Be a good listener and talk only about what they care about. This is essential to write good copy. 

Superman is the hero of his own story. The same way your reader needs to be the hero of the story you write. The hero saves the day. The prospect is at the core. Not the service or product. Your copy should showcase your prospect either achieving their goal or moving towards achieving their goal. Your solution just helps them save the day. The hero is not your product/service, it’s the prospect (The hero is the fireman, not the hose). 

“If X then X” 

The principle of commitment and consistency makes your copy more powerful. 

A commitment focused technique used for generations to close sales — future pacing. 

We create a future for our prospects with our words.

Don’t skip on the details. The more you know who your prospects are and what they want the more you can apply future pacing in your email copy. Complete the purchase in the prospect’s mind. 

Urgency 

You need people to act immediately. That’s why we work with triggers such as scarcity, urgency, and incentives. 

How you can use urgency:

• Set a deadline for your offer. 
• Give them a bonus such as an info product.
• Use “buy 1 get 1 free”.
• Give them an upgrade to a premium product. 

Scarcity 

You´ve probably heard of FOMO. We imagine the disappointment we will feel if we miss a chance to get something we want. And the less there is of something the more we want it. Applies to sales as well as relationships. In fact, Scarcity is one of Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power. As well as one of Cialdini’s principles of Influence. 

Why your open and click rate sucks

First of all, nothing will help you if you’ve wronged your subscribers in the past. If you have, nothing you do will save your newsletter´s soul. You will most likely have to start from scratch with new subscribers.

If you have wronged your subscribers, the best you can do is to tell them what you did wrong and offer them something.  

With that in mind, there could be other reasons your opens and clicks suck: 

• You always send boring content.  
• You just email your list when you want to sell them something.
• You use bait and switch subject lines.
• You sell or have sold crappy products. 
• You are not fair on pricing
• You didn’t optimize for mobile.

Why you don’t always have to sell hard 

Sometimes you can sell without doing it directly. You just have to disguise your sales messages as facts. The facts cut into the “I am being sold to” noise. 

A way to do this is to write an entire email of everything that goes into your product. 

Get as many facts about your product or service as possible and send them all in one email. It’s powerful stuff.  

AB testing for email

Why even the smallest businesses need to split test emails. Email testing is the easiest way to know what is working.  The alternative is guessing and you never want to do that when writing copy. 

The most common tests:

• Subject line 
• Body copy 
• Theme of your email 

Most common email mistakes 

1. Selfish storytelling.
2. Getting too long to get into it. 
3. Being apologetic.
4. Not adding value. 

How to find your message (surveys) 

Survey’s help you find the deeper reasons why somebody buys something. 

You should survey everyone. Buyers, non-buyers, longtime customers. You find out what their objections, anxieties, and barriers are. And what do they need to see on the page to take action today.

Surveys

What is something that if you get it you would shout it to the world? Your prospects are dying to tell you this. The point of research is to discover it. 

Don´t worry about “annoying” your clients. You need to survey your customers to learn from your customers. 

You need insights… 

No writer should write without a survey first. You need to learn from your customers to get more customers. To do this, you need to survey them. Then, you inject the survey answers into your copy.

To reduce the risk of annoying people, offer an incentive to run the survey or reward for those who take it.

Review mining

Your clients are saying stuff already. Check for reviews of solutions similar to yours online. You can find what they are saying on Reddit, Amazon, Yelp, forums, support emails, social media posts, and comments. If a large group of people is talking about the same thing you can most likely use it. 

Client support agents can generally give you good insights. They know what bothers clients, what clients are asking for, what are they happy about, and much more. 

Another great source of reviews is Amazon. In fact, Joanna uses Amazon reviews to craft her messages. 

Interviews

Interview a customer for at least 45 mins to find deep motivators with first-hand emotion. Establish rapport and go deep. You need at least 7 interviews, but try to get as many as possible. 

You can get a full summary of Copyhackers 10x Emails here