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To make email marketing effective, shift from a broadcast mindset to writing as if for a single person. Use personal stories, share a distinct point of view, and adopt a vulnerable tone. This approach makes the recipient feel the message was crafted for them, dramatically increasing engagement.
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Counterintuitively, highly formatted and image-heavy emails can feel corporate and impersonal, decreasing engagement. Shifting to a simpler, plain-text style mimics a personal message from a friend, which increases perceived authenticity and encourages more replies and genuine connection.
Amy Porterfield found her newsletters with the highest open rates and clicks were those sharing personal stories, not just promoting content. This human connection, she argues, is the most powerful business strategy available to a creator.
To maintain a personal voice at scale, have your team or VAs draft the bulk of your marketing emails. However, always reserve the top paragraph for yourself to write a brief, personal story or update. This maintains a relatable, human connection with your audience while scaling content production.
Focusing on email open rates can lead to clickbait subject lines and weak copy. Instead, orient your entire outreach strategy around getting a reply. This forces you to write more personalized, engaging content that addresses the recipient's specific pain points, leading to actual conversations, not just vanity metrics.
Instead of generic holiday greetings, create content that acknowledges what your audience is likely doing. An email with a subject line like "The barbecue is boring" connects with people's actual experience, making them more likely to open and engage because it feels relevant and timely.
Adding a deeply personal postscript (P.S.) to cold emails, such as referencing the recipient's favorite whiskey, demonstrates genuine research and builds rapport. This simple tactic humanizes the outreach and can dramatically increase the likelihood of getting a response from a busy executive.
Leverage AI in email marketing not to replace your voice, but to augment it. Use tools like ChatGPT as a brainstorming partner to generate angles and outlines. This frees up your creative energy to focus on infusing the content with personal stories and genuine connection that only a human can provide.
Including a simple, personal question unrelated to business (e.g., "What TV show did you watch this week?") in newsletters or outreach emails encourages replies. This humanizes the communication, improves engagement metrics, and positively impacts email deliverability.
Go beyond sending from a real person by creating a consistent "inbox persona." For example, framing messages as coming from an intern establishes a unique voice and a story that subscribers want to follow, making plain-text emails feel like an ongoing series rather than one-off communications.
To make your emails more engaging, stop addressing your entire list. Instead, picture one specific, real person—a friend, an ideal client, or someone you admire—and write directly to them. This simple mental shift transforms your tone from a generic broadcast into an intimate, compelling conversation.