A lot of the advice on building an email list is so focused on building an email list through lead magnets and promotion. There is very little information on what to send your email subscribers once you’ve built an email list. Obviously, you should promote your coaching program, but how often and what do you send your email list in between promotions? Here’s everything you need to know to create an engaging email strategy.
What Is an Email Strategy
An email strategy turns your approach from writing a rushed email whenever you remember it to a plan to convert your email subscribers to paying coaching clients. It lays out your goals for your email list and creates a blueprint for getting there.
The goals part is really key for an email strategy. Why did you start your email list? (And “because a marketing guru told you that you have to” is not a good enough response.) What are you hoping it will do for your coaching business? Here are some common reasons that coaches build an email list:
- To maximise the lifetime value of coaching clients or those who purchase other products or services
- To convert their social media followers to coaching clients
- To create a more personalised or VIP experience
Next, consider your goals for your ideal coaching clients. What value do you want them to get from being on your email list? What would make them excited to see your name in their email inbox every day/week/month?
Once you have worked out your goals for your email list, create an email strategy that plans out the content that will help you to achieve those goals.
3 Types of Email Content
The types of content you could send your email list are endless. Broadly speaking, email content can be sorted into 3 categories: value, access, and sales.
Value
The most common type of email content coaches send to their email list is a value email. Your ideal coaching clients’ definition of value is the only one that matters here. Value could be:
- Entertainment – Stories, jokes, or interesting facts
- Knowledge – Advice, case studies, recommendations, or tutorials
- Curation – Sending them a reading list or collection of content they’d find useful
- Deals – There are newsletters out there that exist exclusively to send deals (like a travel deals newsletter.)
Find out from your email list what they would find most useful. You could create a poll or even send a Google Doc to find out. Once you start sending emails, you can look at open rates and click rates to get hard data on what your email list actually finds valuable.
Access
One of the reasons that people sign up for an email list is to receive extra access. That could be unique content that isn’t posted elsewhere, or it could be early access. Again, consider the value to your ideal coaching client. Does early access give them a significant advantage? Would they value email list-only content and resources? Would they value additional access to you? Coaches who have a strong personal brand may find that their ideal coaching clients will happily sign up for behind-the-scenes insights and personal anecdotes.
Consider how you can create email content that gives your ideal coaching clients the extra access that they desire. You may find they value all 3 types of access (exclusive access, early access, and personal access.) Just find out how much they value each type.
The worst thing you could do is to consistently send emails that add no extra value or access. If you are just copy and pasting your blog posts into an email, then why would your subscribers continue to welcome you into their inbox? It’s okay to link to relevant blog posts in your email or repurpose an old blog post when you’re stuck for email content. Just make sure you’re adding extra value. Write each email as if your ideal coaching clients are using that email alone to justify why they should stay subscribed to your email list.
Sales
The third type of email content is sales content. This is where you promote your products and services or affiliate products and services. In our experience, coaches often have sales dysmorphia in their email content (and every other type of content.)
Sales dysmorphia – when coaches believe that they sell too often and are likely annoying their audience but in actuality, they are barely selling to their audience.
There are two facts that you need to know about selling to your audience:
- If you created a coaching program that significantly improves an aspect of your ideal client’s life, then they want you to tell them about it. Wouldn’t you be mad if someone close to you knew how you could improve something and didn’t tell you?
- As long as you consistently deliver value to them, they will not mind you selling – even if your coaching program is not right for them. That is the trade-off that we all accept multiple ways in our daily lives.
Stop being apologetic about selling to your audience. If you’re selling things that you actually believe in, then you’re doing your ideal coaching clients a favour.
Most of the emails you send your email list will be multi-purpose. Your value emails will have a soft sell for your coaching program or a template. Your sales emails will contain extra value to hook the reader. Only a small percentage of emails will be pure value or pure sales. If you’re nervous about selling start by writing value emails and soft selling related products or services.
How Often Should I Email My Email List?
There is no magic answer that is right for every coach. You need to find an email frequency that balances:
- How often your email subscribers want to hear from you
- How often you can logistically manage to email your subscribers without sacrificing value.
If in doubt, start with a monthly email and then increase the frequency from there. In most cases monthly, fortnightly, or weekly are widely accepted. Less frequently than monthly and your email list will forget they’re subscribed. More frequently than weekly and you really need to deliver some great value so your subscribers don’t feel like they’re being spammed.
We have seen some coaches who give people the option to choose their ideal frequency when they subscribe to the email list. That could be an option if you want to give daily emails but don’t want to lose subscribers who struggle to communicate with even their mums on a daily basis.
How Do I Get Email Subscribers
Generally speaking, you will get email subscribers in one of two ways:
- Subscribers sign up of their own volition – Usually for an exchange of value like a lead magnet or because they believe they will benefit from being on your email list.
- You sign clients up to your email list – Make sure your contract states that they will be added to your email list rather than just adding people without permission.
Need help creating an email strategy or producing value-packed email content? Contact us to discuss our email copywriting packages. Alternatively, you could book a Pick Our Brain Call to get a copywriter’s opinion on your email strategy.