How I almost done fooked up my business this year

Here’s a cautionary tale for your righteous self: This past June and July I noticed growth of Email Players was good, and steadily growing, but not nearly as well as I’d like it to. And because of that, I started doing some investigating of my numbers. By “numbers” I don’t mean meaningless metrics like opens and clicks. No, what I did was, I looked at my marketing for the two or three months prior. I wanted to see what things looked like over time. And it turns out I’d been making a very dumb mistake in my emails. The reasons mostly had to do with flakiness on my part — as I simply wasn’t thinking about things clearly while juggling multiple sales letters and offers related to BerserkerMail (rewriting the sales page for a general audience instead of just for my list since we’re gearing up to expand its reach) and for the Email Down n’ Delivery offer, plus various other side projects I was juggling (like launching three brand new books in August alone) and trying to finish before leaving in September for a two week road trip to visit my dad. Anyway: When I looked at my advertising for Email Players for those few months it was obvious I had made a very dumb, very stupid, and very amateur mistake during that time. Yes, they were functionally good. In fact, around that time I even got a few long time readers saying they were especially good (this was when I was promoting the June issue — about my late dog Zoe). And in my biased opinion they were pretty good. Certainly they got the job done. But I was still making a terrible mistake in almost every single one. Unacceptable. Not just because I knew my sales could be better… but because I realized I was coming up on the August issue — which was the 12-year anniversary milestone issue about World-Building (a topic especially near and dear to my heart and that a lot of my list had shown interest in for some 9 years prior.) The way I saw it, it was my responsibility… my duty… my moral imperative… to get that issue in as many hands as I could. And to do that I couldn’t keep making the dumb mistake I’d been making in my emails for months prior And so I realized right there and then making that mistake had to stop. It was literally fooking up my entire business in some ways. And, starting with the emails selling that very next issue, I stopped doing it in my emails. I also took a look at some other projects and noticed this dumb mistake was carrying over into my other writing I was working on at a that time, too, like my novels/fiction, and other things here and there. Short story long: I did a total reverse course and stopped everything I was working on. I also rewrote what I’d been doing, and started doing everything else right. And I made absolutely sure this mistake was nowhere to be found in my writing. The result? The August issue, the August book launches, and the emails and other writing (including the screenplay I just finished today, ironically) were ridiculously better, with sales up, and the emails, books, and Email Players getting lots more engagement, etc. All because I: 1. Caught myself making a truly stupid mistake during a slow time 2. Reversed course, and aggressively rewrote and fixed my other writings after All of which begs the question: What was this stupid mistake I was making? Well, I’ll just say this: It’s a mistake a LOT of email and copywriters make — especially those that do a lot of writing, where making this slip-of-judgement is far more common than those who just write one email per month or week, and just haunt social media all day or whatever. And it’s something I talk about starting on page 18 in the December Email Players issue. This isn’t a writing trick or technique I’m talking about. It’s something quite different. And if you are making this mistake and if you but apply what I did to fix it to your next email, your next ad, your next offer, your next anything… then I defy you not to make more money, get more enjoyment in your work, create a stronger more rabid customer or client base for your business. All right I’m finished here. You’re either sold on subscribing in time for the December issue by now or you’re not. If you are, here’s the link, one more time, before sending in the list: [https∶//www.EmailPlayers.com]( Ben Settle This email was sent by Ben Settle as owner of Settle, LLC. Copyright © 2023 Settle, LLC. All Rights Reserved. No part of this email may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from Settle, LLC. Click here to [unsubscribe]( Settle, LLC PO Box 1056 Gold Beach Oregon 97444 USA