Ahoy,

(I just found out that "ahoy" is the actual word for "hello" in Czech. Brilliant!)

As I've been working with consulting clients more and more, I get a peek into other businesses, and the businesses of my clients' joint venture partners... and in general, a much clearer "insider's view" of the entire industry (men's lifestyle & dating).

... and one thing becomes exceedingly clear:

Most everybody think of marketing as a continuous string of one-off "promotional events" ... instead of an ongoing process of communication and relationship-building.

Everybody is obsessed with numbers: How can we make as much money as possible per email we send out? What's your EPC? What's your conversion rate?

And for the most part... they just. Don't. Get. It.

Currently, in this specific client's business, we have an EPC (earnings per click) of about $1.60 ... with NO sales funnel (cold traffic to sales letter) ... on a $500 product. That's pretty good, most people can't do that. But... we could probably quadruple, quintuple or 10x our profits with a proper follow-up sales model.

But people just want the money. Now. And not in two weeks... even though, in 2 weeks they might get 10 times the amount of people who are ready to buy.

One thing I repeatedly stress to all clients, and now to you as well... is that

Email is NOT a sales channel!

It is absolutely terrible for selling stuff. Email is a person's "inner sanctum". Email is a communication channel! You communicate with your audience to get them to know you, like you and trust you... that's it. Not selling. At least not in isolation.

It's aaaaall about the relationship! Most people are still operating their businesses like this: 1. Get as much traffic as humanly possible and trick them into joining your email list. 2. Send spammy, half-baked, half-assed 100% hard-sell emails over and over again until they... (a) unsubscribe or (b) buy something from an affiliate link.

I've seen a lot of business models over the years. And in just about all cases...

The person who has the best relationship with his audience... wins!

The way to build a relationship is to...

• provide exceptional value and help your audience actually solve their problems...
• treat your audience with respect and don't insult their intelligence by sending them bullshit they don't want or care about
• care
• like, really care
• seriously guys, start giving a shit, it's the best strategy even if you just want to get the money

People think the game is all about converting traffic into money... it's not!

It's about converting traffic into (loyal) customers.

In the following weeks, we're going to start structuring a proper marketing funnel in this client's business. Long term autoresponder follow-up, webinars, deep list segmentation, the whole nine yards. Gonna be intensive... fun... and profitable!

And, just to prove a point, I'm considering starting a new niche business based solely around email communication... We'll see though, I'm plenty busy at the moment.

Ciao. Talk soon,

Linus