From Lead Magnets to Subject Lines: Proven Strategies for Effective Email Marketing using Flodesk, Mailchimp, and Convertkit

Zaakirah Muhammad

so, email marketing is what we're going to talk about today. And so I am Zaakirah. I am a creative strategy, professional portrait photographer, and now I help entrepreneurs confidently grow their brand by mastering their marketing. So I've been utilizing email marketing first for nonprofits and small businesses before 2014 I started to do it for my own. And so today I'll go over, like, you know, just briefly what is email marketing why you need to be taken advantage of it. with a my favorite and then of course the How to strategies. So I grabbed this from MailChimp I feel like it's the easiest way to kind of give us a refresh as to what email marketing, so it's definitely direct marketing. So the same way that you would, you know, back in the day, utilize your postcard and your business card is direct marketing, and it helps to make sure your customers are aware of the latest things that you offer. And it continued to build relationships. And so, then for me, that I've wanted to talk more about like who I am, what I do so when I started focused media group back in 2018. It was really because I had saw the struggle I saw the struggle of, you know I was being a social media manager for other, you know, women partners and their businesses. And I was, you know, working on a social media but every question that I have whenever we will review the staff, I'm like, how are they looking on your end. Are you converting over, are you converting the social media follow it, so they will say yeah I mean we're getting more reps I view but I'm like, Okay, how are they retaining to be customers, and so basically I was like you know what I think that's probably where my new zone of genius. And so for me, I've been traveling around the world and photography first and foremost, so a camera literally saved my life. That's a whole nother story. And then I'm satisfied in Adobe, Adobe Photoshop Cornell, and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion I took a certification program that was online as you as. So, yeah, a question for you, I think we'll make it interactive one more time. Where were you when Instagram went down.

Zaakirah Muhammad

Well, funny enough, I was attending a photography conference, and I think one of his sessions at the time was about SEO, ironically, so I was about to go to Twitter to talk about, you know my tidbit from a conference, and she ended I go to Twitter, Instagram and Facebook it down again, I'm like, oh, so I think for me because I was. I've always been into email marketing, I would the ladder I was nonchalant I was like, Oh, okay. So now my question is for you. I think maybe keep this question in your mind as you're going through the entire thing of how are you going to convert the customers who come to your website, or in this case come to your social media. So, briefly talk about my favorite day so I do have a referral link if you you know for life changing, email marketing platforms but motion beware I started with, that's what I did when I was first starting out my email, I started my email list of course within the family, and then later on when I started to either have my photography course, or sell my book, I then would you know, transition over to other start exploring other platforms so it has, you can have up to 2000 subscribers for free. You can have a website on there, you can integrate it with QuickBooks. I feel like it's the only one so far that integrates with QuickBooks, only because they recently acquired being acquired by Intuit, though that's all the, you know, mint in QuickBooks, and all of the money app, and into it, and then ConvertKit is what I ended up switching over to for split second, even though it was established in 2013 I think I joined it maybe in 2015, and it was good for you, I actually got a referral code as well from a different influencer by the name of Melissa Griffin, and it was amazing because they actually had, easy to use, workflows that you can use that was super helpful as far as knowing how to build an average five email sequence that you would need to use to sell, and of course with that sequence, it gave me a confidence and a boost as well and I was able to sell my first, you know, student mic for my photography course. And then of course, the best is FLOTUS, so it was established in 2019, and it's the only one I actually learned it today it's the only one that had Apple Mail tracking privacy. Now I'm sure some of us will get discouraged because we see people aren't reading my emails but actually what could be happening is they turned off that you can see that they read the email, but also what happened they because it's email. The great thing about email is that it's so easy for people to find. So if you post on social media, people will, if you if it's, you know, nine posts back, if they're new to paid most likely nine out of 10 times, they're not going to go back right. But the good thing about email marketing is that people can organize your email they can search for your email, more easily they can go to your email so emails are always going to be received, especially when because it will happen again when Instagram or Facebook, go down again. So basically it's always going to better type of yeah that's a typo. This is supposed to say flow that is awesome also had very modern, sleek designs, and they're all look the same but it makes it easier for you all you have to do is add your logo, add a certain statement like your mission statement, and then have enough has enough space and it'll adjust the font accordingly they will font size accordingly to fit however long your email is, and it was great with dabir So I would definitely be giving more suggestions on how to use Zapier to continue to grow your email list. So now we're talking about that go in your list. So it definitely will take time. It definitely will take consistency and it's definitely changing because like we said there now there are people who can block off whether or not you can see that they've checked the email, which some of us if we look at data, it kind of is discouraging but it shouldn't be. But as long as you continue to either post once a month. If they post once you start focusing on posting once a week, or even at max, three times a week, especially as we get closer to Black Friday so that people really can know you and be familiar with you and be familiar with your voice, and even become excited to see your name pop up in the inbox. So, cross emotion. I think one of the best ways for growing is, make that your call to action. So, put it in your email signature, when you're you know pitching or talking to other customers and clients, put it in an email signature sign up for Mother's Day like sign up for my email list. When you are using it for like your link tree. Talk about it there. When you are getting to talk to other platforms, put it there and make it a part of your digital business card like your link to me. Okay so now how can you use the email sequence, because I think that's the biggest thing that I think gets slept on email sequence is really what get people to rather really well get people to come back to the most sequence though, but I will briefly mention it because it's what gets people to utilize. Having a story and getting started for your story. So the best way is really break down your story, your why your mission, why you do what you do in five emails. So when it comes to sharing your story. Definitely be vulnerable. So some behind the scenes, be personable. So a perfect example of being personable is, even though you sometimes may not want to do what everyone else is doing. But if everyone else is sending emails around the same time, you kind of want to be in there as well. So even though it may seem like oh there's too many emails today actually you kind of do want your name to be shown there. So, for example when Instagram and Facebook went down. I would already go into send an email because I had a challenge going on in my email list, so a five day challenge, so I was sending the email anyways but of course you can tweak this subject line to then say something in your own voice of like, like Where were you, where were happening when Instagram right. Yeah, and then inspire, to inspire inspiration Everyone could use it especially during the tough time. So inspiration is either saying another part of your story, something that you've overcame. And then, later known facts about you. So how many people know that you have a sibling include that by very clearly given the example of flights shutting down and preparing for, you know sibling to get out of your space. And then, promoting your services and products so I kind of say, go in this order if possible, but always save the best for last day promoting your product or services for last. There's like this 8020 rule of 80%, educating or inspiring and 20% selling. So that way, by the time people are ready to buy from you. It's a no brainer to them. Now lead magnets I think some people don't do lead magnet and that's okay. But for those who are comfortable with lead magnets, I wanted to leave a few examples. So I think also what's more relevant for the audience here is your product have like a giveaway, if you can do that within, you know your budget and have a giveaway. You can also have, I think you've seen on your favorite businesses, the email list that you're on, you see that you go to their website you shop they say sign up for my sign up for our email list to get 20% off. You can do that as well. Get 20% off my copywriting services. The get 20% off your first session, get a discount off your, Your quality session or sign up to get a free discovery call so however you want to do it you kind of get people in nine at a time, nine out of 10 times the lead magnet is something that you are able to give for free. Give some kind of value for free. These are just my examples that I've used. When I do the challenges I have like a workbook so people know that they will get the workbook when they sign up for the email list. Then people also will sign up because they want to hear more from podcasts like podcast that you've been on, or if you have your own podcast. These are just a few examples there's endless, endless example we can talk about more at the end, and a few more tips so this is going into once you're in your marketing platform, even the one that you already use here for you then that probably gets slept on as I like to say, you the reason feature, though, just like we talked about there's so many people that don't see email so we think so. We send it, they send it again. So give value more than yourself so once again I think when you open the email to also keep it short and simple but when you ask the sharing in your email list, definitely gave more value than you get out so only depends on I think moving on to the next tip of tag and filtering segment which means if you have had people on your email list and you're able to look at your statistics and see that they are pretty consistent with opening new emails like they're like, in a high percentage of they always open the email, definitely, either tag them or filter them as, like, you know, your most most viewed subscribers or your band or however you wondered maybe name it because it's, it's the name judge for you so whatever you name it, you can name it just so you know who the group of people are, and that way you, these are the people that if you know that they read everything want to email, then they know what you do, most likely nine or 10 times they know what you do. They're just waiting for either that one fo M moment or dead count or giveaway or style that you're having, so that it's very, they're ready to buy from you. So definitely don't sleep on the option to either tag or segment your followers. So for me, I started using it, especially with. When I started out with friends and family like that great, that's great for you know, becoming more comfortable with sharing your story. And doing that but I would then segment them like okay I only tell them when I have news like life, life changing news that I want to tell you about, because that's great as well for you know viewer my family to let me tell you first. And then of course, split it also for the lukewarm customers the ones that are. They wanted to learn more about you, but they have evolved from you yet. And then of course, they're even segmenting the ones that have already bought from you. And I say, automate, automate, automate. I think the first example that come into my mind for automate is vacation. Even though my goal for this conversation today to make sure that you have as many emails as you can, going out on a consistent basis before Black Friday. Even after Black Friday there are more people who want something from your inventory or want to book in session with you, and you're away. The good thing is that you can still give value by automating you don't even have to physically be there when people sign up for your email list. They're going through this five days usually five days, five day email sequence, and then eventually selling from, you know, buying from you. AV testing is what also should be utilized more often to make sure that you add to you in the right subject line, type manner that 10 times, you win by getting people with email addresses. And then you also win by getting people to open your emails right banana 10 times as soon as you get people to open the email. It's normally a 5050 chance that they'll buy from you. Now, as long as you've made it clear to me the call to action, clear. So, I'm going to give a web result at the end but alternate your subject lines. Maybe alternated with one serious type of subject line versus one playful type of study line alternated with the same subject line with and without emojis alternated with them without using their name in the subject line alternated with them without a question. So AB testing is is a great way to see what works best to get more opens. Okay, I'm really emphasizing on growing your email list, because especially again after Instagram and Facebook went down, how are people going to really keep in touch with you, so definitely have that everywhere so one of my first tips, actually, is to post their social media on if chose me to post on your email first MailChimp. MailChimp is the easiest way for you to start on your MailChimp app, and then you can also then send that same social media pose to Instagram, and Facebook. Of course you can send it to Twitter too but then you have to do some tweaking to adjust it, and then promote your landing page, though, when people click on your link tree. They really should be going to save for them to get 20% off your first order. And that will go to that landing page, and that landing page, you would have already set it up in the back end for, okay, the person who clicked on this specific landing page is a new customer, so I know how to segment those emails, so that I'm not talking about something that they would not know about, they would not know that I do. If you don't already have it make sure your sign about is at the bottom of your website. Alternatively, there's a website called mill much the website actually mail Munch, CO, not mail much calm, but that is it was very popular before all the websites, had embedded pop up email to Kipps inbox. But both of them now, they are integrated like flow that has it now. Merge unpadded now, but Mail Merge was able to work with all of them and still collect emails from pop ups on every aspect of your page I'm sure we've all seen it our website, sometimes they're annoying sometimes they're not. But the good thing is that you're able to capture people, you know, after the email, because that's what we want to do, we want to be able to retain the people that come to your website. Their view value is something that I literally just learned about, and it's pretty cool if you are a active Twitter user, and you can connect it with your Twitter, and you can send your tweets as a newsletter. So, if that makes it all easier. So, just this first tip that I have here, of whatever you post on social media post it to your email is the same thing is great about revenue so if you post, informative, tweets, and not just get a lot of times I know a lot of a lot of us like to use Twitter as like public journal, in a way, but if you ended up using tweets that are informational, you can repurpose those tweets into their view, and make it like an email list. Okay kids, more tips. So don't take it personal when people unsubscribe. The good thing about unsubscribe means that they're doing you a favor the favor aid you're nailing down even more. The way that you can serve your audience. Don't take a person on when people don't open. So, even for me there's one ever since I graduated from like Cornell, they still stand as resources. I don't open it because I don't feel the need for it yet but I know that I will. So your message will be the same thing I right now I don't think I need to get fired. I don't think I need copy editing but I will. And I know that if, because this name keeps showing up in my inbox, I know exactly where to go. As soon as I'm ready. And then also subject lines matters so I think I gave a few examples of how to alternate between asking a question, including their name, making it personal. And just kind of tweaking and playing around with the subject line, piles of debris flying more than you do with the actual content in the email could you could have nothing but a link to your YouTube video or nothing but a photo that promotes your next availabilities session, but if you double decline, then people aren't opening the email then it kind of goes out the window, but again, don't be discouraged marketing is all about playing around, and then grammar does not have to be perfect so just kind of going back into that I know that for a while. English was my favorite applicants goal and so sometimes I take that to heart of eyes oh no, I have to make sure that my email is perfect, or oh no I sent the email out and there's a grammar error, no one's gonna buy for me. But, again, just go back to give more value than us down and it will completely be overlooked. And so I think I want to give a few more examples of, you know, what should you really talk about in your email. So what type of posts that represent your brand and personality, photos, you know, lack of screenshots and video like if you are on Youtube, or you were featured on in YouTube, you can embed the video, the link to the video. If you having any events or we can add events you can post that. And I think the most important thing is really to that understand your audience so the same way that you would think about okay, who do I want to engage with me on, on Instagram and Facebook and Twitter, the same thing, apply for your email list, the email list is really just the most controlled platform. So, of course, this is the perfect time to really talk about you talk about your services, talk about your favorite quotes and tips and your testimonial, the new wins. Okay, so we're down at the end. And, of course, we have a little bit amount of time here, but of course I'm accessible I'm going to, you can screenshot this. If you want, and you have more questions beyond what we're going to talk about today, but also I'm going to stop sharing your screen in a few seconds and then we'll talk about questions. So tell me how that was what you learned.

MailChimp I feel like is really really good with E commerce that I mean they already integrate with I saw Shopify and Stripe, I believe, though they already integrate with, you know, people can buy directly from your email. So that's what I love about MailChimp is that they're making so many changes and probably even more changes because they were recently acquired for like billions of dollars, so they're gonna make even more change for it to be better for you to sell directly from the email so

Zaakirah Muhammad

And, but again because now it can be good with automation with everything. There is also Zapier, for example to flow, there's still kind of getting more getting better flow that's it you know it's a baby so it's still getting better with automation. So I use Zapier to automate, depending on which lead paid they came from, to let it automatically segment for me or if someone came to my calendar to automatically add them that way. So, automation and doppia, it's kind of it, it's advanced at biotech goes, but it has so many ways for you to just automate and simplify your life.

Zaakirah Muhammad

know that that's a violation of the GDPR because they technically gave you your email address, right, with that inquiry, they technically want to learn more from you by actually doing the inquiry. So it is valid because they gave you their email address very good you get in from your website, for example, though.

Zaakirah Muhammad

not to use that. Okay, so a great example of when to use it now I'm a night owl and stay for them but I wanted to get this email out, but also say I'm closing in on having discount dude like five days left, I'm having a discount. It's half of, when people were I could tell who it was half of who was opening it last time. So, probably because it was you know nighttime and then got bumped down to the other emailed, I would be standard again, probably at like nine o'clock in the morning with a different Wi Fi, or some people just say, in parentheses, we sending, and I tend to open it like, oh I didn't see it the first time. So, that's a perfect example of if you happen to send it at three o'clock, one day and the next day you send it with me sending or did you see this, or I wanted to make sure you saw this, just resend it again at a different time with a different template.

Unknown Speaker

Okay, so you leave the body content the same and you change the subject. Okay, cool, because I use Flow desk and so I'm pretty sure the feature again I haven't actually used it, but I'm pretty sure the feature is recent to unopened, or you can resend it to everybody. Yep, so I wouldn't resend it to everybody I would just call me the open. Yeah, I would just do an open. Okay, got it, got it.

Zaakirah Muhammad

I had that open Edit tab, then I was gonna add like screenshots and never got to so this is perfect. Let me see if I can. So I think if I can show both FLOTUS, so I'm gonna start with MailChimp, I think like I was saying, for my dog, cat that I've been using MailChimp, like peppering my personal brand more. But I'm also going to move over the flow that before their pipe goes up. So, I'm going to say, Okay, So for MailChimp. Basically I have automations default. When I get signed up for my email course photography email course, so I'm able to set up as a journey as a call it for when they come in they say hi, then. Oh yeah, by the way, it will MailChimp will show you the average open rate and the average click rates, so click rates and how many people actually click on a link and open rates and how many people actually open. So thankfully I'm pretty good at five people actually open it because that's also the important thing but making sure that you also have people that want your emails. Not just anyone. So, like I was saying earlier if they, they say that they want to work with you, by sending an inquiry that's already a new post in for you to warm up with email sequences. So they get the email. This is step four, one day, every hour go over the flow that to every email is that, for how many days you want to send it as soon as they subscribe and how many emails you want to send as well. And then, so for me I have different forms and I integrated it with doppia to know that when they sign up. And then I'm gonna say, like I'm logged into the wrong flow desk. Yeah, run to the hour, but I think is under duplicate, whether you can reassign,

so for flodesk. So I don't really need it that much yeah because I'm in a different media group one and then my personal one. So, you split the new email, it's with the email that is then you can always see who send. And this is where I was referring to like organize it, you can organize the email of like okay, for photography or this is specifically for copy editing, typically for a product, and then also in your workflow, you can do the same thing of adjusted for when, when they when they get the lead magnet if you want that or you just don't nurturing them by saying Hi, my name is Devin so I've been in industry for a while. And the next email I'm going to talk about why I started doing what I do. Now teller matter. Am I answering your question as far as how to duplicate or at least in the email.

Zaakirah Muhammad

before kicking them out I send like a different email, something on the line of how can I support you, and if they even if they don't respond to that if they if they open it, if they open that, you know that they just either busy or something. But if they don't even open that then yeah I'll eventually spend some time removing people who have not literally opened in months.

Zaakirah Muhammad

Yeah, definitely start with MailChimp and if you can't I'll play with it tonight on because setting up that sequence is not as simple as 123 I mean it is if you've been my favorite level you would literally building that audience on social media you can copy and paste those posts over email.

Zaakirah Muhammad

I think what I had to do, I had to get out of my own head because I would be following all the rules, and then when, When they don't work for me, I'm like, it's not working at all. So, basically, it's half and half, like some people if I just I've noticed some people respond to me when I share a relatable story, like people respond to me when I share that. If I simply just ask, what do you what are you doing today, or like, what do you want, what do you what do you want, like when you struggle with, with typically like you have to either be very specific, or don't ask the question at all, just let them know like hey I will read all emails, and then they'll send you an email so it kind of half and half, I could depend on the people because I've noticed, awesome, they'll be my email but still send me a DM. So it's really big.

Zaakirah Muhammad

Yeah, and so you're on the right track with having product base you want people to buy not necessarily reply. But even with service baited well you want people to book a call book, you know, click on something, not necessarily the plot. So, it could be the same thing, unless, like, unless you kind of like put it in every single email maybe at the top of the email like don't hit don't I don't by the send me an email back, but for the most part you know that you're actually going forward by say if you always have that call to action at the bottom of the email of book a strategy call with me, you'll know that, but also you know where they came from, when you put it in your signup form of like, what's your first name, last name, how did you find me. What do you want. Oh, select from like three options of what do you want to load. Now you can do that automate that you know as well. So I feel like there's a way to kind of go around getting replies versus knowing that okay I'm actually getting people to buy

Zaakirah Muhammad

a feature that I use heavily pretty often, but especially when I was doing email marketing for clients. It costs every client tester, if you haven't heard of it cost schedule is like an all in one social media scheduling platform, but what it is is they have this subject line tester where you can test out your subject line, and it'll give you the nice score of, like, zero to 100 of how well that suddenly cloud will come out there of course questions in the subject line will always convert better than. Hey it's me like that, you know, so definitely bookmark that website.

Zaakirah Muhammad

um, me personally because I do love writing, um, I feel I love both more of them, like Facebook ads renovator they're posting on social media every single month, because it's evergreen like truly evergreen, like you don't even have to. You can run it every single month, or you can run it every time someone signs up, it's automated like literally automatic so I love those better because it's literally, you can use it anytime you can anytime you want to launch it every quarter, and you'd have to add a thing that signed up for your email list.

Unknown Speaker

what's your Instagram.

Zaakirah Muhammad

It's at Illumina it's one that's a personal one illuminousone a personal one. I'm active in DM but if you look on there and it looks like I haven't posted it cuz I don't post that email.