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The one client who made me rethink my entire email strategy
I had this client back in 2019, a small bookstore in Portland called 'Powell's'. The owner, a woman named Linda, told me straight up that my fancy automated email flows were making her customers feel like they were talking to a robot. She said, and I quote, 'I want people to feel like I'm writing them a letter, not that some machine spat out a coupon.' At first I was defensive, I spent 3 weeks building that sequence with triggers and tags. But she showed me a hand-written thank you card she sends to every new customer, and I realized she was right. My open rates were at 22% and her personal emails were pulling 45% just by being simple and human. I rewrote the whole campaign to sound like a real person, no templates, no jargon. Three months later her email revenue went up 40%. Has anyone else had a client or boss push back hard on automated marketing and end up being right?
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umamartin1mo ago
Oh man, this whole story just hits so close to home for me. I had a client who sold handmade soap and she basically told me my emails sounded like a corporate memo. She was right, my open rates were tanking. I rewrote everything to sound like I was just chatting with a friend over coffee, and honestly the numbers went up way faster than I expected. People can smell automation from a mile away, especially small business customers who are used to real connections. So yeah, Linda was onto something big, and I bet her handwriting approach is part of why Powell's has such loyal fans.
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fisher.adam1mo ago
@umamartin woah, 45% open rate on handwritten emails? That's wild.
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