Copywriters put a lot of effort into subject lines, but there’s a field that’s even more important… the from field.

Get that wrong and your subject line and email won’t get read at all.

Let’s take this email I got from the Netflix CEO today as an example:

Like most people, I quickly glance at the from column in my inbox first.

I noticed “Reed Hastings, Co-Founder” and didn’t know who the heck that was. I almost trashed it but gave it a second chance because of the subject line.

It turns out Reed Hastings is the CEO of Netflix. Who knew? I didn’t, even though I’ve been a customer for several years. I probably don’t know the names of the CEOs of any of the companies I pay bills to every month.

The from field should have read, “Reed Hastings, Netflix CEO & Co-Founder.” Then “Reed Hastings, Netflix” would have appeared in the from field of my inbox and I would have opened it without almost accidentally deleting it.

If you’re a copywriter, always ask a client what they intend to put in the from field and advise them accordingly. It might seem like a trivial detail but it’s not.

By the way, I like the rest of the Netflix email. I always admire it when someone has the courage to open an email with “I messed up. I owe everyone an explanation.” Plus, I’m a happy instant streaming customer, and hate messing with DVDs, so I’m not in a snit over their new biz model.

So I recently found myself standing at a busy intersection, whistling like a mad woman.

I drew WTF looks from drivers but I didn’t care.

There was a cockatiel in a tree and I was determined to rescue it.

I knew I had my work cut out for me, however, because I was a stranger to the bird and didn’t know his name.

Cockatiels are friendly birds but won’t fly to the shoulder of just anyone.

He was cheeping the way cockatiels cheep when they are anxious or calling out to a cockatiel buddy.

I imitated that cheep as best as I could and made eye contact with him. He calmed down.

He wasn’t budging, though, so I walked to the other side of the tree and started whistling songs cockatiels usually know: the wolf whistle, the Adams Family and Andy Griffith theme songs.

He kept staring at me and gradually felt safe enough to fly to a lower branch.

I wanted to close the deal, however, especially when the waiter at a nearby Mexican restaurant… the guy who made me aware of the cockatiel’s presence in the first place… said sadly, “If you don’t rescue him, he’ll die, won’t he.”

Pressure.

Stress.

Plus, cockatiels are nomadic creatures when in the wild, so I knew I had to close the deal now or never.

This anxiety was making it hard for me to continue to whistle, so I switched tactics and started saying words a cockatiel might know:

“Food.” “Water.” “Step up.” “Pretty bird.”

I used a sing song-y voice in a higher register than my normal speaking voice because cockatiels like higher pitches.

Those words really got his attention and he kept dropping down to lower branches one at a time until he was on the lowest branch.

Suddenly there was a flurry of feathers but I remained still.

He landed on my head.

I ever so carefully walked to my car and slid into the front seat.

He insisted on remaining on my shoulder so I let him stay there during the drive home so as to maintain my bond of trust with him.

Sometimes he hopped onto my head, which probably drew more WTF looks from drivers, but I didn’t care.

The moment I put him into the bird cage at home (we have a small aviary of parakeets and cockatiels at home) he wagged his tail from side to side vigorously, the way cockatiels do when they are happy.

Then he ate and drank for 30 minutes straight.

Which brings us to the “La-Di-Frickin’-Da, what does this have to do with my business” part of the post.

First, there isn’t any one thing that closes the deal when selling to a customer.

Sure, I could conclude that my using words like “food” were what closed the deal, and that I should just launch straight into that if I ever happen upon a cockatiel in the wild again.

Just like some marketers think their fancy-pants sales page is what closes the deal and they fixate on that and neglect their email list.

But it was a large sales funnel, so to speak, beginning with his previous owner, who, based on what I now know of his temperament, clearly had a loving bond with this bird, enabling him to give me the time of day in the first place.

She probably cried and kicked herself for days afterwards when he escaped during a half second of inattention, but her care for him the years beforehand played a huge role in my being able to save him.

The other parts of the funnel:

I spoke/whistled in his language.

I very clearly communicated I had something he desperately needed – food.

I focused completely on him and drew upon the very specific knowledge I have about cockatiels so I could build trust. I didn’t focus on myself at all.

I didn’t rush or push for the sale.

See?

Marketing really is for the birds.

Talk soon.

P. S.  Bottom line: send out a variety of emails to your list. Use a combination of stories and how-to info to gradually build trust.

Eventually one of those emails will finally hit the right hot button and snag the sale, thanks to the funnel that came before it.

It’s a tough thing to do on your own, however, so have a copywriter do it for you.

As you may know, I live in Wisconsin and there has been significant political turmoil here the past few weeks.

I’m not going to go into the politics of it in this email, but I want to point out a couple of principles that are also pertinent to marketing and copywriting (from Neighbor Against Neighbor in Wisconsin in Books & Culture):

In 21st-century America, 70,000 people do not hit the streets in sub-freezing temperatures for political strategy. Policy does not motivate like that anymore. What does motivate is emotion: anger, joy, fear, loathing, celebration, and so on.

I’ve been a copywriter for almost four years and find I have to regularly remind myself and my clients that what matters most is how you make your clients and prospects feel.  It might seem shallow, but providing how-to content and information, although important, isn’t fully motivating unless the emotions are also engaged.

From the article again:

…this conflict remains at heart a local story. It is about the culture of public spaces and public works in a quirky state. It is about who we are, and who we are becoming.

Most of us in Wisconsin feel part of this larger narrative and have felt compelled to spend some time at the capitol building or other venues to participate in the expression of this story. We sense this is history in the making and being part of it in some tangible way like that is important.

Your business has a story, too, and the more your clients and prospects can be a tangible part of it, even in small ways, such as through Facebook fan pages and writing a customer review of your product, the more they will trust you and become a repeat customer.

Emotions. Story. No good protest or marketing campaign can do without them.

As an email copywriter, I’ve always been keenly aware of the possibilty that someday the email platform will change radically or be replaced by something else. After reading this post on the Social Media Examiner blog today, it seems likely that Facebook’s new messaging system will do just that.

A new feature in Facebook’s message system is “groups.” You’ll be able to create private groups among your Facebook friends to help facilitate private conversations:

Instead of sending traditional email blasts, you can send creative messages via Facebook that are more likely to resonate with recipients. It’ll serve as a new and unique platform for receiving marketing messages.

Although it’s too soon to tell if Facebook messages will be the new email, it’s not too soon to suggest that you should already be sending creative messages that resonate with recipients. Start doing that today and no matter what new messaging system emerges in the future, you’ll be ready.

Check out this video of a baseball playing doing a flip over a catcher to avoid getting tagged:

Of course after watching this I wasn’t content… I wanted to know the player’s story.

Does he have a gymnastics background? Did he hurt himself? What was going through his mind before deciding to do the flip? Where did he grow up?

He’s an ordinary player who plays for a team with a losing record, yet he managed to do something extraordinary. This play happened two days ago and the video has more than a million views already.

The marketing (and life) lesson here is pretty obvious. If it seems for all the world like you’re going to get called out, there’s probably a way you can flip over the catcher too, so to speak.

And when you do, be ready with your story. Nothing makes people want to hear your story more than when you do something remarkable.

If you want more details about this baseball player’s story, click here.

Sometimes copywriters wonder how much they have contributed to the more negative aspects of internet marketing.

I’ve pondered that too from time to time and, specifically, I’ve wondered at times if I’m merely selling feelings instead of products.

There’s that great line from Don Draper (head of the creative department in a 1960s ad agency) in Mad Men where he says, “I sell products, not advertising.”

He wasn’t interested in just selling clients on slick marketing campaigns… he wanted to actually sell their products.

But like Don also says to one of his copywriters, “You are the product. You are feeling something. That’s what sells.”

So there’s no avoiding feelings in copy. The key is to avoid contributing to the never-ending festival of hype that only helps create Ralph Wolves instead of Sam Sheepdogs.

Also, I’ve taken encouragement from what Brian Eno said last year in an interview about how he works with U2 in the studio:

They feed on their own excitement… the point is to keep offering ladders that people can climb up to another place and then you can throw the ladder away afterwards, it doesn’t matter.”

So even if your product isn’t the greatest or most unique product out there, as long as it’s a ladder, then it’s OK, because ultimately it’s not your product itself that makes the difference but how it motivates customers to use their own strength to climb up to another place.

Way back in the day, my first full time job was as a consumer respondent at Parker Brothers games.

I answered questions about the rules to the various games they make (Monopoly, Ouija board, Sorry and so on).

One time an elderly lady wrote a letter requesting a copy of the rules to the game of Sorry because she had lost them.

She then went on for several paragraphs about how sad she was because her husband had died, she was estranged from a daughter, etc. etc. I was so struck by how she poured her heart out to a stranger.

People would often call and ask things like, “The Ouija board says I’m going to die tomorrow. What do I do????”

The way I handled calls like this is worthy of a blog post of its own.

Suffice to say I had to do a tremendous amount of listening to customers about things that had nothing to do about the actual products we sold.

Listening is powerful and effective but how can you use it in your marketing?

I’ll describe two of the ways you can do this.

The first is a listening technique called BATHE that was developed by two doctors as a way to quickly get to the heart of a patient’s story in a busy doctor’s office and also show empathy at the same time.

I’ve used this technique in marketing as well.

For example, I once created a survey that asked questions based on these questions and it received a huge response.

One can use this technique in other ways as well, such as questions you ask on you Facebook fan pages, etc.

Here’s how it works:

B = Background. Ask the question, “What happened to you?”

In marketing, the questions would be something like, “Tell me a little about your background and experience with email marketing.”

A = Affect. Ask the question, “And how does that make you feel?”

Yes, you should ask that question in your business too because as copywriters and marketers it’s very important to know what their dominant feeling is about their problem.

T = Trouble. Ask the question, “And what troubles you the most now?” This helps focus the person’s mind.

In marketing, asking something like, “What is your greatest difficulty with email marketing?”

You’ll get specific answers that will even inspire product ideas sometimes.

This happened to me after creating a survey using these questions.

H = Handling. Ask the question, “And what helps you the most to handle this?” This question focuses the attention on the resources around them that can help them to cope and take action.

In marketing this question can give you an opportunity to follow up by showing what you have to offer them.

E = Empathy. Sincerely express the feelings you experienced as you listened to the other person.

In marketing this would take the form of simple statements like, “I’m very sorry you had difficult with our product” while interacting with a customer.

Or telling a story in your email or web copy that shows you have once been in their shoes.

The second way to listen to your customers is to write emails and blog posts that they want to reply to.

An email is more than an opportunity to get a customer to click on your link.

It’s an opportunity to listen as well. The listening benefits the customer… and you and your bottom line.

If you want to read more about how to use BATHE in your personal life (after all, the great thing about marketing is how these skills can make you a better person too) read my How Listening is Like Prozac post on my personal blog. I have other posts there about listening as well.

And thanks to Doberman Dan for making a video that reminded me I’ve been wanting to write this post for a long time.

A couple of months ago I went to one of my favorite restaurants for lunch.

I showed up at 11:30 but the door was locked, even though they open at 11:00.

I saw workers inside so I knocked. I waited a couple of minutes and almost left.

Finally someone opened the door. She noticed the time and said, “Yikes, I wonder how much business we lost by accidentally keeping the door locked?!”

That’s an excellent question and one you should ask yourself regularly, even if yours is an online business.

Today I want to address two specific areas where I see a lot of marketers keeping the door locked:

Sending out teaser emails that link to a blog post instead of including the entire content in the email.

And:

Not including the entire blog post in the RSS feed. So only a snippet appears in people’s Google Reader inbox.

To me this is the equivalent of a locked door.

When I’m looking at my email inbox I’m almost always in a hurry and focused on which emails I need to reply to. I’m not usually in the mood to click on a link.

I’m also seeing which emails I can quickly delete. If there’s an email from a marketer with the complete blog post in the email there’s at least a chance I will read it right away or save it for later.

If there is only a teaser, the email gets deleted. I usually subscribe to their RSS feed instead so I can see their blog posts that way and avoid the teaser email.

But sometimes those same marketers don’t let their entire post appear in Google Reader either. Argh!

That’s too bad because when I’m in Google Reader I’m actually in the frame of mind to read more leisurely, unlike when I’m looking at my email inbox.

Google Reader doesn’t have the urgency and pressure that an email inbox has, so don’t irritate your readers there by making them have to click to read the post.

Please don’t overlook the importance of Google Reader in your email marketing. If you send out blog posts as emails (as you should, as I’ve written about before) then please check the reading setting of your blog and make sure “full text” is checked instead of “summary” in the feed section.

I know there are those that will say they get higher conversion rates by only sending teasers. That’s cool.

My recommendations are based on what I’ve seen my clients do and all the high profile bloggers I read who let their complete posts appear in Reader. In my opinion, I think this is one door you won’t want to keep locked.

As much as I like Bugs Bunny, I think my favorite Loony Tunes character is Sam Sheepdog.

What does this have to do with marketing?

Well…

Sam Sheepdog spends his days protecting the sheep from Ralph Wolf.

On the surface it often seems like Sam is doing nothing.

He just sits there and his eyes are covered with fur.

Yet 100% of the time, without fail, he’s all over it when Ralph tries to steal a sheep.

He either whips out just the right tool from under his fur to disrupt Ralph or gets himself to the right location with amazing speed.

By contrast, Ralph spends his days in constant motion.

He orders various Acme products in the hopes of trying to catch a sheep without Sam noticing.

He digs tunnels, climbs trees, hangs out on cliffs.

All so he can finally snag a sheep.

In the meantime Sam Sheepdog just sits… even if a boulder is rolling towards him. He knows that at the last minute the boulder will hit a rock and stray off course so he doesn’t budge.

Ralph Wolf reminds me of a lot of marketers just starting out… and even of some goo-roos.

Always chasing some new product or trying to outwit competitors.

Constant motion in the form of product launches and testing the latest strategies… but getting nowhere.

Always trying too hard to get a sale.

Whereas Sam Sheepdog reminds me of marketers who put the hours in and get the job done.

When they face a challenge they don’t flinch. Like Sam in the path of a rolling boulder, they know no harm will ultimately befall them so they stay the course and don’t panic.

It might seem like the Sam Sheepdog marketers are doing nothing. They aren’t posting in all the forums or using all of the latest and greatest tools.

But like Sam whipping out a magnet from his fur to foil Ralph as he bounces on springs, they always have the *right* tools and know how to use them.

The Sam Sheepdogs don’t chase after sales. There’s nothing desperate about Sam Sheepdog. Whereas Ralph Wolfs are the very definition of desperate.

If you want more of a Sam Sheepdog approach to your own marketing, and want to keep the Ralph Wolfs away, one of the best ways is to load your autoresponder with high-quality emails.

Like Sam, you won’t have to budge and can instead keep scanning the horizon for new opportunities as l do all the writing – you’ll just copy and paste and drop them into your autoresponder when I’m done.

Each day you don’t send an email to your list – or send a lousy email – you lose sales.

Send an email to me anitaashland @ gmail.com and let’s talk.

P. S.  If you’re an affiliate marketer and money is tight, I’m pretty sure Sam Sheepdog would approve of my pre-written Money Making Email email packs.