Matt Ragland is a 10-year electronic mail marketer, first at ConvertKit and now at Good Folks Digital, the Nashville-based company he launched in early 2023. His strategy to superior electronic mail efficiency is storytelling.
He informed me, “Manufacturers that excel at electronic mail advertising regularly inform a narrative to their supreme viewers.”
In our latest dialog, he and I addressed storytelling ways, electronic mail design, automation methods, and extra. Our whole audio is embedded beneath. The transcript is condensed and edited for readability.
Eric Bandholz: Who the heck are you?
Matt Ragland: I run an electronic mail advertising and course-launch company referred to as Good Folks Digital. We work with creators and ecommerce suppliers. We construct electronic mail and launch newsletters, often for programs and knowledge merchandise. I’ve been within the electronic mail sport for nearly 10 years.
I do lots of issues within the creator economic system. I’ve a YouTube channel that’s just below 100,000 subscribers.
Bandholz: What’s your strategy to electronic mail advertising?
Ragland: I give attention to a narrative or narrative. For ecommerce, manufacturers that excel at electronic mail advertising regularly inform a narrative to their supreme viewers and embody their merchandise. I want to see extra ecommerce manufacturers deliver their prospects into that story in a pure means.
Creators do job with tales, however many are horrible at promoting and selling. After which many ecommerce retailers are good at promoting, promotion, packaging, and positioning however not storytelling. Either side have a lot to study from one another.
Bandholz: E-mail publication manufacturers resembling The Hustle and Morning Brew have grown to eight-figure valuations. Stroll us by means of that enterprise mannequin.
Ragland: Their income mannequin focuses virtually solely on promoting and sponsorships.
It prices little or no to start out an electronic mail publication. The Hustle and Morning Brew each went to a day by day publication fairly early. I keep in mind listening to the Morning Brew founders. They launched the publication whereas college students on the College of Michigan. They requested individuals of their enterprise courses to subscribe on paper.
It began to develop naturally from there by means of referrals. They’d a strong referral program. Say I’m studying the Morning Brew, signal as much as be a referral accomplice, and ship it to you and 10 different individuals who join. I then get a sticker and a shirt. The Hustle did one thing related.
The opposite factor Morning Brew and The Hustle did effectively was paid acquisition of publication subscribers. Ecommerce has been nice at this for years. However extra conventional newsletters didn’t perceive the identical means as ecommerce sellers when Fb advertisements had been low-cost, round 2015. It felt like free cash.
Bandholz: Is there any new tactic in electronic mail advertising to take inspiration from?
Ragland: Lots of people really feel electronic mail advertising is previous and out of vogue. However it stays amongst the perfect types of direct advertising. By way of new ways, emphasize the story facet and ease — making the newsletters so simple as potential and reducing again on graphics.
Strive making a publication look extra like a private electronic mail message. A pal of mine runs a design studio referred to as Late Checkout. He publishes a design publication and stripped away the entire visuals final 12 months.
He now sends one thing that appears extra like a letter to shareholders, which he calls “Greg’s Letter.”
Bandholz: The largest innovation to me is marketing campaign flows and automation. That’s how Klaviyo acquired traction over Mailchimp.
Ragland: Sure. Additionally, what Klaviyo did so effectively and nonetheless does is combine SMS.
The automation piece is big, as is the flexibility to have one entry level as the beginning for a complete circulate that may upsell, down-sell, and cross-sell. We applied it for an ecommerce shopper. As an alternative of the preliminary entry level of signing up for the publication or buying a product, we used a mid-life cycle automation based mostly on curiosity or intent.
For instance, a subscriber who clicks on a selected product or hyperlink in an electronic mail launches an automation much like cart abandonment, with cross-sells and storytelling round that kind of merchandise.
Bandholz: Your spouse is anticipating your fourth youngster. What’s your philosophy on find out how to be dad?
Ragland: I need to be instance for my youngsters. I need to present them what I consider in and what being man is. I’ve been lucky to have lots of nice examples in my life. I’m shut with my dad, and he’s wonderful. He’s all the time been an enormous supporter and fan of mine. My uncles have been glorious mentors, and I’ve had lots of people in my life who’ve proven me that that is what it’s to be man and dad.
Bandholz: The place can listeners comply with you and study extra about your electronic mail companies?
Ragland: Our company website is MyGoodPeople.com — AutomaticEvergreen.com is our electronic mail advertising service. They’ll comply with my YouTube channel or contact me on LinkedIn or X — @mattragland.
