140: Guest Expert Liz Wilcox on How to Grow Your Business Using Email

In this episode, Jules White is joined by email marketing expert Liz Wilcox to talk about how your email list can grow your business without relying on social media. Picking up the thread of the series so far, relationships, visibility through guest talks, collaborations, and owning your own podcast and website content, Jules turns to email: the channel where you truly own the relationship and no algorithm can switch it off.

Liz shares how she went from RV travel blogger to email marketing expert, and makes a refreshingly honest case for why your list matters more than any social following. Whether you run an online business, a B2C brand, or a location-based business, this conversation is full of practical, do-it-messy advice on writing emails that connect, growing your list, and selling without feeling salesy.

Key Takeaways:

Own Your Audience: Social platforms can change overnight, shut you out, or disappear entirely. Your email list is the one asset you own and can take with you wherever you go.

Email Works for Local and Everyday Businesses: From RV travellers to nail salons, restaurants and local shops, Liz explains why email brings the people who already know you back through the door, and how it can even add value to your business.

Start Small, Write to One Person: Your subscribers do not know how small your list is, so write to one real person. Even with three people on your list, that is how you build momentum and real relationships.

Grow Your List Without Social Media: QR codes, networking, freebie swaps, guesting and collaborations, and specific, well-chosen giveaways all help you fill your list without posting to socials.

Sell Without Feeling Salesy: Your subscribers opted in and want to hear from you. Liz shares how a low-ticket offer, a welcome sequence and planned launches let you sell with confidence, and why doing it messy and being real beats sounding polished, especially in the age of AI.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Grab Liz Wilcox's free email starter kit (a complete welcome sequence, three newsletter samples and 52 subject lines, just hit the hot pink button): lizwilcox.com
• Join Liz Wilcox's Email Marketing Membership for plug-and-play email templates at $9 a month: lizwilcox.com/email-marketing-membership

Transcript

[00:00:00] Introduction & Guest Welcome

Jules White: Hi, welcome back to the Website Success Show. It is Jules here.

And the last, over the last few episodes of the show, we've been talking about the different ways to grow your business without relying on social media. We've covered relationships, visibility through guest talks, collaborations, um, owning your own podcast and your own website content.

And today we are talking about email, another marketing channel where you tru truly own the relationships and no algorithm can switch it off. So today I am very excited to welcome a special guest to have a chat about how you can use your email list to grow your business.

And I've learned so much from this lovely person, so welcoming the wonderful Liz Wilcox. Hi Liz. It's great to have you here.

Liz Wilcox: Hey friends, I'm excited to be here. What a, what a sweet intro.

I can't wait to get into it.

Jules White: I was trying to remember how we met and I knew it was through a bundle or collaboration or something, but I couldn't quite remember. And then this morning I remembered it was through Elizabeth Godard and through a, the bundle that she did for one to many, um, in back in 2023.

So I have been a member of your membership. I'm a member of Liz's email marketing membership, and I've been been in your world since 2023.

And yeah, I've, I've just found it so helpful. So I'd love you to introduce yourself, Liz, and let us know a little bit more about you and what you do.

Liz Wilcox: Yeah. What's up.

Uh, you know, that feeling you get when you listen to an amazing podcast like Jules's and, uh, you know, there's some lady on and she keeps talking about email, email, email. You gotta email.

That's how you make the real books and you get all fired up. And so you log into your ConvertKit or your active campaign or flow desk and then you promptly feel kind of dumb, kind of stupid 'cause you have no idea what to say.

Well, what's up? I'm Liz Wilcox and I help eliminate that problem.

I teach people how to write emails that actually connect with their audience that are easy to write, dare I say, um, and make sales. And I'm really excited to talk today.

Jules White: So how did you, Liz, end up as like the person? How did you get into email?

Me Email marketing? How did you end up the, like when everyone else is saying go after social media and you gotta be on socials, how did you end up down the email list with Rabbit Hole?

Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so, right, so I actually started as an RV travel blogger, and I just knew that I wanted to make money, right?

Like of course, you know, I was interested in RVs, but it wasn't something like, oh my gosh, get in an RV or a caravan and, you know, hit the open road, right? Uh, I knew that was my dream and I wanted to share that dream.

[00:02:20] Liz's Origin Story: From RV Blogger to Email Expert

Liz Wilcox: And people were telling me, Hey, you can make money on the internet by blogging. So I started the blog, but as I was, before I even launched it, as I was writing the blog post, learning about WordPress, et cetera, everyone was saying email, email, email.

Right? I wish I would've taken my email seriously.

Hey, you write the blog post to get people on your email list, da da da. You know, all roads led back to email.

So mama didn't raise no fool. The day I officially launched the blog, AKA told my friends on Facebook, Hey, I have a blog.

Now was the day that I said, Hey, join my email list, because I knew those things were synonymous. I knew that, again, all roads led to email, because that's what everyone was saying, even social media, you know, doing things on social was to get people on an email list, right?

And so I tend to be a two step chick. If it takes three steps, I'm out.

And so I was always looking for shortcuts to just get people on my email list. Um, and just grew and grew from there.

And eventually over a few years, I, I launched a digital course. You know, people were telling me, Hey, the real way to make money with an email list is to have your own thing, right? Um, and so I launched a couple little things and then I was like, okay, I'm gonna go for the big kahuna.

I'm gonna launch a course. And I had a wait list of 141 people, not so bad.

And I converted 141 people. So I don't know if you guys are good at math, you know, I know you're probably driving or doing the dishes.

That's a hundred percent conversion rate, right? Exactly.

So that's when people started asking me, what, how you did with who, right? And so that's when I realised, oh wow, I'm actually really good at email marketing.

You know, I'm all right in the RV space, but I think I could go a lot further teaching people what I know. And so, so, so this was an email about rv a a, an online course about RV travel, yes.

About RV maintenance. Okay.

You know, how to, how to fix your rv. It was called Fix it Yourself.

Jules White: Okay. So not an online offer, not, you know, obviously yours was an online offer, but you weren't teaching online offers there or anything.

This was, this was a, a real world business that you were doing. And not that email isn't a real world business.

Liz Wilcox: Yes, yes. Y'all very business to consumer B2C.

Uh, everybody thinks B2B is like where it's at. Y'all B2C is way easier.

Like, there it is called Business to consumer. Consumer we consume.

Jules White: That's probably something I should let you know that a lot of, a lot of my podcast, listen listeners are location based businesses, B2C businesses. And so yeah.

That's, that's, I would imagine that's really good for them to hear that actually this applies to them as well in their businesses.

Liz Wilcox: Oh, absolutely, y'all, absolutely. And that's why I wanted to go into the B2B quote unquote space.

'cause I was like, I came from the B2C space. I came from having to build an email list of people not trying to make money, but, you know, trying to learn a thing or, you know, experience a thing, become a part of a community, and y'all, my customers didn't wanna pay for electricity. Okay?

They're RV travel, right? They're, look, there's something called boondocking.

That's where you literally park in the middle of the desert basically, and you just live off the land. You know, you maybe you got some solar panels or you've got, you know, some fuel for a few days.

But these people don't wanna pay for basic necessities. They don't wanna pay for water, they don't wanna pay for a mortgage.

They sell their house and they buy an rv. They wanna be debt free.

They wanna be able, you know, there are articles, how to live on $500 a month. You know? Okay, so these, and these people didn't even know what an online course was.

My biggest objection was, Liz, I don't know what you're selling. Liz, I don't have internet.

How am I supposed to take this course? Okay.

Like, I only have an internet when I'm at a rest stop. Okay.

And so it is possible for you to sell to real people, I promise.

Jules White: So what did, how did you know, how did you know that people were asking those questions or telling? Like, were people just telling you?

Liz Wilcox: Were they Yeah, people were just telling me, Hey Liz, what's an online course? What's an ebook?

Yeah. They were replying to me.

Uh, you know, I had built, that's why I was able to have such high conversion rates. And that's why I love email over something like social is because you can build those relationships.

You can get replies. Right.

You can turn one to many into one-on-one. Right.

One email to many people. But you hit reply, I'm replying back to you.

I'm sure. That's how Jules and I got to know each other.

I probably, you know, got her to reply to something. We started chatting.

She was like, oh, this a real person. And you know, now, now we're sitting here together.

Jules White: Yeah. I think that's the biggest, one of the biggest things that I have learned from you, from, from being part of the membership and just hearing how you are like in the, on the q and a calls, and you just, you just give us permission to do it messy and to be ourselves and to, especially now we're moving so much more into ai.

I feel like I can spot the AI written emails and I know when I, when an email comes from you, it feels like it is just a personal email from you. So I love that.

And I think that's definitely something Thank you that, yeah. And especially if we are then B2C type businesses, that's, people don't wanna feel like they're just getting sold to an email, I think. Really?

Liz Wilcox: Yeah. We want to, we want to connect.

Right. And I learned that in the B2C industry, people were opting into me to hear more about my travels to, you know, how, how does this chick do it?

Maybe I can learn something from her too. Right.

People want to connect. I got into a little debate with, uh, someone who's pretty big in the online space, and they were saying, you know, CI think community is dead.

Like, we needed that during the pandemic, but now people just wanna be told what to do. And I was like, well, I think it's both, right?

I think, you know, the fact that, oh, you want people to tell you what to do, okay, well, you need keyword people. Right? That's community, right?

And so I think there's this real, especially Jules mentioned AI in this age of ai, there's this real desire, this real craving, this real need for community, for that relationship building, right? And replies are a great way to do that in the inbox.

You know, you can literally just type out, Hey, I'm a real person. I read every reply.

Mm-hmm. Right?

Jules White: Yeah.

Liz Wilcox: And that's the beauty of when you are smaller. If you're thinking, oh, well I don't have a lot of people on my list, that's great, that's great because you can reply to everyone.

You can create those real relationships and those early adopters, uh, as I call them, they, they are actually interested. They weren't signing up because everyone else was doing it right?

They signed up because they were genuinely interested. And they will be genuinely excited to know that they can talk to you directly.

Jules White: That's, yeah, that's, I think definitely the, the smallest part, part of it, I think is often where people get a little bit hung up or they think, oh, my list is too small to, to even start emailing. Have you got any thought?

I know you've got thoughts on this, but what are you, what, what would you be your advice about that? If somebody's thinking, well, I've only got three people on my list.

Liz Wilcox: Okay, well those three people don't know how many people are on your list. Right?

You wanna write an email, you know, it's like, okay on social media, right when you go live and there's always that lady that's like, okay, well I'm just gonna wait for a few more people to join. It's like, why I am right here.

Or they say, Hey guys, who are you talking to? It's just me.

I'm the only person listening, right? I'm not, I'm not sitting here watching your live stream with my friends.

You know, I'm just on my couch alone. It's the same with email.

You know, you're writing to one person, right? So think of that ideal customer, that ideal reader, listener, whatever, and write to that one person.

When I write emails and I write to different people, but I only write to one person, I'm like, who is that person that needs this message today? I'm gonna write to them.

Or what can I say? You know, John is on my list and he's been on my list for two years and he's never replied, but I know he needs help with X. Mm-hmm.

What can I say about X today to get him to reply, right? And then I read an email tomorrow, Jules is on my list.

We've been talking a tonne. I know, you know, yesterday on our q and a, she mentioned this.

I'm gonna talk to Jules today and remind her of what we talked about yesterday. Right?

But there's a lot of jewels out there. There's a lot of Johns on the list, right?

And so just writing to that one person, even when you only have three people on your list, that's how you're gonna start to build that momentum.

Jules White: Yeah, definitely. So why, um, why do you think that the list is so much more important than social media, than just collecting a big following on social media?

Is there, is there one sort of thing that you would say? Well, it's completely, yeah, well.

[00:12:09] Why Email Beats Social Media

Liz Wilcox: Here y'all raise your hand if you were alive in like 20 23, 20 24, and you remember when a billionaire bought a social media platform, changed its name, started going all crazy over there, lost half of its users, lost all of its sponsorship dollars, and almost imploded within 12 months. Raise your hand.

Right? This is why we need email.

We do not own social media. And clearly, you know, the, the billionaires out there have shown us that one decision can change everything.

One guy, one person owns like four social media platforms. Shout out Zuck in the gang, right?

If he decides tomorrow to shut threads down, it's not making enough money or Facebook is dying, I'm gonna cut that off and sell it. What are you gonna do?

If you had built your entire platform, like a lot of journalists and authors and editors had built their entire platform on what was known as Twitter and suddenly their audience was gone and they're wondering, where are my people at? Right?

You could lose your business. Or you know, we've all heard of shadow bands, right?

You say the wrong thing or someone comments. I, I met a guy that had a very large YouTube following, we're talking like half a million subscribers or something, was making millions of dollars with sponsorships for his videos, and he was doing a live stream and someone commented something highly inappropriate on the live stream.

They shut his channel down. That was a multi seven figure business gone overnight.

Ooh. I don't know about you, but I'm suddenly sick to my stomach.

Jules White: Yeah. There's a lot of recovering to do from that.

Liz Wilcox: Right. Luckily, he had an email list, and luckily for him, he was so big and on YouTube, he knew somebody on YouTube.

But you and I, we don't know on nobody on YouTube. I don't know nobody.

Okay. And so this, this is quite, if you can even get to talk to somebody, period.

Jules White: Right. I listened to, um, the, uh, podcast in business school, Adam on there.

He had built up a Threads community that was the only platform he was using apart from his podcast. And he had to verify he was human to a bot, and he couldn't verify that he was human to a bot.

So he lost his threads account. And that was the only, I mean, he had, again, had built up his email list.

Luckily he then emailed his subscribers and they all contacted Threads and he managed to get his account back. But there was a few days where he was like, I'm not even sure this is gonna happen.

So I th and that was from a bot that decided he wasn't a human. He is like, well, what can I do to show you, I'm a human, I can send you a store.

Liz Wilcox: Right. How can I prove to a bot?

Yeah. Yeah.

So the point of that is we need our email list, right? Because our email list is our direct connection.

Right. We get those subscribers, they consent.

Yes. Here is my email address.

Right? So whether you use Kit Today and Flow Desk tomorrow, you can take those addresses, those people with you.

You cannot do that with social media. That is why it's so important as a creator, as a service provider, as an online business owner, or even as a local business, to have those email addresses.

Jules White: Definitely. And I think especially for local businesses, maybe they don't realise that actually that becomes then a valuable asset for your business.

If you are, if you were thinking about selling your business and you've got a email list of, you know, 15,000 sub, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Engaged subscribers. Mm-hmm.

Then that, that's a way, you know, that must increase the value of your business then as well.

Liz Wilcox: Yeah. So let's talk about, uh, you know, for a local business, there was a study, and I'm not sure the exact amount, but it's like over 70% of people say that email swayed their decision about a purchase.

Mm-hmm. Right?

And so even if you have like a restaurant or you know, a local shop, I know when I get those local emails. I'm like, oh yeah, I haven't been there in a while.

Let me go. You know, even if there's not a discount inside, even if it's just like a, Hey, don't forget we've got happy hour on Friday.

Or, you know, we, these are our specials of the week. Or, uh, I I, my favourite shop is like a local art gallery and like, boutique shop, and they're always sending emails, Hey, this is the new artist, this is our artist of the week.

Um, you know, this customer bought this piece of jewellery, isn't it be, and I'm like, oh, I wanted that. What am I missing out on? Right? Yeah.

And I'm going into the shop a lot more since they started emailing. Like, now they know me by name.

I have a wishlist there. If, you know, family, friends, uh, wanna go in and buy me something, you know, like, that's, that's incredible marketing, right?

And so local business really, really needs that, um, email list. Uh, also, especially if you're, if you are trying to do social media, a lot of local businesses do social media.

You're competing with everyone else. If I watch, let's say you're a nail salon.

I watch your, uh, stuff, I follow you. Now the algorithm is feeding me every other nail salon in a 50 mile radius because the algorithm knows that I'm interested in that, right?

But email is not like that, right? I've signed up to your list.

I get your emails. Google is not, you know, sending me emails about other nail salons.

Hey, if you like this email list, you might like this. Right?

It's a totally different experience. It's much more intimate, for lack of a better word.

And that's what you want. You want.

You wanna build that brand loyalty, right? And you can do that really, really easily with email marketing as a local business.

Jules White: Yeah. I feel that this feel feeds so much into the whole message of social media being optional and I very much focus on creating content that you own first.

And it, it's, it's a fundamental part of my business to do that. And I think like the website part of it, definitely in terms of actually, um, attracting people when they're looking for what you do, but the email list and, and keeping those people there, I think we can often end up thinking about the people who don't know about us and forget about the people who are already interested in what we do or who, who have already been customers.

And actually those are the people that are on our email list. And yeah, if we can keep, keep them coming back, really.

Liz Wilcox: Yeah. Amen. Go on.

Sorry to interrupt, but I, I have a thought for like, when you're building your website as well, you know, Jules is so great at helping you with the SEO of it and, you know, making sure it's nice and fit, so to speak. Um, but what I always say is, you know, build your list for leads.

'cause there are some people that are going there that are just looking, you know, we are not eBay, we are not Amazon. Nobody's going to our site to shop, right?

Uh, they're going to, they're going to window shop. Um, but if we can gather leads from our website, that's really, really great.

So for example, if you go to liz wilcox.com, you'll see on the homepage alone, I ask you five times to join my list. I'm very nineties theme.

So at the bottoms it says, oops, you did it again. You got to the end and you're still not on my list.

Of course, that's very meta, that's not for everybody, but you know, it's just a little bit of brand humour and people love it, right? And so making sure it's very easy for you to get signups on your site is important.

For example, I do a lot of podcasting, right? Um, and so at the end when people say, Liz, where can people find you?

I say, oh, go directly to liz wilcox.com. Hit the hot pink button in the top right hand corner.

That's website design, y'all. That is intentional.

I, now I'm geeking out with Jules. Like, that was intentional so that when I get in front of a customer, even locally, like I, for example, I just went to an event, people kept saying, how can I find you, Liz?

And I had a QR code that went directly to my we website. It was the wallpaper of my phone, you guys, right?

And it was. You know, go there and just hit the hot pink button that'll get you signed up to the list.

Right? So when you work with Jules, you know, making sure you have that super easy, you know, if a customer comes in, they don't buy anything, hey, you know, hey, scan this QR code, you know, we've got some sales coming up, or I know we've got some new inventory, you know, if you join, you know, you go, go there.

Just click that yellow button, you know, that'll get you signed up so I can notify you. Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Super simple.

Jules White: Definitely. Yeah, and I think, um, we can often end up feeling like we're bothering people with when we email them.

Um, so I, that's definitely something I hear quite a lot if I talk to people about emails of like, oh yeah, but I don't wanna keep sending people emails. I don't wanna annoy them.

Liz Wilcox: Okay, let's talk about that, thoughts about that. Let's talk about that y'all.

You opted in to hear from someone, right? We've, we've all been on the other side where it's like, oh my gosh, Jules, I'm really interested.

I need to know more about my SEO. My website is a mess.

I'm gonna opt into her list. Is Jules bothering you?

No. You opted in, you consented.

You said, Hey, I wanna learn more. That's your subscriber.

It's, you know, what is annoying? When I click on something, I watch something on social media, and then the algorithm thinks that's my entire personality, and it's the only thing I'm seeing over and over.

And it's like, wait, I just saw this guy. Why did I just see 10 of his videos in a row?

That's annoying. That's non-consensual.

The, the algorithm is making those choices. Mark Zuckerberg said so, right, but with email, we opt in.

Right? The only reason it might feel annoying is because maybe we have like some corporate, I don't know, trauma, right?

Where we, we always had that boss that was sending emails that, you know, this could have been one email, it's 10 of them, right? Or the guy that accidentally replies all when it's like, oh, that's a conversation between you and Liz.

Why am I in this? Right?

Um, you know, so that's why email can feel annoying, but good email feels great to the person, right? Oh yeah, I did go to that shop.

Oh, they have that inventory now. I'm so glad I signed up.

I'm gonna go in there and get it right. You have a business, which means you have a responsibility not only to the business, but to your customers and to your potential customers to let them know, one time I was walking out of a, an elevator and somebody was on the phone clearly with their girlfriend or something.

Well, how was I supposed to know? You never told me.

And ain't that the truth, baby, about our sales, right? How is the customer supposed to know if you never tell them they've given you their interest, that's why they opted into your email list.

It's your job. It's your responsibility.

I would say it's even your duty to make sure they know what is going on so that they can, uh, you know, take advantage when the time is right for them.

Jules White: Yeah. And if you believe in what you're selling and you know that you, you offer a good service, then why not?

Why not? Why keep it hidden?

Liz Wilcox: Amen. I love that.

Why not?

Jules White: So if people aren't using social media to grow an email list, have you got any other suggestions of how you can actually fill, fill the list and get people subscribed?

[00:23:42] Building & Growing Your Email List

Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so when you're, when you're local, you know that QR code on your phone or passing it out is a great one. Um, also networking.

Y'all, it's not, okay, I just learned this at Craft and Commerce Kits event, which is an email service provider. It, they, this was, there was this recurring theme of like, it's not.

Who, you know, it's who knows you, but even further, it's not who knows you, it's who knows what you need, right? So using networking to find out how you can serve others in your network and how the, that network can serve you, right?

So if Jules knows, I'm trying to grow my email list, oh, maybe we can do a freebie swap. I share your freebie to my email list.

You share my freebie. So a freebie is, you know, Hey, sign up for this list.

You're gonna get this free thing. It's often called a lead magnet or an opt-in, right?

So making sure people in your network know, Hey, I'm trying to grow my email list. Um, and a, a freebie swap is a great way to do it.

Also, um, guesting, right? So going into and doing collabs with other people, this is a type of guesting, right?

I'm guesting on Jules's podcast, right? Uh, if you're local, how can you do deals with other people, right?

Like if my, my boutique does a lot of deals with local artists that might have their own galleries, but oh, we're, they're being featured in our gallery now, right? They're guesting with each other.

I, I thought of, um, you know how you guys know the rapper, Meghan the stallion? She did a collab with Popeye's Chicken.

You would think what? But she had a song about like a hot girl summer.

So they were like, oh, we have this, uh, really hot chicken that's for sale. You know, all the hot girls want the hot chicken or whatever.

Right? So what are some creative ways that you can collab with other businesses, uh, in your industry or on your block, you know, if you're local, things like that.

How can you do collaborations? Something my downtown area does are, you know, like we have a pirate festival, so there's a pirate walk and you have to go to all the businesses and they work together to share.

Um, and they grow their email lists with, you know, like, oh, hey, you stopped by. You know, if you like the store, you know, put your name here.

It can be as simple as writing down your name. Mm-hmm.

Right? I saw that at a local library.

Join our list. I was like, oh my gosh, this is awesome.

Jules White: Yeah.

Liz Wilcox: Sometimes it's just a matter of even asking, Hey, do you wanna join our email list? Yeah.

Um, that can really, really help as well.

Jules White: Yeah, definitely. So, um, in terms of size of list, is it just about growing the size of your list?

I, I, I know I've, my list grew and then it's definitely shrunk down a little bit again, because one of the things I've learned from you is that we need to kind of keep it, um, keep, like if people aren't opening our emails or not clicking on stuff, then we need to maybe remove them from our list. But what do you, what are your thoughts on, in terms of, is it just about the size of the list?

[00:26:48] List Quality vs. List Size

Liz Wilcox: It's definitely not, it's all about the quality of the list, right? If so, let's use that local example again.

If I've got people coming into my shop from the pirate walk, I can pretty much tell who is actually looking around the shop and who isn't. If they're just coming for the candy, I'm not gonna pitch my email list, right?

But if they come in, oh, I love that piece, or, oh, that jacket is so beautiful, oh, you should join the list. We've got inventory that comes every 60 days, you know, oh, I, I'm sorry.

We don't have that in your size. You know, put your email list down or your email down and I, I can email you when I get a new shipment.

Right? And so it's the, it's the same on your list.

And we, we don't want people that aren't coming in the shop and actually looking, right? We want people that are gonna open the emails that aren't gonna be annoyed.

Um, another way to grow your list is through giveaways, right? But we don't wanna do a giveaway to an iPad.

Everybody wants an iPad, right? We wanna do a very specific giveaway.

So if Jules was doing a giveaway, uh, you know, something very specific would be, maybe I'm gonna give away a 60 minute website audit where I go through dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. This makes sure people already have a website.

Right? You know, nobody would sign up for that if they don't have their website yet.

Right. And, you know, Jules can't help them if there's nothing to go off of.

Yes. Right?

They've gotta, they've gotta have some first step done. Right?

And so that would be a good giveaway for her. So think about, um, you know, what kind of giveaway you could do that would really, really.

Increase the quality of your leads. You know, don't just give away anything.

Give away something super specific. So thinking about, you know, is it the size of the list?

Absolutely not. It really is that quality and, and working backwards from there.

Like, these are the people I want on my list. How am I gonna go find them?

Where are those people hanging out? Whether in my local community or online?

Jules White: Yeah, absolutely. I think it, that's one of the things that I've realised from working with clients over the years on websites, is that if you're not clear on who you are actually trying to show up for what, who you are trying to help, then that makes everything else d more difficult.

And I think that is the same with the email list as well, really, isn't it? So,

Liz Wilcox: absolutely, it is.

Jules White: Definitely. So how do you actually sell to your list without feeling salesy?

I think that's probably like one of the big questions that people like, if you feel like you are, what do you talk to people about in your emails?

[00:29:25] How to Sell via Email Without Feeling Salesy

Liz Wilcox: Yeah, so, well, first I wanted ask you to define salesy, right? What is wrong with selling?

People love to buy y'all. People love to buy people.

I, I mean, I'm here in the United States. We are in debt, okay?

We are in debt because we love to buy so much. And so I want to invite you to just think about it differently.

You know, people love to buy, they consented to hear from you, consented to hear more about your offers. And so, you know, you get, this is the permission slip you didn't know you needed to sell, okay?

So right off the bat, when they join the email list, that's when they're most excited, right? They are actively searching for a solution or came into your store or, you know, checked out your website and wanted to hear more, right?

So you can start selling right then. It's not sales.

They're actively searching for a solution. They were typing into Google, you know, where is my da da da, what can I do for blah, blah, blah, right?

They're actively searching for a solution. So the best way I like to, uh, start selling is just right off the bat I use something called a trip wire, which is a low ticket offer.

Instead of when they sign up saying, Hey, thanks, check your inbox, y'all. It's the 2020s.

People know to check their inbox. They know they just signed up, right?

And so I send them to a short sales page, Hey, some kind of discounted offer for a limited time. Uh, for me it's my membership.

It's normally $9. You can get a trial for a dollar, right? Uh, for you it might be, you know, hey, here's a coupon, you gotta use it in the next 24 hours or something like that if you're a local business, right?

Yeah. Uh, so that just right off the bat.

Now I'm not making a million dollars off of that, but I am telling people, Hey, I'm a real business. I have real solutions to your real problems, right?

So it sort of flips the switch from, Hey, I just got something to for free to, Hey, Liz is a real business. Let me check this out.

Right? So then we have a welcome sequence.

And we wanna sell in that welcome sequence too. Number one, we wanna tell them, Hey, I'm gonna offer you free and paid services, products, whatever.

And then, uh, at the end of the sequence, usually it's around email four. I just make a hard pitch.

Hey, this is, this is the thing I'm known for, this is how I can help you the best, you know, join my membership, right? If you have a service, you know, hey, this is the thing I'm known for, this is how I can help you.

Best book a call here. You know, check out the offer here, right?

And then of course you want to sell throughout getting to Jules actual question, right? You want to, you, you wanna just sprinkle in your sales.

It's your job to make sure nobody comes off the elevator saying, how out was I supposed to know? Right?

That's your job. So sprinkling in sales, always telling people what your offers are, how many available, you know, PS don't forget to come into the shop, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Don't forget, I've got two spots available this month. Book a call here, right? Uh, for example, I have a welcome sequence workshop that usually comes out in January, but you can buy it anytime.

And so maybe today I wanna write an email and I wanna give three tips for your welcome sequence. A, B, C.

Oh, by the way, don't forget, I have this welcome sequence workshop. You can get it here for 49 bucks, or whatever the price is, right?

And so just, you know, writing emails that have to do with that topic or that thing that you're selling. And then reminding people, Hey, I actually go deeper over here.

Would you like to take a look?

Jules White: Yeah.

Liz Wilcox: Click over to the sales page, the book, a call button, whatever, right? And then the last thing I want to make sure you do is create launches.

So I'm not at home if you're watching, I've got this messy background, but normally I've got a giant calendar in my background. Get yourself a calendar.

You don't have to map out the whole year, but take a look at the next 90 days. Where can you sell?

What do you wanna sell? How much money do you wanna make?

And put a launch, an email launch on your calendar. That means, you know, two to five days where I'm just selling, right?

I mentioned that a hundred percent conversion rate. Y'all.

I had a pre-launch where I was saying, this is coming, this is coming, this is coming. I had a launch Monday through Friday.

Buy it, buy it, buy it. Here are A, B, C, D, E, F, G, all the way to Z.

Reasons to buy it. You know, be a little shameless in your launches.

Do that pre-launch. Tell people, Hey, this is coming.

Change their mind from, you know, they believe x, I need them to believe Y, I'm gonna spend a month or two moving them into that new belief so that they know this offer is correct. Right.

It's not salesy. They asked you, Hey, I need help with this.

Hey, I wanna know more about this. Hey, I love this.

Tell me more. Right?

They said that they can unsubscribe at any time, but again, it's your duty. To find those customers.

Jules White: Absolutely. And this is just part or part of running a business, of having the strategy.

I say this about websites as well, that if we have to be involved as the business owner, we've gotta be the one. Even if we out are outsourcing our marketing, we've still got to be involved in that strategy.

And yeah, email is just part of that as well, isn't it?

Liz Wilcox: Amen. Amen.

I'm getting hyped up y'all. I love sales.

I love y'all. I have a stomach, my kid has a stomach.

I just adopted a teenager. Oh my gosh.

She has a stomach. I, groceries are expensive.

I don't know about where you live, but where I live, uh, I bought a steak. It was $45 USDA pound.

Okay. One steak, $45.

So I got, I've got to get out there and ask you, Hey, do you want this? You said you were interested.

Do you want this? That's all it, that's all it has to be, you know, sharing the benefits, sharing the features, sharing the why behind what you created.

Hey, this is why I teach email. This is why I, you know, created this specific membership.

This is why I want you to join. These are the types of people I'm looking for.

Are you that person? Those are the things that don't feel salesy.

Jules White: Yeah. So if somebody wants help with this, how can you help?

If somebody's sitting there thinking, well, I like the sound of all this, but I dunno what to put on these emails. Can you help with that?

[00:36:09] Liz's Membership & Where to Find Her

Liz Wilcox: Yeah. Wow.

What a great setup. Thanks, Jules.

Yeah, of course. I'm an email marketer, right?

This is what I do and I love helping people that still feel a little lost or maybe a lot lost mm-hmm. around, uh, emails and selling and building those relationships so that it, it doesn't feel salesy, right? Uh, so I actually have a $9 a month membership.

It's kind of plug and play templates where you can take and make the your own. We talked about getting replies.

I didn't mention this, but it's, for me, it's never about closing the sale, right? That feels salesy.

It's always about opening up that relationship, right? We mentioned Jules got on my list, we started replying back and forth.

You know, she's in my membership, now I'm here. Right?

That's a, that's a relationship. That's a, you know, that's part of my network now, right?

And that's what I wanna help teach you. And so I've got my $9 a month membership, it's called email Marketing membership.

You know, I figured I'd come up with a better name later. And then I thought, oh, that's actually a really good name for SEO purposes, right?

And y'all now with ai, I get so many, uh, referrals from ai and I think it has a lot to do with the fact that it's called email marketing membership. Um, but anyway,

Jules White: and also the fact that you, you have been on so many podcasts makes a massive difference as well. 'cause everywhere out on the internet.

People know Liz Wilcox is email marketing expert,

Liz Wilcox: right? That's just another plug for SEO and making sure your website and other people's websites are set up for your success.

Absolutely. But if you wanna go deeper and, you know, after they visit your website, they join your list, what then?

That's what I do. And I would love to help people and I try to make it as accessible as possible so you can just try it out, you know, spend some time.

'cause it is a long term like website and SEO traffic, that's a long term strategy. Email is two, so nine bucks a month.

It's a really simple offer. And, uh, if you wanna just try it out, you can also join my email list.

You can go to liz wilcox.com. You can't miss that hot pink button.

It's in the top right hand corner. You're gonna get an entire welcome sequence.

We talked about how important that is already written for you. You're gonna get three newsletter samples from the membership and 52 subject lines.

That's all for free. Liz wilcox.com hot pink button.

Jules White: Fantastic. And I can highly recommend being part of, of Liz's membership.

One thing I would say, actually, this is a real, um, testimonial as well, is I try not to work in the evenings. Now, my background is salons.

So I've done with working in the evenings and Liz's monthly q and a call is actually in the UK evening times. And it's the only call that I do, it's the only time I work in the evenings, is to go to Liz's q and a call.

And I make sure I'm there every month. 'cause it's, I al I came off it, I think it was last time, and I said to my husband, that is one of the most inspiring calls I go on e every month because you're just there and you're just all our cheerleader and it's fun as well.

So I am, I'm very grateful to be part of your membership, so thank you, Liz.

Liz Wilcox: Yes, thank you. And I really do try to be a cheerleader.

I really believe in people and I believe in the power of taking action. And so within my membership and even on my email list, if I can inspire you to action, then I know you're gonna see some result.

And so that's my entire mission is just to get you to hit send, do it messy again. Like if you're not watching the video, I've got water bottles in the background.

You know, there's a microwave. It's, I forgot to close the door.

You know, we, we do it messy, uh, so that we can see what works and we can refine from there. So if, if that sounds good to you, I'd love for you to join.

Jules White: Yeah, definitely. And I think the messy stuff as well now with ai, I think it's even better people like that.

I've had a fly buzzing round in here the whole time we've been recording. It's been really annoying.

Liz Wilcox: That's so funny, right? AI kind can't replicate and the, just the back from the, the dog walker, she's just walked in and laid down. So yes.

I love that. Yeah, it's real.

People want reel. If you want real.

Check me out because that's all I can be, baby.

Jules White: Fantastic. Oh, well thank you so much, Liz.

It's been amazing talking to you. I'm so glad to have had you here and I know it'll be really helpful for everyone listening as well.

So thank you so much.

Liz Wilcox: Thank you. Can't wait to see what everybody does with email.

Jules White: Yeah. So thanks a lot for listening and I'll see you next time.

Bye.