Stop Charging For The List. Start Charging For The Message.

I had a conversation recently about email marketing.

The question was pretty straightforward:

“What would you charge to market to a list of about 1,000 people?”

And that’s where I think a lot of marketers get email marketing completely wrong.

They focus on the size of the list.

1,000 contacts.
5,000 contacts.
10,000 contacts.
50,000 contacts.

Who cares?

Having 10,000 people on an email list doesn’t mean you have 10,000 people paying attention.

You could have a list of 50,000 people and generate absolutely nothing from it.

Or…

You could have a list of 500 people who know you, trust you, read what you send and actually take action.

The list isn’t the magic.

The message is.

And so is the frequency.

If you’re emailing your audience once every couple of months whenever you suddenly remember you have an email list, don’t expect much to happen.

People are busy.

They forget about you.

They forget what you do.

They forget why they joined your list in the first place.

That’s why I’m a big believer in consistency.

For most businesses, once a week is a good starting point.

Not seven emails a day.

Not disappearing for three months and then suddenly sending five emails because you need money.

Once a week.

Show up.

Provide value.

Tell stories.

Educate.

Answer questions.

Address problems.

Remind people what you do.

Give them a reason to respond.

And, yes…

Sell something.

There’s nothing wrong with asking people to buy.

That’s probably why you’re emailing them in the first place.

But here’s where marketers get pricing wrong.

They’ll charge based primarily on the number of contacts.

Why?

Sending an email to 1,000 people isn’t significantly more intellectually difficult than sending one to 10,000.

Writing an email that 1,000 people actually want to read?

That’s the work.

Understanding the audience is the work.

Developing the strategy is the work.

Finding the right message is the work.

Writing the subject line that gets someone to open it is the work.

Creating the CTA that gets someone to respond is the work.

Doing it again next week…

And the week after that…

And the week after that…

That’s the work.

Now, sure, list size can affect the cost of the email platform itself. That’s a technology expense.

But don’t confuse the cost of sending an email with the value of creating one.

You’re not paying me because I know where the SEND button is.

You’re paying me because I know what should be sent before anyone pushes it.

And there’s a massive difference.

Stop obsessing over the size of your list.

Start obsessing over what you’re saying to the people already on it.

Because 1,000 people receiving the wrong message is still…

1,000 people receiving the wrong message.

The list isn’t the strategy.

The message and the frequency are.