Email Marketing For Beginners

[00:00:00] Calan Breckon: Today’s episode is sponsored by Kit, formally known as ConvertKit, the email marketing platform for creators. I’ve been using Kit for years because I found that it is the most efficient and easy to use out of all the email service providers. Kit simplifies your email marketing by combining powerful automations with an easy to use interface. I love the Visual Automations builder because I am a very visual person and it really helps me to organize all of my automations in a very simple, simple and easy way. And let’s face it, automations is a must have in order to succeed in any business today. Kit also integrates with all of your favorite e commerce platforms, lead generation services, and much more. The best part about Kit is that it runs on a sliding scale for payment so that you can get started for free while you learn all about Kit systems and how to grow your email list. So to get started today for free, head on over to calanbreckon.com/kit or just click the link in the show notes. Now let’s get on to today’s episode.

Welcome to the Business Gay podcast where we talk about all things business, marketing and entrepreneurship. I’m your host, Calan Breckon, and on today’s episode, I have email marketing genius, Sebastian Dziuk. Sebastian is a professional speaker, US army veteran, and founder of Dziuk Studios LLC, an email marketing agency helping LGBTQ+ and allied professional speakers expand their businesses through email. He’s a contributing author to two books, “Thriving in Business: Strategies for the LGBTQ+ Entrepreneur” and “With Honor and Integrity: Transgender Troops in Their Own Words.” As a queer trans man, Sebastian uses his experience to help others tell their authentic stories, to elevate their messages. I’m excited to talk about email marketing today with Sebastian, So let’s jump in.

Hey Sebastian, thank you so much for joining me. How are you doing?

[00:01:57] Sebastian Dziuk: I’m doing well. I’m so excited to be here.

[00:01:59] Calan Breckon: Yeah, I’m really excited to dive into your expertise around email and email marketing and all those things because I know how important it is, but I think a lot of people don’t, so I’m glad that we can jump into it. So how long have you been in like the email marketing space?

[00:02:16] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, so interestingly enough, I got into email marketing last year, but I’ve been writing online from social media management, content creation for over a decade. I’d spent 10 years in the Minnesota Army National Guard, so the US army actually taught me how to write really well, take awesome photos, video interview, and manage social media like that’s an actual job in the military. A lot of people don’t know about. So I did that for a decade and then I went into some corporate work doing some learning and development to like adult learning theory. And then my background, my degree is actually in entrepreneurship. And so everything kind of blended together. And then I found this big gap in the marketplace. And I particularly work with professional speakers and a lot of them need help with email marketing, as does everybody. But I also have a speaking background, and so it was the perfect fit. And I was able to use my background and then acquire new skills that are more specific to email. But a lot of it’s kind of the same fundamentals. It’s storytelling and using the right copy to hook people in and convert.

[00:03:24] Calan Breckon: Yeah, definitely. Storytelling is a huge component. And copy writing, compelling, good copy that’s going to do the thing you want it to do, is so not as easy as people think. I personally am not good at copy. I know I’m not good at copy and I’m okay with that.

Why? So why is building an email list so important then?

[00:03:52] Sebastian Dziuk: So what I always ask people, do you want a direct line of communication to your audience?

If you say no, then I think you might be in the wrong line of work. But pretty much anybody that’s running a business wants a direct line of communication. It’s something that you own versus Instagram, Facebook link, LinkedIn, all these places, you are renting the space. In the US we saw TikTok disappear for like six hours or something and.

[00:04:15] Calan Breckon: It’S about to disappear again.

[00:04:17] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, who knows? And so it’s. You don’t know what’s going to happen. The algorithms could say, f you, which meta has put out policies against trans folks at this point, so we can’t rely on that. And your account could get hacked for whatever reason. So always also use two factor authentication and backup codes. All that security measures.

But point is, we don’t. We don’t own those assets. But you own your email list and you can even take that from service provider to service provider if you want to switch companies that you work with.

[00:04:49] Calan Breckon: I could not agree more. I think that you cannot build on rented property. I always thought of it as like building your house. But why would you build your house on rented land when the landowner can come along and be like, nope, we’re tearing down your house because it’s on our property. You’re like, I built the house. And it’s like, yeah, but we don’t care.

[00:05:07] Sebastian Dziuk: I spent a million doll doing it.

[00:05:09] Calan Breckon: Right? And I’m just like, it’s so crazy. And having that direct line, especially in today’s era, I think especially with what’s going on politically right now, a lot more people are recognizing this, being like, oh crap, I built this, like, you know, hundreds of thousands of people on my TikTok following or wherever. But if that goes away, like it’s done and gone and I don’t have that direct line. And more people I think are looking towards these email lists and, and building that direct communication so that the, like, if anything does happen, I have the backup and like I can communicate with you and you, you own that. There is value, intrinsic value in that.

If somebody is building an email list, why is it important to do a newsletter as well and not just like collect the email and let it sit there?

[00:05:58] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah. So a newsletter is a great way to even keep yourself consistent of communicating with your audience.

I always say collect emails no matter what. And if you can’t, if you can’t convince yourself to do a regular newsletter and commit to that, that’s fine. But at least like put it out an email blast at least once a month. I. Ideally once a week. But a newsletter is a great way to give consistent value and your audience knows what to expect. Especially if you have a specific format, you have a specific thing that you talk about every week you come in, maybe even a couple times a week. There’s some newsletters, especially if you look at like finance ones that like follow the stock market or something. They’ll have an email sent out every day, every other day. As long as there is value in it, people want it. A big question I get is how often should I email my list? Well, as often as you can give them value and without burning out, because you don’t want to be emailing them tons of value like three times a week. But you can only keep that up for two weeks. So. So if you need, yeah, just start out with every other week, then try and do once a week. And then if you have a sales campaign, that’s gonna be a different scenario and that’s where you would email them more frequently. But newsletters, yeah, it’s a great way to stay top of mind and give consistent value. Cause those are relationships that you’re just continuously nurturing. So then when you do launch a new product, say like an online course or a new book, they are gonna be the first people to buy from you, not your social media followers.

[00:07:32] Calan Breckon: 110% agree with you there.

And I agree with you in the consistency. It’s, it’s one of those Things that if you can only do it once a month, cool, do it once a month. But if you’re doing that once a month and it’s a mile long, I always would suggest that they break it up. Like once you start getting really long, find it and be like, okay, maybe let’s do two a month and split up this information so that it’s more consumable, it’s more digestible for folks. For this I, for my podcast, I do it once a week and it’s the podcast episode and it’s like, here’s the episode and here’s like some fun information about what’s going on and like updates and stuff like that. And it’s simple, it’s consistent and it’s easy.

Do you want to dive in a little bit more as to like, why staying consistent and why building this relationship is important? I think you already mentioned it because like your social is not going to be the first ones to buy from you. But like, let’s dive into that a little bit more.

[00:08:25] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah. So let’s talk about dating.

It’s. You’re taking everyone out on dates, right? And especially for folks who have a high ticket offer asking them to marry you on the first date, that even for gay culture, that’s a little, that’s a little intense, right?

[00:08:40] Calan Breckon: Yeah.

[00:08:41] Sebastian Dziuk: We aren’t trying to u haul here. What we’re trying to do is develop a relationship and you’re building the know like trust factor is what it is. And so by consistently being there and being a reliable source, they’re, you’re going to be the first person that they think of when they think of a certain problem. So for example, my goal as I’ve given myself the title the, the Speaker’s Email Marketer. So whenever professional speakers think about email marketing, I want them to think of me. And so how do I do that? By consistently getting out there and talking about email marketing specifically for them. So how can you make yourself a category of one? So you, your name is associated with the problem that you solve and that can be insanely powerful. But it takes time, which is the point of the emails and continuously showing up and being that reliable person?

[00:09:35] Calan Breckon: Yep. Consistency is definitely a key component to it. Why do you think that some folks who are like primary primarily service providers tend to shy away from email marketing? Because you, you think of email marketing as like, oh, it’s all this spammy stuff. But I know that there’s people out there who like, they’re, they’re speakers, but they just don’t think that they need to do it. Why do you think that is?

[00:10:00] Sebastian Dziuk: Because it’s not as sexy. It’s, it’s kind of what it comes down to. A viral post that seems like, that’s seems like the pinnacle of what people want. But especially queer service providers that can be also a safety risk of like oh, if I’m going viral, where am I going viral? I know trans folks who have ended up on the wrong side of TikTok and then they’re getting a lot of trolls and threats and hate. And so the goal in business isn’t to go viral, it’s to have consistently generation.

And so what we want to do is continue to create content on social media because social media, there’s a place in it for marketing, that’s your brand awareness and that’s for people to eventually find you one way or another through the algorithm. But then you want to turn those followers into subscribers so you can continue that, continue that relationship there.

[00:10:55] Calan Breckon: Yeah, a hundred percent. So now we know why it’s important and how often to email. But where does somebody start if they’re like fresh and new to doing email? Like what are some of the most effective ways to start building an email list?

[00:11:11] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, so the most effective way is to have a lead magnet. You want to give people a reason to give you their email address because like we talked about before, we’re worried about being spammy in someone’s email inbox. And so, so we don’t just give our email address willy nilly. A lot of people used to do that in the past but that’s how junk emails became a thing. And so most we all got them. Yep. And that just has thousands of unread messages because it’s full of like marketing stuff. And so you want to give something. I like to say would someone pay $20 for this if they wouldn’t pay $20? And I should clarify, not just someone would your ideal client pay $20 for this if they would not make it better? And so a lot of people will make a downloadable checklist or graphic or a PDF document that’s like 10 pages and most of it’s filled with pictures anyway that stuff doesn’t cut it anymore unless one it’s hyper targeted. But what is the most powerful lead magnet is an educational email course. People like James Clear utilize these and it’s really underrated thing because it takes some time and effort to create. But when you do it right, you’re showing up in someone’s inbox for multiple days in a row and Giving them insane value day after day after day. So you’re accelerating this no like trust factor cycle and then you can upsell them at the end of like hey, I have limited spots, want to hop on a call for XYZ service? Or hey, I have a book that goes even deeper into this stuff. Would you like to buy it? And that’s how you can start to generate sales. And now they’re also on your email list. And so fundamentals just start with a lead magnet and if you can’t do an email course right now, that’s fine. But if you’re doing like a downloadable checklist or something, make sure it’s hyper targeted and not filled with fluff. So like don’t just take the Canva template and change a few things.

[00:13:11] Calan Breckon: I think that there’s some people who do do this really well but a lot of social media folks I think miss the boat on this one where they like, like oh yeah, go follow me in all my different places. And I really want to like always just like shake them and be like, make one of those things to be. Go sign up for your email list.

[00:13:30] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah.

[00:13:30] Calan Breckon: In your bio. Because it’s, it’s honestly one of the most important aspects of building a business is having that structural security. And by building your email list, you are building that structural security into your business. And I’m curious what your thoughts on what’s more important, the size of the email list or the consistency in which you nurture that email list.

[00:13:57] Sebastian Dziuk: I feel like I need a third option because the third option I would say is the quality of your email list, the size of it. If it’s filled with a thousand people but only 50 of them are your ideal client, it’s not worth much. You could be consistent with them and send out the best emails. But it’s going to be hard to sell a snowmobile to someone that lives in Texas.

So what you need to do is make sure that your lead magnet is like I mentioned, having it hyper targeted to your ideal client because that you’re going to have fewer downloads. But every person that signs up, that’s a warm lead. Someone who will likely or could buy from you in the future or know someone. And so if you have a hundred people on your email list and they’re all your ideal client, that is way better than having a thousand people with only 50 of them being ideal. And then you tie that in with the consistency, that’s, that’s when the dollars are really going to start rolling in.

[00:14:56] Calan Breckon: Yep, I definitely agree with you. Consistency is definitely very important there because I mean I’ve, I had friends who had like a 70,000 like email list but they hadn’t touched it in like a year. And I was like, that’s so expensive too.

[00:15:11] Sebastian Dziuk: Email providers, you pay based on how many subscribers you have. That’s another reason to have a smaller like narrowed email list because like with I use kit.com formally convert kit, I.

[00:15:23] Calan Breckon: Also know I use it as well.

[00:15:25] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah. And so I have less than. The first plan is up to 3,000 followers. I have less than 3,000 followers on my own list right now. And so I pay like 20, 25 bucks a month. But if I have more than that, she’s going to keep going up in price. And so you might as well make sure you have the right people on the list that you pay less too.

[00:15:42] Calan Breckon: I have always thought of like, I have like a, an unsubscribe nurture list is that when I have emails that go cold, I don’t just leave them on my list for like having the numbers because that ends up costing you more. And it’s actually bad for your metrics inside of the email service provider because if you’re sending out your email and more people are not opening it than opening it, you’re going to start getting sent to the spam folder. And so by having those people on your list you think, oh, I have this massive email list, but it’s actually a detriment to what you are building and what you want to do. So set up a nurture sequence that you can take your cold list and you just click tag and it takes them into unsubscribe list and it tries to reengage them and if they don’t, it automatically removes them from list because that way you keep your list nice and clean, your open rates are a lot higher. There’s a lot less chance of you getting sent to the spam folder.

[00:16:34] Sebastian Dziuk: Exactly. That’s a huge point. And a lot of people miss that. And even thinking about the attempting to re engage them. Yeah, some people will just take them off completely, but it’s like you can try and save them.

[00:16:45] Calan Breckon: There might, I mean you never know. Usually they don’t, but like there’s one or two times where they do come through and they’re like, oh no, like I didn’t even see these. Like sometimes it just gets lost or whatever.

So yeah, it’s really important and I’d rather have a small but mighty list that actually moves the marker than have like thousands of people who like I Never have anything come through. You know, it’s like, what, what’s your end result? That should be the focal points, not the numbers. Not the like looking important.

[00:17:11] Sebastian Dziuk: Um, cause no one even sees that number. They see how many Instagram followers you have, but no one can see your email list following.

[00:17:18] Calan Breckon: Right, exactly. Uh, do you have any like fun success stories or anything you’d like to end off with here?

[00:17:24] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, so I actually worked with a queer graphic designer from the UK last fall. And so this person didn’t have any email list whatsoever. They just went freelance earlier that year and have been pretty consistent with their bookings, but they wanted to have some kind of free resource. And so together we created the Queer Brand Guide. And so you can find it queerbrandguide.com and we took their email list from nothing to 165 subscribers in a few months. And that was with only a couple of posts on their LinkedIn, TikTok and Instagram. And what helped with this is they were already pretty well engaged on their social platforms and they’re really like genuine human and so have formed a lot of good connections. But the really cool thing with this is they went from 0 to 165, but also 0 to now having a paid community by utilizing this list. Because then they launched a wait list where they also posted the waitlist landing page on all their platforms. But they sent that out to their new email list and got even more people on the waitlist that way. And so now they have this paid community that’s for queer, trans and neurodivergent freelancers who are trying to do freelance business in the non traditional ways. And so that’s the other power of the email list is you’re going to get more like more of a loyal following over email and people that really want to interact with you versus on social media where people are just interacting in passing.

[00:19:04] Calan Breckon: Yeah, it’s building that more intimate community. It’s, it’s like having a, it’s like a podcast. I think they go so well together because podcasting, you’re that intimate voice in their ear that they spend time with, whether they’re cleaning or at the gym or whatever. And you get to build more of that relationship. And then an email list is the same like you’re consistently showing up to them or showing up for them, sharing advice, sharing information. And so when it comes time for you to say, okay, I would really like love to share this with you, this is my product or this is my thing, people are like, oh my God, you’ve provided me with so much good, valuable information or so much good, valuable stuff. Of course I want to support you in return and you build that community in that world and it’s. It’s really great. I’ll make sure to have that link in the show notes for everybody to go check out as well.

[00:19:49] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, that’d be a great thing for everyone to go through too. If you want to, like, figure out your branding and personal branding within your business. It’s a great course to take.

[00:19:57] Calan Breckon: Definitely. Awesome. So where can folks find out more about you and your business and what you can offer?

[00:20:04] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, so I am most active on good old LinkedIn.

I’m also. I also have Instagram, but I don’t post as much there. I get much more activity on LinkedIn and I also have my own website Dziukstudios.com so you can learn more about my services and a little bit more about my backstory. Um, I do some of my own speaking as well, although you won’t find that as much online yet.

So, yeah, LinkedIn and my website are the best places to find me.

[00:20:33] Calan Breckon: Okay, perfect. I’ll make sure that I have those in the show notes for everybody. Thank you so much, Sebastian, for being a guest today. I’m pretty sure that everybody got a lot of really good, valuable information in today’s episode.

[00:20:45] Sebastian Dziuk: Yeah, thanks for having me. And people can feel free to reach out to me with even questions. I do free consultation, so I’m happy to help anybody that’s listening thing.

[00:20:52] Calan Breckon: Thanks for tuning in today. Don’t forget to hit that subscribe button. And if you really enjoyed today’s episode, I would love a star rating from you. The Business Gay podcast is written, produced and edited by me, Calan Breckon. That’s it for today. Peace, love, rainbows.