Most education brands know email should be their strongest channel and yet it rarely delivers on its potential. Between inconsistent sends, generic copy, and the pressure to sound “professional,” messages that could build real connection often end up sounding like noise.

Email strategist Liz Wilcox joins Elana to share how education organizations can shift from transactional messaging to meaningful communication. She breaks down why simplicity outperforms polish, how to build trust through steady, human touchpoints, and what the best senders are doing differently in 2025.

She outlines her “follower, friend, customer” framework, a 20-minute approach to writing newsletters that actually get read, and the mindset shift from selling to serving. Liz also explains how a strong onboarding sequence sets the tone for every future interaction—and why owning your mistakes in email can make people trust you more, not less.

If you’ve ever hesitated to hit send or wondered what to say next, this episode will reset how you think about email.

What You’ll Learn

• Why email should be the backbone of your marketing strategy—not an afterthought
• How to turn your list into a community through consistency and simplicity
• The “follower, friend, customer” model for long-term trust and engagement
• The 20-minute newsletter framework that makes authentic communication sustainable
• How to balance professionalism with personality (and why both matter)
• Why transparency, even in mistakes, builds loyalty faster than polish

Access the full show notes.

Mentioned in this episode:

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I can see.

All right, welcome to the show, Liz. I am so excited to have you on. And honestly, it was one of those things where I was like, should I ask her? Because I don't even want to be bold enough to ask you to come on the show. But thank you for coming on the show. And I'm just so excited what you're going to tell our audience all about things email marketing today. So thank you.

You're so welcome. I'm really excited. A lot of people don't know this. A little known fact about Liz Wilcox. I have an education background. I love educators. I feel like they have such an advantage in marketing. Even if you think, I'm not a marketer. Are you kidding me? You have to sell to your teachers on certain curriculum or if you're a teacher and you started out in the classroom, you have to sell your students on what you're teaching. So we have such an advantage as educators. So I'm excited to get into this.

Yeah, I think that's a really good, like, I've been in EdTech for about 20 years now, and I still to this day don't consider myself an educator, just because I respect the profession so much, but every day we are teaching. So thank you for that reminder. And maybe just for a quick shout out, people always live hearing backgrounds. What did you do in education? Like, what's your background there?

So I have a bachelor's in elementary ed. So I was an elementary school teacher. And then I went on to get my master's in educational leadership. And the plan was to have my own school one day. But now I just kind of have my own online school. And it's great and a lot less stress, to be honest.

That is amazing. I did not know that fun fact about you. So you're perfect for this show because we talk about all things marketing and education here. So great. Okay, let's dive into the good stuff. So email.

Mm-hmm. Perfect. It was a match made in heaven.

Yeah.

like you are one of like what I would consider the queens of email, the hierarchy of people that know what's really going on in email. I look to you, I look to lots of other people and I'm constantly professionally developing. But without you all, we would not have the best practices to really dive into. So that's why I'm excited to pick your brain selfishly and let people listen.

So why don't we talk about the power of email? I love it. You love it because it's one of the only platforms that we own, right? It's that and in education, it's really important that we build trust over time with people that are just constantly coming and going in ed tech, like here today, gone tomorrow. People are moving around in jobs all of the time, right? Email is that way that we can build relationships and express our authority and like, hey, we can be a thought partner, but

How do you think about using email to do that? So not just selling, but how do you show up consistently and start to earn that credibility? I know you've got lots of tactics and strategies, but like how do you think about that mind shift and then how do you execute it?

Yeah, so I like to think of it as, you know, a little bit of a customer journey. First, you have a follower, then you have a friend, then you have a customer, right? So your followers are people that just join the list or, you know, businesses that just get on your email list. Maybe they're semi-interested in what you've got or what you've got to say. And following up with them via email, not even, you know, always selling, but just following up.

kind of turns them into a friend or makes them friendly or makes you very familiar in the inbox. Like, I know who Liz is. Let's see what you've got to say today. You know, before we hit record, we were talking about how many pieces of even just ed tech, you know, a school district might buy in a school year or, you know, over the course of a few years. You know, it could be thousands, right? And why are they buying this?

probably because it's top of mind, right? Because they heard about it or they got on an email list or it keeps popping up in ads on social media or on Google, right? And so you've got to throw your hat in the ring, so to speak. And following up via email, making that connection first, it's the same as if you think about a teacher and the student, they have to make the connection before the student is gonna care.

It's those first few days of class, right? Where it's like, okay, let's set expectations. Let's tell people how this is gonna go down. Let's talk about what we're gonna learn this semester. And then let's make a friendship. Let's create some sort of relationship, right? That's what you can do with email marketing. It isn't just blast them, buy my thing, buy my thing. This is the best curriculum you're ever gonna get. This is...

The new AI tool you need or your school district is going to go down in flames, right? It's not that it's, hey, I know you, here's what I have to offer. Here's, you know, follow up. Here's a couple connection pieces so that they can start to gain interest, start to invest in your emails and then invest in your products when you're ready to sell.

Yeah, that's and it's never really one email and I think that's what you're saying especially with like when we think about that metaphor of the teacher and the student it's never just one touch point like that's a series of like things that you build upon over time and I love that you kind of created that parallel because email is like that they're still like

You know, who is Liz? What does she like? How does she demonstrate that expertise and credibility? And maybe she doesn't go for the hard sell all the time, right? She actually has valuable emails at times.

I think because a lot of you might not think of yourselves as marketers, but just those different touch points. Think of Coca-Cola, right? Coca-Cola, think they're basically the number one beverage in the world, but they spend so much time on different touch points, right? They're at the movie theater having commercials like

You know, and their commercials aren't even about the soda, right? It's like about, you know, summer love or whatever's going on. you know, it's the, it's the Santa and the polar bear and at Christmas time, right? It's just those different touch points. And so when you look at email like that, like, Hey, I'm just, you know, putting my, again, putting my hat in the ring, making it known that I'm here. You know, you know, the district or so-and-so has this money allocated.

for this particular thing, you're inside that thing. And so you've just got to follow up, make yourself known, do those different touch points. It's not just one email, maybe it's once a month, maybe it's a little more when you know the budget is being released and making sure you are known so your product gets bought instead of maybe your competitors.

And as you were talking, like sometimes I talk to marketers and they're like, I should only email when I feel like I'm releasing something or doing something. And I don't have enough, like, what should I say? And I like how you're thinking about the journey because you said, well, maybe align it to the buyer cycle, but maybe align it to timely stuff too. And be that touch point. Cause email is nothing if not, like you have to be consistent. And technically we have to make sure that the domain knows that you're not a spammer with these spiky like sends all the time. Right.

Yeah, let's talk about that a little bit. We're not gonna get super technical today. I won't bore you. We all have jobs and lives. But yes, the domain sender, they need, I call them the internet gods. They need to know you're a legit sender. And the more you email, the more information you're going to give them and the more trust you're going to build with Google, ProtonMail, Yahoo.

All those internet gods, right? They just need more information so they can make a direct decision and put you in the inbox if you're just You know emailing when you want to sell something You know, you might go to spam, right? And so we don't want that. We want to make sure you get into the inbox So the more you email the more credibility you have with the internet gods on top of everything We just said you'll have credibility with your potential customers as well

Yes, and for those of you that are thinking, OK, how do I not make me spiky? Align your emails to the content you're launching. Align your emails to big campaigns. You were talking about those launches with the buying cycle. Have email sequences that ping off of your downloads. And so then it's more of a cool wave rather than a big spike of email sends all the time, right? All right.

Right, love that.

This is the biggest question and we're gonna get into it more for those of you listening. We're gonna do a lightning round at the end. But I wanna talk about what's working right now in email and that's a huge loaded question. But I remember listening to you on email marketing heroes where you talked about success with that like one word subject line. And that was what? Six months ago, three months ago, something and then.

Yeah.

And then everyone copied you and it probably now doesn't work as well, right? So with everything changing all the time, like what do you find that's working for your audience that might be applicable to our audience?

Yeah, so I actually have a membership with thousands of people. So I have a lot of data on what's working in a lot of different industries, right? And I think what is really, really working right now is just that human to human connection we've already been talking about. You know, there's, I don't know, Everyone and their mother is doing AI, right? So you might even be thinking maybe this conversation was about how to use AI to write your emails.

Spoiler alert, it's not. I will not recommend that to you at all. But I do recommend remembering as you're writing your emails, you're talking to a human. Even if you're emailing the boss of the boss of the boss of the boss in the district, right? Like that's still a human. Even if they're the most corporate type you could ever imagine, that's still a person. And so what's working right now,

is to just write the email like you're talking to another human. That's why I use that language, follower friend customer. You want to get very friendly. The one word subject line mentioned before is just, I'll write the email and it's like, what's one word that's kind of fun and kind of enticing, right? It's my way of being human. If I put into AI, write a subject line for this.

email about XYZ, it's going to spit out these long subject lines, right? And so the one word is just so different. It's something, you know, only a human that can understand the nuance of the email can write. So really, when you're writing, you know, you might think, I need it perfectly formatted. I need it beautiful to look professional. I need images. So I'm taken seriously. But honestly, what's working right now?

It's just very simple text based emails. You know, hey, Liz, I was, you know, I was late to my podcast interview today, but they made it work for me anyway, dot, dot, dot. What I really wanted to talk to you about is the new development within our curriculum. Last year, X, you know, it was X, Y, Z.

We've changed it to WXY. Here are three reasons why, if you want to sneak peek, take a look. I just wrote an entire email about your curriculum change, right? That didn't take me very long, but I made a quick connection. I've been late to an interview before. Gosh, that's the worst. That gets me interested. That's that human piece. Now we've moved on to our mutual interest, which is what curriculum are we going to decide for the next five years?

is what's out coming directly from a company because there is a trend in education that, you know, not all companies have a figurehead. And, and sometimes the CEO isn't, isn't that figurehead. might be the head of marketing or growth, but a lot of the times they don't have that, or it's a mind shift to get it into, I'm a person connecting an email. It's usually like, Hey, we got a webinar, step right up, click here. Very, very, you know what I mean? So

Mm-hmm.

you

how do we get that shift and is it completely out? Because if it's out, I want people to know that too. Like it has to be.

Yeah, I mean, if you have a very professional business and that is part of the brand voice, so to speak, to be a certain level of professional, go ahead and be that level of professional, but let people in, right? If there are lots of webinars happening, who are the webinar hosts? It's likely the same three to five people every time. What can you do when somebody first joins your email list to say,

Liz is our webinar partner. She hosts every Monday on XYZ topics. Liz has a bachelor's in elementary, a master's in leadership, and a 10-year-old daughter who just can't stand XYZ. Whatever. Just something to make them remember, that personal piece. That's still being very professional. We're introducing the webinar host.

but we're adding a little bit of personal touch. That way, when every Monday you send out that, Liz is hosting the webinar, let's see what kind of food her daughter isn't eating this week. Make sure you come a few minutes early. That's that personal piece that's going to not just gain customers, but keep them around for years to come.

And you got me curious, what is that food that she's not eating right now?

Actually, I have no idea why I said that my daughter is the least picky eater. Even if she doesn't like something, she'll eat it. I don't know. I'm on the fly, y'all.

Sorry.

Well, you got me intrigued and I was like, I gotta go the webinar, right? So another podcast I listened to is Jay Shweddelson, right? And he does like, you know, in the beginning, he's got these tips about marketing and whatnot. But then at the end, it's like just nonsensical things about his life. And, you know, and most of time I'm like, well, maybe I should cut it off, but I always listen to it. And today he was talking about, you know, the Love is Blind UK. And I'm like, God, I gotta listen to this, right?

Right.

I love that.

you connect relationships.

Yes, relationships. You want people to connect with you. It reminds me of, just real quick before we move on, Red Lobster. So Red Lobster was going bankrupt in the last year or so. They got a new CEO and I swear to you, all of social media is obsessed with this guy. He's my age. I think he's 36 or 37 years old and he's somehow, by miracle,

been able to pull the Red Lobster out of bankruptcy, but he's listening to his people for feedback. know, you guys said you want the biscuits, we're keeping the biscuits. You said you want a seafood bag, we're gonna get that. You know, you want Old Bay, come in right up, right? It's this relationship, right? And in return, guess what? I'm driving 30 miles to the Red Lobster because I know this guy is invested in his customer.

And so that's what email can do for you. It can become this two-way street where people are saying, you know, writing back, I love Liz's webinars. You know, I wish she could do them on Wednesdays. And then maybe every once in while we can do a Wednesday one because we heard enough people say that, right? But we don't know that if we're not having this open line of communication, if we're not creating this relationship, an email's a great place to do it.

Yeah, it's such a great reminder for our industry because we want to be professional, of course, but at the same time, sometimes at the expense of being professional, we lose our humanity. We lose that opportunity to connect. And what you're saying is, gosh, what if humanity actually helped you with your goals even more so, and you feel like connected and being seen as a human, it's like a win-win across the board. So I love it. love it. All right.

Amen, amen.

Speaking of education, especially back to school time, time in October when things are heads down, really any time in education, I can talk to an educator or an educator administrator and they say, my god, I have zero time. In fact, stop wasting my time. So how do we balance an email? Because I always teach, let's do value driven as much as possible. No matter what, I want them to walk away with something awesome, a tip, like, cool.

But how do we balance it with a call to action that aligns with our goals as well? And sometimes it's like if they're doing an email campaign that doesn't align with like a download or content, like how do we balance that without keeping that authenticity and that relationship? I always struggle with that personally.

Yeah, so I just want to challenge everyone to like the definition of value. Sometimes the value is just showing up. Sometimes the value is saying, hey, you really need to buy this new, you know, EdTech. You really need to update your smart board software. You know, sometimes that is the value, right? So don't when we say, you know, add value, don't think

You know, it has to be all this free stuff and it can't be you actually promoting your product. But as far as the balance goes, and a couple of minutes ago, I just, you know, quote unquote, wrote an email, right? And it had that balance. So I call this the 20 minute newsletter framework. And you just put a greeting at the top, you know, hey, Liz. And then just a personal update, two to three sentences.

about something you've done since the last time you emailed them. That's that humanity piece. You know, it could be, hey, I was late to record a podcast, but they were gracious enough to give me, you know, 30 minutes or so. Anyway, right? That's very relatable, right? Or it could be, you know, school has started and we're all heads down. Just like you, we have no time, right? That's that relatability piece. And then just segue into whatever it is

that you need to promote, whether it's free content or paid, right? Whether it's your content or someone else's, right? And segue, you might think, Liz, I'm not a writer. Put that cap stock on, baby. Anyway, dot, dot, dot. That's a segue. Anyway, you know, because neither one of us has any extra time, I won't waste yours. Here's what's new this week. Here's what's going on with, you know, company name. You know, we've got webinar on Monday.

We're upgrading our software. You know, it's going to be down from midnight to 1 p.m. Eastern, you know, like whatever it is you've got to tell your customers, your potential customers, your new leads. Put that there. So again, greeting, personal update, two to three sentences. Keep it short and sweet. Nobody has time for that. And then segue into the content. It could be even, you know, we read this article.

and we thought, you know, it would be really poignant for you as well. It doesn't even have to be your content. It just has to be relevant for your people.

Yeah, and I.

I still consider myself a novice when it comes to email marketing, but the way I kind of create categories of emails is kind of campaign oriented. Maybe they're related to content, they're related to calls to action, launches, buying cycles, content emails. I don't know, that's one area, but like newsletters are a completely different jam too. And then you have email sequences too. So how can we get these all going in concert that really activate people and create that

and trusts that we've been talking about, I just think about the ecosystem of email and how it can also uplift everything else they're doing in marketing. Social media, content, conferences, all of the places they're putting their bets to get in front of the buyers, right?

Yeah, so email is really the place where you drive at home for subscribers for potential leads. If you are doing a lot of networking events, you know, you're asking people to follow you on social or join your email list. Email is going to have the highest ROI for you, right? It's the place where you close the deal, so to speak, right? Because it is just a more intimate channel. And so when you think about your ecosystem,

If you have a team, if you're executive level listening to this, hire experts that know what they're doing that can create that large ecosystem we're talking about here. Don't be afraid to skimp on it because it is worth it. It really is the place where you drive home the sales. Now, if you're just in the first five years of your business, you're still working for yourself or you have a really small team, I just want you to think of the email

ecosystem as three different things. Number one, an onboarding sequence. When I join your email list, what are the things you need to tell me? What do I need to know? Right? Set expectations. You know, it's like a, it's like a little tour. It's that first day of class, so to speak. Right. And then there are newsletters, what we just said. And that was kind of what I was crafting for you. Hey, once a week, you know, bi-monthly, you know, hey, this is what's going on.

in the company, this is what's going on with me, this is what I want you to take a look at, right? Those are timely emails. And then the third part of emailing is those are those sales emails, right? Sales campaigns, sequences, funnels, et cetera, that you think of, because you got to sell, right? It's your job. I say it with love. I say it with so much love. No one cares about your business.

You have to care, you have to show them that you care. You have to sell. If you don't sell, how will they know to buy? So again, it's just that onboarding sequence, those newsletters that are timely, and then those sales campaigns that you can sprinkle throughout your calendar.

I love that. And you said it so much more in a digestible way than, than I tried to hack job it, but I feel like I got my, I gave myself a B minus in what I, what I tried to do with categories, but you simplified it in a way. And in our industry, I work with clients that are just too afraid to put links in, too afraid to make that sell, too afraid to make the connection to, we're an expert here by the way, we can come to your district and do this. Right. So for those of you, I just want to underscore what Liz said.

Please don't be afraid to sell. We've done all this work, hopefully, to establish you as an authority and an expert. Make that connection easy for your audience. it's not, people don't wanna be, I don't know, it's this humbleness of educators that I wanna be able to say, you're doing a disservice for not saying that you do this, right?

Amen, I was just gonna say, your products, your services, they're for serving, they're not for selling. And I'm an educator at heart as well. And y'all, my main offer is $9 because when I was in college, they said, if you don't believe everyone has a right to an education, get the heck out of here. You're in the wrong program. And so I very firmly believe that everyone has a right to an education.

And it's why I do so many podcasts, interviews. It's why I go out and I do so much service. But guess what? The best way I can serve you is inside my paid programs, right? Because I have a stomach, because I have an electric bill. And if I am worried about where my, you know, if my electric bill is getting paid and if I'm hungry or not, I cannot serve you. I cannot serve you because I am hungry and I am in the dark, right?

And so we can serve our best when our practical needs are met, right? So we've got to go out there and let people know like, hey, the best way I can serve you is through my paid services, my paid programs, my paid software, whatever, right? That's where I put my heart, soul, blood, sweat, tears into creating this magic for you, right? And you should get paid for that if nothing else

I know you have bills to pay. Okay, baby? That's my soapbox. I'll get off.

And I was doing the, you know, amen type of vibes over here for sure. So, all right. we may end with this. We may have one more fun question at the end if we have time, but let's start with this lightning round. So of what works and stop that right now. my God, please stop that. So it's a lightning round specifically for email. So subject lines, what works or stop that you can do either one.

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

what works, short and sweet, and like you're writing to a friend.

The send date and time.

Doesn't matter whenever you can get your butt in the chair. That's what works best.

and be consistent. I love that. What do you feel about PS or no PS in emails?

Amen.

Always use the PS. No one's reading your emails. They're scrolling to the bottom. So that's the best real estate you've got. Do not lose it.

And this is selfish PS question follow-up. How did you make them actually work? How do you get people to actually respond?

Short and sweet, right? Like, hey, I know you didn't read this email. That's going to catch their attention, right? I know you scroll all the way to the bottom. Suddenly they're reading, right? So something like that. Just a quick attention grabber and always put a link in the PS because people are just looking for the good stuff. So put the good stuff at the bottom.

what works or stop that in email content.

Stop for the love of everything telling so many stories. I know a lot of marketers would come on the show and tell you to tell stories. Stories connect. Sure, heck yeah they do. But it's a newsletter, not a novel. Chances are if you don't have time to write the story, they don't have time to read it. So instead, try those personal updates, two to three sentences about something you've done instead of trying to tell a story.

You're pushing me and don't read my newsletter because I have a story in the beginning, but I don't always do stories. All right, what works? Stop that for, actually that is not really right. My prompt was whatever you do, you need to stop. You just said stories. Is there anything else? Gut reaction of just don't do this anymore.

Stop complicating email. I just simplified it for you. You've got your onboarding sequence, you've got some newsletters, we went through a 20 minute newsletter framework for yourself, and then you gotta have sales campaigns built into your calendar. So stop using, it's complicated as an excuse. It can be really, really simple and it is so worth your while.

And emails are somewhat ephemeral, right? So like here, there, it only becomes relevant for a certain amount of time in the inbox. Sometimes we just want to make it perfect. And we have three lines of approving processes. And it's all this stuff that just sucks out the joy in email. So I love that. OK. This is the number one thing that'll move the needle with your email marketing.

a proper onboarding sequence, you've got to make sure, it's the same, again, I'm gonna put that first day of class, right? If you walked into a classroom and you saw the teacher not setting expectations, not going over classroom rules, not telling them what they're gonna cover, that's gonna be a long semester, right? The teacher and the students are not gonna be happy. Nobody's gonna know what's going on and it's going to be a disaster, right?

You know, the teachers probably don't get fired to be honest, right? So don't fire yourself, right? Don't let your subscribers fire you. Have a proper onboarding sequence, a welcome sequence, a nurture sequence, whatever word you've heard it called, where you set expectations, you give a little bit of personality so they can, you know, know what your brand is and what you stand for, and then share the vision. You know, together we're going to do X, Y, My vision for you...

is that you make money with email marketing. I don't care what podcast mic you use. I don't care if you got a good background. I don't care if you do social media. All I care about my vision for you is you make money with email marketing, right? So what do you care about for your subscribers? Put that in the onboarding sequence and you'll be golden.

Yes. And I want to say as a marketer, I actually don't have a great welcome series. And so you are pushing me to say, that's really important. I knew it was important, but I just thought when they get my first email, they'll be amazed and they'll, but it's not that it's about like setting the tone and making sure that active. So after this, we're going to make that a priority. for all of you.

Yes.

Yay! we are making changes! I'm so happy!

Well, I mean, that's what I hope all of you that are listening. It's like, usually my end is like this host would say, think of one thing, but we really mean it, right? I want you to think of one thing that Liz said, whether it be a welcome series or just personalizing and that one-on-one kind of human approach, whatever it is, I want you to walk away with it and then let us know on LinkedIn if you ended up doing it. These things can really move the needle. And I love that I kind of rehashed the question of moving the needle at the end.

All right, so bonus question here, and I don't think a lot of people would align or like make the connection. So I wanted to do it. You did such an amazing, inspiring, like, I don't even know how to explain what you did on Survivor, but you were a castaway on Survivor 46. Our whole team was just like screaming and cheering you on the entire time. When we went to dinner in Florida, like,

Okay.

I still have goosebumps with that woman who came up to you and said that like how much you inspired her. And I'm sure you get that everywhere, right? How does it change? Like having this reality show experience, how did it change your approach to email marketing and just maybe you as a business person in general?

Yeah, well, I think so. I was on the show called Survivor. Google it if you haven't heard of it. Yes, it is still on TV. They just recorded season 50. And it was an experience for sure. And it just taught me. And I think what I brought home to my business email and beyond was that. It can really just be that simple, you know, you don't.

A lot of people on Survivor try to complicate Survivor. so, spoiler alert, I got fourth place. I was the last person eliminated from the competition. And I just realized out there, like, you know, I am a marketer. So how can I market myself that people want to keep me around? And I was like, the answer is just really simple. Don't do the things that other people are doing. Don't get paranoid. Don't...

You know, don't forget to apologize if you make a mistake own up to Your mistakes be honest. Like if you're cranky just say yeah, I'm cranky. I'm sorry, right and that I was able to bring that back to my business and Realize the more open and transparent. I am just like I was in the show the more People relate to me the more that it is that human to human connection the more people say

I like Liz, want to keep her around because she is open and transparent. Even when she makes a mistake like, crap, I forgot the subject line. that was the wrong link. I was an hour late to a podcast interview and interrupt a business meeting. Right? The more I can just say, yep, I did that. I, you know, I'm sorry. the more people want to stick around. I learned that out on Survivor really, really well.

Cause I did make mistakes. If you Google me, you're going to see something really crazy. Okay. But you'll also see that I stuck around everyone, you know, forgave me and they said, Liz, we just love that you owned it. Right. And so in my business and especially in my email marketing, I just own who I am and where I'm at and people want to stick around. People want to buy my products. and yeah, it's, it's just an awesome thing.

Yeah, and when you were talking, I just liked the phrase of you were unapologetically who you were. I'm proud for it.

And you inspired so many other people around that. And it's just, I think you caught people off guard with it because the name of the game of Survivor, like, oh, I'm not gonna say my job. Oh, I'm gonna pretend this or, oh, I'm really scared right now, but I'm not gonna show it. Like you were there, you were transparent. And I think it was like, what game is this woman playing? You know, and I loved that. Like you flipped it.

Yes, that's so funny. A lot of people say, yeah, you can't be honest on Survivor, but I think I might've been one of the most honest people to ever play. But that really endeared people to me and that was something I can translate into marketing is just when you're on, even somebody buys your software and it breaks, just coming clean. Yeah, we are not sure what happened. We're still working on it. Please stick around. We're gonna email you

tomorrow morning, even if we don't have a good update, we're going to update you people really really really appreciate that transparency It might be easier to hide behind, know, gosh I'm not gonna I'm not gonna email them until it's fixed but people want updates, right? They want the truth and if the truth is hey, we haven't figured this out yet They're gonna stick around because they know you're actively working on it and there's no guesswork involved.

Yeah, and if you email enough, the chances are you're going to make mistakes in the email in particular. then your business is going to make mistakes on top of it, right? So, and it's no, it's no like coincidence that sometimes when you email again and you're like, we made a mistake. There's a cool way to do it where you're like, Hey, this happens really sorry. We're sheepish. You can make a joke or you can just like completely flop it. Like I got an email yesterday from

Amen. Yes.

Yeah.

like paper source, know, like the or paper, you know, the party invite company. They accidentally emailed everyone about their upcoming wedding. And I was like, am I getting married? Right. And it was in their entire list. Right. And then they followed up with something so drab that it was like, you got an accidental email. And I'm like, that was such an opportunity to make a joke, do something fun.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, or like send a picture of the, you know, bride and groom. Yeah, that happened to me too. Y'all, is perfect. So this is so perfect, I think, to end on. So don't be afraid to show a little personality, especially when you make the mistake. I got a bunch of emails from like a fitness boot camp, like a local gym, and I got, you know, a follow up. I didn't even notice that I got a ton of emails.

Yeah!

And then I got one like, my God, it was so apologetic. It was nice. I say it with love, but it was sort of pathetic. They were like, my gosh, this is never gonna happen again. I'm like, first of all, false is going to happen again. You know, clearly you guys are not experts. You know, you just got a whole slew of emails. It'll never happen again. Like don't apologize for your emails. Make it.

you know, whoops, you know, know, when you get to the gym and you get overzealous and now you're super sore, that's what we just did with our email service provider. We, you know, we did way too many reps, right? You know, make it fun, make it personal, right? And people will really endear themselves to you.

Yes. And so for those of you listening that you're like, okay, Liz has convinced me. Now I need to convince my boss around this tone shift or whatever. Have them listen to this podcast. She's not just saying it because she likes doing it and it aligns with her style. She's saying it because it works and she teaches thousands of people across the nation and they make it work.

Right? So we will put all of Liz's information in our show notes, but Liz, do want to just tell people about you? How can they, you know, continue this relationship with you and your email program?

Yeah, sure.

Yeah, so of course I'm an email marketer. I'd love for you to join my list. You can go directly to LizWilcox.com. In the top right hand corner there is a hot pink button. You can't miss it. Remember I said your number one mistake might be not having a proper onboarding sequence. When you hit that hot pink button and enter your email, you're gonna get an entire welcome sequence already written for you. You'll get three newsletter samples so you can see what I mean by making those connections week by week.

and you'll get 52 subject lines for a week full of prompts. That's LizWilcox.com. Hot pink button, you can't miss it. And of course, if you'd like to check out my program where I write your weekly email for you, there's a yellow bar at the top of LizWilcox.com. You can check it out as well.

I love all the value that you give right away. And for those of you that are listening, take advantage of that. I'd love to hear your journey alongside and learning more with Liz. Liz, thank you. Thank you so much. I feel like we could talk for hours around this, but I'm sure this will be one of our more popular episodes and I'd love to have you on next time. But let's see how this reverberates in education. I want to talk to you about it because I'm excited for people to, again,

Pick one thing that Liz said, do it, report back. We're your accountability partners. Okay, thank you everyone for joining. Thank you, Liz. Really, really appreciate you. And thanks for making me laugh between it all. It's been fun. All right, we'll see you all next time on all things marketing and education. Take care.

Yeah, thanks. Yes, for sure.