Hey, hey Reader,

The first full week of being back in New Jersey from Denmark, I enrolled my son in his new school, got a new car, presented at a speaking event, and interviewed for a job and got it (🎉).

Phew.

So now I needed childcare, fast, for the upcoming summer.

I posted in a local Facebook group asking for a nanny for my 7-year-old son. I wasn't vague. I listed the exact days, the exact hours, and five specific week-long windows in July and August. I handed them the info on a silver platter.

Here's what came back:

"I'm a certified teacher and teaching assistant. I love working with children. I wish I could help you and do this, I would need housing."

"I'm down at my sister's a lot nearby. I could help you, but I don't know when I'll be down in July and August. Pm me for more details."

I gave them everything, the dates, hours, and weeks. And every single response came back talking about themselves, their credentials, their feelings, their schedule, their needs.

This is your email marketing.

I've seen it a thousand times, and I've done it myself.

We help teams do X. Our platform offers Y. We're excited to announce Z.

We. We. We. (translation: Me. Me. Me.)

Your subscribers open emails with one question: "What's in this for me?" And before they even finish the subject line, you've already started talking about yourself.

Justin Welsh wrote something recently in his Saturday Solopreneur newsletter that reminded me of my childcare problem.

He told a story about a traveling nurse who sent him six messages the morning of his appointment with traffic updates, GPS screenshots, and running commentary on her commute. What she never sent was her ETA. The one piece of information he needed and asked for and never got.

Then she showed up thirty minutes early, unannounced.

His point was that she communicated from her own perspective instead of his.

Lots of effort, but zero of the information that mattered.

The default is always "me."

Communicating from your own perspective is the path of least resistance. You know your product. You know your features. You know what you're excited about. So that's what comes out.

But admins doesn't care about any of that, not yet. They care about themselves, their problems, their budgets and deadlines, and their superiors. And rightfully so. They're the buyer. They're the one you're trying to reach.

The nanny applicants knew their own credentials better than they knew my situation.

The nurse knew her traffic better than she knew Justin’s morning.

And most email marketers know their product better than they know their target audience.

What you want to say and what they need to hear, is where you lose people.

I teach a whole lesson on you-focused messaging in my email marketing course, and the first thing I tell students is asking what does this person, at this moment, need?

When you answer that question first and every time, your subject lines get sharper, intros skip the niceties, and CTAs stop feeling pushy.

You're pointing toward something the reader already wants.

And if you want to go deeper on you-focused messaging, check out Inbox Haven.​

That's it for me this week. See you next Wednesday.

And as always, I'm rooting for you, Kelly