Email Valhalla

Steve Jobs’s highly influential way of business thinking

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Anyone can put something together, slap a price on it, spend some money on advertising, and get people to buy it as long as the price is low enough.

But few can create something their target audience not just wants, but desperately needs, allowing them to sell it effortlessly at almost any price of their choosing.

This holds true regardless of the market you’re in.

The moment price becomes the main differentiator between your product and that of your competitors is the moment you lose.

“Ok”, you ask, “so how do I create a product my audience desperately needs?” you may ask.

Except that’s the wrong question.

Instead, you should ask, “How do I get to know my customers better than they know themselves?”

This is the kind of thinking I once heard Steve Jobs talk about in an interview when asked what kind of technology he and his team had been working on (and contributed to society) for the past decade—this question was asked in a “prove my you’re better than your competitors” kind of way.

Jobs immediately pointed out how this “technology first” kind of thinking was an extremely flawed way of doing business.

Instead of thinking “What technology can I create and how can I sell it?”, every business should ask themselves, “How can I deliver the best customer experience?”.

Once you answered that, only then is it time to ask yourself “What technology do I need to make it happen?”.

Who knows, maybe you already have everything that’s required.

Either way, this will set you up correctly.

Coincidentally, even though this interview is publicly available for everyone to watch, interpret, and learn from on YouTube (and has been for many, many years), still so many people spend weeks, months, even years creating something to sell, never bothering to think how the customer will benefit from it or if they even need it at all, only to have to figure out how they’re going to sell it once they’re done building the product.

Anyway.

While I’m unable to help you discover how to best help your target audience, I do know one of the best ways to do so is by staying in frequent contact with your customers.

One way to do so, which my biased ass highly recommends to you, is by writing simple, efficient, and entertaining emails on a daily basis.

If that sounds like something you’d want to do, then check out Email Valhalla here to learn more: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


Star Wars is racist

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Not everyone seemed to enjoy Star Wars when it was first released back in 1977.

Even though it was an immediate success and raked in insane amounts of money, the likes of which had almost never been seen before.

More specifically.

Some critics called the movie “as simple as black and white—and not in a good way,” even going as far as writing “The blockbuster, bestselling movie Star Wars is one of the most racist movies ever produced.”

Another criticism read, “The force of evil in Star Wars is dressed in all black and has the voice of a black man… That character reinforces the old stereotype that black is evil.”

Here’s another example (taken word for word from the book George Lucas by Brian Jay Jones):

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Another critic even ‘pointed out’ that the two droids acted, and were treated, like slaves, all the way down to being sold to a young white man they called “Master”.

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Seriously, I wish I was making this stuff up.

This proves to me one thing and one thing only.

People will hate you no matter what. The more successful you are, the more the hatred will become.

There’s just no pleasing everyone.

One of my favorite quotes (and guiding principles) I’ve learned in the past year is from the great Dan Kennedy himself: “If you haven’t offended anyone by noon each day, you’re not marketing hard enough.”

The more I grow and learn, the more I realize how true this is.

Don’t believe me?

Try it out yourself. The next email you write, the next post you share, or the next podcast you’re on, try sharing your opinion about something controversial without holding back. Truly express your opinion. Don’t sugarcoat it one bit.

Yes, you’ll get backlash, yes people will take offense.

But those people weren’t your audience anyway.

What’s more important is how much more trustworthy you’ll be to the people that matter.

And if you’d like more email tips like this, then check out Email Valhalla here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


In need of a new fantasy book to read

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It’s that time again.

I’ve finished reading A Clash Of Kings, the second book in the A Song of Fire And Ice series, also known as Game of Thrones.

The book itself was about 800 pages, which shouldn’t have taken me that long.

But I have this habit of always reading multiple books at once—around 8–12 most of the time.

Why do I do this?

It helps me to stay disciplined in my reading habit. Whenever I don’t feel like reading a certain book, I’ve got a handful of others to choose from.

So no matter what mood I’m in or if I don’t feel like reading a specific book that day, I’ll still get my daily reading in (A nice and rather unexpected consequence is how it also helps me make better connections between different topics I’m reading about)

Doing it this way allows me to get through a lot more reading each month than I would otherwise.

The secret isn’t to read fast (I’d argue reading slower is better), nor is it to spend half your day reading.

No.

The secret is best described by the man, the myth, the legend, Rocky Balboa himself, when training Adonis in the movie Creed.

“One step at a time, one punch at a time, one round at a time.”

And so it is for reading, business, and life as a whole.

The goal for most important things in life isn’t to win, it’s to keep playing the game one step at a time.

Another way I’ve been applying this “one step at a time” mentality is with email.

Just one simple email a day, for months, years, or even decades straight has the power to change your entire life.

So why not give it a try yourself?

Check out Email Valhalla here to see what all the fuss is about: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


How to enjoy doing the stuff you dislike

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A fair warning first.

I’m no psychologist, therapist, or any other type of person who formally studied any of this.

I can only tell you about my experience.

But if you pick something you don’t enjoy doing (yet don’t absolutely despise doing either) and just do a lot of it?

Well then you’ll slowly but surely start becoming better at it.

A lot better even in certain cases.

You’ll start to discover the hidden intricacies of the skill you’re pursuing and you’ll start to appreciate everything you’re doing—and can do—a whole lot more.

Which almost always leads to you starting to like and sometimes even come to love what you’re doing.

It’s extremely rare that your enjoyment doesn’t increase when you actually put in the time and effort to develop the skillset and understanding that goes along with what you’re doing.

And so it is for writing emails (or any other form of writing even).

The more you do it, the better you’ll become, and the more fun you’ll have.

This brings me to remind you of my flagship course Email Valhalla which will show you how to write extremely quick and easy emails that get you paid and keep your readers reading for years to come.

Check it out here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


Brandon Sanderson’s 3-question character writing rule

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The quality of a story depends almost entirely upon the quality of the characters and their development.

Even more so if your story is told from the perspective of one main character the audience follows throughout the story. No matter how deep you explore real-life relatable topics, how detailed your worldbuilding is, how new and exciting your magic system is, or how epic your large-scale battles are, none of it will help you if the characters are lifeless, unrelatable, and devoid of true meaning, emotion, or ambition.

Writing good characters, however, is a whole art in itself.

But, luckily you can get almost 80% of the way there by simply asking yourself the following three questions, which I’ve first heard mentioned by Brandon Sanderson, best-selling author known for his works such as the Mistborn series or the Stormlight Archive (as well as many, many more):

  1. What does your character desperately want?

  2. What does your character need?

  3. Why can’t they have both?

Answering this will not only set you up with a good, lifelike character, but if done correctly, it could potentially help you create your entire story from start to finish with just these three questions in mind.

More.

You could ask the same question about your readers/customers/clients/whoever and come up with interesting and valuable information about how to 1) treat them as best you can and 2) dramatically improve your business because of it.

Hell, I’d even argue this could be the base of your entire marketing strategy.

  1. What does your average customer want?

  2. What does he actually need?

  3. What stopping you from giving them both of these?

Figure out the answers to these questions, entice your customers with what they think they want, then include the thing they actually want, and you’ll have yourself your golden ticket to success.

Let’s take you as an example.

I’m guessing, since you’re on my email list, you’d want to earn more money selling your own products, books, courses, art, services, whatever. But what you actually need is a simple and reliable way to get your stuff in front of your target audience so you can make sales while focusing on the stuff you do best—creating.

Well, the thing that’s been stopping me so far from giving you both is the fact that my paid ad course (which would give you both of these things) isn’t out yet… but it’s almost here!

All that’s left to do is for you to wait a little while longer and for me to finish the last bits and pieces of the course.

So definitely keep an eye out for that.

In the meantime, check out my flagship course, Email Valhalla, which makes for an extremely powerful—and profitable—addition on top of said paid ads course I’ll be releasing shortly.

Click here to learn more about Email Valhalla: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


The best confusing piece of advice for new and upcoming writers

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When asked about advice for new and upcoming writers, the great George R. R. Martin often goes into a story about how, when he was still a “new and upcoming writer”, he’d get advice along the lines of, “Write what you know.”

This always confused him.

Because here he is, wanting to write about dragons, medieval empires, large-scale military battles, lots of politics, shady spy networks, and all kinds of weird and ancient magic. Yet he’s told to “write what he knows”, which, strangely enough, doesn’t include any of the above, let alone dragons and magic.

Fair enough, right?

But it wasn’t until George got older, wiser, and more experienced that he truly started to understand the meaning and intention behind “Write what you know”.

It’s not so much about the big central topic as it is about the underlying emotions and relationships that carry the story—after all, as the great Chris Claremont, who single-handedly revived the entire X-Men series when nobody thought anything of it and turned it into the giant that it is today, used the say, “the fights are bullshit”

For example:

You might not know anything about dragons, magic, or the ruling of kingdoms but you might know how it feels to be disconnected from a loved one, to be scared to death not knowing if you’ll ever see a relative again during a period of war and chaos, to be raised in a broken family full of alcohol and abuse, or even to do everything you can, hoping for someone to tell you they’re proud of you, only it feels like nothing is ever good enough.

Those are the things you know which you should write about.

Do this right and other people will be able to relate to a dragon-riding, empire-ruling, 5,000-year-old vampire assassin. Because it’s never about what’s on the cover. It’s always been about what’s underneath.

Coincidentally, “Write what you know” isn’t only good fiction writing advice.

It’s good writing advice in general, including writing emails that get you paid and keep your readers coming back day after day.

If that’s something you’d like to learn more about, then check out Email Valhalla here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


My long-forgotten past of playing the social media content creator

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I used to be active on Twitter (I’m never calling it X) for over a year until I got banned and then player around on LinkedIn for a while.

But I’m no longer active on either.

Or any other social media for that matter.

I realized that I don’t actually enjoy the whole social media content creator thing as much anymore. A lot of stuff I read feels (and often is) fake.

It’s all the same dumbed-down information (if it isn’t outright BS advice that’s actively hurting every single person who’s reading it).

Don’t get me wrong.

Social media can be a good thing. It’s a tool like any other, after all.

It’s probably one of the best practice fields for newcomers.

But it shouldn’t be the only thing people depend on. In fact, you shouldn’t depend on it at all.

I’ve seen so many people fall into the social media echo chamber only never to get out again. They skip (or simply forget to learn) so many business fundamentals necessary for their career.

But that’s not even the worst part.

What’s by far the biggest danger is how it feels like you’re doing stuff and achieving something, while in reality, you probably aren’t.

Likes, shares, and follows feels nice. Sure. And so do, one-off clients here and there.

But recurring and predictable revenue, something most social media content creators don’t have, is a whole lot nicer.

So how do you get recurring and predictable revenue?

Well, some ways include but are not limited to, running paid ads, getting on podcasts, driving traffic to your website, writing articles, working on SEO, getting referrals, and so on.

The key here is, however, to make your email list the center of everything.

As the saying goes, “All roads lead to email”.

And if you want to learn how to build and monetize that email list effectively, then check out Email Valhalla here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


The social media game is fake.

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Attention is the new currency of our current time.

Whoever gathers the most attention, wins.

And so everyone is fighting to get a piece of it—as am I right now with this email you’re reading.

There’s no way around it.

You could say it’s wrong, there’s definitely an argument to be made for it. But how are you going to spread your message without gathering attention? How are you going to make an impact and make positive changes in the world?

Bottom line: getting attention isn’t evil.

But let me warn you about this: everyone on social media is playing the same game.

As with everything, there are evergreen strategies to get engagement and capture attention. One of those is to pick a fight. To choose an enemy and attack them. It can be anything: people, concepts, trends, ideas, beliefs, whatever you want. The more popular, the better.

Controversy gets attention. Controversy sells.

Which means people are fighting all the time. Coffee, morning routines, cold outreach, 4am club, cold showers, cohorts, daily emails, meditation, tweet templates, platitudes, ‘authenticity’, storytelling, copywriting, 18-year-old life coaches, best and worst markets to be in, unhealthy mindsets,…

The list goes on.

This is the sad cycle of social media:

Something rises in popularity → A lot of people talk highly about it → It becomes hugely popular → people start attacking it for attention → attacking it becomes popular → the thing itself is unpopular again → people start defending it again because now that’s the ‘unpopular’ thing to do (which gets attention) → it becomes popular again.

And the cycle repeats.

What I’m trying to say is that you’ll always have people hating everything on social media—it quite literally pays to start new fights and pick new enemies.

The only way to get out of this mess?

Building your own world. Doing your own thing.

The #1 worst mistake you can make is to listen to other people’s advice. Seriously.

Experiment with stuff you come across, get inspired by others, try stuff you think is cool, and stick with it.

Don’t let other people tell you what you can post and what you can’t. Don’t let other people tell you what’s going to make you successful and what won’t. And don’t let other people tell you how many emails you can send before people ‘get annoyed’ at you. Test it out and go see it for yourself.

If you think sending daily emails sounds stupid, boring, a waste of time, then don’t listen to me and do your own thing.

But if you think sending daily emails to get paid sounds cool, exciting, and something you’d like to test out for yourself, then check out Email Valhalla here to learn more: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


If it’s mainstream, it’s wrong

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As a general rule of thumb, I believe that everything "for the masses" is dumbed down, lacks refinement, and is devoid of intrinsic meaning, value, or thought.

That goes for everything from movies, music, and yes, even (especially) the stuff you learn from your favorite big-name guru or whatever’s written inside that New York Times bestseller everyone’s been yapping about for years.

Let me clarify.

Everyone’s different in some way or another.

Everyone has different likes, beliefs, interests, tastes, opinions, and many other things that shape a person into who they are. Whether this is because of their surroundings, their genes, or something else entirely doesn’t matter in this case.

People are different, and there’s no getting around it.

We, as a species, simply can’t collectively agree with anything (even with this statement—proving the point in the process, as paradoxical as that sounds).

So, to circle back to why this matters, if people are all different, and they can’t agree with anything, then everything that’s trying to appeal to as many people as possible (aka, anything that gets a lot of attention and praise by tons of people—which is always by designs, don’t let anyone convince you otherwise) has to be made as general, as widely accepted, and as simple as possible.

Or in other words.

It has to be dumbed down to the point where it’s (almost—nothing is absolute) devoid of value for any single individual—no matter the lie they tell themself or the lies other people/society are instilling into them (cognitive dissonance is one hell of a force, I’m telling you).

There’s a lot going on here.

Many forces are at play.

Each of these could arm me with many, many emails to talk about each of them in detail.

This email is one of the least precise, and most vague ones I’ve written in a while, by design, because of the nature of the topic.

As with anything, if any of this tickled your fancy, got you interested in something, both positive or negative, whether you agree with what I wrote or not, I advise you to go do some research on your own.

Educate yourself on the words and principles talked about in this email (as well as those I haven’t mentioned), come up with a hypothesis of what’s going on on your own, try to test & design some theories. Then finally see how they stack up with the examples you come across.

Or don’t and just reply with an angry email telling me I’m wrong because you said so—that seems to be what the cool kids do nowadays.

But enough about that.

I don’t have anything to offer to you that’s “for the masses”. Instead I have useful, valuable, and insightful training information that’ll help you write better converting emails to grow your list and sell more products (or services, whatever floats your goats).

You can find out more about that by clicking this link: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


I freed myself from using social media to grow my business

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Here’s how I did it:

The first thing I did was create and host my very own WordPress site on which I could publish all of my emails online.

Combine this with learning some SEO basics (a whole lot less than you might think) to get visitors to my page and teasing Email Valhalla course on sign-up… and you’ve already got a semi-passively (I still have to write the emails after all) functioning business right there.

Not only that, but I’ll keep earning based on past emails I’ve written—emails that will only grow in numbers and get better in quality the more I write.

To me there’s truly no better business model out there.

Find me another business where you can earn a living by writing whenever you want, from wherever you want, all the while helping people accomplish their own dreams, getting thank-you emails on the regular, and, last but not least, doing all of this without an income ceiling limited by any one resource such as time, distribution, money, or costs.

I’m not saying other business are bad (they’re not), or people doing things differently are stupid (they aren’t).

Just saying that’s not the way I like to run things.

I like to keep it simple, efficient, and with a freedom-first aspect.

Anyway.

If you’re only using social media to grow your business, you’re seriously missing out.

Go get your online real estate up and running.

And if you’re not even building your own email list yet, what are you waiting for?

Check out Email Valhalla today and get started right away: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla