Relationship Marketing

Never show weakness

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For some reason, the so-called “social media experts” love circle jerking about how important it is to show vulnerability and to share your mistakes.

This would create relatability with your reader and better your engagement, increasing your success. Or so they say at least…

Yet sharing your mistakes, showing vulnerability, and being open and “authentic”, as they call it, which is the complete opposite of true authenticity if you think about it… The only thing that would do is create doubt, distrust, and possibly even disgust in the minds of your readers.

Sure, some people might end up “relating”, whatever the hell that means, or even sympathizing with you. But people don’t buy out of sympathy—and those that do often feel awful about it afterward, most often even cheated.

You don’t build a business out of sympathy.

“But Alex, I’ve seen some of my favorite creators share their flaws, their mistakes, and their misfortune before and it got great results, I even loved it myself!”, you might complain.

Ah yes. These types of stories do happen. Often part of their infamous “origin story”, which includes, but is not limited to, having to sleep on the couch, or worse, “the floor!”, in a crappy office they’ve hired, losing all of their social connections, thinking everything is over, only to just then, at that almost poetic timing, meet an unknown mentor, pick up an obscure book, or figure out some crazy method that suddenly catapulted them into riches and success.

Or something along those lines.

Anyway, the point remains. Those are carefully, even more carefully than a bomb squad might approach a suspicious backpack in the middle of the town’s square, crafted stories with attention to specific details and especially specific outcomes.

Namely.

Those stories all share a happy ending. An overcoming of the obstacles in front of them. A true underdog story.

These (often made-up, or at least highly altered to fit the necessary message) stories aren’t a rich collection of their mistakes, their flaws, and vulnerabilities. These stories are, in fact, a manifesto of their ideology, a tale to show their extreme perseverance, untapped potential, can-do attitude, otherwordly creative thinking prowess, and everything else necessary to show how incredible of a human being they just so happen to be.

After all, a flaw isn’t a flaw if it can be turned into a positive outcome.

Because let’s be honest.

Nobody buys from a homeless nutjob preaching the healing powers of moon-infused special rocks that hold the body to shape your body like that of Arnold Schwarzenegger without so much as lifting your butt off the couch. But if that same nutjob, preaching those same scientifically dubious rocks, just so happened to have overcome immense odds, built their dreamlife, and appears to be successful solely due to the discovery of these life-altering rocks, then maybe, just maybe, possibly even more than maybe, maybe even quite certainly, you’d be willing to make the leap of faith and trade your hard-earned pocket money in favor for some rocks infused with metaphysical powers, and quite certainly a weird but soothing smell that comes along with it.

Anyway, I don’t know what these special rocks have to do with anything, or even where my imagination came from.

But I hope the point is clear.

People want to believe in someone they can look up to. Someone who seems so far ahead of them, almost blessed by holy powers, someone they can put on a pedestal, carefully listen to, learn from, and be told what to do and how to do it, hoping they can perhaps achieve a similar level of success— or even a sliver of theirs would be enough.

These people don’t “make mistakes”.

Now, if this message doesn’t suit you, if it doesn’t sound “authentic”, then that’s fine. I’m just sharing a message. Don’t shoot the messenger, even though that’s what happens most of the time historically speaking—quite a strange saying then, huh?

But just know and be aware of the dangers that lie behind the ever-so-common piece of advice of “sharing your flaws”.

If you still want to come across as “real” and “authentic”, whatever that means to you, then I’d suggest you check out Email Valhalla, where I give you actual sound and tested advice on how to do so through your writing, without resorting to sharing your flaws or coming up with weird, often shrewd and ill-intentioned, origin stories.

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


Bubbles

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Newsletters (and email lists by extension) are undoubtedly a big bubble right now and have been for a while now.

In fact, I’d argue in a few year’s time about 80% of all newsletters will disappear, either on their own or because people get tired of them and unsubscribe.

Case in point: most people always start by subscribing to 10-20 newsletters but trim them down to a select 2-3 a year later.

So what's the takeaway?

You need to stand out and be memorable while you still can. The goal is to end up along those 2-3 email lists people stay subscribed to.

Meaning everything you do should be with the following thought in mind, "how do I become the most memorable in my reader’s mind?".

That means:

1) be original
2) go against the grain
3) send often, the more the merrier

And no, people won't get tired of seeing you in their inbox, I'm living proof of that. (sometimes send 20+ emails in a week and nobody complains)

That said.

There’s a right way and a wrong way to go about it and write emails. Do it wrong and in the best-case scenario it’ll take you months, if not years to make any meaningful progress. Worst-case scenario, you’ll burn out, start blaming the system or the market, believe it’s all a scam, and give up before anything good happens.

Make sure you do it right by studying the fundamentals I teach in Email Valhalla.

Click here for more information about Email Valhalla: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla/


Running some sneaky “experiments”

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In the past, I’ve run some sneaky “experiments”.

More precisely.

I deliberately wouldn’t send an email at the “usual” time I send them.

Why?

Well, I once heard Josh Spector, who runs a 40,000+ email list called For The Interested, mention in an interview a little tactic to see whether you really have “fans” on your list.

Or if it’s just a bunch of readers who don’t really care much about you.

The tactic?

Don’t send an email for a day—or send one a lot later than you normally would.

Then just wait and see whether people will message you asking about your missing email. If you do get one or more of these questions, then you’re doing it right (remember, if one person asks something, a hundred are thinking it).

So that’s what I did once in a while.

And lo and behold.

I usually receive a few such questions (obviously not from the same people because they already know this happens).

But doing so shows you the power of daily email and building that relationship.

That said.

If you’d like to learn how to build a relationship with your reader by writing simple, yet entertaining, daily emails that just so happen to get you paid in the meantime as well…

Well then look no further than my flagship course Email Valhalla.

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


Email daily, you lazy bum

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For reasons beyond my understanding, some people don’t like to hear this.

But it needs to be said: The more emails you write, the more money you’ll make. It really is that simple.

There’s no secret trick, no special method, no crazy life hack.

You email more, you earn more.

You have to realize that most people, especially when they’re new to a market, will subscribe to a bunch of different newsletters and email lists.

Almost nobody stands out from the get-go (and that’s ok).

But now imagine that, after they subscribed to a whole bunch of email lists, out of everyone, you’re the only one sending daily emails—something that could very well be the case, since most people don’t bother.

In that case one of two things will happen:

1) They get annoyed and bored of your emails and unsubscribe. This is a good thing because they would never buy anything worthwhile from you, anyway. They don’t see the value in what you’re giving them, so they would never spend a dime on any of your products. It’s good to rid yourself of these people and only keep the people who understand the value of what you offer.

2) They see your name 7x as much as all the other people and build a relationship with you that’s 10–20 times stronger because you’re the only one who’s putting in the constant effort to show up and check in on them. You’re giving value and entertaining them day-in, day-out.

Already they’re much more likely to buy from you than from anyone else.

On top of that, eventually—and this happens to everyone—they get tired of getting so many emails from all these different people, and they’ll unsubscribe to most of the email lists they’ve subscribed to. But because you’ve spent so much time building a relationship with them, you’re one of the few that they’ll keep reading daily—if not the only one.

At that time you don’t have any competition anymore and you win simply because you showed up every single day.

On top of those examples. You’ll be the person who improves the fastest (you’re getting more practice in after all).

Not only that, you’ll also be seen as the one and only true expert—even a leader. While everyone claims to be the expert. Only you’ve put in the work to prove it.

So start emailing daily today.

And if you’re not sure where to start, then check out my flagship course Email Valhalla here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla/


Abracadabra, here I am!

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You may (or may not) have noticed that I didn’t write an email yesterday.

That was intentional.

See, I wanted to test something.

More specifically.

I wanted to test how healthy and developed my relationship and close connection is to my readers. It turns out, it’s quite healthy.

Today, I woke up to a handful of people pointing out that they didn’t receive an email yesterday and they wanted to see if something went wrong (either on my end or theirs).

While a handful of people doesn’t sound like a lot, you must remember: if one person asks it, dozens more are thinking it.

So that’s an easy way to confirm whether I’m taking up “mental real estate” in people’s heads—and apparently, I am.

If you’ve got a medium where you’re keeping constant connection with your audience, then try this “experiment” out yourself. See whether people notice if you stopped tweeting, posting, emailing, podcasting, or whatever else you might do, just for one day.

The results may very well surprise you and you might learn something new about the routine-like relationship you have with your audience.

As one long-time reader once told me (paraphrased), “Your emails are like getting up to have a quick chat with a friendly co-worker at the water cooler”.

And that’s a good place to be.

Anyway.

If you’d like to learn more how you can build a deep relationship powered by constant connection with your audience, especially when it comes to email, then I suggest you check out Email Valhalla.

Click here to find out more: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


How to set your empire on fire and live to fight another day

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Many tales are told about the Roman emperor Nero.

Such as the story of how Nero supposedly set fire to his own majestic imperial capital. A fire that we to this day refer to as the Great Fire of Rome, which occurred on the night of July 19, AD 64.

Yet it’s likely that almost none of it is true.

That’s the premise of one of the books I picked up up a year ago while paying a visit to the Gallo-Roman Museum.

I don’t exactly remember who mentioned it, but I once came across a rule somewhere mentioning the benefits of forcing yourself to buy at least one book every time you enter a bookshop. It doesn’t matter which book. Just one. The first one that catches your eye.

You’ll learn lots of cool stuff you wouldn’t have otherwise.

It so happened that the museum had a bookshop. And so I had to get myself a book. I couldn’t decide between 2, so I just bought both of them.

Trajan by Nicholas Jackson and Rome is Burning by Anthony A. Barrett.

Both are fascinating reads and I’d recommend them to everyone slightly interested in history or the Roman Empire.

But back to Nero.

He’s commonly been called a tyrant who ruled with ruthless impulsiveness. Yet, for most of his rule, he was, in fact, liked by the general populace of Rome.

The people loved him. He did good things. He entertained the people. He often took part in plays and would sing together with the other performers.

Nero was a liked and popular emperor.

Yet his popularity plummeted after the fire because of all the rumors. Rumors of how he started the fire. Rumors of his lack of leadership and correct behavior. Some rumors stated he himself started the fire, others stated he could be seen singing on his balcony while Rome stood burning for 6 days straight.

Whatever the case was, he didn’t rule—or even live—much longer after that.

Was Nero to blame for all of this? Did he deserve it? Was he actually insane and tyrannical? Was his popularity and gentleness before nothing more than a facade?

We will never know.

But one thing we do know is this: he could’ve used some lessons on personal branding.

You see. Being the emperor of Rome or building your own brand isn’t all that different. There’s a huge importance in maintaining a strong and likable image, building a strong connection with your ‘audience’, and even building your own world to ensure you’re unreplaceable and effectively ‘cancel-proof’.

Perhaps, if Nero knew what we know today, his people would have continued loving him, regardless of whether he caused the Great Fire and executed his family members.

Clearly Nero didn’t succeed in doing so. But that doesn’t mean you can’t succeed either.

And in my humble, yet accurate and proven opinion, there’s no better way to build a good relationship with your readers than by staying in constant connection with them through frequent emails.

You can’t even come close to understanding how powerful this constant connection is until you’ve experienced it yourself.

And if you’d like some pointers on how to get started the right way, while getting paid and building your creative business alongside it, then you might want to check out Email Valhalla.

Click here for more information: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


Action-packed titles all suffer from the same problems

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Have you ever watched a movie or an episode of something that included a fight scene, yet found it extremely boring to watch?

I know I have.

One of the best well-known (and modern) examples I can give is the latest John Wick film. Now, don’t get me wrong. I loved the series. It’s a great movie, with top-tier moments, and I very much enjoyed watching it… but not because of the fighting/shooting scenes. Those scenes simply took too long and there were too many of them.

If you’ve seen one of them, you’ve seen all of them.

More.

Even Chris Claremont, the famous comic book writer who single-handedly took it upon himself to take X-Men, one of Marvel’s worst-performing titles back then which nobody cared about, and was on the brink of cancellation, to one of the most recognized, well-known, and best-performing comic book series of all time, resulting in tons of storylines, dozens of media adaptions, hundreds of toy lines, video games, and so, so much more, once told an interviewer, “To me, the fights are bullshit”.

Yes, the creator of one of the most successful action-packed comic book series of all time thought the fights were bullshit. All he cared about were the emotional relationships between the characters, how they interacted with the world, and the consequences these emotions had.

And so it goes in almost every other form of fiction as well.

A good fight is nothing else but an opportunity to further the plot or the emotional relationship between characters, developing them as people in the process.

That’s also why the lightsaber fights in the Star Wars prequels are often criticized as being lackluster and much worse than the original trilogy, even though the prequels had better choreography with much more flashy moves and a more dramatic and exciting setting… but they didn’t carry the same emotional baggage as the original trilogy did, nor did they further the plot most of the time.

So the fights, were in fact, bullshit.

Even more.

This isn’t just about fiction.

It perfectly applies to business as well—with one slight difference. This time it’s not “the fights are bullshit” but instead, “the value is bullshit”.

Just as any beginner fiction writer makes the mistake of thinking the fights are the end-all-be-all, so does the beginner marketer make the mistake of thinking the value is all that matters.

Spoiler alert: is doesn’t.

In fact, it’s probably not even in the top 10 of things that matter. What matters more is the relationship you have with your reader/viewer/listener/customer, the relationship they have with your offers, the mindset (inherently different than pure “how-to value”) you bring, the motivation you give, the opportunity to think differently, the feeling of being understood, the community to be a part of, and the “World” you welcome them in with open arms (as well as the barriers you put up to keep the people you don’t want as far away from your world as you possibly can).

So the next time someone comes to you, shouting “Provide more value!!”, probably expecting you to give it all away for free as well, then know…

They don’t know what they’re talking about and you’re simply better than them.

As to how to get even better yourself and learn how to actually write content that gets you sales and keeps people reading every day (without resorting to “giving more value”), then check out Email Valhalla here: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


The Wolverine teaches business

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I rewatched Logan—the Wolverine movie—a few days ago.

And while this isn’t the first time I realized it, it made me think about how much your current state of mind or current interests and curiosities shape the way you look at everything you see and hear.

Here’s what I mean.

The movie revolves around Wolverine—an otherwise insane mutant whose abilities include having razor-sharp claws he can extend and retract out of his knuckles at will as well as super-human regeneration, aka, everything he gets wounded, it’ll heal almost immediately—making him virtually unkillable.

But that’s not what we see in Logan.

No in the film we learn that the Adamantium—the metal that’s fused with his skeleton and what his claws are made from—inside his body has been poisoning him, making it so he’s slower, weaker, slowly dying, and only barely regenerates.

What does this have to do with anything?

See, this time around while watching, my mind immediately went “oh wow, that’s a great marketing lesson”.

Let me explain.

When building a business, if done right, you can make it so you can steal Wolverine’s power of super-human regeneration, or in business terms, you can survive, recover from, potentially even thrive, from everything that happens to you if you’ve got your foundations right (such as building a great relationship with your customers, backing up your list, and making sure you stay in constant contact through email).

But, and this is a big but.

You can still get sick, your business can still deteriorate and lose its powers…

When the disease finds itself on the inside.

If you’re making mistakes, if you’re messing things up, if you don’t understand your business fundamentals or your vital marketing principles, then your business doesn’t stand a chance.

So there.

A lesson from the man, the myth, the legend, Logan, The Wolverine, himself.

Anyway.

One of the best ways I know, according to my biased, but experienced and more-than-qualified self, is through my flagship course Email Valhalla.

Click this link for more information: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla/


Why I don’t mention my promotions on social media

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Nor do I even try to sell any of my products (let alone even mention them).

Here’s why:

See, my reasoning is twofold.

First, I simply can’t be bothered.

Yes I’m certain I could earn more money, sign more clients, and sell more products if I were to mention and actively sell on my timeline.

But I don’t enjoy doing so.

And seeing as how ‘enjoyment’ is one of my 3 main business pillars, alongside simplicity and freedom, that should already be reason enough.

But still.

The second reason, and a more “reasonable” answer for some perhaps, is that this is my way of giving something back to everyone on my list.

I’m intentionally limiting the people who have access to my products, services, promotions, and bonuses to those on my email list.

Yes obviously I’m creating content, writing emails, offering services, and coming up with valuable products because I want to get paid.

I need to eat after all.

But I’m not desperate to get paid—there’s a true superpower in taking the approach of “no matter whether you buy my stuff or not, I’m eating steak either way”.

I don’t just accept anyone and everyone as a customer. I just simply don’t allow just about anyone to give me money.

I’m very selective about that.

I can count more clients I refused to work with than I can the ones I did.

That doesn’t bother me.

Maybe you’re calling me crazy right now (and you know, maybe I am, who knows?) But still, I’d call you inexperienced in the way of dealing with clients. You have no idea how enjoyable it is to work with good clients and how absolutely awful and outright painful it is to work with your average Joe.

In a sense, you could say I’m not trying to build a business.

I’m building a lifestyle—one that’s enjoyable at all times.

And that requires extreme filtering.

If you’re not filtering (heavily) in your business, I can all but guarantee you’re not enjoying it.

So, let me ask you.

What sort of filters do you have in place in your business?

And if you’d like to learn how you can run a successful business while limiting the number of people who even get the chance to buy from you, then you might want to check out Email Valhalla.

Click here to see what I’m talking about: https://alexvandromme.com/valhalla


Getting a thank you is useless if you’re not getting paid

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Adding to yesterday’s email of realizing the people who engage with your content aren’t the people who most enjoy it, there’s something else, something highly valuable and important, I thought about.

It didn’t exactly fit the theme and adding it to yesterday’s email would only make things more complicated.

Plus I found it valuable enough to give it its own email.

So here it is:

Being liked doesn’t matter, being respected does.

See, many people want to be liked (which goes hand in hand with getting a lot of engagement on their posts). They’re constantly in need of getting confirmation that what they’re doing is good, and they’re sharing awesome stuff. They want people to tell them how much they love what they’re doing and thank them all the time.

Get them a few naysayers and all hell breaks loose.

I hate to break it to you though, but ‘being’ liked doesn’t pay the bills. Being respected does.

What this means is, people will give compliments to the guy they like, they’ll engage with him, reply to all his stuff, and tell him how amazing his content is, but when it gets down to actually taking out their credit cards and buying some new product they’ve been eyeing for a while, they’ll always purchase from the guy they respect rather than the one they like.

In fact, there’s something to be said that your biggest haters and dislikes are actually your most valuable customers, but that’s something for another time.

Now, I don’t know about you but I’d rather be respected than liked if it meant actually getting paid (in real-life money, not imaginary likes or thank you’s) for what I do.

So how do you go about it?

Well, there are many ways to be respected.

But if I were to name one, just one, that you could start doing today, without any issues, without much work, that’ll have an almost immediate effect, and will keep increasing its effect until nobody dares not to respect you, let alone compete with you, for months, years, even decades (not saying you’ll have to do it for decades, just showing you the absolute power of this), then it would have to be, without a doubt, the act of mailing your list daily, showing up day after day, showing who’s the boss, sharing something every day, never taking any shit, proving you know your shit, and doing it your way.

I know, it ain’t exciting.

It’s nothing new.

But it’s by far the best, most effective, and, dare I say, fastest way to become respected instead of merely being liked (something that isn’t as valuable as you might think at first).

Anyway.

To learn more about the most effective way to send daily emails, build up a reputation, show your readers you know your shit, and do it in a manner that’s easy, simple, and doesn’t take any time whatsoever, but has massive effects for you, both in the short-run as in the long-run, then check out Email Valhalla.

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