Hi – Ian here (apparently that's my catch-phrase :o ).

Last email I said that for high-value services you want to avoid doing what most email marketing training recommends: putting pressure on your subscribers to buy.

Flash sales, 5-day cash machines and the like all work for low-value products where a bit of pressure nudges a potential buyer into saying yes.

But for a high-value product or service when someone isn't ready to buy, putting pressure on them pushes them away. It backfires.

So what do you do instead?

The answer is a bit blindingly obvious I'm afraid. But rarely done.

If someone isn't ready to buy, then instead of pushing them to buy, you should get them ready to buy instead.

Unfortunately, getting people ready to buy isn’t easy and it takes time. Which is why most marketing people prefer quick tricks and hacks and “secrets”.

Getting people ready to buy starts with understanding what needs to be in place for your clients to be ready. 

And while there are differences that are unique to your specific situation, the good news is that a lot of it is common across all clients:

• Firstly, people only buy something significant when they believe their problem or goal is big and urgent.
• And if they're going to buy from you they'll want to know that you understand them and their challenges – and that you're on their side.
• To have confidence you'll be able to help, they'll need to see that you have new ideas, insights and experience (new to them at least). And solutions that actually work.
• And for any kind of service they'll want to know that you’re the kind of person they and their team can work with.

And it turns out that these are all things you can get across – or at least make significant progress on – in emails.

I'll talk about how to do it in more detail in future emails, but here are a few examples to get you going:

• Rather than just sending your readers a tip, explain it via a story about how you experienced the problem yourself – or a case study of a client. That'll show your readers you understand them and their challenges.
• Rather than just sending out emails with the same advice as others are giving (no matter how good it is) – focus your tips on the areas where your advice is different.
• Be open in your emails about your beliefs, the causes you champion and the way you believe things should be done. You'll attract people with similar beliefs who want to work with people like you. And just as importantly you'll repel the people you wouldn’t have got on with.

Every email you send needs to be interesting and valuable to your readers – otherwise they won't read them. But in your emails you can also cover so much more that gives your readers what they need to know and feel to be ready to buy from you.

– Ian