Last week I was in court, here's what happened

It’s 1:14 a.m. I just got done writing 42 tweets, 5 long forms, 3 micro articles, and 5 emails.

I won’t lie, my brain is fried, so excuse me if this email feels like it’s all over the place.

But this topic has been bugging me for a while now and I think it’s time to finally address it.

And to make things feel more out of place, let’s role-play like we’re in a court hearing.

“Your Honor, the creator in front of the readers here is being charged for annoying their audience because of the garbage newsletter they’re running and if found guilty, they should delete it and be sentenced to jail'“

The audience gasps for air, shocked, and whispers loudly to one another.

“How could Hussain, be accusing another creator of not running a newsletter?” — said one of the people in the audience.

I’m telling you this because I’m signed up for many newsletters (mainly from other creators I know) and most of them suck.

Now, by no means am I saying that I’m better than them at writing emails, I’m just saying from a reader’s POV their emails are useless.

Before you go around X and tell people that I am a hypocrite, let me explain my argument.

‘Your Honor, a newsletter, should do 1 of 3 things:’

1. Offer deeper insights about what you talk about and go deeper on a specific problem

2. Offer something exclusive to your email subscribers (if your emails are the same as your LF posts, then why should people care to sign up for your newsletter?)

3. You want to have a space to practice persuasive writing without worrying about the algorithm (and without using the same format as writing long-form because you become a better writer by practicing different methods of writing).

But most creators’ newsletters are surface-level ideas, copy/paste their emails to X almost immediately, and write their emails the same way as writing long-form posts.

Now do you see what I mean?

(Btw we’ll go into more detail about each problem in a bit)

If you feel like I called you out. Good. You probably need to hear the rest of this argument.

But before I start laying down my hammer and presenting my bulletproof argument, I want to clear some more misconceptions about newsletters.

Misconception #1: Emails are the best place to monetize and sell your offer.

This is true for the most part, but you can still monetize without having a newsletter, sending cold DMs, begging others to purchase your offer

You can sell your offer through your content alone. I signed 4 clients through my X posts alone.

@erwanlier makes ~$1,000/mo selling digital products without him promoting his offers and having a newsletter.

He relies on his content to do well, generate profile clicks, get people to click on the link on his bio, and make sales that way.

• Is it an efficient way to monetize your brand? Absolutely not.

• Is it possible and most importantly can you replicate his strategy? Absolutely.

I’ve done it for a while and it worked. I’ve also seen some creators have a CTA for their offers and it worked for them as well.

Misconception #2: Emails are easy to write and don’t take up too much of your time.

They’re easy to write when you know how to write well. Before that it’s hard.

Because writing emails is not like writing on social media.

Writing emails is like having a 1:1 conversation with your reader and you don’t want to be publishing trashy emails. You’ll only ruin your reputation.

And let’s not talk about the extra work that you’ll have to do just because you’re running a newsletter.

I mean you’ll be:

• Publishing on a set schedule

• Writing in-depth content

• Endless hours editing

So no, emails, great emails especially, aren’t easy to write.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s dig into the real problems.

My Bullet Proof Argument.

1) Offer deeper insights about what you talk about and go deeper on a specific problem

I see Justin Welsh doing this extremely well. On X, he talks about solopreneurship and how to start a creator business. But in his emails, he talks about different topics and problems related to solopreneurship:

• Writing content

• Offer creation

• Marketing

• Copywriting

• Personal branding

And much, much more. That’s what I mean by offering deeper insights.

Dan Koe is another example of this, but honestly, I think both, you and I are tired of hearing about his name and what he does, so I’ll save you the trouble and skip him.

2) Exclusive content for your subscribers

Now this gets a bit touchy.

Most people want to repurpose their emails to X (which I get and is something that you should do), but copying and pasting your email to X and posting it without waiting AT LEAST a few months, is wrong.

This feels like you just cheated on your partner.

The audience nods their heads in agreement.

They signed up for your newsletter thinking it’s exclusive content, but turns out your long forms are the same as your emails, so why would they bother staying on your email list?

They can just read it on X and not have you clog their inbox.

3) Having a place to practice your writing without worrying about the algorithm

I’ll break down this down into 2 different points:

1) Not exploring their curiosities:

Most creators, think emails should be related to what you post on social media, but that’s not true.

A lot of my emails were just me sharing what I read online, topics I’m interested in, sharing a piece of advice I wish someone told me, and sometimes they’re rants like these.

The way I like to think about newsletters is having a place to show a different side of you.

A version that doesn’t appear on social media. After all, the people who joined your newsletter did it willingly.

So they’re not here for more ‘value’, they are here because they like YOU. And most probably they like the way you write, see the world, and opinions.

2) Thinking they’re still writing on social media

• 3-5 word sentences

• Bulleted points every 2-3 lines

• Rushing the information and plot

• Sticking to surface-level content and problems.

We then go back to the Exclusive Content Problem, why should people sign up and read your emails, if you’re just going to write them the same way?

Do you not realize that with email the goal is to build trust?

Do you not realize that the point of your newsletter is to break all the social media writing rules that you’re so addicted to?

Do you not realize that the reason you are addicted to short sentences and bulleted points is that you lack the skills to write long, engaging, and persuasive content, so you have to resort to fast-paced content to keep holding their attention?

Do you not realize that by practicing different styles of writing you become a faster, better, and more interesting writer?

If you’re so scared to lose people’s attention early, use this framework:

• Get people to open cuz you have a good headline

• Deliver on the promise you made in the headline ASAP

• Started going deeper into the problem without worrying about them clicking off and thinking that you’re a liar

When you deliver on the promise you made on the headline, you didn’t lie to your readers, and most probably they’ll keep reading, because they can’t stop otherwise all the time they spent on your reading it (even if it was a few seconds) would go to waste.

‘Your Honor, you just heard my argument, what do you think of the creators who do the problems I just mentioned?’

The crowd sits in silence, everyone is anxious. I’m sweating like I just played the final game of the NBA’s playoff.

The crowd is pissed, everyone is swearing at the judge.

The creator on trial is crying cuz they won’t be able to annoy their readers anymore.

I’m running around celebrating like I just hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer and won the game with 1 difference.

This is what victory tastes like…

Session. Over.

Now if you feel like I called you out, or you just started a newsletter, or already have a newsletter but don’t know what to write about, then you might wanna give this a read:

https://joshspector.com/how-to-start-a-newsletter/

See you on Tuesday,

Hussain ‘Saul Goodman’ Ibarra