Remember the good old days of email marketing when you could just send email to someone and they would actually look forward to receiving it? While it’s true that email marketing was different in the past, I believe there is a case to be made that we are in The Golden Age of email marketing right now…and you can still be a part of it.

My guest this week is someone who knows a lot about how to get the most out of your email marketing. Nathan Barry is the founder of ConvertKit, and he is going to share some simple hacks that will help you become a vital part of the email renaissance.

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When I walk into my office each day, the first thing I see is a pink index card with three words written on it. Those three words are the principles that drive my business daily.

Those words are:

•Presence
•People
•Profit

Presence has two meanings for me: number one, and the most important, is the presence of God. I want to be aware of God's presence every moment of the day. The second meaning of the word presence is being present with people. This is a big deal to me.

The second principle is people. The real foundation of my business is people just like you. No people…no business. But people mean much more to me than that. We all need deep relationships with others and relationships are reciprocal. We need each other. We need people in our lives.

The third principle is profit, because if you don't have a profit, you won't have a business for very long.

Those are the priorities that I think about every day in the business as I walk in the door. If I stay focused on the presence of God while being present with people and recognizing their importance, the profit will take care of itself.

I ditched my iPad…kind of. I ditched my smaller 9.7” iPad in favor of the larger 12.9” one. From the outside I can understand why people might have a problem with that decision…I mean, does it really make that big a difference?

Yes, and here are five reasons why:

1. It's the size of a full sheet of paper.
2. It has a split screen.
3. I can handwrite my notes and draw little illustrations, or do sketch-noting.
4. I can easily annotate PDF’s.
5. I can leave my laptop behind, because there are very few things I can do on my laptop that I can't do on my iPad Pro.

While the adage isn’t always true, in this case, bigger is actually better.

My guest Nathan Barry likes to build audiences and companies. Right now he is focused on building ConvertKit, an email marketing company for professional bloggers. It’s both powerful and easy to use, plus amazing people like Tim Ferriss, Pat Flynn, Chris Guillebeau, as well as 12,000 other great bloggers swear by it.

Here are some snippets from our conversation:

The riches are in the niches – Why ConvertKit isn’t just a different email service provider, it’s a better one ([18:10])
One of these things is not like the other – Why trying to be all things to all people is a recipe for business disaster ([20:28])
Scratch your own itch – How Nathan Barry learned that solving his own problem was the fastest path to the cash ([21:05])
What’s your startup story – Join Nathan in a no-holds-barred look behind the scenes of what start-up success really looks like ([21:22])
“Shut it down, or double down” – The wise advice Nathan Barry received from a friend that completely turned his business around ([23:10])
Mired in the Sea of Sameness – Why it takes more than a just passionate message to get your voice heard in the marketplace ([27:34])
Stop celebrating complexity – The real reason why consistently providing value still reigns supreme in the marketplace of ideas ([29:05])
The right tool for the right job – What ConvertKit learned about the mistake of trying to make everyone fit into the same box ([30:45])
Here’s what to do first – Simple hacks that can take from no list at all, to having an engaged list that you can be proud of ([32:51])
Dodging the fiery darts of email marketing failure – What tagging and segmentation are, and why they may be the secret weapon your marketing system has been searching for ([36:07])
The Cowardly Lion approach to marketing – How to easily spot customers who are digitally raising their hands and ready to buy from you ([38:06])
Focus on what you care about – What you can learn from ConvertKit’s commitment to user experience so you can dominate your segment of the online world ([41:17])

•ConvertKit
•GoodNotes
•9 Inch iPad Pro
•Anything You Want: 40 Lessons for a New Kind of Entrepreneur

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