How to Write Better Emails

Have you ever sat down to start writing emails and just hit a brick wall? You know you need to get your email marketing going strong, but it just seems like you can’t get started on it.

Writing better emails starts with getting the right idea for the email you want to send out. Often, we know we need to send out emails. We have flash sales and holiday sales and promotionals, but what about the rest? What about the content? You get better in your email marketing efforts by keeping your readers engaged.

We’ve found one of the best ways to start writing better emails in your email marketing is to start by asking questions. It’ also the easiest way to write blog articles by the way…. Below, you’ll find a list of questions you can ask to break the writer’s block and get started on the path to writing better emails for your email marketing.

70 Questions to Jump Start Your Email Writing

1. What keeps your readers up at night?
2. Can you describe your PERFECT customer?
3. Your WORST customer?
4. What questions do you get most often from customers?
5. What’s a dirty little secret in your industry?
6. What is your favorite customer success story?
7. What’s the funniest/craziest thing that ever happened to you in your business?
8. What is your personal business philosophy?
9. What’s the best reason for a customer to NOT do business with you?
10. What can you teach your readers to do (for free) that would help them solve a chronic problem?
11. Are there other services, providers, products that you can recommend to your readers?
12. Is there “conventional wisdom” in your industry that is just plain wrong?
13. What things is your company NOT good at?
14. How and why did you get into the business you’re in?
15. What’s your most embarrassing failure story?
16. What lies are told in your industry?
17. What do you find yourself complaining about most?
18. What’s your favorite part about coming to work everyday?
19. Look through customer emails for the last 6 months. Do you see any patterns? Any great stories? Any complaints you handled well?
20. Can you write a cheat sheet?
21. Can you email your list and ask them what they would like to read about?
22. What is the most common exaggeration in your industry? How can you use understatement?
23. Do you have a blog…if so, what’s your most popular blog post?
24. Have you been interviewed for a radio show? Newspaper article?
25. Has your company been mentioned on TV? Trade publication?
26. Have you written a white paper? Free report? Checklist? Guide? Instruction manual? Book?
27. If you were to survey your list, what would you ask them?
28. What email subject line would ruin your business?
29. What’s your greatest non-business success?
30. What is the next step you’d like the reader to take? How can you make it easier for him/her to take it?
31. If they’ve downloaded a free report, white paper, or ebook, have you spoon fed the most important principals back to them in email form?
32. Think of the most recent current event/pop culture reference that captured your attention. Can you relate it to your business? Can you make a contrast between the way “the world” thinks and the way your readers think?
33. What’s the most profound story from your personal life?
34. If you were to segment your customers into 3 or 4 “types” what would they be?
35. What is your most profound “Eureka!” moment when you finally “got it”?
36. What’s the biggest mistake you ever made in your business?
37. Have you ever “fired” a customer?
38. What is your business “motto”? Do you have a phrase or famous quote you find yourself saying to yourself, your co-workers, your family?
39. Can you interview (either in person, on the phone or thru email) an expert in your industry or a related field?
40. What is the most earth-shattering claim you can make about your business?
41. What’s the saddest experience you’ve had that you learned the most from?
42. What is the most common misconception your readers / customers have about what you do?
43. What’s the earliest/most favorite childhood memory you have of being interested in your business or in business in general?
44. What problems do you face that your customers also face?
45. What’s your favorite “war story”?
46. If you were to compare a customer’s (or your) success story to a fairy tale or famous movie…which one would it be?
47. What is the boldest challenge you could make to your readers?
48. What’s the sweetest deal you could make as a last ditch effort to get a reader to buy?
49. What are the characteristics that separate the winners from the “wanna-bees” on your list?
50. What’s your favorite “paid your dues” story?
51. In what ways does the 80/20 rule apply to your business/industry/reader list?
52. What businesses do you admire? Hate?
53. What’s your take on the latest industry news?
54. If you were king of the world, what 3 things would you change about the world (or your industry)?
55. What’s the FUNNEST thing about doing business with you?
56. What are the biggest costs your readers will incur if they don’t do business with you (put dollar figures to them)?
57. What analogies do you find yourself using the most when discussing your business?
58. Do you have special procedures, policies or people that make you unique?
59. What are your business goals for this year? Next year? Five years?
60. What’s the most outrageous guarantee you can make?
61. What’s the dumbest thing a customer ever did?
62. What are the three main reasons your product is so expensive? So inexpensive?
63. What do your competitors say about your product/service?
64. What’s the most “imperfect” thing about your product/service?
65. What does your spouse know better about your business than you do?
66. If you could slap your readers upside the head and get just ONE idea through their thick skulls, what would it be?
67. If you had to give a speech at your industry’s trade show, what topic would you choose?
68. What’s the most common reason that customers DELAY doing business with you? Do you have “I wish I had done this sooner” testimonials?
69. Can you run a contest?
70. If you had to send an email message every day for 30 days, what would you write about?

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