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March 13, 2020

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Hey! Ashlyn here, OG copywriter for creatives—reporting for duty. 

Let's get you a message so tight you can bounce a quarter off of it. Around here, we serve up science-based storytelling strategies the creative set.  Even while raking in more than 1.26M in agency work since I've been at it, I firmly believe working from a place of rest (not hustle) IS possible—and I want the same for you. Words matter. Best be sure they work (and oui, with math) ... and know how to party while they're at it. 

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Reading time: 7 min.

“Oh my gosh, I cannot wait to sign up for more email lists today,” said absolutely no one ever. True, buuuut the data doesn’t lie. 👉Around 28% of people said that they do want to receive more than just one promotional email a week from brands they signed up to hear more from.

Your subscribers are going to be the ~most~ excited to hear from you within that 48- ish hour window right after they sign up for your list. Just like your dad said, “first impressions matter”—they matter in your emails, too.

Today, I am breaking down 3 myths that hold people back from writing a better welcome sequence. By the end of this video you’ll be able to write your own welcome sequence a little bit better starting today! 🙂 

Ready?! Let’s jump in!

How to write a welcome sequence- Ashlyn Writes

Do you appreciate a good host or hostess who thinks to get you a glass of water, a cup of coffee, cup of tea, orrrr when you walk into a wedding and there’s a whole champagne tower and a flute is yours for the taking?!?! That’s a heck of a way to say welcome, right?

Your welcome sequence is your new subscribers’ champagne toast into your entire brand. You’ve got to roll out the red carpet for them here.

At this point, I have completely lost count of how many email sequences that my team and I have written for different copywriting clients. Oftentimes what we’re doing is playing a variation on a theme, that theme being a welcome sequence.

If we take the basic bones of a welcome sequence and we’re using them either in some kind of a sales sequence or an on boarding sequence, there’s going to be certain thematic elements of the welcome sequence that we’re going to maintain even though the sequence is serving in a different sort of a purpose. 

I’m not going to take you through a perfect welcome sequence, I have a template for that in my shop that you can find here,  instead I want to walk you through 3 myths that I have seen hold people back from either improving their welcome sequence or just getting out of the starting gate and starting their welcome sequence.

Hopefully you can use these tips and tricks to tweak your welcome sequence (nurture sequence, indoctrination sequence, whatever you want to call it) yourself!



Welcome Sequence Myth No. 1 | “I’m going to annoy them” 

I just got back from Social Media Marketing World, a conference in San Diego of 7,000 people,it was ~so~ much fun…BUT let me tell you… I always feel a little bit more introvert than extrovert. I say I am a learned extrovert just because of the nature of working in communications, but I really like to recharge on my own.

Well, lo and behold at this conference, when there’s all these networking events and parties, my roommate says she would love nothing more than to put on face masks, pour a glass of wine and watch The Bachelor together in our hotel room…

Ding, ding, ding, as if I didn’t already love her enough! That’s exactly what I wanted to hear, but didn’t vocalize myself.  🙌

This might be a silly example,but, my point is that you’re not going to annoy someone by showing up and helping them articulate something they may not have already realized they thought or believed.

To take it another step further, you’re really not going to annoy them if you continue to show up with the resources, the education, and the tools they need to get them from where they were to the person that they really want to be. 

When someone raises their hand and says they want to learn from or hear from you…lace up your sneakers, this is your time. Go! 

I say this here because I want you to show up with a bit more of an urgent pace than you would maybe later on in the sequence. So you could show up in essence on day one, day two, maybe day three, maybe day five, seven. THEN start to space it out a little bit. 

One more strategy here: go ahead and take a stand for something in that initial email you send. 

In my last video, I broke down 4 different types of sequences that would help you out as a creative small business owner. In this video, when talking about your welcome sequence, I mentioned this—you may have your delivery email separate from your welcome sequence or indoctrination sequence and that’s okay. Either way, one of the first pieces of communications that I want them to receive from you, I want you to take a stand.

Back to that silly conference example that I brought up at the beginning… My roommate had an opinion and I liked it. I went with that. Now somebody else could very well not have liked that opinion at all, that’s okay. It’s the same with you. 

Attract and repel. It’s okay. 

Go ahead put your stake in the ground. Say what you stand for. This is your chance to kind of rally the troops a little bit. You want to get that subscriber on your side and you also want to throw rocks at the common enemy that you both have.


Welcome Sequence Myth No. 2 | “I don’t have anything to say” 

One time I purchased a t-shirt from an organization called Live Action, a pro life and human rights organization that I wanted to donate to. I got a thank you email and I was put on what I knew was a welcome sequence. 

I noticed as I moved through the emails, they were answering the questions that I didn’t even realize I had or that I hadn’t articulated yet.

When it comes to figuring out what to say in your welcome sequence, it’s just like anything else in copywriting, things that you’ve heard me talk about here allllll the time. We always want to bring it back to your audience.

In welcome sequences that I write with my team, I typically like the second or the third email to be a self segment or email. That means giving people the opportunity to chime in and click on a certain link in the email and that will then tag them for where they are in your lineup.

That could be where they are on the customer journey, what kind of future purchaser they’re going to be, somebody who is newly engaged, or somebody who is just planning her Pinterest wedding and nowhere near that yet…BUT the point of your welcome sequence is to inch readers further along in the conversion journey to becoming one of your clients or customers. It’s also going to help set you up to send them more relevant content down the road like launches or products or offers that are more custom to them.

In a video I did the other week where I talked through my about page framework, A-R-T-I-S-T, you’ll notice that it wasn’t until midway through the framework that you get into bringing up who you are and introducing yourself by name and by job description. 

It’s kind of the same thing in your welcome sequence. 

You don’t want to come out of the gate with your story. You don’t want to put it at the very end either, so it belongs somewhere in this middle part. Just like your about page, you’re doing it in a way that serves your reader. Like I said before, your welcome sequence can kind of like an accordion and can be different shapes. It can be three emails, five emails. I’ve done entire long term nurture sequences that are six months long.

Alright a little review before moving forward—we have coming right out of the gate, you’re going to stand for something. Pretty soon early on before you share your story, you’re going to see if you can self segment them. (Remember at the beginning of your email list, they’re more excited than ever and they’re more likely to click on different links and help you understand who they are.) Be creative here in adding different action steps. 

You can ask them to click through to a blog, to a video, to a podcast link. During this middle part of the sequence, after you’ve self segmented them, you may also just want to ask them to hit reply. That’ll white list your emails, which is always a good thing.

Need extra help writing those emails?! You may be interested in this : 9 Strategic Ways to Send Better Emails to Your List


Welcome Sequence Myth No. 3 | “I can’t commit to emailing regularly”

I will never forget where I was in 2017. I had been in business for one year and I was at a mastermind events of sorts. I sat on the floor with some friends and I realized that I just spent an entire year building other people’s businesses as a copywriter, but not my own. 

With tears in my eyes, I decided that time was over. I was finally going to commit to sending out at least one email every single week for 52 weeks out of the year….and I did it. That’s what it takes. 

You do at some level need to commit to showing up for these people, but you can do it after you have your welcome sequence ready. Don’t forget that all of these emails that you’re writing, all this content that you’re creating can go and tack on the backend of this in something that I kind of call bottomless broadcasts. 

True, you’ll either want to pause this sequence or send them out in tandem, if you’re doing something like a live launch coming up, but at least it gives you the opportunity to continue to repurpose content that’s already good in evergreen, and working in getting results for people.


Alright, now it’s time to put this all in action! Are you looking for a tool to help you get started?! A welcome sequence is pretty easy to get set up in your business using a tool called Convert kit that I’ve used for years! I highly recommend it! 🙂 

 I also have a free workshop coming up with Convert kit where we’re talking about the 5 emails that you need to be able to send to your lists.—grab your seat here!

Also, like I mentioned, I do have a shop item where I have a welcome sequence template, if all of this sounds a little obscure and you just want a paint by number approach to it. Voila! Enjoy that. 

P.S—If you’re looking for a few more email sequences that you need to plug in for your subscribers, then be sure to watch this video where I’m talking through 3 more email sequences that you need to have automated and ready to go for your subscribers!


How to write a welcome sequence- Ashlyn Writes

Reading Time: 7 Minutes Reading time: 7 min. “Oh my gosh, I cannot wait to sign up for more email lists today,” said absolutely no one ever. True, buuuut the data doesn’t lie. 👉Around 28% of people said that they do want to receive more than just one promotional email a week from brands they signed up to hear […]

3/13/20

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