EMM10: Times I Thought To Myself: “I’m Going to Marry This Girl” by Ben Kassoy
At 8:30AM, the sound of my alarm lifts me out of sleep. I turn it off, open my blinds, and stumble into the bathroom.
Toothpaste, meet toothbrush. Toothbrush, meet my teeth and gums.
Hello, Shower. I'm Robert. Good to meet you.
Roughly two minutes into the shower, I'm thinking to myself:
"Repetition… repetition… what's a time when I have used repetition to accomplish something? … or when I've used repetition and failed at something?"
(The focus on "repetition" will make sense in a moment.)
Roughly three minutes into my shower, my alarm — which is coming from my phone, which is still in my bedroom and NOT in the bathroom — starts going off.
And I realize:
I didn't turn it "all the way" off. I just snoozed it.
But now I'm dripping with water and halfway through a shower. I'm BUSY, Alarm! Can't you see that?
It can't, though. Because it's an alarm.
And I'm not about to cut a shower short just so I can turn the damn thing off.
So I let the alarm do its thing. Convinced that, after a few cycles — it'll wear itself out.
It doesn’t.
10 minutes later, I step out of the shower and turn it off.
Sometimes, repetition can be inconvenient. Such as, oh I don't know, when your alarm goes off for 10 minutes straight and you can't turn it off.
But in writing — and in email marketing — repetition can be a helpful tool.
I'll explain in this week's episode.
The Piece
After you finish reading, scroll down for the lessons.
Lessons We Can Learn From This Piece
1. Write about someone else.
After you write enough emails to your list, you'll notice something:
You end up talking about yourself a LOT.
On one level, this feels good. Because if most of your emails are about yourself, and people actually read and engage with them…
It means they're interested in you!
Which, let's be honest, always feels nice.
But sometimes, you might feel a little insecure about this.
"Geez, I'm talking about myself a LOT here. Am I being self-centered?"
Short answer:
Probably a little. Just make sure you’re still helping people and it’s all good though.
But when you're feeling that way, one good way to counter it is by writing about someone else.
This can be someone you don't know — Cole Schafer is the master of writing about how the lives of iconic figures apply to advertising, creativity, and copywriting.
But if you don't want to dig into the life of someone you don't know — you can write about a friend.
That's how Kassoy opens this piece:
"Whenever my friend goes on a first date he texts me
I’m going to marry this girl
just so he’ll have the receipts in case he’s ever right."
He then smoothly transitions into writing about himself with this sentence:
"And I think about all the different times, in all the different relationships, that I thought the same."
You can do the same thing in your emails.
Open with a quick fact or story about a friend — and then shift the spotlight to a story or experience you've had.
Or… if you're feeling particularly shy that day… make the whole email about your friend.
Ideally, one of two things will be true if you write about a friend in an email:
1) They're okay with you writing about them and mentioning their name, or…
2) You keep it anonymous, like Kassoy does, and either give your friend a fake name or avoid mentioning them by name at all.
Regardless, shifting the spotlight to someone else is a great way to add some variety to your emails.
2. Use repetition for emphasis.
Repetition, repetition, repetition.
Let's talk about it. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about it.
… okay enough of that.
Notice how, in this piece, Kassoy repeats the phrase:
"I'm going to marry this girl"
That phrase essentially forms the scaffolding of the rest of the piece. It holds the whole thing together.
Without the repetition of that phrase and the rhythm and meaning that comes from it, the piece would feel much more "formless."
So what role does repetition have in your email marketing?
You can use it to emphasize a point.
I recently worked on a series of launch emails for a client, and throughout the emails, I made sure we repeated the launch deadline.
Not just, "this ends Friday," but…
"This ends Friday, 9/24, at 11:59 PM EST."
Why?
Because it's one of the most important parts of the email.
Readers needed to know the launch had a deadline, so they could make their decision before then.
And they didn't just need to know the deadline in a general way — they needed to know exactly when it was.
So we repeated it.
Eddie Shleyner of VeryGoodCopy recently did a great breakdown about this aspect of repetition in this LinkedIn post.
Bottom line: If you want a reader to know something, repeat it.
3. Be unexpected in order to be funny.
If you're an author, speaker, coach, consultant, etc. and you're writing emails to your list regularly…
One of the main things you're trying to do is build a connection with readers.
Humor is a great way to do that.
Kassoy adds humor to this piece by saying what is NOT expected.
Here's an example:
"There was the night we sat in Bryant Park alone under an umbrella, safe from the warm summer storm that sent hundreds fleeing, and watched a Katharine Hepburn movie shine like the sun through the darkness and I thought
I’m going to marry this girl
and years later you haven’t accepted my invitation on LinkedIn."
One of my favorite things about this piece is how the scenarios Kassoy writes about are simultaneously funny and heartbreaking. It's incredible.
I won't delve into the "heartbreaking" part of this, but I will get into the "funny" part.
The reason these sections have an aspect of humor is because the outcome is wildly different from the setup.
The setup ("There was the night we sat in Bryant Park…") creates a romantic, sentimental picture…
But the outcome ("And years later…") is the exact opposite of what you would expect.
If you want to do the same thing in your emails — write a big, long drawn-out setup where it seems like you're leading to one thing…
And then finish with the opposite of what the reader expects.
The jokes you write with this formula (long, drawn-out setup + short, unexpected ending) can tend to be sarcastic, though.
So if that's not your "brand" of humor, then feel free to skip this one.
4. Use "and" to increase the pace.
This is subtle. But look at how Kassoy uses "and" to connect phrases and create long, run-on sentences (emphasis added):
"There was the time I thought I cracked my femur in a tubing accident AND you were gently palpating my upper thigh AND I broke almost every doctor-patient boundary by asking you out, AND you broke the rest by saying yes AND I thought"
This makes the reader move through the copy more quickly. And it creates a "breathless" feel. Kind of like the writer is so excited to share the idea that they can't be bothered with things like punctuation.
If you want to increase the pace of your writing, this is a cool way to do it.
5. Use vignettes to your advantage.
In this piece, Kassoy is telling a story without telling one single story.
I'll explain:
He's not focusing on one specific situation, but multiple different ones. And instead of giving us a full breakdown of each scenario, he's giving us a snapshot.
That's it.
It keeps us moving through the piece and by giving us those snapshots, he's telling the bigger story of his past relationships.
It's a cool way to get a point across.
You can do the same thing in your emails.
You don't always have to tell one long story. Instead, you can introduce an idea, like Kassoy does at the beginning of this piece…
"Whenever my friend goes on a first date he texts me
I’m going to marry this girl
just so he’ll have the receipts in case he’s ever right. And I think about all the different times, in all the different relationships, that I thought the same."
… and then write brief scenarios that expand on and illustrate that idea, like Kassoy does in the rest of the piece.
How To Apply These Lessons To Your Email Marketing ASAP
Here's a quick summary of the lessons from this piece:
Write about someone else.
Use repetition for emphasis.
Be unexpected in order to be funny.
Use "and" to increase the pace.
Use vignettes to your advantage.
And here's how you can apply them to your email marketing:
Write a "vignette" email of your own.
I think the best way to illustrate this will be with an example. So…
Let's pretend you're a fitness coach with an email list. If you wanted to write a "vignette" email, you could make a statement like:
"I've always had trouble eliminating certain food groups from my diet."
Then you could say things like:
"There was the time I tried to do Whole30 and ended up eating a gallon of Blue Bell ice cream one Friday night…
Or the time I tried to go vegetarian and ate a bacon cheeseburger one evening after a night out…
Or even the time I tried to go grain-free and 'broke' after a week — I ate half a loaf of bread…
By itself.
No peanut butter. No nothing. Just… bread.
So yeah. 'Elimination diets' have never really worked for me."
Then, you could transition into your pitch:
"If you can relate — you might be interested in a new challenge I'm starting next week.
It's called:
Enjoyable Eating: How To Eat Whatever You Want And Still Lose Weight"
So the basic structure is:
Make a general statement related to your niche
Write a few vignettes related to that statement
Transition to your pitch
Here's What You Should Do Next
Thanks for reading Email Marketing Motivation. Here's what you should do next:
Click here and join my email list. I'll give you a heads up when I publish the next episode of Email Marketing Motivation, AND you'll get free access to my subject line copywriting handbook, Subject Line Shortcuts.
Share this article with someone — or a group of people — who would like it. They'll be impressed by how smart and thoughtful you are.
Check out my course, Stories That Sell, if you want my comprehensive guide on how to write storytelling emails that earn more money for your business and help you connect with your audience in a genuine way.