Email Newsletters: The Underrated Marketing Tool with Nikita Morell | 022

I will email inboxes are already overflowing with pointless emails.

And boring newsletters emails can really suck.

So, is there any point in you sending an email newsletter?

That's exactly what I'm discussing with Nikita morale.

In this episode of architecture business club, the weekly podcast for solo and

small firm architecture practice owners, just like you, you want to build a

profitable future-proof architecture business that fits around their life.

I'm the host, John Clayton.

And if you want a business in architecture that gives you more freedom,

flexibility, and fulfillment, then go to architecture, business club.com

forward slash blueprint and download the architecture business blueprint.

It's the step by step formula to freedom for architects,

architecture, technologists, and architectural designers.

And it's absolutely free.

As a gift from me now let's discuss email newsletters.

Nikita Morell is a copywriter for Architecture Professionals.

She's also the founder of Architects Wordshop, an online shop dedicated to

helping architects with their words.

Nikita specializes in helping architecture practices and sole practitioners

around the world make their own words.

With their website messaging and uncovering their X factor, the one

thing that makes them different from every other architecture firm so

that they can get a steady stream of ridiculously good projects and she's

analyzed 663 architecture websites.

And you can see the results on her website.

And she's recognized for her unboring email newsletter and slightly

controversial LinkedIn posts.

To get Nikita's hilarious emails full of free copywriting go to nikitamorrell.

com forward slash newsletter.

Nikita, welcome to architecture business club.

Thank you so much.

Thanks for having me, John.

Oh, it's awesome to have you here.

Nikita, before we get stuck into the topic that we were going to talk about today

I've heard that you, you enjoy weaving.

You've got quite an interest in textiles.

Could you, could you tell me a little bit about that?

That

Yeah, sure.

So yeah, when I'm not weaving words, um, I really enjoy weaving

on my Japanese floor loom.

So I've been doing it almost, I think over 10 years now.

And it's just a good way, I guess, to kind of unwind and, you know,

these days are always exciting.

Scrolling or typing of that.

I feel like when I'm on my loom, it's just kind of like you can zone out.

It's quite meditative and I just can't do anything else with my hands, but you

know, we've, um, so yeah, I create lots of different types of textual artworks.

It's a hobby that maybe one day who knows might turn into something bigger,

but for now, um, yeah, it's just a nice little hobby to have on the side.

sounds fun.

What's the biggest piece that you've worked on?

I'd say it's a couple of meters.

Like normally they're quite, I keep them quite contained.

Kind of get them framed in that.

But yeah, I would say like a few meters long, maybe one and a half

or something was quite large.

A couple of years back I did that, but yeah, it takes a long time.

So you have to have the patience.

It's a good life lesson weaving.

It can be very frustrating as well.

My, my daughter is a huge crochet fan, so she would probably absolutely love it.

I'll stick with the guitars, I think.

Yeah

yeah, brilliant.

Well, look, uh, we're going to talk about email newsletters.

So why, why send email newsletters?

I'll start off with, by saying, I just feel like email newsletters

are Such an underrated, um, I guess, marketing tool, uh, in the architecture

industry, and I really, it disheartens me because I feel like it's just

such a great way to stay top of mind.

And I always say, you know, when you're sending email and newsletters, like a

huge part of it is that, um, Unlike social media where you're kind of controlled

by the algorithm or one day it might just, you know, the platform might

collapse or change, or who knows with an email newsletter, you own the list.

So you, the people who are signing up, you're giving like those people

giving you permission to send the messages directly to their inbox.

And so I just feel like it's a very kind of direct one on one conversation that

you can have with your ideal clients.

And you know, even if they don't read the email or they open it,

they're going to see your name, which is something you can't guarantee.

If you're on linked in or, you know, because of the impressions and that.

So I do feel that emails have a better reach than a lot of social posts.

And you can really personalize these emails to create a

real connection as well.

You know, even with my list, I'm always getting replies.

From people who, you know, I obviously feel so familiar to

them and I don't even know them.

So you can really create that strong bond as well.

So they're just a few reasons why architects should definitely

at least explore or contemplate sending email newsletters.

That's interesting, isn't it?

That as practices and, and architects were probably the first thing

to go to would be social media.

Wouldn't it, if you're thinking of sort of writing any content and putting anything

out there, email newsletters probably isn't the first thing that springs to

mind for most of them, is it, but it's probably like the most powerful, isn't it?

Well, I really, I really believe it is.

And that's like kind of talking from personal experience.

Like I think, you know, with the architecture, Sales cycle.

It's so long.

It's so complex.

There's so many people involved, you know, and someone might be

looking for an architect now, or they might be just doing their research.

So email newsletters are a great way to kind of stay top of mind.

So yeah, as you said, very powerful.

Typically, architecture practice owners, architects, they tend to

like to make things look pretty.

We like beautiful things.

Does that same logic apply to email newsletters?

Do we need to make them look pretty?

I'm a firm believer and you know, I might get a lot of slap saying this,

but look, your email newsletters do not have to look pretty.

And sometimes I feel like that's a huge roadblock or an obstacle with

a lot of practices as they spend so much time thinking about how

the piece is going to look or what images are going to go in there.

But there are a lot of different types of emails.

So yes, you can have like a basic.

Template with your branding.

Then obviously you can go the whole other spectrum and make it fully designed.

But another way of doing it is just plain text emails.

And so I'm a big fan of that.

And I have seen, you know, slowly, um, some architects, you know, at

least trialing it out and plain text emails are basically just that you

just writing a, you know, newsletter to you kind of keep one person in

mind and you just write to them.

And one thing I will say, John, is I think there just needs

to be a bit of a mind shift.

around email newsletters.

And Hanley, she's a great marketer.

And she says you need to focus on the letter part of the newsletter.

And so once you kind of shift your mind and you think I'm not going to

be annoying people, cause you know, we all kind of think, Oh, like I'm going

to sit there and write a newsletter.

Like is that going to annoy people?

I don't want to feel like I'm spamming them or whatever.

But once you start to really think of it as letter, To your

ideal prospective clients.

It just, I don't know, I think it kind of opens up a few more doors and it makes

you maybe feel a bit more comfortable and at least exploring the medium.

That's awesome.

You mentioned Anne Handley there.

I've, I've had the pleasure of hearing a talk at a conference in person.

She was absolutely incredible.

So yeah, that was a real treat.

Okay.

So it sounds like then that if we're thinking about writing an

email newsletter, that we don't have to necessarily overthink

the visual side of things.

We can just concentrate on the words.

Think about it like writing a letter.

It can be quite simple in terms of how we, we present it visually.

Um, so.

What things, what other things should we think about before

writing an email newsletter?

Are there a few things that we should think about before we start writing?

Yeah, look, I think the number one thing is even before you start writing

is to really think should I be writing an email newsletter, you know, like,

kind of taking that step back and thinking, you know, obviously, if you

don't have the resources to know that you're not going to consistently be able

to do it, you know, things like that.

Obviously, there's limitations, but I think the first step is to really

determine What value your newsletter is going to be providing to ideal

clients and to your business as well.

So you need to really think about why does your newsletter exist?

Does it exist to, for example, educate?

Does it exist to entertain or to build credibility?

Or to build relationships, like something completely different.

Like, but what is that value that you're going to be giving your ideal client?

And that kind of goes back to this idea of being a newsletter.

You know, you're writing it directly to someone.

You want to be giving them some sort of value.

And then I guess before you sit down and write your email newsletter, you

need to be thinking about who are you writing it to, like, what is your goal?

Like, why are you sending it?

And I think sometimes those deeper questions.

You know, you sit down, you just think, Oh, I'm just going to tell everyone

about this new project that we've just taken on or just about to complete.

And that's where it can start to get feel a bit same, same, um, across

some of these architecture industry.

Use that as, you know, there's nothing stopping you like kind of telling a story

about your day or telling people about a client or a question they asked and

then answering that question in an email.

So.

Yeah, I could go, go on about this for days, but, um, yeah, there's

a lot of different things you need to think about before writing.

I think a problem with a lot of newsletters, um, certainly the

ones that land in my inbox, a lot of them are pretty vanilla.

They're a bit boring.

Yeah.

There's definitely an art to writing a good email newsletter for sure.

Yeah.

And even just segmenting, you know, that I guess comes a bit later down the piece,

but it's like, you need to be telling prospective clients different things to

what you would be telling past clients.

You know, again, it's got a different goal.

So that's where kind of email segmentation where you can

segment your list and be writing.

You know, I know it feels like a lot of effort, but.

This is how, you know, if you're going to be pouring yourself into one kind

of marketing tactic, then this, I think is a particularly powerful one.

So that point there about segmenting your list.

So essentially that's that the email that you might write for a prospective client.

You're not going to write the same email and send the same

message to a past client.

So it's thinking about the different groups of people that you might have on

your email list and within your audience.

And tailoring the messaging within the newsletter to suit what stage

that they're at and who they are.

Is that correct?

Exactly.

And you know, you can segment by that, or you might segment just for example,

you're, um, a multidisciplinary firm and you've got commercial clients and

residential clients, then perhaps you want to segment by the type of client.

You know, government clients not going to want to hear the

same things as a residency.

So it's.

Trying to really, I guess, personalize that kind of email again, so that

it feels like a letter that's being written to you because it feels like,

yeah, they know who they're writing to.

Is that segmentation separating those groups out?

Is that quite easy to do in most email platforms?

Yes.

And that's getting a lot easier too.

So, I mean, for example, I use active campaign, but I know, um, yeah,

there's lots of different ones like MailChimp and that out there that

you can do very easily these days.

I mean, the actual task of like, you know, you got to be asking

the right questions when you.

Get people onto your list, but to actually technically do it, it's, it's easy.

That's good to hear.

How often should we send email newsletters?

Yeah.

So this is the burning question that I get asked all the time.

And look, I, I usually think of it in the way that I would, you rather

be consistent in the quality of email that you're sending out rather

than how often you send it out.

So you want to be consistently sending good emails rather than not.

But as a rule of thumb I usually say at a minimum every two weeks.

You know, maybe every month if you've got it depends on kind of the resources,

but the key thing is and this is Something a lot of architecture firms

do is they make it like a monthly newsletter or they title it, you know,

our weekly newsletter or whatever.

And I think that puts a lot of pressure because then you feel like you're trying

to scramble around and get content.

And sometimes that content could be, let's face it, pretty crap, but you just

need something to put in the newsletter because, you know, number, number two was

coming out and we've promised everyone.

And I personally, for my newsletter, you know, I've been sending

it for almost like four years.

Four years now, every second week, but sometimes I do it every third

week or sometimes a bit more.

It just, I think, again, it goes back to that value.

So if you've got something that you want to say, then say it.

You don't want to leave too long between it, but I think, um, yeah, good rule of

thumb every fortnight or a month, I'd say

So the main thing is that it's the consistency is the main thing.

exactly.

You don't want to go MIA and just turn up again in someone's inbox.

You want to keep that it's a relationship.

You want to keep it going.

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Now, back to the show.

Yeah, I think picking up on something that we, uh, talked about a little bit

earlier, that the, the leading time from when a prospective client starts

looking into working with an architect or researching different practices, that sort

of thing, it can be a really long time.

So, actually, that.

The idea of having like a regular consistent newsletter that goes out,

even if it is just, you know, maybe once or twice a month that over time,

that's still going to really help to build that trust and authority

with your audience, isn't it?

That and I think that's the thing that because of that length of

time, we're not in an industry where you necessarily have to be like,

you know, I know some people like.

There are some people that email every day, you know, that send a daily email.

I'm not sure that that's a necessity in our industry, um, given that

length of time that people are considering working with a practice.

So

Exactly.

my, my thoughts on it.

No, and I completely agree.

And you mentioned that credibility.

And I think another huge factor that email marketing can, or email newsletters

can really help with is likability, you know, at the end of the day, no one really

wants to work with a jerk or like someone that's going to be hard to work with.

And I feel like email newsletters are the perfect way to kind of let a little

bit of your, you know, showcase your personality and I tell architects all

the time, these newsletters don't have to be about architecture, they don't

have to be about projects and things you've got going on, they could just be.

You know, Spotify playlists.

You know that you're really into or a beautiful piece of art

that you've been inspired by.

So you're giving people a little bit of, especially for these smaller practices,

um, these newsletters work really well for you, giving them an essence of

who they're going to be working with.

And I think that's really valuable as well.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

People, people buy from people it's a really good point.

It's particularly with those smaller practices where and especially if

they're working like B2C, if they're working on a lot of residential

design projects with homeowners.

Then it is, it's a really personal thing, isn't it?

Like who, which architect you choose to work with.

It's a really personal thing when it's somebody's own home.

So that's really important, isn't it?

That you actually kind of, you, you know, you like each other.

Yeah, exactly.

And yeah, for the larger firms, it's, I guess, kind of talking about that kind of

culture that you've got as well and what's happening inside the office just so people

can kind of get behind the scenes as well.

Yeah.

So, okay.

So, so to help people put this into practice, then could you share any,

any rules or tips for writing emails?

Have you got any of the thoughts that you could share with us to help

us, um, craft an email newsletter?

Yeah, sure.

So I'll, yeah, I'll keep it quite high level.

Um, but in terms of, um, when you're crafting like writing

a newsletter, I always say, make sure you use a lot of use.

So write directly to your, um, audience, whoever it may be.

So instead of using, you know, our clients.

around and just say, well, you, you know, taught, like even sometimes I still do

this, but I write DS, you know, and then a name of someone I know, um, and you delete

it out, but you write the email just as if you're writing to that one person.

And then you, um, so just, it keeps that, I guess that connection going.

Another thing that's really great is to, you know, it's kind of in that

email with a question or, um, just something that's going to prompt a reply.

I think that's always a good way to keep that conversation going as well.

You know, when I send out email newsletters, I get great replies and then

it just, it starts that conversation and then you, again, it's that familiarity

and you feel like, you know, that person.

And then another thing I would say is like, write like you speak.

I think that's, there's a lot of, you know, kind of controversy in the

copywriter world, whether that's.

People say, well, you don't want to write like you speak, but in, just

think of it like that so that you are keeping it quite conversational.

You're writing in your voice.

So don't kind of automatically slip into that really professional.

I'm writing it from our architecture firm.

So keep it quite lighthearted if you can.

And if that's on brand with your firm brand, but I think, um, yeah,

just write, write conversationally, make it an enjoyable read.

Because that's going to make you relatable, I guess, at the end of the day.

And that's.

How people start to build trust.

That's some great recommendations.

Should we also then try and limit the, the architect speak that sometimes

some of the, uh, the big words and, uh, confusing architectural terminology that

often we see on a lot of architecture websites, I guess we should try and

limit those in our email newsletters as well, depending on the audience.

Yeah.

I always tell my clients to say, send the test email to

someone who's not an architect.

And if they don't understand something, you know, make them tell you what they

don't understand, and then you've got to keep revising it until they do.

So it's a good way just to kind of get an objective and a perspective on it as well.

So what about, um, What about building your email list?

Do you have any recommendations of ways to, to get people onto

your email list to actually start receiving the email newsletter?

Yeah.

I mean, look, there's lots of different ways, but I think, um, a good one to

start with is to put a lead magnet of some sort on your website and just

Simply that means just a downloadable.

So it could be, um, you know, a project portfolio or a case study, or it could

be just more information or, you know, it could be something like top 10 questions

that you should ask your architect, you know, depending on the type of firm.

But yeah, just something that's going to really resonate with your ideal client and

they feel like very compelled to download.

And then once they download.

In exchange, you're, um, giving them, they give you your, their details.

That's one way, you know, um, at the bottom of your email signature, kind of

having a link to your email list there.

And you might even just say, Hey, you know, we've just started this new

newsletter or announce it that way.

Just kind of in your emails, um, or on your LinkedIn, like in your bio, it's

just really kind of planting the seed.

You've got an email newsletter list and you know, people are busy.

So you really have to, I guess, um, once you start hopefully getting some

people replying, um, even telling them to kind of spread the word as well.

But yeah, look, it's not an easy.

I'm still, you know, I do this for a living and it's, it's a,

it's a tough, it's a tricky thing to build 500 or 5, 000 people.

It's really about the engagement and it's really, you just want

quality people on your list.

It's not really about, you know, building it to a certain size.

It's my take on it.

Yeah, so quality over quantity.

It's better to have a small list of really engaged email subscribers that

really enjoy the content that open most of those emails and reply to your messages

rather than having a big list where hardly anybody opens the emails and.

You get no replies.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, that makes it feel a bit more achievable for everybody, doesn't it?

To, um, to get started with email marketing.

Nikita, that's been really awesome.

I'm glad we, we focused in on this because I think it's a really

underrated thing that people can do.

And it's something that's pretty easy to get started with really.

What would be the main thing that you'd, you'd like everyone to take

away from the conversation today?

Yeah, I really would like, I know it sounds very general and cliche,

but I just really would love more architects to give this a go.

And you look, the worst thing is that you try and you don't, but I just

feel like a lot of architects, they have a big objection around this.

I think it's going to be a lot of work and that, but it can

actually be quite enjoyable.

So yeah, I'd really love to see more architecture newsletters in my inbox, um,

that are, you know, filled with stories that are conversational and that just

don't have that real professional kind of.

Kind of layer on it.

So, yes.

Now that would be great, wouldn't it?

Nikita, is there anything else that you wanted to add that we, we haven't

already covered in the conversation?

No, I think, I think that's it.

I think we've covered most things.

Yeah, I mean, I do have like an email newsletter in one

hour masterclass on my website.

So people can go check that out where I kind of show people

how to write newsletters.

But other than that, yeah, give it a go.

Okay, cool.

Well, look, before we wrap things up, um, I have one other

question that I wanted to ask.

It's nothing to do with email newsletters.

It's just like a regular question that I like to ask all of the guests on the show.

I love to travel and discover new places.

So I wanted to ask you, could you tell me about one of your, um, Favorite

places and what you love about it.

And this can be near or far.

So it can be the end of your street or the far side of the world.

Is there anywhere that pops into your head?

Oh gosh, yes.

I have been quite a few places, but you know where, um, so there's up, so I live

in Sydney, Australia, and I would say it's a 45 minute drive, um, a bit longer,

maybe an hour, um, is up the coast.

So it's a place called Copacabana and it's, um, A beautiful beach.

You know, obviously in Sydney we're very spoiled.

But it's a beach that I guess holds many childhood memories for me, and now I'm

taking my kids up there, um, quite often.

So I feel it's, it's very nice to have a place that you love so much

that you can just keep coming back to.

So, yes, the beach for sure.

That sounds fantastic.

Nikita, thanks so much for joining us today.

Would you better remind everybody where they can sign up to your

fantastic email newsletter?

Yes, sure.

So if you just go to www dot Nikita.

Morel.

com and then forward slash newsletter.

You'll land on a page, which I'm sure we'll get a few laughs.

Um, but I will leave it at that to go check it out.

But yeah, you can join my email newsletter there and every single

newsletter of mine is free.

Got a funny story or an anecdote and yeah, so hopefully you'll enjoy.

That's brilliant.

Thanks so much.

And if people would like to connect with you online, where is the best

place for people to connect with you?

Sure.

So online, um, definitely LinkedIn.

I'm very active on LinkedIn, so I would love to, yeah.

Send me a connection request.

LinkedIn, I post every day, so I'm always hanging around there.

Awesome.

Thanks Nikita.

Thanks.

Thanks so much, John.

Thank you so much.

Next time I'll be talking to business finance, fix up the mood Raza.

About money and getting to grips with your numbers.

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