TA #132: 📬 You ask, I answer: Questions on AI, the most important email metric, what to read... + more

Photo: Getty

Boston, Sunday, February 26, 2023

Hello, Sunshine!

I get letters. Sometimes I answer them out loud, right here.

Today is one of those sometimes.

Let's pop the secret code into the keypad (beep boop beep) to unlock the Chamber of Reader Letters, where they're stored.

Slip through the door. And enter now into this edition of FAQs: Frequent Annarchy Questions.

Note: Some of these have been edited for brevity and clarity, and to cloak the identity of that guy one cubicle over from you.

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FAQ: I work at an agency. Leadership is pushing us to use AI tools to generate content exclusively, with only light editing of the output. I have expressed concerns about this, but they aren't being heard. Is there anything I can do? Or do I just bow down to the AI gods and move on? Signed, Not a Bot

Dear NotBot,

Ay-yi-yi. I've been worried about this.

For weeks I've been imagining bosses in boardrooms everywhere hip-checking writers out of the way and pulling up a nice, comfy seat for the robot.

Maybe you have, too.

Maybe you hear how Buzzfeed cut 12% of its staff in December, then announced weeks later that it will increase the use of ChatGPT to tell you which White Lotus character is more like you. Maybe you heard that Buzzfeed stock price then doubled.

And you start to think hmm yeah... maybe the robots do need to slide into all those writer seats? Maybe the robot needs an extra chair cushion and lumbar support and a warm cappuccino to jolt its creativity?

Just kidding about that cappuccino.

Robots don't drink cappuccino to charge their creativity. Because they aren't creative—at least not like you and me.

AI is not the god ruling us. We are the gods ruling it.

AI tools can produce content. (Can is the key word there.)

But the questions are...

What's the content for?
Why are you creating content to begin with?
Whom will it delight?

How will you signal that it could come only from you?

And:

Are you creating to blacken the box on an editorial calendar?

To stuff your automation program with synthetic, slippery emails?

To extrude your blog posts through pipes that plop them into your CMS... touched lightly but not loved by other humans?

Or does our marketing signify for something more valuable? A chance to connect with the hearts and minds of your prospects, subscribers, customers...?

You remember them, you say to your boss now, NotBot. The people who matter most to our business. Those we serve. They are our people.

The boss hesitates, her face a mixed brew of emotion. The cost would be lower without writers. So would the quality. Does anyone care?

She doesn't say that last question part out loud. But you feel the question hang in the air, like a rain cloud. Does anyone care?

You forge on.

Generative AI is a tool for creatives. Not a replacement for them, you say. Now you're getting fired up.

Our content isn't extruded and rolled and mass-produced! Or it shouldn't be! (You practically shout this last part!)

You pull out a fat marker and sketch this on the whiteboard:

❌ AI is not the creator at the keyboard.

✅ AI is a helper perched on your shoulder.

Then you draw out all the ways AI can help your writers (writing furiously, A Beautiful Mind-style):

> brainstorm
> outline
> refine
> edit
> check tone
> help with voice
> add accessibility (audio transcription, captioning, text-to-speech)
> conjure up a script from a blog post
> conjure up a blog post from a script
> iterate on headlines
> consistently optimize, update top-ranking articles on your site (hat tip to Chris Carr for that idea)
> produce meta descriptions
> ...that kind of thing.

What's not on that list?

> replace all the writers

An AI tool is only as powerful as the writer wielding it. You really are shouting now! (That's why that sentence is in bold!)

The boss nods.

She's getting there.

You can feel the energy shift in the room. The raincloud floats away... down the hallway toward Legal, where it usually hovers. (lol)

That question is back... Does anyone care...?

Yes. The boss does. She cares.

The relentless cursor of the robot waits. It blinks. On, off. On, off.

It is silent.

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FAQ: Recently you wrote about that the One Email Metric You Need to Track is the Open to Write Back Rate (OWBR). You said 82% of subscribers to Total Annarchy open your Welcome email. And that 43% of them write you back. That sounds like a lot of mail. Love, I Have Doubts

Dear Doubts,

I sense that the question camouflaged in your comment is... How do you have time to respond to all of those people who write back to you?

Yes, 43% of new subscribers respond to the Welcome email. Not all subscribers to this list every time I mail a newsletter.

Does that make it sound more manageable?

Lemme drop some math. Over the course of a month, this newsletter gets, on average:

1,800 new subscribers >
1,470-ish opens of the Welcome email (82%) >
630 responses to the Welcome email (43%) >
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20-ish responses per day

I spend just a few seconds on reading/writing back on each response—say, 30 seconds. Tops. That comes out to about 10 minutes a day.

Do I have 10 minutes a day to work on nurturing an engaged list? Yes, I do.

Do you have 10 minutes a day? Your call.

You become what you focus on.

P.S. I spent longer than 30 seconds on this response LOL.

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FAQ: What should a writer read? What about that book everyone says is life-changing but you can't make it past the 60th page without a groan of boredom? Signed, Please Don't Make Me Read Page 61

Dear Reader,

A writer should read... well, that's the whole sentence. A writer should read. Period.

Maybe before you give up on that book... try to read it like a writer. Get inside the author's head, a little. Imagine their goal, their approach. Notice the craft. 

Stay curious about three things:

1) Try to see the scaffolding. How they build the story (fiction) or the argument (nonfiction). Why did they choose to show that moment before that one? What might the writer have been thinking? Can you see the path or structure they choose?

2) How much are they telling versus showing? Very often when I find a book boring. it's because it tells, not shows.

It tells me too much instead of letting me participate. It doesn't let me observe or feel it for myself.

3) What metaphors do they use? Do they distract or enhance?

Still isn't working for you...? Ditch it.

P.S. We all have a book that everyone loves but we just can't get into. What book was it for you? (Hit reply and tell me. I'll tell you mine, too.)

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FAQ: Will there be an audio version of the new Everybody Writes 2? Signed, All Ears

Hullo, 'earie!

Yes! It'll be out soon.

Back story: I don't narrate the whole book. I recorded only the Introduction—the first 15 pages—and that alone took me 3 hours sealed inside a hot, airless sound room.

I read into a microphone the size of a burrito, wearing headphones so sensitive that I could hear my own pulse knocking at my temples.

I want to say that I didn't have time in my schedule to read the other 399 pages.

Not untrue. But also... I realized it's not my skill.

Book narrating is akin to acting: You need big, big energy! A voice warmed with emotion!

Most of all... you have to love it. You have to...

LOVE.

IT.

You have to eagerly show up for many days in a row to sit in a little room and belt it out with gung-ho! And joy!

You can't fidget and check your phone and secretly wish it was over while the guy in the sound booth on the other side of the wall tells you to stop creating "friction."

I wanted that gung-ho, joyous person to be me.

It wasn't me.

Thanks to Ron Ploof for this fun wax seal, created from Everybody Writes cover art.

TAKE THIS SURVEY PLZ?

If you're a podcaster, writer, YouTuber 🥔, TikTok creator... please take a few moments to share your opinions in this new survey about the Creator Economy..

I'm partnering with my friends at The Tilt again this year to answer the question: What are our biggest fears, hopes, dreams, challenges? How do we make money doing what we love?

As a THANK YOU, you might win AirPods or a $250 Amazon gift card.

The link again.

DEPARTMENT OF SHENANIGANS

Silent like the P.

LOVE LETTERS
Shouts from around the Internet.

💌 So crazy honored to be name the top inspiring marketer on this list 2 years in a row, as voted by the Marketed.Live community. Extra love in this love letter to Paul Ince and everyone who voted for me. Here's the list.

P.S. Notice how the profiles on that page ^^ sound human. Not curated by AI... like a lot of lists these days.

💌 To Influence Digest for naming me the top content marketer in 2023.

💌 To George Stenitzer of Crystal Clear Communications for the generous Everybody Writes 2 book review.

💌 To Bart Caylor and Troy Singer for hosting me on their higher-ed marketer podcast.

💌 To Stuart Aitken at Lift The Bar podcast for being so much fun to talk to! (Inside scoop: At first I thought "Lift the Bar" was a podcast for lawyers. It turns out to be for personal trainers. Oops. Don't tell Stuart I was momentarily confused OK?)

💌 To Moosend for this deconstruction of 15+ Things to Learn from This Newsletter.

💌 To the amazing Danielle Brigida of the World Wildlife Fund for the book love (alongside some dude named Simon Sinek).
 

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Thanks for reading this far.

Thanks for your kindness and generosity.

Stay sane. Stay healthy. See you again on March 12.