frustrated

I recently finished reading a book called: "Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words" Dan Kennedy recommended it in his newsletter last month. And I found it to be quite a fascinating book that is a bunch of Steve Jobs internal memos & emails, interviews, talks, etc. I found it especially interesting, though, that the main reason they created the iPhone was purely what I describe in my elBenbo Press book as: “Sociological Marketing” This is a term I invented some years ago to describe the way I built my own newsletter & book publishing company... that was heavily influenced by guys like Steve Jobs, Walt Disney, etc. It’s the opposite, in some ways, of what most direct response marketers do (what I call “Psychological Marketing”) in as much as Sociological Marketing’s not first about metrics, numbers, stats, tests, tracking or any of that. If anything it is the exact, polar opposite. In my case: I couldn’t care less about any metrics, spreadsheets, stats, etc. They do not dictate anything I do except under very rare circumstances — and even then it’s all done within the Sociological framework I do business inside of. This has always gotten me a bunch of flack from the internet marketing fluffer community who spend all their time prancing around Facebook and social media trying to sound cool and savvy with their statistically irrelevant tests or parasitizing off their clients’ tests & successes, or posting an endless string of selfies with goo-roos to create social proof because they haven’t really built anything on their own. But I have never particularly cared what they think anyway. So it is all good... Back to Jobs: The iPhone was purely Sociological Marketing. In other words, zero formal market research. No looking at any financial spreadsheets. And avoiding data analysis, testing for demand, etc. Instead, it was all created out of pure… Frustration. Specifically, Jobs said: "It was driven by the fact that we all hated our phones. We talked to all of our friends and all the people we knew, and they all hated their phones. And we thought, 'This is a really important device, and everybody hates it. They don't know how to use even 10 percent of the features that are on these phones!' . . . You know, almost every phone let's you set up a conference call. Nobody knows it! They'll never figure it out! It's on page 93 of the manual they didn't read, and it's seven, eight cryptic keys! And you can do it, and nobody ever does it - because they don't know it's there. And that's true of feature after feature after feature." What was most ironic about this is: It's what was basically the first conversation my biz partner Troy Broussard and I had at the Napa, California wine bar described in detail on the BerserkerMail sales page about email, that got us talking about what would eventually, two years later, become the BerserkerMail platform. Neither of us ran any polls or surveys to our lists. Nor did we do any kind of market analysis. We both had been in the email game a long time, were frustrated with the options available, and figured we would create our own platform created by email marketers for email marketers… who actually use email every single day in our own businesses, selling our own offers, to our own lists. We also wanted A-player customer service (our helpdesk is run by two Email Players subscribers who ‘get’ email, not people who just stack copy & paste support tickets all day). We wanted testing/tracking/automation/campaign building that is advanced enough for the seasoned techie wanting to do elaborate campaigns and automation (like Troy, who was a Navy Nuclear Engineer and Executive Director of Technology for Encyclopedia Brittanica)… but also simple enough for the grunting caveman (like me, who only uses it for email broadcasting) to use. We also wanted an interface that was as frictionless as possible. In other words: No having to navigate multiple screens, tick multiple boxes, slog through multiple clicks, fill in multiple fields, etc just to load and send a friggin’ email. Even the simplest of ESP interfaces we had used (and between the two of us, we’ve used nearly all of the reputable ones) took 15+ actions, lots of cumulative time wasted, just to load and send/schedule an email, and we got it down to 2-3 clicks. We also wanted advanced blocking capabilities. And, of course, advanced email deliverability. Again: We use our own platform in our own businesses. Thus, we are going to do everything in our power to get as high of inbox deliverability as we possibly can. Not just for our clients… but also selfishly, for OUR own uses. That means having a few rules in place that turn off the goo-roo fanboys who rely on images and memes (we don't allow any images on the platform) because they probably aren’t very good at writing. And that is okay, we are not all things to all people, nor do we care to be. We are primarily for the frustrated and jaded email marketer who is a value shopper (NOT a price shopper). * The one who watches their current ESP interface get more insultingly user-unfriendly by the day… * Who notices it getting overrun with managers who care more about getting your pronouns right than your business getting more sales… * Whose deliverability, engagement, and sales are dropping like flies because their ESP does not make deliverability a priority over trying to out-feature the other ESPs... * Who winces every time there is an update knowing it is going to make their experience more needlessly complex just to appease the developers (what makes software more simple for the end user almost always makes the development more complicated for the development team) and to brag about having more features nobody actually uses, but that they will still charge you for, in their marketing… * And who observes their ESP bragging about getting 10s, even 100’s, of millions in funding… only to watch their prices and fees go up even as their sales, engagement, and enjoyment of using email marketing at all go down … Lots of frustration going on out there. And that is why we created BerserkerMail: Frustration. So anyway, circling back: Helluva book about Steve Jobs. It ain’t cheap or easy to find, though. I nabbed mine for almost $400 a few weeks ago. And today I see it selling on Amazon for as high as $650. Some people reading this email will think that’s reprehensible and crazy. People voting for Kamala probably even think it should be considered illegal price gouging. And should she seize the cherry blossom throne it probably will be since she's a communist. But then again, if you’ve been on my list for any length of time, you’ll know my opinion on high priced books, and how low my opinion is - i.e., I think they are idiots - of anyone in "business" who judges info products by volume, weight, and format over the information inside. All right, since I talked about BerserkerMail: You can see if what I say about it is true yourself any time you want with a free test drive. You don’t need a credit card to test it out, either. Plus, just for getting a test drive you will get access to the BerserkerMail mobile app (you will need a smart phone or iPad to access it), with lots of email training in there you can use whether you decide to go with BerserkerMail or not. Yes, our training works even for the inferior platforms. Including startups run by “founders” who are more interested in getting a big payout when they exit and sell to some DEI-obsessed corporate monstrosity looking to wear it (and your data) as a financial & accounting skin suit... than actually using email themselves, in their own company, selling their own offers. We also give you an eBook in the app I wrote called: “12 Fast-Cash Ways To Profit From Email — Even During A Worldwide Financial Crisis” Very timely info for today, in my opinion. Especially as economies around the world are collapsing in real time. Here’s where to read more about BerserkerMail: [( Ben Settle This email was sent by Ben Settle as owner of Settle, LLC. Copyright © 2024 Settle, LLC. All Rights Reserved. No part of this email may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from Settle, LLC. Click here to [unsubscribe]( Settle, LLC PO Box 1056 Gold Beach Oregon 97444 USA