Week 11: Automation and Scale#
Week 4 argued for specificity that would be false for a different reader. What happens to that argument at scale?
What this lecture covers#
- the trade automation makes for volume
- why a template can’t hold week 4’s kind of specificity
- a composite templated email and where it breaks
- the tell that gives a merged template away
The trade#
An automated sequence can send a thousand emails in the time a one-to-one version takes to write one.
It cannot, by construction, contain week 4’s specificity. That specificity has to be true of one reader and false of the rest. A sequence merges fields into a template; it doesn’t know anything about the recipient a variable didn’t already know.
Not an argument against automation. An argument for knowing what it costs.
Not an argument against automation#
It’s an argument for knowing what it costs.
A sequence trades reply rate per email for volume of emails sent. A writer who doesn’t know that trade is happening will optimise the wrong thing.
Predict, then watch#
Before the next slide: predict which words in a merged-field template will be the ones doing no real work. Then check.
From: [Sender]
To: [Recipient]
Subject: Noticed what {{company}} is doing
I noticed {{company}} has been doing great things in the {{industry}} space lately.
Everything around this line can be competently merged. This can’t: a template holds a company name and an industry field, not what “great things” means for one specific reader, so it falls back to a phrase true of none of them in particular.
The tell#
Language a template falls back on when it has nothing specific left to merge. Recognising it is the practical skill this week is for.
From: [Sender]
To: [Recipient]
Subject: {{company}} and the {{industry}} problem
Sending this to a shortlist of {{industry}} teams we think are hitting [specific, real constraint]. If that’s not {{company}}, ignore this. If it is, worth a reply.
Still a template, still merged at scale. It names the actual thing segmenting the list, rather than inventing a compliment the merge fields can’t support.
Look this up#
Find a templated email in your own inbox. Identify the merge fields. Identify the sentence sitting next to them that’s doing no real work: that’s the tell.
Recap#
- reply rate per email vs. volume of emails sent is the trade being made
- a template can’t hold week 4’s kind of specificity, only merge fields
- the tell: vague filler exactly where specificity should be