Email Marketing 101 and SDR Crash Course: Landing Page

2020. What a year. To finish this insane year out strong, I decided to challenge myself to undergo a sales and marketing crash course. During December, I learned how to optimize a sales funnel, write a cold email script, send marketing emails to promote a brand, and more. I’ve already embarked on the journey. Are you ready to embark on reading it?

Photo by Octavian Dan on Unsplash

Inspiration Behind the Project

At the beginning of December, I had my first two Praxis interviews. The first one was for an Outbound SDR role with Baremetrics and Xplenty. The second one was for a marketing position with SecondKeys. The interviews went well, but while on the Zoom calls, I realized that if I want to back up the skills I claimed to have, I would have to signal them by showcasing them through projects and blog posts. This month, I learned as much as I could about sales and marketing to build evidence that supports my skillset in future roles.

Stay Updated!

Month Overview: In this post, you’ll find my all-inclusive plan of attack for the month.

Week One: The first week of the month involved in depth planning of my project outline and confirmation of the Cre8tives newsletter opportunity with Praxis alumni, Randalyn Hill.

Week Two: I learned all about sales funnels and continued the creative journey of creating my first newsletter!

Week Three: I learned how to write cold emails and finished writing the Cre8tives newsletter. I also revised my original project outline to fit more realistically with my demanding work schedule.

Week Four: I edited the Cre8tives newsletter and sent it out to the creative community with Mailchimp!

Check it Out!

I taught myself sales funnel optimization.

I learned everything I could about sales funnels. Specifically, how to make the most effective and evergreen funnels that produce the highest revenue margins.

I taught myself the art of cold-emailing.

I tried my hand at cold-emailing. I learned how to use Linkedin and conduct detailed research to personalize initial emails that establish warmer relationships at the beginning of the sales process.

I taught myself how to use Mailchimp.

I gained valuable experience navigating the ins and outs of a common email marketing tool, Mailchimp.

Cre8tives Newsletter

Throughout the month, I worked with Randalyn Hill, the founder of Cre8tives. She gave me the privilege of caring for the monthly newsletter and granted me the freedom of adding my personality to the creative community.

Credit: Randalyn Hill

I created a newsletter for Cre8tives using Mailchimp. Check out the final product!

Only a few hours after the newsletter’s inbox delivery, the open rate grew to 50%.

Compared to last December, the newsletter open rate went up 10%.

The total audience size grew by 41% which means increasing the open rate by 10% is quite the achievement!

What I gained from the opportunity:

• I learned how to use a newsletter to market and promote a company.
• I created a newsletter from the ground up while staying true to an already established brand.
• I learned how to navigate Mailchimp and successfully send out a campaign to a subscriber list.
• I learned to communicate my progress through email updates to others.

December’s Biggest Obstacles

Photo by Tim Collins on Unsplash

This month wasn’t without its barriers and battles. Most of my obstacles came in the form of time-consuming commitments. Although making money and landing interviews are not what I would consider “obstacles,” they did act as roadblocks to my original timeline.

Holiday Hours at a Leading Retailer

Right before December, I landed a seasonal position at Target. I found myself clocking in upwards of 50 hours a week. The hours varied depending on the store’s demand, which meant my unpredictable schedule limited valuable project time.

Although the holiday season retail stress created tendencies of self-doubt (in terms of my overall accomplishments for the month), the experience still came with a few valuable teaching moments.

• There is more to life than a paycheck. I can’t deny that the overtime hours I put in this month created some of the thickest paychecks I’ve ever earned. Still, the toll it had on my body, both physically and mentally, my relationships with family and friends, and my journey to eventual financial freedom, isn’t entirely worth it.
• Time is money. There is a cost for anything worth having in life. At this chapter in my life, my time is valuable. I can choose to trade it to another company, and in turn, I receive monetary compensation. The other side of the coin involves investing my time into building skills needed to find personal contentment and career success. The cost for me now is smaller paychecks; however, the ultimate payoff of the sacrifice results in a job I wholeheartedly enjoy with financial peace and flexibility to enjoy my life beyond the bounds of that job. My intention for 2021 is to find the most valuable ways to spend my time and embrace the inevitable sacrifices that come from sprinting towards my dreams.

Unrealistic Expectations

At the beginning of the month, I believed my high ambitions to be attainable within 30 days. However, if I wanted high-quality results, my action plan needed serious adjustment. It was hard to get myself to lower the impressive bar I had set. This month taught me about creating realistic goals over unattainable fantasies.

• I have to go the essential mile before I go the extra mile. I found myself trying to make everything exceptionally flawless before moving on to the next task that required my attention. This perfectionist mentality bled into the quantity of my accomplishments for the month. If getting caught up in the smaller details of a project takes away from essential components, there’s room for letting go.

Interview Preparation

On top of my 50 hour work weeks, the project timeline, and my commitment to Randalyn Hill’s December newsletter, I also had two interviews that required time and preparation. The self-discipline required to adequately prepare for interviews along with the interviews themselves painted another memorable teaching moment.

• I am in control of my level of success. Although we are socially conditioned to believe that a successful career starts with the perfect company, in reality, it begins with me, myself, and I. I am the driver of my dreams, and the vehicle that will take me there is the company I choose to help write that story.

December’s Takeaways

Although this month doesn’t look like what I had imagined, I’m still proud of what I accomplished. Aside from what I created, I also gained many transferable skills:

• I learned how to respond to an initial interview opportunity.
• I learned how to prepare for interviews.
• I learned how to personalize cold-emails.
• I learned how to create a sales funnel.
• I created a newsletter and prepared it for seamless inbox delivery using Mailchimp.
• I gained experience communicating professionally with those I make commitments to. Specifically, how to weekly update my progress on an assigned task.

If you made it here and still crave more of my journey to personal contentment, financial freedom, and the career of my dreams, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn!