Starting a Klaviyo Email Marketing Digital Agency

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

There’s a popular saying that “What gets measured gets done.”

Personally I’m not a massive fan of management by numbers, especially at the start of a project where you’re trying to find what works.

Yeah, my thinking is definitely on the numbers side. Being formally educated to think so systematically may have its use in the future, but right now, it's just overthinking.

I appreciate the pushes through, it's forcing me to consider what's taking a step forward vs. what's sugar coating data to make it look aesthetically nice.

I can’t remember if you already mentioned this, but have you joined Facebook groups and online communities of people using Klaviyo and helped them?

I did follow @NinjaBartender's advice and followed a bunch of Shopify groups. I should add Klaviyo on top of that, good idea.

If you talk about XYZ, help people with XYZ, and especially help people in public, then you’ll get known as “The XYZ Guy/Gal” and you may find work comes to you.

That would be my preferred way of approaching this.

Your recommendation is enough to get me started with this. It'll be nice to play a more active role in solving problems as a community member. I gotta practice what I preach if I want to be the type of person who genuinely wants to help business owners!

A lot of the links in my signature may help you.

I slowly go through the content every day. At the moment, I listen to your podcast when I'm taking breaks, I believe I'm on episode 7(They are pretty short). Good stuff so far. It's nice to hear how human the sales process can be and how simply wanting to help others can be the bedrock for good business.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

To give you some more food for thought: I'm currently reading Alex Hormozi's book "$100M Offers" and I think it might give you some inspiration for what to actually offer and how to set your offer apart.

I've been following his Youtube for a while. I also have the book, but I admit it's just been laying around. I'll get to it from your recommendation! I love your references!

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 10 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000 (Days Left: 18)
Pomodoro Count: 2 (I forgot to record a few pomodoros)

• Planning [x1]
  • I was planning for how I'd like to systemize how I'd offer my service. In retrospect, this pomodoro was just overthinking. It's way too early to start considering how to neatly package my service.
• Prospect List [x1]
  • Slogging away again at building up the list to a decent size. I'm hovering around 10, but only a handful are worth pitching towards. I have more of a jumbled list of "what to-do's" and "what not to's" sprinkled in with prospects.

I was continuing on with building the prospect list and got the comment from @Andy Black about just starting tracking emails sent. From there(I forget to record pomodoros here), I started sending out personalized emails to the prospects I already have. At the moment, I'm using Saleshandy's extension to track open rates and such. We'll see how the emails do.

 

[NinjaBartender]

Great to see you started sending some emails!
Talking to potential clients even without an offer package already built out will definitely give you some insights on what your clients need.

Will you focus on email marketing alone or did you consider doing SMS/ text message marketing with Klaviyo as well?

 

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[NinjaBartender]

Hah, I have zero experience with SMS marketing, I just find the concept intriguing. It might be a great added service for your potential clients and a chance to set you apart from competitors. Certainly worth looking into!

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Hah, I have zero experience with SMS marketing, I just find the concept intriguing. It might be a great added service for your potential clients and a chance to set you apart from competitors. Certainly worth looking into!

For sure! It's only a matter of time when the trend becomes a normal part of any website, anyways.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 11 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000 (Days Left: 17)
Pomodoro Count: 5

• Emails [x5]
  • These pomodoros were pretty straightforward. I set the goal of sending 25 personalized emails for the week. As we are getting later into the week, I'll hold off on sending the emails and send them on Monday instead. I'll still be generating the emails in advance.

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 13 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000 (Days Left: 15)
Pomodoro Count: 0

Nothing special about today, just taking it easy. I'll be brainstorming how to address some of the recurring problems with fatigue over the weekend.

Hope yall enjoyed your weekend!

 

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[Black_Dragon43]

Day 15 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000 (Days Left: 13)
Pomodoro Count: 3

• Emails [x3]
  • Continuing on with finding and contacting as many people as I can.

I'm starting to pick up on how naive it was to set a numbers goal without much of a plan to do that.

As I run out of days to complete this goal, I'm realizing that I've got to change a few things up.

For one, the goal of making $1000 isn't working.

Although it's a goal in the right direction, what this goal is doing is pulling me away from getting in contact with customers. I'm rushing decisions that only enable profits. Currently, my goal should be getting testimonials and proof of how valuable my services are to the client.

All I care about is getting in contact with those clients/customers.

What that means is beyond just sending emails for a closing pitch, it's about building up a wealth of context about my market, my customers, and in the end, a clear opportunity to provide value. I've been trying to shape vs. fulfill the demand of the market.

I'll spend the next month focusing on getting to at least 500 points of contact. Whether it's email, social media, or problem-solving on an eCommerce forum, I want to focus on reaching out to as many people as I can within this space(eCommerce). What this goal means is that my new goal is to find 500 NEW points of contact every day.

For the time being, the goal of $1k is delayed, not canceled. I won't give up on that.

What to expect from upcoming posts is:

• Where I got in contact with someone (LinkedIn, Email, Facebook)
• An overall # of total contacts end goal being 500
• How many contacts convert or anything I learn along the way

I apologize for the confusing narrative! Just trying the readjust as quickly as needed to get these goals done.

Awesome, keep us updated, you’ve got a much better direction now!

 

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[Andy Black]

I wonder if you'd do better helping 5 people a day rather than contacting 500 people a day?

As per this:

There’s a popular saying that “What gets measured gets done.”

Personally I’m not a massive fan of management by numbers, especially at the start of a project where you’re trying to find what works.

Indeed my favourite business quote is the Mother Theresa line in my signature.

I can’t remember if you already mentioned this, but have you joined Facebook groups and online communities of people using Klaviyo and helped them?

If you talk about XYZ, help people with XYZ, and especially help people in public, then you’ll get known as “The XYZ Guy/Gal” and you may find work comes to you.

That would be my preferred way of approaching this.

A lot of the links in my signature may help you.

 

[Andy Black]

Ah. I read this and wondered...

What this goal means is that my new goal is to find 500 NEW points of contact every day.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Ah. I read this and wondered...

Gotcha. I fixed it. I should have added a comma.

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Quick Update:

I'm taking a brief few days to brainstorm a few ideas and work on routines for the upcoming work week. My concentration has been pretty terrible. I'm simply not doing enough work. I'm adjusting myself by taking breaks from social media and preparing my environment to get the work done. I'll start the new goal of 500 contacts for the month on Monday.

 

[Andy Black]

Yeah, I should be working on it each day. Thanks for keeping me accountable.

Some things are the rocks in our day. Some things are just the sand between the rocks in our day.

“Kill a rock every day.”
(Blaise Brosnan)


(No rocks were harmed in the making of this post.)

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

[Goal 2.0] Day 3 breakdown:
Total Contacts: 11/500 (Days Left: 27)
Pomodoro Count: 8

• Strategizing [x2]
  • Weighing my options and determining what's the ideal path moving forward.
• Klaviyo Problem Solving Client [x6]
  • I had a small contract to help someone with their Klaviyo mobile optimizations.

A bit of an interesting day. I managed to land a small client. I'm hesitant to really count it as anything because it was a simple job and in the end, I couldn't solve it(it was a device-specific problem). Nevertheless, I did get to test my knowledge of Klaviyo and what kind of answers to expect from clients working with that platform.

For the time being, I'm going to try and capitalize on smaller task jobs I find on Klaviyo and work my way up.

The day passed by quickly!

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

[Goal 2.0] Day 4 breakdown:
Total Contacts: 11/500 (Days Left: 26)
Pomodoro Count: 8

• Skills [x6]
  • Went on a binge of what strategies people are using to find more clients. I'm brainstorming ways I could make this process faster.
• Template [x2]
  • I decided on a template I would use for each niche I would specifically target. (Niches: e-commerce, productivity, and smaller businesses)

Today was a bit of a grinder. Maybe I'm getting burnt out, not sure. I'm not too worried about it, I know I just need some rest.

Also, I'm spending way too much time assessing the potential of each business of the contacts I'm going through. Thankfully, after seeing hundreds of Shopify stores, I can immediately tell which ones I'd have a genuine interest in and others that would strictly be business.

I'm going to hone down on a couple of things:

1. Testing subject lines with a templated email copy. (I'll add in a single personal flair, of course. If I'm genuinely interested, more personalization)
2. Stick to hard and fast criteria.

I'm going to test each component of the email bit by bit over the next week. Effective Subject Line == Good Open Rates -> Effective Email Copy == Meetings Scheduled.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Have you reached out to other bigger agencies that offer Klaivyo? If you make friends with salespeople at those agencies you can offer to set up a referral partnership. You send them the clients that are "too big" for you, and they can send you the clients tha are "too small" for them. Every big agency is hit with these small price shoppers and want to turn them away. All you have to do is convince them to turn them to you.

And if you really are friends with those salespeople, take them out for a beer and talk shop. Ask about what sales tactics have been working for them...

I would have never thought of this! I'm beginning to dip my toes in sales culture and the communities that exist. I'll definitely be keeping this in mind when I find other like-minded agencies I come across or people I naturally vibe with.

 

[Andy Black]

Are you reaching out to people who use Shopify or people who use Klaviyo?

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Are you reaching out to people who use Shopify or people who use Klaviyo?

I'm reaching out to Shopify stores that use Klaviyo. I sign up for their newsletter which, thankfully, shows which email platform they use in the domain. I know both those platforms pretty well. I figured I'd niche down.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

I am following your advice from your former post about searching for customers that know the Klaviyo platform as opposed to teaching them what Klaviyo is.

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 1 breakdown:

To increase my chances of closing the sales calls, I want to have a way of demonstrating my services. The niche I'm targeting will be eCommerce businesses' where I can add some obvious improvement(low hanging fruit) to their automated email systems and then close on a retainer for daily/weekly newsletters. I'm assuming that some might not even know what the hell Klaviyo is.

The portfolio piece will be a dropshipping Shopify store with all the Klaviyo flows in place. (welcome series, abandoned cart, and so on.)

Pomodoro Count: 8
Pomodoro Categories:

• Research [x8]
  
  • I found the dropshipping product and confirmed the market for it along with other criteria. I'll be spending the next couple of days getting the website up. I won't spend any more time than I need to during this phase.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

I wonder if you overthink this... At the end of the day, your clients' pain point is that they lose money by losing sales that could have happened via abandoned cart emails, newsletters etc. That's all they really care about. If you can solve that problem, the gig is yours. I don't think they care about the strategy at that point, or ever. In fact, the end goal is that they pay you to just do it and take the pain away.

Have you considered to offer your services for free or cheaper so you can get a testimonial and/or case study that you can refer to?

As for cold emails, I don't use templates, and I actually use a similar strategy, mentioning a couple of things that I notice to improve on. Other tips would be to keep it as short as possible, and make it all about them and their problem, not about you. Sometimes, I also throw in something to make it more human, like mentioning the weather, or if they have something interesting in their About page, I'd refer to that. Also don't be afraid to follow up if they don't reply. Sometimes, it takes a few emails to get them to come back to you.

Exciting times!

Yeah, I think I am. I tend to overprepare out of insecurity. I'll try and carry that idea moving forward. I need to cater my services more along that vein and just make it an easy decision for them.

I have had some testimonials before. I should really consider that as a system within itself. I'll spend more time thinking about how I can ask for testimonials once I get a more solid foundation on the business.

Gotcha, gotcha. Just curious. Pulling current events is a good idea. I can see that a lot of people getting spam and pulling current events makes your writing seem more conversational versus chat botty.

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 3 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000
Pomodoro Count: 4

• Setup [x2]
  • Setting up importing products and Shopify apps.
• Design Research [x2]
  • Worked on picking apart other cleaning brands(Dyson, Irobot, etc.) and seeing what the general theme is.

At first, I was just continuing with the portfolio project, but based on the feedback I've been getting, I think it's time for a pivot.

It's always a fine line when taking in feedback and following your own intuition. Hell, even pursuing entrepreneurship in a family of specialized labor is going against the grindstone for me. But, in this instance, all the thoughtful responses ring clear to me.

If I followed the familiar path, I'd just end up where I've already been and that isn't working.

If I want to solve problems for customers, I first have to understand who my customers even are. Nothing would benefit me more than simply finding and speaking to them and understanding what they say their problems are.

For the time being, I'll scrap the portfolio project and go straight to speaking to clients.

My first order of action is to find databases/domain lists to scout prospects.

I appreciate everyone who's helped!

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

I did a podcast about “Sales For Techies”. It’s somewhere in the “Let’s Chat Sales” thread:

HOT! - EXECUTION - Let's Chat Sales

I started a podcast with Brendan McAdams who has years of experience as a sales pro. Join us in our first episode to learn how we: Figure it out as we go along. Find Product-Market-Fit, one customer at a time. Allow niches to reveal themselves as we engage the market. We also discuss, among...

www.thefastlaneforum.com

I'll check it out on Spotify!

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 4 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000
Pomodoro Count: 6

• Audit Form [x2]
  • Not trying to build a robust system just yet. This is more of quickly figuring out what criteria's I'll consider for each potential prospect. I'll spend more time on this system when I've got a more concrete idea of what clients are willing to pay for.
• Building Prospect List [x4]
  • Scouring my social media for tips for finding prospects. At the moment, I'm using My IP Address - Shows IPv4 & IPv6 | Blacklist IP Check - Hosting Info to find all Shopify domain registered websites and working from that list. I'm not going to even bother with the top listers as I'm sure they've got millions of dollars already spent on marketing.

For now, the remainder of this week will be brainstorming how I could find clients. I feel myself tunnel visioning a bit too much, so I'll take a step back tomorrow to give myself some more headspace.

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 7 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000
Pomodoro Count: 0 (I did an hour-ish of work, but didn't record them as pomodoros)

Just a heads up, these posts are done in retrospect. (I'm doing Pomodoros today, but the update will be tomorrow.)

Looking back at progress from last week, I completed in total:

• 20 Pomodoros
• 0 Sales Calls
• 0 Email Sent

Looking back at how much I accomplished, well, there isn't much, but I understand that the rate of progress is what matters in these situations. Comparing my effort from last week vs. my first week posting here on the Fastlane Forum, it's a big improvement. I'd like to throw out the thanks to everyone who's helped so far! But, what that ultimately means is that I've got to make some considerable improvements this coming week.

Now, time for some goals for this coming week.

Here are the goals I'm going to shoot for:

• 30 Pomodoros (40 Pomodoros is ideal, for me. Consistency is more important than quantity.)
• 25 Personalized Prospective Emails Sent at a MINIMUM
• 1 Sales Call (I hesitate to increase this number as it's not something I can control. But, if I land a sales call, I'll definitely up the anty, immediately.)

 

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[ChrisLeeHoskins]

Day 8 breakdown:
Current Profits: 0/1000 (Days Left: 20)
Pomodoro Count: 6

• Personal Writing [x3]
  • I was running into a bit of analysis paralysis and had to sit down to write it through. As much as I'd want to pull the trigger and send immediate pitches for my services, I want to make sure that the value I'm providing goes beyond the price tag of the service. I'm not here to squeeze out every dime from my clients. I'll be shooting for adding actual value to their business.
• Prospect List [x3]
  • I made the mistake of tracking businesses' by their newsletters only to find out that a majority of them have no timed sent emails, effectively losing contact altogether. I'll be sure to record prospects even prior to gauging their email campaigns. I pretty much wasted a day of work. Bummer.

 

[Andy Black]

I’m wondering if it would be more helpful if you tracked the number of emails sent, personal messages sent, Facebook group comments replied to, etc?

 

[ChrisLeeHoskins]

I’m wondering if it would be more helpful if you tracked the number of emails sent, personal messages sent, Facebook group comments replied to, etc?

Currently, the goal is to build a prospect list for 100 potential clients(should only take a couple of days). From there, I'll start following some goal numbers such as 5 sales calls per week when I know what my conversion rates are looking like. I'll be sure to post an update with that info.

 

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[Andy Black]

Currently, the goal is to build a prospect list for 100 potential clients(should only take a couple of days). From there, I'll start following some goal numbers such as 5 sales calls per week when I know what my conversion rates are looking like. I'll be sure to post an update with that info.

What about making X number of daily outbound emails or calls your goal?

The sales calls is a lagging indicator of doing enough outbound calls/emails.