Why I Titled My New Book “SMART Email Marketing” for Freelancers and Startups
Hint: dumb email marketing never works - Unless we apply the SMART principles and practices in this established framework, email marketing attempts might fail for valid reasons.
I published this important post on Medium and my website.
Dear friends, after some background on the misconceptions about email marketing, which new writers still need to understand, I will introduce you to a framework I created for successful email marketing. Anyone can use this framework as a model. My new book uses this framework, which works well for me and successful people in email marketing. First, I will paint a quick, honest picture to show the reality for freelance writers who suffer unnecessarily.
Many people in my circles tried email marketing, and unfortunately, they gave up quickly with outcomes they did not expect. Some said it was too difficult, some said they received no response, and some said it was a waste of time. When I listened to their approach, I noticed that they performed every pitfall I discussed in my new book, SMART Email Marketing.
Recently, hundreds of alpha and beta readers completed reading the manuscript, and most of them were surprised with the content as they had no clue email marketing could be so lucrative and much easier than other methods they have been using for years.
Some freelance writers who came across sample chapters on various platforms contacted me privately, asking why I wrote this book and why I am so passionate about it. When chatting with a few new freelancers, I noticed how naive they were about content hosting and social media platforms. I felt deep empathy and compassion for them, as I used to have a similar perception that if you work hard, you can build an audience and make loyal readers.
Audience-building on content platforms and social media is an elusive dream. In the beginning, it feels great to have thousands of followers and get some likes and comments on our posts. But in the long term, they are all vanity metrics that bring no tangible benefits to freelancers or startups.
In 2006, I was so excited about Twitter that I kept sending daily tweets about my work, thoughts, and feelings. By 2020, I had accumulated thousands of followers. In the first week of January 2020, Twitter sent an email saying my account was suspended. There was no reason given and no appeal process. It broke my heart at the time, but then it was a blessing in disguise. My email list helped me find my real audience quickly via a new account.
The same year, I created a publication called ILLUMINATION on Medium. In the first three months, when the publication was making a global sensation, Medium suddenly suspended my account, and the pub was closed. It was resolved quickly, but I felt like it was another signal from the universe that I shouldn’t trust any platform, no matter how great it is. However, I respect all platforms as they are legitimate businesses with their own goals, like anyone else.
In 2021, Thumblr, a blogging platform on which I shared my Medium story links, sent an email saying my account was permanently suspended as they saw them as promotion. The same year, one of my favourite communities on Reddit banned my account for a lifetime as I talked about fasting and meditation as they saw them as pseudoscience.
The same year, a new NewsBreak immature AI gave me six warnings in one day because my stories were deemed harmful and suspended my account. In 2024, Facebook suspended my 20-year-old account out of nowhere when I mentioned Meta in my post, which never broke any rules. They were all fixed later, but they taught me valuable lessons.
There were many more horrifying situations so that I won’t bore you. You get the message. As a person who diligently follows the rules of every platform and always respects their policies, I was affected badly and unfairly. But I am not alone. Thousands, if not millions, of thought leaders and professionals faced similar situations. The smart ones took personal responsibility by building their own platforms and email lists, which no platform can take away from them.
Why is the audience a myth in social media and writing platforms?
Recently, an entrepreneur on LinkedIn approached me and asked how much it would cost for him to buy my Medium account, which has over 100K followers. He thought this could be a lucrative business opportunity to grow his content business. As I had no intention of selling my account, I said If you can introduce me to your 100 active email subscribers, I will give it to you for free. He intrigued. After a friendly Zoom call, he understood the reality.
Maybe this example can be unrelatable to freelance writers. I will give you another relatable example.
In 2021, I established a publication called ILLUMINATION Book Chapters on this platform to give book authors an opportunity to showcase their books and offer edited book chapters to our readers. I was so hopeful about it. But not a single story was distributed to readers, not even best-selling book chapters. After four years with hundreds of great book chapters, the poor publication only gained 1.4K followers, mainly direct links I and my editorial team shared in other platforms. However, a non-member gained 234K followers, possibly all fake.
A few weeks ago, I decided to extend this special pub to Substack to integrate it with this platform. I wrote an introduction here hoping some book authors and book lovers can find it helpful. But out of my 104K followers, only around 50 people found it again via direct links. 99.99% of my followers did not see it. So, the audience did not mean a thing again.
However, it didn’t bother me because when I used my mailing list to introduce it to a certain segment of my SMART-empowered list for just book authors, look what happened on Substack in two weeks:
Yes, many book authors got excited about it and joined the journey even with little content before starting the mission. This is a small example of the power of SMART email marketing in just two weeks, not four years, as opposed to so-called platform audience building. It means nothing to me anymore, but it inspired me to write this book and guide freelancers to take ownership of their content and clients.
As a New Freelancer, How Can Email Marketing Help Me, and What Can I Use It For?
Inviting you to email marketing does not mean giving up writing on platforms or stopping social media entirely. I invite you to allocate only 10% of your precious time to building your list while still spending 90% on other platforms to grow your content archive. If you do that, you will thank me next year when you see the benefits. I don’t expect anything from you except your success, health, wellness, and happiness.
The SMART Principles of Email Marketing: Combining Science and Art for Lasting Success
In this chapter summary, I will explain the ideas behind the SMART email marketing framework that I developed to reflect the essence of the book and show how you can use the SMART principles to turn your email marketing efforts into a strategic and highly effective tool for building relationships, growing a loyal subscriber-base, and creating sustainable revenue.
These principles (Segmentation and Personalization, Measurable Growth and Optimization, Automation and Efficiency, Relationship Building and Trust, and Targeted Content Integration) form a framework that integrates every aspect of successful email marketing, regardless of size or niche.
Instead of approaching email marketing as a series of isolated techniques, the SMART framework I developed over the years will help you see it as a cohesive system. When each principle works together, email marketing becomes effortless and a powerful bridge connecting content creation, audience engagement, and revenue generation.
I will summarize each component of this SMART framework.
S — Segmentation and Personalization
Email marketing can be most effective when it feels personal. Your subscribers are individuals with a heart and a brain and different interests, needs, and preferences. Treating them as one large, uniform audience is a recipe for disengagement and failure of your attempts.
Segmentation is the practice of dividing your email list into smaller groups based on specific criteria. This could include their interests, how they signed up, how often they interact with your content, or what topics they care about most. Segmentation helps you send the right message to the right people at the right time.
For example, if you are a freelancer who writes about both health and marketing, sending your marketing-related content to your health-focused subscribers would be irrelevant and likely unwelcome. By segmenting your audience, you respect their interests and deliver more valuable content.
But segmentation is only part of the puzzle. Personalization goes beyond simply using someone’s name in an email. It involves understanding their preferences, past behaviors, current needs, and future goals. When you personalize your emails effectively, your subscribers feel like you are speaking directly to them.
The goal is to make every subscriber feel understood, valued, and respected. When people feel that your emails are tailored to their interests and needs, they are more likely to open, read, and act on them.
M — Measurable Growth and Optimization
Unlike social media, where metrics are vague and difficult to interpret, email marketing gives you clear and actionable insights. Every interaction your audience has with your emails generates data that can help you improve.
Metrics such as open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and unsubscribe rates are essential for measuring success. But metrics are not just numbers. They are windows into how your audience thinks and feels about your content.
Successful email marketers do not rely on guesswork. They test, measure, and optimize their approach continually. For example, A/B testing allows you to compare different subject lines, email formats, or calls to action to see what works best.
Optimization goes beyond simply improving numbers. It involves understanding why certain emails perform better than others. Are your subject lines engaging enough? Is your content valuable and relevant? Are your calls to action clear and compelling?
Measurable growth means continuously learning from your subscribers and adjusting your strategy to serve them better. It involves creating a feedback loop where each campaign builds on the successes and lessons of the previous one.
A — Automation and Efficiency
Time is a limited resource, especially for freelancers, startups, and business professionals juggling multiple projects and responsibilities. Automation allows you to maintain high-quality communication without feeling overwhelmed.
Autoresponders, drip campaigns, and behavioral email sequences help you engage with your subscribers at the most appropriate moments. When someone subscribes to your newsletter, automation can ensure they receive a welcome series that introduces them to your content and sets expectations.
Automation also allows you to follow up with potential customers, nurture long-term relationships, and provide timely reminders without constant manual effort.
However, automation should never feel robotic. The key is to make automated messages feel genuine, conversational, and valuable. Efficiency does not mean sacrificing authenticity. It means enhancing your communication through well-designed systems.
R — Relationship Building and Trust
Email marketing is not just about broadcasting messages. It is mainly about building relationships. Trust is the key success factor for lucrative email marketing. Without it, your subscribers will tune out, unsubscribe, or simply ignore your messages.
Unlike social media posts that get buried in noisy feeds, emails offer a more private and personal communication channel. When someone gives you their email address, they are granting you permission to speak directly to them. Thus, respecting that trust is crucial.
The best email marketers focus on giving value before making any requests. Instead of constantly promoting products or services, they share insights, stories, lessons, and resources that benefit their audience. This creates a relationship based on genuine value rather than mere transactions. As a universal principle, I learned that the more you give, the more you receive.
Trust is also built through consistency and transparency. You must tell your audience what to expect and deliver on those promises. When you provide reliable, relevant content, you earn their loyalty and grow your business sustainably.
T — Targeted Content Integration
Email marketing does not operate in isolation. Its real power happens when it integrates with other aspects of your content strategy. Email can act as the bridge connecting your blog, social media presence, digital products, and even live events. Therefore, I added the content integration aspect to the title of this book as a key success factor.
Successful email marketers use their email lists to guide subscribers toward other valuable content. For example, if you write a new article, share it through your email list and explain why it matters. If you launch a new course or webinar, your email list is the ideal audience to introduce it to.
When email marketing becomes a central hub rather than a side project, it transforms into a cohesive system. Everything you create feeds into your email strategy, making your communication more powerful and your content more visible.
Targeted content integration also means using your emails to promote affiliate products or collaborate with other creators. If done right, these partnerships feel natural rather than forced, providing real value to your audience. Your business starts growing naturally.
Making SMART Email Marketing Work for You
The SMART framework is a comprehensive approach that combines the science, philosophy, art, and practice of email marketing. By focusing on Segmentation, Measurable Growth, Automation, Relationship Building, and Targeted Content Integration, you are not just sending emails but creating unique experiences.
Instead of chasing social media algorithms or hoping for viral content on some writing platforms, SMART email marketing allows you to build genuine connections, create lasting relationships, and achieve sustainable growth.
Every principle works best when it complements the others. Segmentation ensures relevance. Measurable growth guides improvement. Automation saves time. Relationship-building grows trust and loyalty. Targeted content integration connects your efforts to a unified strategy.
Questions to Reflect On
How can you optimize your email campaigns through continuous measurement and testing?
How can you integrate email marketing more effectively with your broader content strategy to enhance your subscribers’ experience?
After reading the relevant chapters, how can you enhance your segmentation and personalization efforts to make your emails feel more relevant and valuable?
I will guide you through this book, which will be available by the end of this month.
The Smart Email Marketing Book Will Be Available Soon
This 334-page book is in preorder via multiple bookstores.
However, as the book passed editorial QA, I will start uploading digital and audio chapters in the next few days for the members of Content Marketing Strategy Insights publication, which also includes my Substack Mastery books, From Zero to Substack Hero training program, and my other exclusive content for freelance writers.
This book is not directly about Substack, but it will be invaluable for freelance writers or startups using that platform.
This email marketing book follows my two Substack books, which helped hundreds of freelance writers successfully start Substack and helped some of them become bestsellers. Here are the links to the Substack books if you haven’t heard about them before.
Substack Mastery: Insider Secrets
A Powerful Toolkit for Advanced Substack Newsletter Mastery
“Substack for Avid Readers” I also wrote a short book for readers to start Substack who want to start this platform. It is called
They are all available to the members of my Content Marketing Strategy Insights in digital and audio formats.
Aiden, who now shares the scripts here, turned my book into a comprehensive education program on Udemy titled From Zero to Substack Hero and also made it available to the members of my Content Marketing Strategy Insights publication on Substack.
If you prefer to take the course on Udemy, here are the discount vouchers:
From Zero to Substack Hero — Level 1
Here is a sample video of the course:
Thank you for checking out these resources if you are a freelance writer. They can educate you and increase your confidence. I offer a 20% membership discount to get you started for this low-cost education and marketing service covering the Substack Mastery Boost Pilot program.
If you are a new writer, you might check out my writing list to find some helpful stories for your education.
Writing, Content Development & Marketing Strategy Guides on Medium.
Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a healthy and happy life.
You convinced me and I regret understanding it so late. Thank you for generously sharing your knowledge and experience. I found your book practical and strategic.
Really comprehensive and helpful. Thanks for sharing.