I get a lot of questions about 9-word emails. And they usually ask, “What do I do after I send that initial 9-word email and get all these replies back?” “What’s phase two?”
My answer is always the same: You must look at it as a chess master.
First, know where you’re going. Only then you’ll know what your phase two is going to be. Remember the South Park “Underpants Gnomes” episode? The one with the 3-step Profit Plan checklist?
- Step one – collect underwear.
- Step two – ????
- Step three – profits.
That’s precisely what I’m talking about here 🙂
You have to have your step three already figured out: “What do I ultimately help people with? What’s the result that I’m creating for them?” Once you have that, your phase two (“How do I take them there?”) will almost write itself.
Because here’s the thing:
What’s really going on in your “phase two” is… you’re determining if somebody is your 5-star prospect or not. Are they willing to engage? They are if they respond to the initial 9-word email. Are they friendly and cooperative? They are if they will continue the conversation with you and reply when you say something back.
Do they know what they want? They do if they have a specific problem they want to be solved and are aware of, and so on. But you have to progress in stages. It’s like the stage lighting at the drag races.
You wait for the first light to come on…
then the second light comes on…
then the third light comes on…
and then, when you get to the fifth light, you’re off!
The same is valid here. You only move to the next step when you know the rest. That first question you sent out initially is the “are you still looking for x?” one… that’s really just a setup for what comes next. This means the game has already been played by the time you send it out,
Because you already know where everything’s going.
I speak more on this in the podcast with Frank Kern.
