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The #1 relationship no-no š© email marketers should know


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The #1 relationship no-no š© email marketers should know
To quote Rocky Balboa in Rocky III, āHumpday aināt nuthin!ā
And to get momentum to conquer that hump, todayās Feature Story lays out how to use relationship marketing principles to improve your email campaigns or newsletter.
Includes 5 solid examples of brands giving a dang about the customer relationships. After you soak that up, you can sift through the following sectionsā¦
The Knowledge Base
Self Help (Aristotle in Bike shorts)
Facts & Stats (word game boom)
Get Hacking (influencer-adjacent)
Appetizer: The one thing hardly anyoneās doing with their 168 hours per week.
Now, letās wade neck-deep into todayās Feature Storyā¦

Feature Story
Relationships are Relationships
How many friendships and marriages end because one party isnāt putting in much effort?
Same principle with email marketing. If emails are lackluster, there are a million other emails subscribers can open instead.
So⦠avoid the #1 relationship mistake according to this Professor of Psychology:
1ļøā£Taking someone for granted.
Your email campaigns are competing against all the other email marketers. Worse - your emails are up against busy peopleās time constraints, video content, and spam filters too.
Your subscribersā attention is a gift. Canāt take it for granted.
Is Losing One Email Subscriber a Big Deal?
Yes and no.
Youāll never keep 100% of readers. But losing any subscriber because they donāt feel appreciated is like throwing away money.
Chasing new customers (or subscribers) is fun because itās a challenge, I guess. But have ya ever noticed itās mostly chasing?
Better to ease up and focus on current customers so they keep buying from you and opening your next email because I didnāt take them for granted.
Itās easier to sell to existing customers than to someone youāre chasing, which is like stalking.
Real-Life Examples of Relationship Marketing
My buddy, who used to own the beer / check-cashing store, never failed to be open.
Never failed to have folding money on-hand to cash every customerās check, either.
Every single payday, 200+ people depended on him to cash their checks.
Same repeat customers like clockwork every week.
But, thenā¦
He sold the place. The new owners stopped cashing checks for 3 weeks.
It took just one week for word to spread, though.
Groups of workers at the same company all went to another business or started using a bank (which they hated in the first place - plus banks donāt sell beer).
Those customers never returned. Relationships can end fast.
It Isnāt Rocket Science
Relationship marketing can be as simple as being insanely consistent so you never let your customers down.
If you promise a weekly newsletter. Never miss a week.
If you promise weekly discount codes, send them 52 weeks a year.
If you promise uncommon opinions and perspectives, donāt ever mimic bland content.
5 Relationship Marketing Examples (beyond the beer store)
A detailed list from Mailshake is here.
#1 IKEA - Changed font back when customers hated the new one.
#2 Samās Club - Early hours for VIP members to avoid lines.
#3 GE - Produced sci-fi podcasts (not much in it for them, just entertaining for customers).
#4 Hillās Tool Rental - Local business owner helped me find parts for a pressure washer and didnāt charge me for taking up an hour of his time.
#5 Enterprise Car Rental - Gave me a full-sized truck and let me bring it back with an empty gas tank because they didnāt have the smaller car Iād reserved.
Proof Relationship Marketing is Worth the Effort
Good customer relationships make selling easier. But thatās not all.
Brand missteps will be more forgivable
User-generated content is an easier ask
Only 5% of Americans have āa great deal of confidenceā in faceless corporations
Also, consumer surveys show people are let down when they receive offers they have zero interest in or have already bought. Why?
The brand has shown little interest in getting to know them.
Onward now to The Knowledge Baseā¦

The Knowledge Base
The future of retail (includes how brands benefit from knockoffs)
šŖ5 phone-busters if youāre in the 43% of folks who feel addicted
āMagic The Gatheringā- the tip of a $1 billion digital iceberg?
š”3 ways to turn docs into assets via Google NotebookLM
These wise people played the XL long career game
š¦āš„Why corporate social feeds are boring & how to fix them
Watch: Why home improvement sales depend on video now
š¦„How convenience is destroying culture
These 9 post-purchase email ideas drive repeat sales
šComing up, donāt sit in the standsš

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Self-Help
You could do a lot worse than listening to The Art of Manliness podcast to soak up some everyday wisdom.
Recent episode had life lessons from an old-school dad and football coach. Dude wore Bike coachās shorts and taught his sonā¦
To never run in the rain
To get out of the stands
That nobody cares what you did last year
Episodeās here and Iāll give you the context on the second bullet above. All the fans in the stands want to switch places with athletes on the field. Fans do not want to sacrifice what it takes to get where the athletes are, though.

Facts & Stats
![]() Budgets⦠Sales of Hamburger Helper are up 14.5% this year as consumers tighten budgets (Seattle Times). | ![]() Word$⦠More than 28 million people play NYTās word games (NYT). | ![]() Cuts⦠AI has directly caused over 10,000 job cuts in the first seven months of 2025 (CBS News). |
Bonus: In April 2025, readers spent an average of 92 minutes on _____, outperforming social platforms like Snapchat, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. Answer at end of email.

Get Hacking
A specific strategy to implement today
Nike got Caitlin Clark. Biggest āgetā of an influencer in a while.
Not many brands get a shot at a major influencer. But even the smallest companies have a shot at signing potential influencers who have access to influencers with medium to large followings.
Think about the back-up point guard on a team with a star. Or the mom of a fashion influencer.
Micro influencers have been proven hits for brands - better engagement than mega-influencers.
But most of us donāt think about how to get the micro-influencers before anyone else knows about them. Or how to help them evolve into an influencer.
ALT Hack: Easy pickins for content creation. Sports writing is horrible today.
Most articles are either AI slop or filled with fan tweets. If a sports writer has nothing to say and leans on dingbat fan opinions, what kind of writer is that? One that can be replaced by you. Just find a way to connect sports to your campaigns here and there.

Thanks for reading Inbox Hacking. Please share it with your peeps - itās sugar-free but stings a bit.
Shane McLendon - Copy Kingpin
Bonus answer from Facts & Stats section: Readers spent an average 92 minutes on The New York Times Digital games, beating social platforms like Snapchat, Pinterest, and LinkedIn (NYT).