Ecom Growth Insider · Podcast episode

Max Sturtevant: List Growth Is the Lever, and the Pop-Up Is Where It Lives

With Max Sturtevant · Published 2026-04-01 · 56 minutes · Hosted by Andrej Tumachowitsch

Max Sturtevant: List Growth Is the Lever, and the Pop-Up Is Where It Lives

Max Sturtevant founded Wellcopy, which runs email, SMS and subscription programmes for around 130 DTC brands with a team of about 80. He got there from flipping sports cards, a spell in crypto that ended net negative, and freelance copywriting on Upwork that turned into email work because every client needed emails.

His argument is that email is simple at the core and most brands make it complicated in the wrong place. List growth is the highest lever there is, the pop-up form is where list growth happens, and almost nobody tests it. He says they lift pop-up conversion by an average of 2.7 times when they take a brand on.

This is for operators who are sending campaigns and tinkering with subject lines while the form that fills the list goes untouched for a year. You get his pop-up structure, the offers he tests, the mystery discount mechanic, and a blunt case against over-segmentation.

What you will take away

• The pop-up form is the asset nobody tests. Max wants it A/B tested weekly. His rough target is ten percent or better, with the caveat that a brand converting at ten might belong at twenty five, and that a German store will convert lower than a US one because that market likes pop-ups less. Across the brands they take on, they average a 2.7 times lift on pop-up conversion, which means 2.7 times the list.
• Ask for something easier than the email first. Going straight for the address reads as work. A first step that costs nothing, even a yes or no on a discount, triggers commitment bias: people follow through on what they have started. He runs quiz pop-ups that ask a question first, then email, then phone, and the answer becomes a profile property that segments the welcome flow.
• Use dollars off when the order is big. Five percent off a two thousand dollar order sounds like nothing and reads as nothing. It is a hundred dollars. On high AOV brands he switches the pop-up to the dollar figure with a minimum order threshold, and the same offer starts converting in the pop-up and again in the welcome flow.
• A mystery discount often beats a stated one. Ten percent off told plainly converts worse than the same ten percent presented as a mystery. Taken further, the code can reveal the amount only at checkout, which walks the person through choosing a product first. On abandoned cart and checkout emails he now runs mystery discounts as standard: roughly double the click rate and about fifty percent more placed orders.
• Subscription brands should front-load the discount. Rather than fifteen percent off recurring forever, he prefers a larger discount on the first subscription order and a much smaller one after. It converts better at the front and costs less across the life of the subscription.
• Stop over-segmenting campaigns. Max's biggest objection is brands who send a hyper-targeted email to a fraction of the list while under-sending to the whole engaged list. He wants four campaigns a week to the 120-day engaged list, and segmentation done inside the flows instead, where it is built once and keeps running.
• Lead magnets do not replace a discount. He has not been able to make them work for acquisition. They bring in people who do not buy, and a discount at least moves somebody towards a purchase. Run the comparison on gross profit rather than on margin given away.
• Copy still surprises him. He talks about focusing on the high levers, then his team ships a subject line test that doubles revenue. Changing an abandoned cart subject line to say the order is ready to ship consistently outperforms the usual question about forgetting something.

Full transcript

Lightly edited from the episode captions for readability. The episode is the record - where they differ, the audio wins. The source is YouTube's automatically generated captions, which carry no speaker labels and no timings, so this runs as continuous prose rather than a speaker-by-speaker transcript.

Welcome back to Ecom Growth Insider, the show where we break down what's actually working to scale D2C brands profitably. Today's guest is Max Divant, founder of Well Copy, one of the biggest and fastest growing email and SMS agencies in the e-commerce industry. Max and his team work with 7 to 9 figure brands. He's managing the retention for over 130 different brands and he has built a team of roughly 80 people to handle all of that. This episode is a straightup retention masterass.

We get into the real levers that move revenue and email while list growth is the number one priority. How Max thinks about pop-up conversion rates, offer testing, and the mystery discount strategy that can dramatically lift welcome flow and abandoned card performance. And he has a take I fully agree with. Most brands don't need more segmentation. They need to send more consistently to their engaged list and stop over complicating things.

If you run a Shopify store, this episode will definitely put more money into your pocket. Let's dive in. Hey, Max, where in the world are you right now? What up? I'm in San Diego right now in an Airbnb.

I just got kicked out of my last Airbnb because of some some like um it was it was like some emergency construction and they were like, "Hey, we got some emergency construction. You got to go find a new place in 3 days cuz we're kicking you out." And so then I had to run find a new Airbnb. And then now I'm here and I just got back here settling in. But I'm in San Diego. Damn.

So, not even your fault not partying too hard. Surprisingly, no. Surprisingly, no. See, you'd think so. And if you like look at my place, like you can even like I can move this.

There's like literal like party stuff in this place now. Like it's just so much so much crazy stuff. Uh but no, it actually wasn't my fault surprisingly. Nice. Nice.

Give people a quick a quick overview like what do you do and who do you work with today? Hell yeah. Let's do it. Uh my name is Max. I'm the founder of WellCopy.

Um, so email and SMS agency uh for ecom brands. We work with 7 to nine figure ecom brands. Um, and um, yeah, we run their emails, text messages, and subscription programs to make them more money. Uh, so we work with right now about like 130ish brands right now. Um, and we got a team of like 80 now.

Um, and yeah, that's that's pretty much pretty much what we do. So just scaling brands with email and SMS. 130 brands is is unbelievable, dude. It's a it's a headache. But, you know, there are other there are other agencies with thousands of customers.

I don't know how they do it, but we're we're we're slowly, you know, the the more customer the more brands we add, the more like, oh like this gets it gets more complex and more complex and it's just like it gets to just people so many people that you're managing that it gets to be there there are different there it it depends on like the type of agency that you want to build and like the model that you go with cuz you know there are some agencies where it's like five clients but we go super deep with them and we it's performance based and do that. So there's that that has its own headaches. And then there's the headaches of like the the route that we've went through. Uh which is having a lot more brands. Um but you don't go as deep with them.

So fulfillment's a little bit simpler. However, to scale you have to really grow your headcount and you just got so many people. And so then it's just like operational sort of internal stuff and things that you got to learn. And so kind of just got to pick your battles and that's just like naturally that's how we've ended up with it. But yeah, it's a it's a lot at times.

Yeah. Do you want to get to to a thousand clients more? Oh, Lord have mercy. I sure hope not. That would be that would be not not in this specific model, but um you know like with a SAS or whatnot then absolutely.

But actually like running to emails then that like with our current setup I I mean to have a thousand clients that would be you know at least like a 2,000 person headcount which would be crazy. But someday maybe you know I I don't know. I I never thought that I'd get to 100 clients with this. Um, so who knows? Maybe maybe I can create like something that's super automated with AI and then just sign a ton of people.

But, um, I don't know. Honestly, literally everything's just been like in terms of like how we've gotten to the current point. Like it's just been super natural. It's not like I had this since I started just like this super dedicated plan and this 10step plan of do this, do this, do this, do this, and then we're going to be at 100 clients. It's just like happened naturally where every single day I'm just like, "Hey, let's keep growing.

Let's keep growing." And I try my best to do that. Um and um I just like it's it's kind of just happens happened naturally. Um but yeah, I don't know. Maybe probably not, but we'll see. Yeah.

How did it all start for you? It was so very natural kind of. Um, so I mean when I was in high school, I started flipping sports cards over COVID. Um, cuz I was bored as hell and I found my old cards and I started selling them and I was like, "Oh you could make money online." And so then I just got obsessed with that, just buying and selling cards online. That's how I got into like the online business space and like creating my own storefront and creating social media accounts to uh push myself um push my products and whatnot.

Um, and then I went off to college and I didn't want to have pieces of cardboard worth $5,000 within my dorm room. Um, so I was like, "All right, well, what next?" Went off to college, sold all my cards, and then kind of like messed around at college for a semester, and then I was like, "Oh I want to be doing more." Started doing crypto. Uh, cuz I was like in the online business space, and everybody was talking about crypto. It was 2021. Um, so it was popping.

So then I started doing crypto. Started doing NFTTS. How did that go? made 100 made 100 grand lost 120 grand so was net negative um but it was very fun and I learned a lot and then I was just like after that happened I was like okay I need something more sustainable um and I naturally like knew what freelance marketing was um so I was just like how can I be a freelance marketer came across copywriting um and just started doing copyrightiting and I was like all right I'm a freelance copywriter within a couple months was doing uh within a couple months like I was just naturally doing a lot of email marketing for the brands that I was writing for. Uh, I was just like ripping Upwork, just like, "Hey, I'm a copyright.

I'm a copyriter all day, every day, just submitting proposals." Um, and I was signing different people, brands. I was doing all sorts of different stuff, working with influencers, uh, brands, all sorts of stuff. And for all of them, they just needed emails. So, I was writing a lot of emails. And then naturally, like one of the brands I was doing everything for, um, and writing their emails, they're like, "Hey, we fired like our email marketing strategist.

We're hiring one. Do you know anybody?" And I was like, "Here, looking at them. I could do this I'm an expert email marketer. I'd never been inside Claio or anything. I was just writing the emails.

Um, but then they gave me a shot and then I was like, "All right, I'm an email marketer." Um, and then I just loved it. I did I remember I sent one campaign with an AB test. AB testing a headline in that email and one variation made like double the amount of money. One email made 10 thou the variation made $10,000 and the other var variation made $5,000. I was like, "What the fuck?" Um, that's interesting.

That's fun. So then I just became obsessed with it. Um, and so then I started marketing myself as a freelance email marketer. Um, and so by the time like I really took copyrightiting seriously um would probably that was probably like May 2022 is when I started to really take it seriously. And then by I mean I was I was I was making like I got to 10K a month pretty fast um in like fiveish months or so.

Um I'd say and so that was that was sick and I just kept doing that. did that for about a year being in-house email marketer um for a couple different brands uh at a few different eight figure brands and did that for about a year just learning learning learning and then I got to a point where it's like I'm confident in myself um and I want to start building a team I want to start working with more brands so then well copy was birthed at around like the beginning of 2023 um and that was like all right I got to get clients upwork isn't working um just because Upwork was so like projectbased like people post on Upwork like hey I'm looking for it's a job posting platform for anybody who doesn't know um it's just like hey I'm looking for email marketer to build out my flows and and I got lucky with like a couple of the brands on there who I was able to get on retainer but I needed something else so then I started doing cold email um joined client ascension um and then everything kind of coaching program which teaches cold email and just how to run an agency and then everything kind of just like grew from there. So by the end of so beginning of 2023 I start a well copy. So end of 2023 with like 10 clients um and probably like maybe three team members maybe like freelance sort of style. Um and the whole time I was posting organic content.

And then by the end of 2023 to the beginning of 2024 is when my content really started to pick up steam and clients actually started to sign for my content. And I was like holy And at that time, cold email was starting to become really, really difficult um and for ecom. And I just started to sign clients off content. And in 2024, so then I stopped cold email and just doubled down on content. And so end of 2023, finished like 10 clients.

And then by the end of 2024, had like 50 clients um and like 20 team members. Um and then by the end of 2025, this past year, finished with like 120ish clients and um 60 team members roughly. Um, so it all just happened naturally and yeah, it's kind of like the whole the whole story. That's some that's some solid growth there. What would you say?

What was what was the hardest part about like going from from freelancer to like real real business owner? The hardest part The hardest part is always getting clients. Like that's always the difficult part. Um, that's always the difficult part. but kind of happened naturally for me with content um where I was just posting content all day every day and I just committed to the long-term success of posting content.

Um so the hardest part for anybody is getting clients. It's the only reason why um I've been able to grow to this point is from just like my content just started started working. Um, but I knew like through it, as I was creating the content, I never really expected to get clients off content. Like the first platform that started working was YouTube. And my whole goal with with YouTube and nobody was really doing email marketing YouTube.

There was one guy and but nobody was really doing it. And my whole goal of the whole goal of YouTube videos, me starting to post YouTube videos was to prove to people that I was cold emailing that I'm a real person and just to differentiate myself and share my strategies. And so it was just like I would post YouTube videos and after I'd book a call off cold email or if somebody responded to my cold email, I just send them to my YouTube channel just being like, "Hey, look at like I'm a I'm a real person and I have good ideas, good strategies." Um, so that was the whole goal. And then I was posting on Twitter as well. Um, and the whole goal of posting on Twitter was just like to meet other people in the space because I was I was in college and I didn't know anybody doing email marketing.

So, the whole goal of Twitter was just like let me meet other people doing this and let me like learn um from other people. So, then I started posting and that was and it was super fun. And I never viewed it as like getting clients. It's just like here's my knowledge like if I get clients cool, but like really it's just more like I'm going to send potential clients in my sales process to this content. And I and then by the end of 2024, people just started finding my YouTube.

And then I was like, "Okay, maybe I got to double down on this even more." So then I started putting more time into it, more time into it. So that's always the hardest part for most people. For me, it kind of happened naturally, so it wasn't too difficult. Um, I'd say the real hardest part for me was giving up control um, with because like I had to stop doing everything myself in order to cuz like the only way that I was going to grow would be to do more content cuz we're signing clients on content and so if I want to sign more clients, why don't I just double the amount of content that I'm doing? Um, but I was already working 12 hours a day.

So it's like I got to I'd have to give up control over like my clients and the strategy and everything. And so that was the most difficult part was getting giving that up and then getting people inside that I trust to manage the accounts. Uh so that was the really difficult part where it took a lot of training um for one specific person that I eventually trusted to take over accounts um to at least free my workload. So it started off not me I never started off and hand somebody a whole Claio account. Here's like the whole client like you got everything piece.

It's like little by little. So I brought somebody in with like little experience. Um but they were hungry to learn and I just slowly they started to learn thing by thing. So they started copywriting and then uh so I had them just writing the emails to free that up from my time and then after they got that down it's like okay now let's start doing campaign strategy. They got that down then it's like okay let's get you involved in client communication.

They got that down and slowly they started to just like take more off my plate. So it was a gradual process with this one specific person. Um and then eventually they they got it off. So, it wasn't like immediate, but slowly built up trust to where I could hand accounts to them. And then all I'm doing is meeting with them on a one-on-one once a week and just making sure things are things across the accounts are going smoothly.

Um, but that was the most difficult part and the part that took me the longest to do. And yeah, that was that that's what I would say the big difference between the hardest part for me going from freelancer to actual agency owner and hiring more clients was giving up that control cuz I was like nobody can do it as bad nobody can do this as good as me. Like these are my clients. Like my strategy is like nobody can do it as good as me. And you know what?

I'm right. And everybody's right. Nobody can do as good as you. Like Andre like with your clients like nobody can run accounts as good as you in your eyes in your opinion. Like obviously I think I'm the best in the world at email marketing because it's based off of my ideas and how I think good is.

Um and so the thing is like that I had to get over and I heard it on like a podcast is just like hey 80% of the way there is 100% awesome. Um where I was like you know what maybe everything doesn't need to be 100% up to my standards because my standards aren't necessarily right. It's not like I'm email marketing Jesus. It's like it's like there are multiple different ways to do it. Um, and so the biggest thing for me was I wanted everybody I wanted every I wanted accounts to be managed exactly how I would manage them.

But I was just pulling my hair out in frustration just like why the are we not doing this? Why aren't we doing this? Like we should be doing this. Um, and it just caused a lot of pain. But it's kind of like by force I had to just be like, you know what, it.

Like do what you think. Do it do what you think with the account and just follow like my base strategies. And I just gave gave up some control. And you know what? It wasn't as good as me, but the client liked it better because it wasn't as good as me in my eyes because it's my way of doing things.

Of course, I'm going to think my way of doing things is better. But then the client is like, "Dude, things are things are going so much better. Like um like I like what you guys are doing now." I actually didn't tell the client that it was this other person doing the work. I told them like it was still me. And they're like, "Dude, the strate I I don't know what happened like last month, but like I'm loving what you're doing now more." I was like, "What the fuck?" like um and so and so that was like a big wakeup call for me is like it was like it's not always like of course you in your own mind are going to think that you're the best but the thing is you might not be and so nobody's going to 100% live up to exactly how you do things.

Nobody's ever going to do that. So just try to shoot for 80% of the way there. And even if it is 80% as good as you, that's fine. That's fine. That's that's a-ok.

Okay. the client might might not even notice or it might that might not be even be the difference, but also you're 100 like another person's 80% in somebody else's eyes. Like the client liked that better than my And so it's like you just got to give that up and accept that hey, it's not going to be exactly how I would do it or exactly I might I might not even think it's nearly as good as what I could do. Of course, like you got to have standards and make make sure it live up to your standards. But point being on this little yap is you can't expect somebody to do things exactly the way that you do it.

And once you give up that control and give just be like, hey, you know what? This is 80% of the way there. 80% how I would do it. Perfect. Roll with it.

And then you'll free up a lot of your time and stress and your results will probably be could potentially be better as long as the person that you're working with is competent and decent. Yeah. That's also the thing that that I've struggled with the the most um in the past and also to some degree even even today um that is still very difficult to to give away control because as you mentioned you always think you you know it better you always think you're you're the best at at getting results and knowing what the customer wants or the client wants. And that's not just like a decision one day you wake up with it and it's like okay I'm I'm cool with everything now because I still struggle with it. It's a reminder every single day like I'm probably I'm probably the worst person at it still.

Um because it's like for example like my content like I still don't give up my content. I still have that limiting belief of so it's like an internal it's always like a battle that you're going to have with yourself. Um like for me it's like my content is like I want to keep producing more content but you know I only have so many hours in the day and so it's like you got to give it up. Um you got to give it up. Um, and um, so it's like I think it's something that everybody struggles with like forever because you want things to be done your way and it's hard to give up control.

Um, but you know, you just got to ask yourself if I where do if like your goal is like you want to be 10x your current size. Um, you just have to imagine yourself in that 10x position however however many years down the line it is. uh what are your responsibilities on the on a day-to-day basis? Are you really going to be managing ad accounts? It's like no, you're not.

So, why not just give it up now? Why not just do it now so you can build systems that are that can grow? And so, that was one thing I read a book called 10x is easier than 2x and it changed my life. And that was right when this started to happen. Um and that was beginning of 2024ish.

um when I was still like controlling everything and now we're at like 20 30 clients and I like can't be doing everything but like I need to I need to give it up if I want to keep growing. Um and it's a really good book. I recommend everybody reads it. I read it every so often. Flip through it.

Um it's very nostalgic for me too. I I love I love that book. Um but essentially like the main thing that it teaches is just like 10x is easier easier than 2x. Like if you think 10x, it's it's easier to grow 10x than it is to grow 2x because to grow 2x, you're competing in a world with other people growing 2x. And so, for example, Andre, like what what would it be for you to to like 2x your business?

Okay, it's probably just like, okay, I probably got to hire a couple people here. Uh, keep doing what I'm doing, but like do more of it. um and maybe like use more ad spend, maybe build out this other funnel, whatever. The problem is everybody who runs a ad agency is doing that and they think like that. What if you asked yourself what would I need to do to 10x?

And then it's like there are really only cuz there are a million paths to 2x. There are a million ways that you could 2x your business, but how many ways are there to 10x your business? And so it's actually easier because there's really only a couple paths to 2x your to 10x your business. There are millions of paths to 2x your business. Um, and so that's kind of like what it teaches and like the philosophy around it is like, hey, what is how would you 10x if you were going to do it because there's really only like a couple things that you probably could do to theoretically do that within 2 years.

And um, you know what, like you might not 10x, but you might 5x thinking that way. Um, so it's just like the whole the whole thought process is there's much less competition if you think 10x, but there's a ton of compet competition if you think 2x. Um, so you so that's something that I always have to remind myself um every day and it's something that I have as one of my saved lock screen is uh think 10x is just like you can't think of you can't like you can't conversion rate optimize your way to a 10x like you can't 10x your close rate. You can't 100x your close rate but you can 100x the amount of leads you get to book calls. That's like a 10x example.

Like you could try to nickel and you could try to microoptimize your close rate to get it from 20% to 30%. Or what if you just 10x the amount of leads you get that it doesn't matter what your close rate is. Um so um just thinking about that was one thing that was um that I did at that point or that I thought of at that point and um that I still have to continue to remind myself um and still struggle with. But it made me just be like you know what like if I'm going to 10x I can't be doing this. I got to give it up now.

So, it. And then you just give it up. And then you trust in yourself that you're going to figure it the out. Uh cuz often times there's usually like there's a tough point where it's like you could keep doing what you're doing. Say you're at like say you're at like 50k a month.

Um maybe maybe we could say like 100k a month. Um no, let's say like 50k a month. Say you're at 50k a month. You're at like 50% margins and so you're making like 25k a month. It's like you could keep doing what you're doing and probably like be chilling.

Like if you want to like just live off that, like that's great. Um, but in order to really grow, you have to free up your time and you have to invest like 15k and you so you have to eat into your margins. That's like the problem with like growing is you have to eat into your margins for a short period of time and bet on yourself uh to figure it the out. Uh, so that was like a difficult thing like at many different steps in the business is you have to eat into your margins and then bet on yourself. Like for example, when I hired a closer um to start taking sales calls, it was like I didn't want to do this because bro, I'm going to have to be paying this closer like based on the amount of deals I'm closing, I'm going to be paying him 10 to 20k a month.

That's like 10 to 20k a month out of my pocket. Like Um, and so I didn't do it for the longest time. Uh, cuz it's like I don't I don't want to do that. Uh, but then I get to you get to a point where it's like you have to and then bet on yourself. So, it's like, yes, I'm going to eat into my margins in the short term, but you know what?

I'm paying 10K to 20K a month to this guy right here. And in the short term, that's coming out of my pocket, but I'm betting on myself with the time that I get get back. So, the four hours of time that I just got back, I'm betting on myself that I'm going to be able to bring more than 10k to 20k a month of outsized returns to pay for itself. And so there's always that period where you have to dip into your margins and bet on yourself to figure it the out. And then if you fail, sometimes you will fail and you got to like backtrack, but as long as you So that's that's happened like a a couple times where you you know, you just have to make that next step.

You have to bet on yourself to figure it out. Um I don't even remember the original question, but that that was just like a little rant. Yeah. No, that is so valuable. But basically, yeah, focusing on the long-term potential ROI of like buying the time back by by spending that money and knowing that long term you'll benefit more from that.

Exactly. It's like that's that's what you have to take risks. Like it's you you you have to take those risks or else you're just going to stay stuck forever. Like you got to light a fire under your ass with something like that. Um like for me like starting to pay 10K to 20K a month out of pocket like it lights a fire under your ass to be like now I'm paying this dude.

like I got to I got to make this back rather than just like oh no let me just chill and coast and like do this. But like if you always force yourself to do that, it forces you to really just forces you to really work harder and do other and find other that will make you the money back. And so I think it's important because you get very comfortable and you know I I struggle with that all the time still. Um but it's just always a good always a reminder that you have to tell yourself. Yeah.

Also really liked what you what you said about you you can't conversion rate optimize yourself to like a 10x. That's what we tell our clients all the time. Uh because we obviously focus on paid ads, but also just growing brands in in general. And we oftentimes have clients that want to like 5x their revenue, 10x their revenue. And then they spend a lot of time focusing on some like small tweaks, some conversion rate optimization, getting their website to convert from 2.1 to 2.3%.

Um even though it will never get them to the 5x, 10x that they want to achieve. Um and they should focus on completely different things. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's the same thing for our clients. It's like, bro, we could like clients who are just micro obsessing over like tiny little sentences of copy in a random testimonial email um versus like like dude, our time when we're doing all these like micro revisions.

That's taking away from doing offer tests that can 3x your conversion rate um on within like the welcome flow, for example. Like we just had one client where we took their welcome flow conversion rate um and pop form conversion rate. Essentially we're getting them same ad traffic but four times the amount of revenue coming in uh from the email list off of that. And then like it made their ads like way more profitable. And it's like we were only able to do that because the client wasn't obsessing over the tiniest details and campaigns.

Um and like stupid little but that's the that can really move the needle. And then that offer test that we did in the welcome flow, now they're running ads around it, too. And it's like, oh my god, this is the offer that wins. This is the framing that works. This dollar off plus this free gift, like for some reason, and this product framing, like for some reason that works.

Those are the high levers that can really like move the move the needle. So it's thinking in orders of magnitude, thinking in 10x and not 10%. Uh which obviously it sounds stupid when you say it out loud, but it's like no, it's like just think in that frame of mind. It's just like is this a 10x sort of thing? Like what are the high levers?

And so like for me it's like um what are the 10x tax for me? Like it's like just push more content and get more people to see me. Like that's that for me is like what 10x is. It's like how could I get um I could obsess over working with my closer and getting him from a 25% close rate to a 30% close rate or why don't I just try to make sure that everybody who owns Shopify has seen my face before? Um like that it it's not going to matter.

like little micro micro increases in my uh funnel. Um if everybody knows who the I am. So that's how I try to think of it. Yeah, that makes sense. Now let's shift a little bit to the to the e-commerce side of things.

I mean you you guys get crazy results for your for your clients. Walk us through your like highle approach um when it comes to retention like for you like what matters the most. 100%. Yeah. So obviously it's going to depend like on the brand.

Um but really like email marketing is super simple um at its core. Um and it's just like with anything like 80% of the results are driven by 20% of the things. And so for us it's just like hey let's focus on the high levels first and then we're going to worry about these subject line tests that clients obsess over. But it's like okay like we don't unless we have a popup form that's absolutely dialed an offer that's absolutely dialed. we have all of our core flows with uh multiple emails in each one like three to four emails per core flow and then we're sending consistent campaigns three to four times per week and we have good deliverability that I don't care about any sort of like micro sort of optimization.

So it's like we need to get that set up first. Um so it's just all about the high levers. Like I can go into an account and if they only send two campaigns per week, we increase it from two campaigns to four campaigns per week. We're going to make them a ton more money. Um and so it's just like okay, let's focus on that first.

And so it's just like the bare minimum for me in my opinion when I review accounts is pop a form that's dialed. I I don't like to give a specific KPI for pop-up forms because it really depends on traffic and the customer. Uh like for example like um German stores their pop-up forms are going to convert less naturally than a US-based store cuz the German market they don't like pop-up forms as much and they opt in at a less rate. But like typically for most brands we like to be at like 10% plus. I don't like to also say 10% because there's some brands where I review their pop-up form and it's at 10%.

Um, but it should be at 25%. Um, it just depends on your audience and your customer, but it's like follow best practices in your pop-up form. Uh, based on like what we know works. Um, typically we want it to be like 10% plus val pop-up form. It is the most important thing.

It is what will make you the most amount of money. We come into brands on average we 2.7x their pop-up form conversion rate, which, you know, it sounds good, but like you don't truly like conceptualize that. That is 2.7 times the amount of people on your email list. Like imagine having a million person email list versus a 2.7 million person email list. Like that.

Do you think you're going to make a stupid amount more money with that 2.7 mil? Like yes. And so it's like but pop-up forms like don't get a lot of attention. Like you should be AB testing your pop-up form every single week. Um that's like if you're doing running a high lever high um like running a highle account like that's what you should be doing.

Uh but like pop forms are like the biggest thing and so there's that and then of course like core flows just need to have those. The biggest lever with your core flows just make sure you have three to four emails in each one. Um make sure you're not being stupid about it and you follow best practices. So like the welcome flow four emails. Make sure you're reminded the discount in every email.

Um, make sure you um have urgency at the end. Uh, abandonment emails, wait 30 minutes before the first email. Uh, that's the best time. And then make sure you send an email every single day. Um, like that sort of stuff, like some of like the core stuff.

Um, and then campaigns, just send three to four times per week. You could literally send a blank email with just a shop now button. You're going to make sales. Um, so I I'm less focused on let's do the most hyper optimized content. It's just like, let's get content out and then once we get in a groove, now let's focus on really like testing these styles and concepts that we that we really think can perform.

Um, and so that's really how I like to think about it. Um, and then it's going to depend on like store size as well. So once we get to like the eight figure brand, uh, then we want to be increase our campaigns. So like five times per week. Uh, if we're at nine figures, then you need to be sending every day.

If you're at eight figures, you need to be doing a little bit more segmentation in your flows. And then same as nine figures. Um, it's so so ju it just really depends on the level. But like if I could summarize my philosophy, it's just like get the bases in place cuz they drive 80% of the revenue and then let's start layering in more AB testing and core strategies. But get your bases in first.

They drive the most revenue. Nice. And I mean once you have the basics and once you have the volume of of emails that you're sending, you also start getting the data that will allow you to to optimize because otherwise you'll spend like hours tweaking something, optimizing something without even knowing whether it will work. Exactly. Exactly.

Yeah. And it's just like you've got to especially like early on like with clients like sometimes we come into accounts with like nothing or they have like a few missing holes. Um it's like focus on what's going to make you the most money first. It's like always always that like we used to um do a very templated approach where every single client coming in like this is how we do things. We do this flow then this flow then this flow and then we launch these campaigns and then we do these flows and it's like a very templated like first 60 days.

Uh but we stopped doing that about a year ago. Uh because it's like sometimes that doesn't make sense for a brand. You got to start off with the highest leverage. like why would we start with the welcome flow if the welcome flow is performing well uh but the brand's missing a um the brand's missing like an immediate post-p purchase flow where in our old way of doing things that would be done on day 40 well like should we create a new welcome flow that I think will increase conversions by 25% or insert this post-purchase flow which is going to increase conversions by x amount um so it's just things you have to assess and it's always just like what's the highest leverage first let's make the most amount of money especially with new brands and as an agency, you want to get as many quick wins um as possible right off the bat. Um so that's like how we changed our philosophy.

So now it's a very custom onboarding every single time. Makes it a little bit more complex in the sales process um because we just have to be like we have to build out a road map for every client, a custom road map in the sales process where it's like this is we have to run an audit and then a road map. So it makes it more complex um but it's more fruitful um compared to you know having like a more templated approach but yeah very important. Yeah and I assume it it hugely depends on the on the brands that you're working with but what are some of the best like offers and and pop-ups that you that you're seeing right now? Yeah, for sure.

So, the pop-up forms like you should we use Alia pop-ups um for all of our or we recommend every brand gets on Alia uh Shopify pop-up app. Um really good. So, ideally if we can get on to Alia that would be amazing. Um but we do quiz based popups. Um some sort of engagement based pop-up.

So, we don't ask for the email address right off the bat. Um it's just like played out the customer like you see a pop-up form and it goes straight to email. Customer's like, "Ah, you. I don't want to give you my email." Um, and so instead, it sounds counterintuitive, but you actually need to add more work for the customer. You engage with them first.

You either, you don't ask for email right off the bat. You do a popup and you could just ask them a question. Uh, you could do something as simple as, hey, do you want 25% off? Yes or no. And if somebody if somebody if this person's doom scrolling on their while doom scrolling on the toilet while taking a and you put in there, they click an ad and they see, do you want 25% off?

Yes or no? They're gonna be like, "Fuck yeah." They click yes. And then you ask for email. Um, it seems counterintuitive adding another step, but this triggers commitment bias in humans. So, when somebody first sees that popup first step and it's like, "Hey, do you want 25% off?" And it's just yes or no.

It's like it it's perceived as a little barrier to entry. It's like all I have to do is click this button. Um, whereas like instead of the alternative of 10% off, enter your email. Customer sees that, it's like that's a lot of work. But it's just like yes or no.

They click yes and then you ask for email. And so then it triggers commitment bias in humans. Humans are much more likely to follow through with things that they've started because they don't want to waste energy. They don't want to be like that was a waste of time. Like I got to follow through with this.

And so then they enter their email address. Then it takes them to the next step which says finish signing up with text to activate your discount. So then it's like I already gave these dudes my email. Like might as well give them my phone number. Like I'm already so close.

Um, so that's what So you always start off with an engagement step first. Uh, that's just what works well. And so we do quiz based pop-ups. And so we ask some sort of question. So, uh, typically in most cases, um, it's, um, like if it's clothing brand, for example, we'll be like, "Hey, you've got 10% off.

Um, to claim your discount, tell us what you're shopping for." And then it's just three options: men's, women's, all styles. Um, and so this does the um this acts the same as like the prior thing that I said where it's just like, "Hey, do you want this discount?" Yes or no. But it takes it a step further because it's customized towards the customer. The customer is seeing this. They're like, "Oh like it's custom to me.

Hell yeah." Uh, so it's got that customization bias as well. Um, and so the customer then answers the question. It's like, "I'm shopping for men's." Um, and then we ask and then it asks for email and the person's like, "I already made it this far. Like, let me enter my email." and then they enter their SMS and that's what converts the best. The nice thing about that as well is you can use that data and you tag that profile property to the customer.

So I said I was interested in men's clothing. So what do you think that the welcome flow emails I'm going to receive are? They're going to be focused on there's going to be men's clothing. I'm not going to show any uh women's clothing. Uh whereas the people who do women's, we're going to take them through a welcome flow that is just women's clothing.

Um, and so that's the pop of forms that we see work well as far as structure. As far as offers really depends brandto, um, and what kind of brand you are, subscription brands, for example, um, you see a lot of subscription brands do some crazy acquisition offer, um, which works well. So something like 40% off plus three free gifts. Like typically that's a very enticing offer. Um, so that's something that you can do.

Um, for example, Arra, they do you could do no free gifts and just do like an increased discount on the first order of your subscription. So, you could do like Arra for examp like a lot of brands will do like, hey, 15% off if you subscribe. Um, it's 15% off recurring. But what Armor does is they do 30% off your first subscription order and then 5% off recurring, which saves you margins long term because you're giving more on that first purchase. You're giving 30% off, but that's going to help convert more people on the front end.

Um, and then you're giving way less on the back end, 5% compared to 15%. And so you make it back within like 3 months and everything is just like way less. Um, and so that's something that you could do as well, which I love for subscription brands is an increased discount off the first subscription. Then let's just decrease the recurring cost. Um, which I which I like to do.

Um, other than that, I mean, just classic% off or dollar off work great. Uh, if you're a high AOV brand, um, do dollar off. Um, so for example, like we get brands coming in that they get their AOV is $2,000 and their pop-up form says, "Hey, get 5% off your first purchase." Which sounds stupid. Like 5% off? Like that sounds like nothing.

But what's 5% of $2,000? Like, what are we really giving the customer? Well, 5% of $2,000 is $100. So, we're giving these customers $100. Imagine if somebody went up to you on the street and said, "Hey, here's a $100 bill for your email address is a $20 bill." But uh like that is way more enticing than than 5%.

So for high AOV brands, you want to do like a dollar off offer. So instead for that sort of brand, like anytime we implement that for a brand, take them from like 5% or 10% off to whatever the dollar amount equivalent is and then set a minimum order threshold. Um then that works really well in pop-up forms then also converting in the welcome flow. Um and so there's that. Just dollar offer percent off works well.

Um, but what we mess around with a lot is mystery discounts as well. So, still a dollar off or percent off, but you just tell people on the platform, hey, you've got a mystery discount. And then people are just like, what the is this mystery discount? So, they opt in just cuz they're curious cuz it's like, it could be 50%. It could be could be 10%.

It could be could be whatever. Um, so we do that. It often times performs better than a lower discount. Like if we have 10% off, typically what works better is a mystery discount. Um, so in the popup form, we say, "Hey, you've got a mystery discount.

Enter your email for your mystery discount." They enter it. Enter your phone number for your mystery discount. Okay, here's your mystery discount. It's 10% off. Still 10% off, but you just say it's a mystery discount.

Um, and so there's that. Sometimes we even take it a step further and we literally use code mystery at checkout to reveal your offer. Still 10% off, but it forces people to then be like, "Ah, Now I got to find an item, go to checkout to see what this is." And so in that process, they're going through the whole buying journey and finding a product that they like, and then they go to checkout, then they apply the discount. Same discount as if we told them it was 10% off straight up. But look at how many steps we got this person to go down the funnel.

Uh, doesn't always work. For some brands, it really works, but those are like some of the offer structures that we use um, and that I recommend. That's interesting. I never never thought about the like mystery discount like going as far as until the check out process. I assume it will Yeah, I assume it will have a huge spike in like abandoned cards or abandoned checkouts, but at the same time it can work really well because people already go so far.

Yeah, we try to um I mean we literally 3xed a brand's conversion rate by doing that. Like it was like on their welcome sequence just by their welcome sequence 3xed in conversions. Like that's business changing results by doing that. Like sometimes it just rips. That's why you always got to test these things.

You got to just have them in your have them in your toolbox. But for example, what like always works is doing that mystery discount. Same thing but in your cart abandoned and check out abandoned emails. So say you go to a website and you just abandon a cart. Um a lot of brands will just do like, "Hey, you got 10% off your cart.

Use code cart 10." Um But what we found is what we tested was why don't we still give them 10% off, but let's do a mystery discount because they already have the item in their cart in their checkout. They've already proven they like this. We just need to get them back to their checkout. Um, and so let's do, hey, use code high-4x7g for mystery discount. We put a mystery discount in your cart.

Click here. It's right. It's right there. And we get so much higher conversions by doing that. And so it's now like a standard that we do for most of our brands is our abandoned cart and abandoned checkout discounts are all mystery discounts.

And so it's usually about a double in click rate and about a 50% increase in total placed orders when we do that. Well, that's that's not bad. Not bad. We'll take it. Yeah.

What do you think of those of those bin to- win popup things? Yeah, they do well, but they're they're just tacky. Um, so I I don't we never really use them. It usually the quiz quiz pop-ups perform better than spin to wins. Um, so I don't I don't remember a client that we've done a spin to win for.

I just think it looks tacky. It can perform well, but like quizzes perform better and they're better for the brand and we get data on the customer because they're telling us like whatever question we ask. Um, so we don't really use them, but yeah, I I I lose all my trust in the brand if they if they have one of those. Exactly. Yeah, it's pretty bad.

Have you ever tested like lead magnets or like stuff like that for for e-commerce brands for the dude? They never work. They never work. They never work. Um like they just they just don't.

They just don't work. They just don't. Um I I would love if they would work, but they just don't. Cuz we get a lot of brands coming in that are like, "Hey, we don't want a discount. Like we want a value." And it's like, "Do you hate money?" Um, like it's I mean that's like the real question just like yeah we are happy to do a non-disount like fully no discounts nothing but like you're going to make a lot less money.

Um it's like always the it's like you the only brands you see who don't discount like everybody's always like we want I want to be the Lamborghini. I want to be um I want to be like the Louis Vuitton of my niche. They don't discount. was like, "Yeah, because they've been in business for like 50 years and they have this massive." Do you really think that you're going to do that? Like, like, no, you're not.

Like, do what works. You look at all the fastest growing brands, the zero to$100 million brands. They give up crazy discounts like like that. It just works. Humans buy discounts.

Like, if you if you want to be a non-discount brand, then yeah. Power to you. You just got to make less money. If you if you don't care about money, then yeah. Let's do it.

Um, but yeah, it's just something to consider. But um we do I'm I've never really been able to get them to convert because they just get in the wrong customers. Um they they just don't buy at a high rate. Um you can get more but even then I don't think people care about lead magnets like unless you're like do do people even care? Like do consumers read lead magnets?

Like not really. Um and I could be wrong and there are definite like this is there are definitely ways to make it work. There definitely ways in unique case. I'm not saying that like it's impossible to make it work. Um, but for acquisition, I just don't think it works.

I don't think a customer who just clicks on your ad, I mean, it depends on your product again, but I don't think a customer who just clicks on your ad really wants to read a 30-page PDF that you've put together that they're never going to read. Um, there's like some stat out there like what's the what's the percentage of people who buy a course who don't complete the course? It's like 80%. It's the same thing for lead mags. these people aren't going to use it and it's irrelevant and it doesn't move them towards a purchase.

What a discount does at least is it moves them towards the purchase because it's like there's urgency behind this discount they took like an action. So that's something um important to note. What you can mess with what we have messed with is doing like for p for people who already have their email hitting them with lead magnets once they go back to the website or giving lead magnets and emails. That's what I recommend. Um it's um it can work like for people who you already have their email address, they're on your email list, like let's offer them a lead magnet on our website.

So you just change the targeting to only target people who are already on your email list and then it's like give some sort of lead magnet with a ton of education. You can do that. I mean I just don't get a ton of success. Um I just don't think the ROI is worth it. Like you could do it, but like is the is it worth the time to do it?

But you know like we have one brand for example they like we do it. We do it, but it just I don't see it convert as well. Um, but like we have one brand for example, they literally sell like $200,000 like houses. Like they literally like build you a house and we're doing emails. Like it's they drop it in your back backyard.

I forget what they're called. Um, but like a lot of the people like they run ads towards like how to build your own. Maybe it's like ADUs. I I don't remember. But um it's like how to get like an appraisal or something like that's a lead magnet that can work like stuff like that.

But I haven't seen too much success. Have you are there like specific brands you've seen do it that that work with that sort of thing? Not really. Not really. Yeah, we sometimes get clients ask us about it about about that and they they ask us whether like they can like get rid of the discount for the email signups because they don't want to give the margin away um and want to like replace it with something like a lead magnet.

But I'm always very very skeptical. Yeah, just look at the look at the life look at just look at your gross profit. It's like yes, you're going to give up less mar like if you don't do a discount like you're not giving up any margin, zero margin, but how much less sales are you making? And so it's like usually or every single time I run the test when you do the discount, yes, technically like if you look at if you look back at the last month, like we gave away $50,000 in discounts, but compared to the group that didn't give any discounts, they had like $100,000 less gross profit because you just get less sales with it. Um, so it's usually just not worth it.

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I mean in the end what matters is the the total profit that they get and also the number of new customers that they acquire. Like especially for subscription brands if they do like a very aggressive front-end offer like maybe they'll make less profit right away but they get so many customers from that and the lifetime value of those is still worth lifetime gross profit.

Like that's all that's all that matters. Like you might lose money in the short term but extend your horizons usually. Like we have a brand right now uh gains in bulk. They're doing it's the craziest offer I've ever seen. Their full third so it's literally so it's they sell creatine um and it's it's typically $39.

They're doing what's called creatine revolution. Um where it's literally $1 to get the full 30 serving bag of creatine and free shipping. Like literally your card just gets charged $1. So they're losing a ton of money on the front end. Um, but the bet is we can get people to three to four rebuilds.

We can get x% of people and then we're going to be profitable at that point. It's just like we're getting customers and spreading awareness. Um, so for for subscriptions only. Yes. So it's subscription.

Yep. So you subscribe to it. It's $1. You can cancel anytime technically, but the goal is just like keep them subscribed and you only need I don't know the exact number, but say for example like they've done the numbers maybe like for example in order for it to be profitable this cohort that buys they need to get 25% of people to stay to still be subscribed after month three for example and then they're break even and it's just house money at that point. So, that's like kind of the mathematics that they're betting on.

I made up those numbers. I don't know if they're accurate, but that's the sort of that I think is dope that a lot more brands need to do. Getting creative with their offers and like that. Yeah, that's such a good offer. We we tried a similar like a very like a low ticket offer for a for a supplement brand for the paid ads.

Um, but we didn't really get it to work because it wasn't a subscription and we got a lot of people like at a very cheap customer acquisition cost into the door, but it was very difficult to get them to come back and reorder something something else after they got their first order like a ton of product for like a few dollars. Yeah. The the only way to make it work is or the best way to make it work is just make sure you have your upsells dialed. Um cuz you cuz like what they're doing like it's $1 but like al but their AOV is going to be like $ 20 or $30 actually because it's $1 like you buy it and then there's oneclick upsells right after. It's like hey why don't you buy this as well?

Why don't you buy this as well? Why don't you buy this as well? And you already have the customer's card on file because they build these funnels on like Clickfunnels. So you can do oneclick upsell. It's ecom brand running out of click funnels and you just one click upsell.

So, the person $1, yeah, here's the creatine. Then the thank you page is like, here's this special offer. Um, get this ultimate stack for $20. Literally, all you have to do is click here. This $20 stack is like x% off or whatever.

And then it's like they just made more money. Um, so it's less than that. Or maybe it's like a ebook or maybe it's a challenge or maybe it's whatever whatever you can do to get recuperate more cash on the front end. Um, so like that's really the way to the way to make it work. And they they did this in the past.

So, it's just like a ton of ton of upsells right after to try to get more front-end cash. Um, which is really smart and I think that's the only way you can really make it work. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah.

You you started as a as a copywriter. Do you think copywriting is still important for for email marketing? Absolutely. Yeah. Very.

I'm always surprised. Um, I continue to get shocked every every day with copy and how it can impact things cuz also like I talk so much about like get the get the bases set up, focus on the high levers, yada yada yada, but then my team will send over like an AB test of like a headline that they did that resulted in two times the amount of revenue. um like this subject line for abandoned cart emails saying your order is ready to ship consistently just doubles revenue across abandoned cart emails cuz like most cart subject lines are like forgetting something question mark for some reason saying like your order is ready to ship just psychologically it just like tickles the person's brain differently and it gets them to place orders at such a high rate and so absolutely it's very very important um and I continue to get surprised by it because I'm always just like levers like focus on that like intricate copy stuff isn't going to make a difference but stuff like that can really make a difference. Um so I'm always surprised by it. Um but yeah absolutely very very important and there are a lot of brands that still run on direct response funnels and long form and we have a few clients that are like that and it's great it's awesome works well.

Of course copy is very very important. Um yeah I mean how we do copy is different of course because now you got AI. Um but definitely just as long as you're testing test your different angles. Um, like still like I think that the the most important part of any piece of copy or ad or email whatever is just like what's that one angle? What's that banger angle?

What's that what's that banger like a email on just like hey we have healthy dog food. Um, extend your dog's life with healthy dog food. Like that's that's like a email. Um, but is that a banger angle? What if we twist that?

How can we how can we make this a banger angle? Well, how about instead of feed your dog healthy food, you say you want your dog to live forever, why not feed them like it? Some Like, that's a banger angle. It doesn't matter what the rest of the email says. Like, if I have that as my headline, like that's going to rip.

Like, that's that banger angle. How can you how can we find those banger angles? Um, and so that's where that's where like the high leverage within copy is. And so I think that like people don't read emails word for word like they they and ads and whatnot. Like what's the big idea?

What's that? We want our dogs feed uh or like if you wouldn't eat it, why would you feed it to your dog? Like you your dog your dog's a family member. Like why feed them like they are? Like like like that.

Um like those are the banger angles that you can find. Um and so um finding that those specific angles I think is more important than intricate copy. Um, and so that's like whenever I'm writing an ad email, it's just like, "What's this? What's that oneliner that just makes you like go like damn, yeah." Like that. What's that oneliner that makes you just like be like, "Damn, damn." That's what I'm always trying to think of because I think that's the highest highest leverage in any piece of content that you put together.

Yeah, 100% agree. I mean, it's it's the same with with ads. Yeah. to end the session. You you mentioned you want every Shopify founder to to see your face.

Um if you could tell them one thing like what is one thing that every founder should should start doing with their email and what should they stop doing except for obviously working with you. Optimize the out of your pop-up form and test your acquisition offer. Like literally that that's it. like optimize your pop-up form and optimize the offer that you and so within that is test your offer. Um so really focus on your list growth.

It's going to be the highest leverage for every brand. Um that's what I would say do that to stop doing stop oversegmenting and think about and thinking about segmentation like just stop thinking about segmentation. Um just keep it dead simple. Blast it to everyone. not blast it to everyone, but I mean just like send to your engaged list.

Like a lot of brands like they they try to do like intricate like, okay, we need to do a VIP send here and then we need to do an email dedicated just towards people who have viewed creatine in the past 30 days and then we need to do an email just towards people who wear orange underwear on Thursdays. It's like that's stupid. Like you could do that absolutely but you only have so much time in the day. So, it's like, would I rather send an email, hyperargeted email to 20,000 people, a small part of my list, or would I rather send an email to 250,000 people on my list? Maybe it's less targeted, but you have 10x the amount of people on that list.

And so, even if my conversion rate is five times lower on that email, I'm still making more revenue because there's 10 times the amount of people. And so, for me, it's four emails a week, no matter what, to your engaged wide 120day engaged list. 120day, and just make good content, people will continue to open. Once you have that, sure, you know what? Throw on more segmented stuff.

But I hate it. My biggest pet peeve is when brands are so focused on hyperargeted stuff that they under send to their engaged list and they leave a ton of money on the table. So that's what I would say and that's where I think a lot of money is left on the table and stress and thinking cuz it's like what do I got to do to my list? Like I got to I need to be segmenting more d like no not really. No, just just send good content.

Send it consistently. Send it a lot. And then if you want to do some extra stuff cherry on top, then by all means do it. I prefer to segment in my flows. Keep my campaigns wide.

Within my flows, my abandoned cart, my post-purchase stuff, my whatever I'm going to be segmenting based on the customer. I'm going to segment based on firsttime customer or um multi-time customer or churn subscriber. I'll do my customization in there because I only set that up once and it's going to consistently be happening for me. By post purchase, I'm going to segment based on what the person thought bought before and I'm going to hit them with specific stuff. I don't need to do it in campaigns consistently because I'm wide there.

And then people will get customized flows based on where they're at. This was great. So much value. Where can where can people follow you and learn more? Hell yeah.

Uh you follow my Instagram, WellCopy Max, and I think my Twitter is the other way around. It's Maxwellcopy. Um and yeah, just find me over there. Just look me up on Google or something, Max Sturdivvent. Um, and you just follow me on whatever platform you like.

Awesome. Appreciate you hopping on. That was so much fun. Thank you for letting me Yeah. Appreciate you having me on.

Good chat as always, brother.