A couple of years ago, I became a firm believer that, as an email marketer and campaign strategist, I should split-test the hell out of every single campaign.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. “Split testing every campaign? That sounds like an insane amount of work. It’s not feasible. It’s not efficient. You’re an idiot, Darko. But you’re also kinda hot…”
Anyway… you’re not wrong. It basically doubles the workload for your email team. But it also doubles the speed at which they learn and develop their instincts.
When I first implemented this approach with one of my clients in the fitness education industry, they had zero complaints about me churning out split tests like their lives depended on it. And yeah, it was a grind. We were only generating 60–100 clicks per email on average, so it felt like a lot of effort for not a lot of payoff.
But the payoff wasn’t just in the immediate results. It was in the long-term growth and development of my approach. By forcing myself to split-test every campaign, I was essentially going through an email marketing boot camp. All of a sudden, I realized I started learning at an accelerated pace, developing a fine-tuned sense of what worked and what didn’t.
And as I honed those skills, a funny thing happened. Our email performance started to improve. Dramatically. We were seeing better open rates, better click-through rates, better conversions. All because we had developed the instincts to know what our audience would respond to.
We reached a point where our campaign had 600–1000 clicks per email. And because they allowed me to put in the work early on, we were ready to capitalize on that increased engagement.
So, why TF am I telling you this? Because I want you to understand that email marketing success doesn’t come from some fancy hack or shortcut. It comes from good old-fashioned hard work. And a lot of patience.
If you’re serious about taking your email game to the next level, you need to be willing to put in the reps. I truly believe there’s no AI that can help you override that essential writing grind, as kids today would say.
You need to be relentless about split testing, about analyzing your results, about implementing your findings. You need to be willing to grind it out, even when the payoff isn’t immediately obvious.
And yeah, it helps to work with a company who’s up for the challenge (i.e. open-minded and willing to let me hold the reins as a copywriter and campaign strategist).
But more importantly, it requires a mindset shift.
I started winning when I stopped viewing split testing as a chore and started seeing it as an opportunity — an opportunity to learn and gain a deeper perspective on nuances that go far beyond copy.
And considering the current state of the clusterfuck we call copywriting industry, being more than just a copywriter probably saved my career.
I hear ya, I know it’s not easy. There were plenty of times when I was stretched thin, when I probably wanted to throw in the towel. But I didn’t. I kept pushing, kept grinding, kept learning. And in the end, it paid off in ways I never could have imagined.
So if I was David Goggins, I would tell you to embrace the grind of split testing. And stay HARD. Hooah! Or, I dunno, something edgy like that.
