There’s a particular kind of email that lands in the inbox almost every day.
It usually starts with something like:
“Hi, I’ve been looking at your website…”
Bold move.
Especially when one of your core service offerings is with building websites.
The daily ritual
Open inbox. Coffee in hand. Mild optimism.
But there it is.
An email offering:
- a brand new website
- better SEO
- more leads
- a “quick audit” (that was definitely not quick or personal)
All sent to a marketing agency that quite literally offers those services.
It’s a bit like:
- a finance broker being offered asset finance by another broker
- a cybersecurity company being warned about their cybersecurity
- a dentist getting tips on brushing their teeth
You can admire the effort but need to question the aim.
It’s not the email. It’s the targeting.
Because here’s the thing, outreach isn’t the problem.
- cold emails could work.
- new business is hard.
- everyone’s trying to get in front of the right people.
But that’s the point.
The right people.
If your targeting is off, even the best message in the world lands somewhere between confusing and mildly amusing.
When good marketing forgets the basics
There’s an irony to it.
The same emails that talk about:
- improving conversion rates
- refining messaging
- better audience segmentation
…have skipped one of the most fundamental steps in marketing:
Knowing who you’re talking to.
Because a quick glance would tell you:
- what we do
- who we do it for
- and that we probably don’t need help building a website
(At least, not from a templated email sent to 500 other agencies that morning.)
A gentle reminder (to all of us)
It’s easy to laugh at these emails.
But if we’re honest, most businesses have been on the other side at some point:
- sending messages a bit too broadly
- hoping something sticks
- prioritising volume over precision
So this isn’t really a complaint.
It’s more of a reminder.
The bottom line
Marketing doesn’t start with what you’re selling.
It starts with who you’re talking to.
Get that right, and everything else becomes easier:
- the message
- the channel
- the response
Get it wrong…
and you might just find yourself emailing a marketing agency to offer them marketing services.
Which, to be fair, does keep things entertaining.