VFV Episode 42 Transcription 

Hey, it's time to crank up the truth. I'm Val Selby. Over the decades of working online, I've 
learned the most important lesson: mindset owns your business. If procrastination, imposter 
syndrome, and a lack of focus have been blocking your biz, then I'm here with Val Full Volume ready 
to help you see choices that you're making. Get ready to own your personality and use your expertise 
to create the business of your dreams. Now is the time to make changes and live your best. 
So let's get to it!  
 
Hello? Hello. Hello, hello. Welcome to another week. So. I do wanna keep this short. We'll 
see how that happens, right? I mean, if you've been listening for any length of time, you 
know mm.

Not so good at that. Usually . But we've been talking about procrastination, you know, here 
on the, on the podcast and then also in the group that I'd love for you to join. And one thing 
that I had procrastinated about was going through my list. Oh my gosh. I don't; I've been 
meaning to put together a re-engagement automation.

Um, if you use Convert Kit, it's probably a sequence re-engagement automation. And I put it 
off, and I put it off, and I put it off. And I know that there was major reasons for that a year 
ago. God, I don't know. I lose track of time, thanks to the COVID years. You know, last year I 
really decided that I was setting a big goal of 5,000 on my list because I wanted to 
participate in some of the big giveaways.

And so I was just building and building and building. And before that, when I started this 
current list at ValSelby.com back in 20—I think the earliest ones were saying 2020—I was 
building it and I was joining every fricking thing in the internet world. I mean, like, if there 
was a giveaway, I was creating a product and putting in, putting it in there.

I was just building, building, building, building. And I, I did totally burn out, you know, and 
that was part of it. But a big part of it was I was building this list of full of people who didn't 
matter. Like I had no connection to 'em. I was creating new products for the event that had 
nothing to do with my target market, even in quite a few different ways.

And it's like, "Oh, my God." But I had this goal, and I really, really wanted to hit it so that I 
could get in, you know, like I said, so I could get in these bigger events. I really wanted in the 
bigger events. And those events required 5,000 plus. . I run a lot of events, and here's where 
I'm gonna have a conversation with you, because I know that having 5,000 on my list of 
completely untargeted and, well, not completely, but of mostly untargeted people, means 
that they're not opening.

So if I have 5,000 on my list and my open rates are 20%, that means I'm paying for a lot of 
dead weight in my list every month, and it doesn't matter that I have 5,000 because 
technically I don't. If the same 20% are opening math, not doing it. If the same 20% are 
opening, then that means I really only have what.

Oh, a thousand. A thousand. I think I did quick math. Laugh with me. If I didn't, that means I, 
my list, is really only a thousand because there's only a thousand people, maybe 1500 out of 
that 5,000 that are opening, right? So what in the world is the good of having those 3,500 
other people on there that never open?

So I know that I fought it for a little while because I didn't wanna get rid of people, and there 
was a point where I didn't wanna get rid of people because all of the privacy stuff went into 
effect and we really did not know who was opening our emails. We still don't. I mean, that 
part is just. Changed forever.

I think the privacy and settings, all of that stuff, is just going to make a major mark and 
continue to make a major mark in our email marketing. That doesn't mean email marketing 
is dead. That doesn't mean the email marketing isn't, I think, the best platform. It just means 
that there's going to be people that.

We're gonna lose, and that is just gonna have to be okay, cuz we can't do anything about it. 
We can't do anything about it. So one of the major things was here; I was, I grew my list. I 
knew I needed to coal the dead weight out of it, but I didn't do it. Instead would I do, I 

upped my active campaign account; that is another $600 a year, and it's coming up due.
So I really lit a fire under my.  to get things in place. And so now I am, like a week ago, a 
week ago when you're listening to this now, I went into full obsession mode, I went through 
I, I created the new re-engagement. Automation and added some recipes. That active 
campaign actually had for me to grab very quickly.

I will be adding some videos to a workshop and telling you more about that when those new 
videos are on there. Um, cause I don't think I have a sales page up for it either. Anyways, I'm 
gonna be adding it on there because I really wish that I had set this stuff up from the very 
beginning. It's. Because I had to do the growth, obviously, and I had to get over the 
numbers.

Fact, well, I guess it's not over the numbers. Fact, I have, I had to get over the sheer amount 
of numbers that I wanted. I don't want 5,000. If 3,500 are just gonna be garbage, They're 
just people there. They're not opening. And that's what I was finding when I was going 
through obsessively. I'm going through and opening every single contact.

Now my list is not 5,000, so I was not going through 5,000 people. It was 2600, 2700, or 
something like that. I sat and went through every single contact in that list, except for the 
people that I do know, because they emailed me that I knew that they were opening. So 
there, you know, a few hundred of that.

But I went through every, everybody and I was clicking on it, and I was just, Oh, I should 
probably just wait until all the automations just run through and I still have time. I could 
have done that. I could have let it just go through. But all of a sudden I became obsessed 
with putting them in the re-engagement series and getting them the hell off my list.

And the more I started looking at it, there was two different tags specifically.  did not ever, 
they rarely had any other tags. There was two different giveaways that I did in 2020 that 
were really big ones, and those people that were on my list rarely had any other tags. And, 
uh, you know, a few of them I scrolled through and

I could scroll through the three years of sending emails and they've never opened emails or, 
or very rarely in that time, which means all they have done is paid extra for them. So last 
year I paid an extra $600 for the year for these people that don't mean anything. And I'm 
like, "Well, that was silly."

That was really silly of me to do that. So I'm looking forward to having the list down by 
probably half; I'm gonna assume that it, it could potentially drop in half. Dropped my 
account down so that I don't have to pay that extra 600 until I actually have real people on 
there that are really opening my emails, and I can't wait to see my open rates because if my 
open rates were, you know, 20 to 27% when I had all of that dead weight, what's it gonna 
be like when they are off of there?

I'm pretty excited for that number. I'm pretty excited for just talking to the people that are 
opening my emails. I did not have a problem mentally talking or mentally thinking of the fact 
that I was talking to the people that were opening and not the other ones that was not 
bothering me. However, it's exciting me to know that there's a lot of people on my list.

List that are opening all of my stuff, and I've never had a conversation with them before. So 
that kind of led me to also start making a little list of, oh, you know what, I'm gonna tag this 
person on my list, and, and you know, I'm just gonna go and open a private conversation, 
which I can do in active campaign.

I did; you know that in your active campaign you can go, so send private emails through 
there, just one-on-one. There is that option. So I'm looking at it for that. So it was not. While 
I obsessively went through to add people over to the re-engagement series, especially cuz I 
want to test them before I put them out as templates, there was also the awesome thing of 
seeing how many people are opening.

Of really realizing how many people are opening, and that was fun. I'm not gonna, I'm not 
gonna lie, it was a nice ego boost. It was a nice confidence boost to look at it and go, I've 
never had a conversation with any of these people, and they're reading my stuff all of the 
time. They're opening my emails.

all of the time. That is wonderful. I love it. Now, how can I get them more information? 
What information are they looking for? That's where my brains started going. So I want to 
know, are you going through your list regular, regularly now I've got the automation set up 
and I could, I edited the different areas in the recipe that I just went right into active 
campaign, and they had stuff that I just imported straight from them.

And then just, I just went through and, and edited, but for like how many days out each part 
of the process should do. So I have it set up now to constantly be going through constantly. 
It will constantly now. Every time, well, just, not even, every time I send something, every 
time I send something, it will process that as keeping them active, but it's going to, I'm going 
to have to keep active in my email for sure now because it is on a seven-day cycle.

So if they don't open something in seven days, it starts the process of, of, you know, putting 
them into inactive status. will, if I don't send, if I don't send stuff for a week, that's gonna 
send a lot of people in inactive. Right? So, again, another fire under my butt as well for. 
Potentially those times when I get a little lazy and I'm not scheduling ahead and I know I'm 
busy, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

All the excuses we tell ourselves so we don't email I have to be emailing at least a couple of 
times a week or will mess up my automation. So that's, that's also gonna be something new 
that I'm gonna have to be working on. Whole nother. I think that's a whole nother thing. 
Anyway, so list building, going through your list

Be purposeful when you're creating your list. Don't just add people to be getting that 
number because it's ju, it's a waste of money. It's an absolute waste of money and time, and 
I'm just kind of looking at it going, "Wow, okay. I know how much more money I, I wasted 
cuz I had to keep upping my account. So I'm looking forward to.

The list being dropped down to people that are opening, interested, want my stuff, want to 
talk with me, have the conversations with me. I'm looking forward to that. And saving the 
money, of course, and also continuing to purposely build my list so that I get more of those 
kind of people and I don't, I don't even, well, I'm not worried about it.

That I'm getting less of a drop-off rate, I guess, would be the great thing. All right, so go in 
and figure out who's not opening and who is not opening for multiple months. Kick 'em off. 
They're not hitting the unsubscribe button. Kick 'em off before they hit the spam button. 
You don't want 'em hitting that button either, because all of a sudden they're just like, 
"Where's this coming from?

And people are lazy as fuck, and they go and just hit the spam and screw stuff up. So put an 
automation in, put a sequence in, depending on what program you're using, get something 
in place. So it is going through and taking the dead weight off so that you're not paying for 
it. Yes, it's a business expense, but, you know, $600 in a year.

I could put that someplace else. I could put it towards getting help for something else, or I 
could just put it in my income account instead. Maybe have some fun with it. Anything, 
anything's better than just paying for stuff. That's nothing; nothing is coming from it. All 
that. So go through your Get rid of the dead weight so you're only talking to the people that 
are opening and want your stuff.

Alright, I will talk to you later. Thanks for listening to Val Full Volume. If you are done 
spinning in circles and procrastinating, check out my quick workshop. 14 Biz Actions Action 
creates change. Now go out there and create the biz of your dreams.