In 2012, I managed a live charity event for the Red Cross organization I was volunteering for back then.

It was huge, a party with more than 2,000 people, and many things to think of.

On the night of the event, I was also overlooking the ticket sales.

We had set up a list of some special guests like Red Cross officials, the major, and other political luminaries.

It was a typical list on paper, and every time someone showed up, we put the check mark.

This list had only one simple purpose: keeping track and identifying special guests and VIPs for our event.

After the event was over, we threw the list away.

I was thinking about this little story when I was laying out this letter.

I don't like thinking about my email subscriber pool as a "list" anymore.

It's a powerful database. That's the much more appropriate term.

Why? Because your pool of email contacts is a diverse group of people, all with similar and also very different wants, needs, and dreams.

A simple "list" won't give it justice.

If you still think email marketing means sending out emails to everyone on your "list" or sending slightly different emails to different "lists" of yours, please keep reading.

Most creators send out regular newsletters to all of their subscribers at once.

Everyone gets the same email.

But a smart and modern email marketing tool like Kit (affiliate link) can do so much more than that.

Think about your email subscriber data like a spreadsheet with rows and columns.

Every email address is unique, and represents one row in this spreadsheet.

There are no duplicates, Kit makes sure of that.

Each row entry (email address) can have infinite attributes attached to it.

Attributes can be tags or custom fields.

Information like the first name, age, customer yes/no, and so many more.

Tags are entirely different from custom fields, and I will explain why in another email.

Looking at your database of email subscribers this way, instead of thinking in "lists", changes how you can work out a segmentation and personalization strategy.

You will be able to send hyper-targeted messages to your readers, instead of the same broadcast to everyone.

The results?

More and faster sales, happier subscribers, and an email-based creator business at your fingertips.

Sound good? Please let me know what you think about this concept.

Tomorrow we will take a look at another principle I like to use:

Your email processes are your creator operating system.

See you tomorrow!

—Wolfgang