Send. More. Emails. (Also, Scammers Suck) + Why Chaos Content is King

This week, we’re serving up spicy takes, raw truths, and a little advice to keep your marketing game on fire.

Here’s the tea:

• Jimmy’s war cry for 2024: SEND. MORE. EMAILS. (Yes, in all caps.) It’s not spam if it’s smart. Plus, when BFCM brands hit 5-10x their normal email volume, it taught SaaS teams a tough-love lesson: Communicate or crumble.

• John vs. scammers: Fake “John Roman” tried to grift a team member into buying $1,000 in gift cards. The scam failed (barely), but let’s talk about brands tearing others down to prop themselves up. Newsflash: No one likes a shady business.

• Bryan’s chaos gospel: Perfectly polished content is dead—your audience craves bloopers, spilled drinks, and Karen from accounting’s coffee cameo. Stop overthinking and start hitting “record.”

• Amer’s early-bird manifesto: While the masses cling to Meta, the savvy ones are quietly cashing in on Applovin. Want to win in 2025? Start betting on the underdog platforms now.

So buckle up and keep scrolling—this one’s unfiltered. 🌶️

How to Leverage Affiliate Marketing in eCommerce - EP25

In this episode of the ASOM Pod, we’re diving headfirst into what makes affiliate marketing tick, debating its ROI versus traditional media, and we aren’t shying away from the hard truths about over-reliance on affiliates potentially watering down a brand. Grab your headphones and check out the episode here.

Scammers have a special place waiting for them in hell.

Like clockwork, multiple times a year my team is hammered with texts and emails…

Fake John Roman’s pinging them asking to pay a vendor ASAP, change routing/account info on an employee’s payroll, or work on a secret project for me that involves buying lots of gift cards with their own money which I will later reimburse them for.

The latter happened last week. One of our team members (who I have never texted with before) received a text from “John Roman”. John needed him to stop working and goto the mall or Walmart and buy some Apple Gift cards. Conveniently scratch off the codes and send them to John directly through text.

It's an obvious scam, but these scammers would not be doing this if they did not have some sort of success rate. 

Long story short, after purchasing $1,000 worth of gift cards, he luckily spoke to a co-worker who started to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the ask. The purchases were already made but had not been sent to the scammer. Unfortunately, they were not able to be returned for a refund, but at least the scammer did not get their stolen prize.

I really despise scammers. If they took that energy they are putting towards causing chaos and disruption into actually doing something beneficial, the world would be such a better place.

Speaking of people with horrible moral fiber, let’s talk about the cousin of scammers, businesses that try to build their business up on the backs of other businesses.

Instead of making it about their product, their solution, their experience…

They have to bring up the competitor and say how much “they suck”.

This for the most part does not work, especially if the claim is fake news.

What it does do is show that business’s true colors.

When you are drowning in a year or two and need a floatie, I might get called away to a meeting before I can toss it to you.

Send. More. Emails.

Over the past year, i’ve had 3 simple words as my staple and war cry for 2024. 

Send more emails..

Why? 

Because there’s more noise in the inbox - Avg consumer gets like 121+ emails a day

There’s less wallet share - No doubt the economy is a little slower

More people have turned to the internet to buy their gifts and products/needs 

You have to get mindshare in a limited pool of attention.

Sending more emails isn’t about spamming, it’s about being more mindful of the end subscriber, it’s about personalization through audience management and copywriting. 

And this BFCM, that war cry became reality. 

When brands are typically sending 3-6x more email…

They actually sent 3-6x MORE than those 3-6x MORE..

Which really means.. People were sending 5-10x more email than a typical day.

This surprise..caused all sorts of interesting issues: From ESP’s and services experienced delays to other interesting challenges from other providers that were serving ads or helping drive better customer experience.

Now.. If you’re on the SaaS side of things, there are some interesting lessons to be learned.

First of all: 

1. Don’t panic.

2. Don’t hide.

3. Don’t pretend everything is ok.

Instead.. COMMUNICATE. 

Tell them. 

Sympathize. 

Apologize. 

And provide reassurance. 

It’s actually really easy to be human.

You just have to try.

I hope this BFCM taught SaaS companies the importance of communication.

Content Created vs. Content Captured - Why Captured in Now KING!

Here’s the deal: Consumers are over the overly polished, picture-perfect content that looks like it took a small army and a Hollywood budget to produce. They don’t want another ad that looks like it was designed in a lab. They want real life. The messy, hilarious, unfiltered behind-the-scenes stuff that makes your brand human.

They want to see bloopers, not a script. Your dog stealing the product mid-shoot? Gold. Karen from accounting walking into the frame holding her third “coffee” of the day? Perfection. That moment when your team high-fives after a win but someone spills their drink? Viral potential.

This is the era of captured content. It’s raw, unplanned, and ridiculously authentic, just like pregnancies sometimes. And here’s the beauty of it: You don’t need fancy cameras, perfect lighting, or hours of editing. You just need your phone, some good timing, and the confidence to post the real stuff.

So stop overthinking and start capturing. Your audience doesn’t want you to be perfect, they want you to be you. And the best part? It’s less work for you. Because who has time to choreograph a flawless production when you could just hit record and let the chaos happen?

Step one: Capture the chaos.

Step two: Watch your audience love you for it.

Also, I’m going to leave you with this. Every single day I want you to be going live on social media. I don’t care if you’re a brand, SaaS company, or agency, you NEED to be going live. Those who do will win in 2025.

Adopt & Re-Adopt Earlier. A lot Earlier.

The early bird always gets the worm. This is especially true when it comes to adopting new acquisition channels for brands, 

In the last 15 years, brands still heavily depend on Meta. And as years have gone by, we have seen the acquisition of customers grow exponentially. During this wave, new platforms have provided promise – Snap, X, Pinterest, etc. It came in waves.

We’ve always heard the early adopters glow about it. Then, everyone else wants to jump in.

We also see that brands need to catch up and re-adopt a platform. This is like the stock market…do not jump all in when the stock is proven. Invest in the potential. And when everyone is going all in on a platform, find the one no one is talking about and test and scale slowly.

We are seeing this with Applovin now as well. Early adopters are benefiting. Benefit a lot, and hopefully, Applovin’s requirements will allow them to manage oversaturation 

And that’s a wrap on this week’s unfiltered takes! If you’re hooked on our no-BS rants (or just love the chaos), be sure to hit that Subscribe button and let us keep your inbox spicy. 🌶️

And of course, don’t be selfish—share with your friends, coworkers, or anyone who needs a wake-up call from their boring newsletters.

Cheers to a successful BFCM. ✌️