What makes a good newsletter? How about “unfiltered stories and what we learn from them?” For this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I interviewed business strategist Kristin Kenzy, the writer and strategist behind the Drunk Business Advice newsletter. Kristin’s formula for figuring out what makes a good story for sharing in email or newsletters is gold. As is her “accordion pitch” process. Don’t miss this one. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.

Stuff to check out:

Kristin’s Newsletter

The Copywriter Club Facebook Group

The Copywriter Underground

Full Transcript:

Rob Marsh:  Okay before we get into our interview… long time listeners are probably wondering, what’s up with the new music? For the past five-ish years, we’ve been using a bit of music composed for us by Addison Rice. But after so many years, it just felt like it was time for a change. So the music is different for the new year and we’ll see if we can’t go another five years or so with this new mix.

On top of that, you’ve probably noticed that I’ve been hosting the podcast for the past six months without my one-time co-host Kira Hug. Enough people have asked what’s up with that, that it’s probably time to let you all know what’s up. I mentioned this briefly on one of our throwback episodes, but to make sure you don’t miss it…

I wish there was a juicy story here, or a controversy, a messy falling out worthy of the pages of People magazine, but there’s not. Last year Kira told me that after seven years working on The Copywriter Club, that this project just didn’t light her up like it used to, and she was ready for a different kind of challenge. So we worked to slowly move her out of her daily role at The Copywriter Club. Kira’s still officiallly—legally—a partner behind the scenes, but is no longer working on Copywriter Club projects. We’re still friends. There was no drama… just time for a change. 

At the time I considered ending the podcast, but whenever I mentioned ending the podcast to someone I trusted, they all said, “no, you can’t do that… this podcast is too important for writers who want a look into how other people are running their businesses.” And on top of that I really enjoy talking with copywriters and other marketing experts about this thing we all do. It’s still lighting me up and I’ve got some great guests coming in the next few weeks, so hopefully you’ll all stay tuned to see what’s coming next. I’m still committed to our original promise of sharing strategies and ideas you can steal and use in your own business.

Speaking of great guests… my guest today is business strategist and story teller Kristin Kenzy. Kristin writes one of my favorite newsletters, Drunk Business Advice. In it, she combines interesting marketing take-aways with fantastic storytelling that makes me (and thousands of other readers) look forward to it each week. I wanted to talk with Kristin about her approach to finding and writing the stories she shares. The formula she uses to figure out if a story is worth telling is excellent and she walked me through during our interview. We also talked about why writers need to stop journaling and a better way to pitch prospects in person… something Kristin calls “accordian pitching”. It’s good stuff, so stay tuned to hear what she had to share.

Before we jump into this interview, we’ve got some really great guest trainings lined up in The Copywriter Underground this month… one on building connections with prospects and clients without burning out on social media. If you’re like me and struggle to show up on social media consistently, this one will change your approach entirely. And a second training on landing a “real” in-house job—either part time or full time—if you are looking for something a little more stable than freelancing is. Ironicallly, copywriters are bad at telling our own career stories and this workshop will show you what to do if you want to land one of these so-called “real” jobs. Both of these workshops are exclusively available for members of The Copywriter Underground. If you want access to them plus more than 30 templates, 70 other workshops and trainings, and monthly coaching from me, you can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. If you’ve been thinking about trying out The Underground, this month is the month to do it. Go to thecopywriterclub.com/tcu for more information.

And now, let’s go to our interview with Kristin Kenzy. 

Rob Marsh: Welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. We always start with your story, but I’ve got to say, I’m hesitating to ask that because you’ve had so many experiences that I’ve read about in your newsletter. We could talk about your story for the entire podcast. So your version of how you got to where you are today, running your own newsletter and the businesses that you’ve been starting.

Kristin Kenzy: Of course. Well, thank you, Rob, for having me. It’s really an honor to jump in here in the week between Christmas and New Year’s, where none of us know what day it is or what’s going on outside or where anything is in the world, to actually be a little centered and talk about writing and talk about business. 

So I’ll answer your question by just looking at the last couple of years, because the last couple of years is when I’ve become a writer. And I have a definition of a writer, right? A writer is someone that actually gets paid to write. So lots of people write. I have written throughout my entire life. A lot of us have written, have published, have done self-exploratory work through writing. But I only became a writer really in the last 18 months. And that is a result of having had 20 years of entrepreneurship experience. So as you mentioned, we can talk a lot about all of those different ventures that I’ve been a part of, but how that switched from being an entrepreneur to being really a writer or an entrepreneurial writer is getting hired by Trends by the Hustle. Trends was the premium subscription of the Hustle newsletter for about five years, and it was an entrepreneurship analytics publication. And they had had many editors, many writers, many analysts over the years, and they needed someone to take it over who actually wasn’t a writer. They wanted someone who viewed the world through the lens of entrepreneurship. 

So with zero editorial background, zero professional writing experience, I stepped into that role simply because they thought that I knew how to talk to that audience. And again, I looked at it as an exercise in clarity, an exercise in taking actual experiences, actual advice, actual data, and communicating it as effectively as possible to an audience that is really looking to be entertained while they’re reading it, but also they need to get something out of it. So that started my entire sort of writing journey, and I was the managing editor there for about a year. Decided to part ways with them just because The hustle and trends had been acquired by HubSpot, which is a big software conglomerate. And journalism and media and corporate America don’t blend super well. And I thought that there was just some cultural nuance there that wasn’t really jiving for me. But in that time, I had just fallen in love with editorial. I had met the coolest people that I’ve ever known before in my entire life, in my entire career, who were our writers and our analysts. The most incredible entrepreneurs who were part of our readership and part of our community. And I just said, this is what I want to do. And I felt that after having 20 years of business experience, I had earned the right to stop doing it and start talking about it and start teaching it. And so I made that big shift. I was, you know, a huge part of my career was in real estate development. And I like to say I retired my hard hat and adopted a laptop as my main business tool and made that shift into editorial. But again, I don’t look at any of this as a writer. I look at it as a person who has had experiences that I think can help others. and or entertain others, hopefully both. And that’s really the platform by which I’ve built my newsletter and all of the other editorial and community aspects of what I’m working on right now.

Rob Marsh: So before we jump into a lot of that stuff, what’s really interesting with what you’ve shared so far is the fact that you weren’t a writer before you became a writer. And there are a lot of people who listen to this podcast who are starting writing businesses or have been writing for a little while. They’re looking for clients. that the challenge of how do I communicate now that I can do this thing, this writing thing. And you obviously did it. I mean, it’s almost counterintuitive where you say, well, I, you know, you, you managed, you know, skating rinks and you’ve like, y