When you buy newsletter ads, you typically have two options: a big “main ad” at the top of the email or getting mentioned near the bottom of the email in the “classifieds” section.

The main ad is typically 10x more expensive.

Every single test I’ve run had shown that this is a complete waste of money*.

You always get a better ROI with the classifieds section.

Either people care about what you offer or they don’t. And having a long paragaph with a big image at the top of the email doesn’t change that.

Sure, there is some drop off as a result of people not scrolling all the way down to the classifieds section. But most people will see what you offer either way.

And if you only have one or two sentences to get people interested, you have to be extremely clear about what you offer and why it’s valuable. So a lot more people will actually understand what you offer compared to the main ad.

I’m seeing the exact same pattern running outbound for dozens of companies.

There is nothing you can do in cold outreach messages to make people care about your offer if they don’t care about it in the first place.

No clever copywriting, no relentless follow-ups.

People either care or they don’t.

*(This is why I ditched the main ad from my newsletter and only offer classifieds which appear at the top of the email now.)