Why your emails are likely inflicting cognitive distress onto your customers (and a dirt-simple way to stop it…) 

Continuing with maxim #2 in need of an update.

Here’s some context in case you missed yesterday’s email:

I’m doing a 4-day breakdown of 4 particular maxims from David Ogilvy’s phenomenal 1972 ad titled:

“How to create advertising that sells”

(Check out yesterday’s email if you need further context.)

Yesterday I broke down his maxim about having to make your marketing pretty…

…otherwise the consumer would think you’re shoddy and not buy.

I strongly contested that – I thought it was outdated and in need of an update to the 2026 environment.

But with today’s maxim?

It’s the opposite.

I actually couldn’t agree more with it.

In fact:

I believe the following maxim is even MORE instrumental today than it was 54 years ago when Ogilvy wrote it:

===

    Go the whole hog. Most advertising campaigns are too complicated. They reflect a long list of marketing objectives. They embrace the divergent views of too many executives. By attempting too many things, they achieve nothing.

    It pays to boil down your strategy to one simple promise––and go whole hog in delivering that promise.

===

This is essentially, well…

The entirety of Blind Spot #6 is in my Book.

i.e. the catalogue-style marketing emails where you offer 17 different protein powders, creatines, pre-workouts, mass-gainers, fat-burners etc. to buy from with a big “SHOP NOW” button below each of those…

…that just trigger analysis-paralysis in the buyer.

The average person makes thousands of decisions every single day:

• What to eat…
• What to wear…
• Which meeting/appointment to reschedule…
• Which call to return…
• What picture to post on Instagram…
• Which problem to handle first…
• What fire to put out…
• Which EMAIL to open…

By the time they sit down, open your email, and even ENTERTAIN buying something from you…

They’re already operating near their limit.

Decision fatigue is a real thing.

Seriously:

It’s documented and it’s actively working against you in every interaction, whether you’re aware of it or not.

(But judging by the state of email marketing in this industry… most aren’t – hence why I dedicated Blind Spot #6 to it in my Book.)

So the absolute WORST possible thing you can do in your emails…

Is to present people with a menu of options.

“Hey, if I just put 17 different supplements in this email… at least one of them is gonna catch their eye and they’ll buy, right?”

Nuh-uh.

Not how it works, sadly.

What that does is just add onto an – already – overwhelming cognitive load and make that person’s path to a “yes” harder.

Again:

I go much more in-depth into this inside my Book in Blind Spot #6.