You haven’t slept, you’re short on creativity and you have to sell by email: a survival guide

It’s 7:30. You’ve slept two hours, maybe three if you count the accidental nap on the sofa. And today you have to work, be productive and, to top it all off, send this week’s newsletter.

Relax. You won’t win any creativity awards, but you can still save the day. Here’s a two-part plan: first, to survive; then, so your emails don’t look like they were written by a zombie.

Warning: these tricks are for a bad day, not a bad habit. If you often sleep badly, what you need is to talk to a health professional, not to look for more tricks.

What to do if you haven’t slept at all and have to work

1. Have a proper breakfast. Not just a black coffee and three cookies: protein, fruit and some carbs. Your brain is running on fumes and needs fuel.
2. Get some sunlight. Ten minutes of natural light in the morning tells your body it’s daytime, even if it doesn’t believe it.
3. Drink your coffee strategically. One coffee when you start and another mid-morning work better than four in a row. From mid-afternoon on, stop: you want to sleep tonight.
4. Cold water on your face (and in your glass). Washing your face wakes you up, and drinking water helps more than you’d think: tiredness hits harder if you’re also dehydrated.
5. Important things first. Your best time today is the first few hours. Use them for the task that needs the most brainpower and leave the mechanical stuff for the afternoon.
6. One thing at a time. Without sleep, doing several things at once means doing several things badly. Close tabs and silence notifications.
7. Move. A five-minute walk every hour wakes you up more than staring at the screen waiting for the day to end.
8. A short nap, if you can. Between 10 and 20 minutes. If you overdo it, you’ll wake up feeling worse than before.

You haven’t slept, you’re short on creativity… and you have to sell by email?

Today is not the day to come up with the campaign of the year. It’s the day to work with what already works. Here are the tricks for sending a good email even when your creativity is on vacation:

1. Don’t start from scratch: use a template. Pick a design from the newsletter editor and change only the text and images.
2. Recycle your best email. Look in your statistics for the email with the most clicks in recent months and adapt it. If it worked once, it can work again.
3. Let AI write the first draft. Ask the editor for a proposal and spend what little energy you have on reviewing it and adding your own touch. Editing is much easier than writing.
4. One email, one idea, one button. Without sleep you’re in no state for complicated structures, and your readers will thank you for it.
5. Try two subject lines. If you don’t know which one is better, run an A/B test and let your subscribers decide.
6. Send yourself a test. Today is the perfect day for a “Hi, {{nombre}}” or a broken link to slip through. Check the test on your phone before sending.
7. Schedule the send. Don’t send it at 3 a.m. just because you’ve finished it: schedule it for tomorrow at the time your audience usually opens.

5 subject lines for when your brain is in airplane mode

“I’ll sum it up in 3 points”

“What you liked most this month”

“A quick question (10 seconds)”

“This ends on Friday”

“Today, straight to the point:”

They’re simple formulas that don’t need inspiration and almost always work. Adapt them to your business and try them out with an A/B test. If you want more ideas for when you’re well rested, here are 20 eye-catching email subject lines.

What not to do after a sleepless night

• Sending without reviewing. Tiredness shows in typos.
• Replying to that angry customer. Your patience is at rock bottom today. Write the reply, save it and send it tomorrow.
• Making big decisions. Changing prices, launching a new offer or deleting contacts can wait until you’ve slept.
• Drinking one coffee after another. After the third one you don’t gain energy, you gain jitters.

And tonight: how to sleep better

The best trick for tomorrow is to sleep tonight. A few simple guidelines:

• Screens off at least half an hour before bed (yes, your phone too).
• A fixed schedule, even on weekends.
• Bed is for sleeping: not for working or going over tomorrow’s email.
• A light dinner and no caffeinated drinks in the afternoon.
• Empty your head: write down on paper what’s worrying you about tomorrow and leave it there.

Frequently asked questions

Can you work well without sleep?

You can get through the day, but you’ll perform worse and find it harder to concentrate. That’s why it’s best to leave important tasks for the first few hours and avoid big decisions.

Which is better, coffee or a nap?

Both help. Coffee gives you a quick boost, and a short nap of 10 to 20 minutes helps you recover some energy. What you shouldn’t do is drink coffee in the afternoon or take a long nap.

How do I write a sales email if I can’t think of anything?

Start from a template or from an email that has already worked for you, let AI give you a first draft and focus on reviewing it. A simple email, with one idea and one button, works better than a complicated one.

Can I schedule the email for another day?

Yes. In Mailrelay you can schedule the send for the day and time you choose, so you don’t have to send it when you’re exhausted.

If you want to keep improving your performance beyond those occasional nights, you’ll find more resources in How to be more productive and manage your time better, and the keys to planning and effective time management will help you organize your day-to-day better.

These tips also go well with our guide to the best project management tools for organizing your day-to-day.

Getting back on track is also easier if you organize your daily tasks on a Kanban board.

Jose Argudo

CMO at Mailrelay. Writes about email marketing, copywriting and conversion for small businesses and entrepreneurs.

More articles by Jose · LinkedIn