November 8, 2026 · DECKER. Newsletter Issue #3

365 cold emails. Zero replies. Eight clients, all relationships.

Lead story

I sent 365 cold emails. Zero people replied. Here’s what actually gets me clients.

I published the full story on the blog Saturday, October 31, and I’m putting it in here because it’s the most honest thing I’ve written about how this business actually grows.

Earlier this year I did what every marketing guru on the internet told me to do. I built the list. I wrote the sequences — first touch, bump, breakup email, all of it. I sent about 365 cold emails, run the way the playbooks say to run them.

Positive replies: zero. Not low. Zero.

In October I shut the whole thing down. Then I sat down and looked at where my clients actually came from. I have 8 paying clients. Every single one came through a warm relationship or a referral. Every one. Not most. All of them.

So the funnel is simpler than the gurus sell: show up, do right by people, give the introduction before you need one, and be findable when the referral happens. That’s the article. Go read it — then count where your last five clients actually came from. I’d bet the answer is sitting in a room somewhere, shaking hands.

Read the article on alandecker.co →

Connector Spotlight

The roofing seat is filled — Matthew Aris, Aris Roofing and Construction

The Bay Area Business Alliance holds one seat per industry. One roofer. One lender. One HVAC company. One CPA. When a seat is open, we don’t fill it with whoever applies first — we wait for the right owner.

The roofing seat is filled.

Matthew Aris runs Aris Roofing and Construction LLC, right here in the Coastal Bend. He applied on November 1, was approved the same day, and paid his $1,000 membership in full on November 5. Four days from application to committed. That’s how this room works — nobody counts until they put something on the table, and he did.

Here’s why that matters to everybody else in the network: when a member, a client, or a neighbor needs a roof, there’s now exactly one call to make. Not a directory. Not a Google search. One name, already in the room and already invested in it.

Welcome to the Alliance, Matthew. His first meeting with the group is Wednesday, November 11, noon at The BWB Restaurant in Corpus Christi.

Need a roof — or a roofer you can refer without holding your breath? Matthew Aris, Aris Roofing and Construction LLC: matthew.aris@arisroofingandconstruction.com · (361) 813-9133

Coming up

• Wednesday, November 11 — Bay Area Business Alliance meeting, 12:00–1:00 PM, The BWB Restaurant, Corpus Christi. Matthew Aris’s first meeting in the room.
• Straight Talk: no confirmed recording date to announce. The invitation to Arlene Medrano is still with her — our last exchange was October 28, and no booking is claimed until she sets a date.
• Know a local business owner I should spotlight next? Tell me who.

From the arena

• Saturday: the cold-email article went live on alandecker.co — 365 sends, zero replies, eight clients, eight relationships. It is also this site’s November blog post, done early instead of at the deadline.
• Sunday: I sent Diatchoin Bryant of Bryant Comfort Solutions his new website to review. The project started November 1; now it waits on his replies — his Duda access, his TACLA number, and his merchant financing link. A site isn’t done when it’s built. It’s done when the owner can run with it.
• This week in the Alliance room: three owners applied for Bay Area Business Alliance seats and were approved — Matthew Aris of Aris Roofing and Construction, Lavernon Clay of Clear View Shutters, and Phillip Willms of Willms CPA. Aris paid in full on November 5 and took the roofing seat — he’s this issue’s Connector Spotlight. Clay and Willms hold reserved seats; theirs fill when their payments land. That’s the rule, and it applies to everybody.
• Wednesday: I built a real app for my coach’s team, Coach Big J — meal planning, training plans, and the weekly check-in, all in one place instead of a spreadsheet. I compete in Men’s Physique under Coach Big J, so I’m the first athlete on it. He makes people better at the work. The least I can do is hand him a better tool for it.

— Alan