The Trojan Horse Playbook

How I Landed My First $10,000 Email Ghostwriting Client

My first ever email ghostwriting client paid me $10,000 for ONE project.

What was the project?

Building an email course funnel to generate sales of his paid course on autopilot.

Now, here’s the interesting part:

Back then, I didn’t have…

• A fancy funnel

• Any case studies

• Or a big audience

So, how did I “persuade” this person to work with me and, on top of that, pay me a premium?

The Trojan Horse Strategy.

Let’s break it down (so you can do the same):

The Trojan Horse Strategy: Overview

In case you’re not familiar, my name is Daniel Bustamante.

And I’m the COO & email marketing wizard behind a portfolio of 6 & 7 figure education companies in the digital writing space:

• Premium Ghostwriting Academy

• Ship 30 for 30

• Write With AI

Now, I love my job - but I’ve always been very entrepreneurial.

So back in January 2023, I decided to start email ghostwriting on the side.

And at first, I tried the same things everyone does:

Cold DMs and cold emails - tons of them.

But guess what?

Most people just ghosted me (pun intended lol).

The problem was…

My DMs were OK - but they didn’t really stand out.

So, I started asking myself:

“How can I create a message that people actually want to immediately respond ‘yes’ to?”

And after doing some thinking, I arrived at 2 conclusions:

1. The message should be highly personalized & relevant to each person I’m sending it to. That will increase the odds people actually read it.

2. The message should contain a “Trojan Horse Offer” that people feel stupid saying “no” to. That way, I can get my foot in the door, overdeliver with free value, and them solve another problem in their business (but in the form of a paid project).

Now, Step #1 is relatively straightforward.

You need to do your homework & craft a nice, very personal email.

(Don’t worry, though, I’ll share some examples of how I did this too so you can draw some inspiration for crafting your own personalized emails/DMs.)

But the second part is more nuanced:

What does it mean to create a great “Trojan Horse Offer”?

For me, a great free offer should be:

• Something you would normally do as part of your full service/package/offer - but is still valuable on its own

• Small enough that you can fulfill it in a few days - but meaningful enough that the client actually wants it

• And something most of your ideal clients need or want (so you can systematize it and do it repeatedly)

Again, your goal here is NOT to make money (yet) - but to get an opportunity to show a potential client (1) how much value you can create in their business and (2) how smooth & easy it is to work with you.

So after reviewing my offer stack and doing some research, I created my first free offer:

A free segmentation survey implementation.

My rationale:

• This was something I was already planning on doing as part of my full package. And even if they didn’t end up hiring me to build the whole thing, they could still benefit from having that in place.

• It would only take me a few days to implement it. So if needed, I could do several of these every month. But also, the prospect would be able to immediately see the value.

• Lastly, I noticed this was a piece most of my dream clients were missing in their funnel. And I knew that, with some education, I could easily “sell” them on the idea.

So, I ran with that.

And in less than a week, I got my first “yes.”

So, I jumped on a call with the guy, got access to all his stuff, and got to work.

And of course, I did everything I could to delight him.

And once I was done fulfilling on my free offer, guess what he said:

“This is epic. What else can you help me with? I’d love to keep working together.”

2 weeks later, he paid me $10,000 to build & ghostwrite an email course funnel for him.

But here’s the best part:

This strategy didn’t just help me land this one client.

It’s actually landed me most of my “outbound” clients—and has helped me generate me over $100,000 in ghostwriting income (and mind you: I do this as a side hustle, it’s not my main thing).

And just in case—here’s some proof :)

So I know it works.

Which is why I wanted to share it with you.

Now, as you can see, this requires some “thinking.”

The good news?

I’ve created a step-by-step checklist (which also includes some AI prompts & real-world examples) to help you streamline this whole process—so you can create your own Trojan Horse Offer 10x faster.

Here are the steps:

1. Break down your current offer stack

2. Brainstorm "Trojan Horse Offers" with AI

3. Research your ideal clients

4. Pick your “Trojan Horse Offer”

5. Create your "Trojan Horse Offer" DM/email scripts

6. Start pitching your "Trojan Horse Offer" (script template)

7. Overdeliver on your "Trojan Horse Offer"

8. Upsell your client

So, are you ready?

Let's dive in.

Step #1: Break down your "offer stack"

This is pretty straightforward - but it's crucial you get it right.

Grab a piece of paper (or open a new doc) and brain dump every single deliverable you provide in your paid service.

And I mean everything.

• Those strategy sessions you do? Write 'em down.

• The implementation work? Yep.

• Even the small stuff like weekly check-ins or progress reports.

Why?

Because your Trojan Horse Offer needs to be a slice of your actual service - not some random thing you came up with.

Trust me, when you list everything out, you'll start seeing opportunities for Trojan Horse Offers you didn't even realize existed.

The key here is being thorough.

Don't rush this part.

Step #2: Brainstorm "Trojan Horse Offers" with AI (prompt included)

Now this is where the magic happens.

I've created a special AI prompt to help you brainstorm killer Trojan Horse Offer ideas.

Just copy it, fill in your details, and feed it to ChatGPT, Claude, or your favorite AI tool.

Here’s the prompt: