Newsletters: An Indispensable Communication Link and Sales Tool

How many online newsletters do you receive in an average day? How about over the week, the month? Take a wild guess. No matter what the number is, it is steadily increasing. Acquiring customers or intensifying the customer dialogue is the goal of more than 82% of email marketing according to research by Maisberger & Partners.

Newsletters have proven themselves as the most widely distributed and most established form of email marketing and have become an indispensable part of the communications strategy for many companies. They provide consumers with quick, pre-digested information from a trusted source and they provide businesses with cost-effective, safe ways to continue to build the relationship with consumers.

But before you launch into creating an online newsletter for your site here are some major considerations:

How does the newsletter integrate with the website and other offline marketing materials?

What is the subscription process? Is it user friendly? Is there some easy-to-follow confirmation process?

Do you adhere to data protection policies and how is permission granted by the subscriber?

What is the timing and frequency of the newsletter? Is this realistic that you can consistently deliver?

Is the content tailored to the readers interests?

Does the look and feel present the right image for the company?

A study conducted by eCircle, found that the area in most need of attention to ensure success was the personalization and individualization of the newsletter. Personalized newsletters had, on average, a 35% higher click rate than non-personalized newsletters with generic messages. Additional weaknesses were identified in the newsletter subscription process - specifically the presentation and layout of the registration form. A lot of potential is thrown away. With a more user-friendly subscription process newsletters can achieve on average a 19% higher registration rates.

The often overlooked advantage of having a newsletter is the income that it can generate. You can generate sales directly from the newsletter through various product offerings. But you can also sell advertising space in the newsletter and create another stream of income. But again, this is hard to achieve if you have not established a trusted relationship with the readers and this stems from giving them good content. Newsletters can be a source of new leads. Because it takes a decent-sized opt-in list to make a newsletter effective, offering places in your other online or offline marketing materials where people can subscribe can help build your list and your loyal readers.

Not as easy as it sounds.

Sounds good, it is. But newsletters require a considerable amount of work. It is vital that you provide a lot of good, relevant content and that you disseminate your newsletter on a regular basis. This is not easy especially when you consider all the work that is already on your plate. You also need to make sure that you have a decent size opt-in email list or it wont be worth your while to go to the work of creating a newsletter. Maintaining and constantly building the list is critical.

Newsletters can have a very positive impact on your online and offline business and if you dedicate yourself to keeping it up, you will find it a very cost effective marketing tool that can have great bottom-line rewards. By paying attention to the issues identified above and creating a clearly structured newsletter with an engaging concept, the success of the email newsletter can only increase.

Natalie Judd is principal of Big Voice Communications a PR and marketing firm and co-founder of Internet Master Series a 13-week teleconference series featuring the best marketing minds in the world. For more information visit http://www.InternetMasterSeries.com

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