The Value of Email Newsletters
Email newsletters with the customer in mind provide valuable, informative and helpful information. A newsletter is a very effective marketing tool. It assists customers in meeting their objectives and it increases the profitability of your business.
Please remember; however, that your customers will not be the only people to read your newsletter. Your competitors will also read it. With that in mind, make sure that you are careful not to put information into your newsletter that you wouldn’t want your competitors to get their hands on.
When considering how to make your newsletter effective, keep in mind that repetition of information is a good thing, as long as you are not the one who is doing the repeating. You should get your customers to write about your goods and services, highlighting benefits and key features. Whenever possible, encourage them to use metrics. Using metrics is a very solid and successful method of demonstrating the high quality of your offering.
A customers-only section in your newsletter
This section will allow customers to get answers to their “How do I” questions easily and quickly. You should provide a thorough index and a way for the customers to easily search by specific products or topics.
Your focus should be on helping your customers to make use of your products to their full potential. Your newsletter can highlight products and services that you choose, offer testimonials, include a “Tricks and Tips” column and address customer service questions in a frequently asked questions (FAQ) section. Remember to get approval from your customers before you send them updates and product information.
Attract new customers through your free informational newsletter
You should mail your newsletter to all those who sign up on your website, even if they aren’t customers. The newsletter will provide valuable information to comparison shoppers as well as supplying useful information to your customers and your competitor’s customers. Additionally, your newsletter can address questions that don’t necessarily apply to customers, such as general questions regarding your area of expertise and questions related to products and services.
Have a clear understanding of who is reading your newsletter
Focus your content on the needs and wants of your readers. You can generate content by using online information-gathering research services.
Keep your newsletter focused on your customers’ needs, not yours
Use HTML for functionality and appearance
HTML looks better (aesthetically) than plain text. It also allows your newsletter to access data on your website without having to send attachments. Attachments can potentially cause Internet service providers (ISPs) to block your messages.
Use links to sections of interest
Even though readers willingly sign up to receive a free newsletter, they won’t be inclined to actually read it unless something captures their interest. You need to ensure that your newsletter content makes it quick and easy to find what matters to them.
Make it easy for customers to do business with you
You should include contact information for new product inquiries, technical support, customer support, etc, in every newsletter. Never assume that customers automatically know who to contact when they need help quickly.
What About Spam and Privacy Concerns?
Spam is the hottest topic in Email marketing today. As corporations and ISPs strive to control the volume of unsolicited Email entering their systems, they may accidentally filter out legitimate emails. This type of error is known as a “false positive,” and the result is that some Emails that are sent to people who have requested them don’t ever reach their destination.
However, let us put this into perspective. Even with spam’s negative impact, a good email communication sent to your house list will still be opened by over 40% of the people to whom it is sent. Considering typical response rates to traditional marketing tactics, that is 40 times better than the percentage of people who respond to your direct mail; return your unsolicited phone calls, or read your newspaper ads.
Email marketing represents the first time in history that we have ever been able to cost-effectively communicate with our entire prospect and customer base on a regular basis. Additionally, thanks to the democratic nature of Email (ie, the big businesses don’t get any more space in the email inbox than the rest of us), Email marketing gives us the opportunity to compete with and outperform our much larger competitors for the attention of the readers.
How to mail your newsletter
You can create an HTML Email template to use for all possible issues, including a navigation bar with entries such as “Page of the week” or “Customer of the Month.
An Email Marketing Service Makes it Easy and Affordable
There are Web-based Email marketing services, such as Constant Contact Email Marketing, that are not expensive and are designed to make Email marketing simple for the non-technical user. These types of services eliminate the heavy lifting to allow you to do what you do best – promote your own product, service or cause. An Email marketing service maintains relationships with ISPs, delivers your Emails with proper protocols, and has a full-time staff in order to gain the highest deliverability rates for your Email. Finally, a good Email marketing service is Can-Spam compliant, which offers a complete solution, including list management and real-time reporting.
In Conclusion
Email marketing offers business owners an opportunity to reach out to customers and prospects. It increases customer retention in ways that were simply not possible a few years ago. Whether you use a service like Constant Contact or hire an agency to handle the entire process, Email marketing should be an essential part of your customer relationship efforts.
We are pleased to provide you the insightful comments contained herein. Please contact us at CompuKol Communications for further discussion on how we might be able to assist you and your team.
