Eight Secrets to Marketing Your Products via e-Newsletters

Why should you publish an e-newsletter?
Well, research has shown that it is a lot more cost effective and profitable to grow your business by increasing revenue and referrals from existing customers than it is to keep chasing new prospects. If you have a good in-house customer or prospect list, then by all means, think of that list as a valuable asset. And, therefore, you need a way to stay in touch with that valuable asset.

What does an e-newsletter do for you?
First of all, your customers, prospects, business partners, vendors, and the like, will keep you and your company "top of mind". It also provides an ongoing low-key communication to these people. And, it enables you to promote new products or services that you are offering. Plus an e-newsletter develops relationships. And isn’t that what we all want between our company and our customers? Did you know that permission-based e-mail campaigns are ten times more effective than regular direct mail campaigns?

Your customers can immediately interact with you and provide you feedback. An e-newsletter is a good way to augment your current marketing programs. It doesn’t compete with them; it actually complements them. By tracking how many people opened your e-newsletter, clicked on the links, or how many e-mail addresses bounced, you can easily measure which people you reached with your e-newsletter; and, therefore, how successful you were with your e-mail campaign. Here are a few hints and tips that you might find helpful for creating effective e-newsletters.

Secret No. 1: Keep your e-newsletter short and sweet and to the point.
People just don’t have time to read lengthy articles, so keep your information brief. Most people will just scan your articles. Think of your e-newsletter as a small sound bite of information. Use multiple headlines, bullets, and short paragraphs. And don’t forget to add links to important information on your Website such as a sign-up box or more detailed information.

Secret No. 2: Keep the content focused on news and not on yourself.
Provide the reader interesting content, not just a commercial for your services or products. For example, you could provide information about a new product application; or, announce a tutorial program, a podcast, or something of value to the reader. Do you know of some current industry news, market trends, or a new technology that might be of interest to your customers?

Secret No. 3: Don’t forget to link content on your e-newsletter to your Website.
After all, one of the main goals of an e-newsletter is to draw traffic to your Website. You can provide more detailed information to your readers on your Website. You can even provide additional links on your Website to professional organizations or associations. This is another way to build strong relationships with your customers and to find out what interests them.

Secret No. 4: Grab the reader’s attention with a nice looking format, content, and headline.
Just like an advertisement or a press release, use the headline to draw the reader’s attention to your content. Use a simple format. If you make the layout too complicated or fancy you’ll lose the reader’s attention. They’ll get too involved with your layout and not focus on your content.

Secret No. 5: Send the e-newsletter only when you have something important to say.
There are no hard and fast rules as to how often you should send out an e-newsletter. Some retailers will send out one a day when they are having a sale, for example. But, the main rule is to send out an e-newsletter often enough so that your customers don’t forget about you but not too often so that they are annoyed by your continuous communication. As long as you are providing interesting content, then you should be able to send out an e-newsletter at least once a month to your key customers.

Secret No. 6: Make it easy for your subscribers to subscribe or unsubscribe.
Permission-based e-mail is the best method, so use your existing in-house list. It’s probably not a good idea to purchase a list since your e-mail could be considered spam by people who did not opt-in to your e-newsletter. Place a sign-up form on your Website, blog, or social media page such as Facebook. Promote your e-newsletter in other marketing literature, trade shows, advertisements, blogs, social media, or press releases. Also make it easy for people to unsubscribe if they no longer feel your e-newsletter is of value to them. And always add a way for them to forward your e-newsletter to a colleague. By getting referrals you can attract other people to sign up for your e-newsletter.

Secret No. 7: Provide a privacy statement.
Provide a privacy policy on your Website and provide a link to it from your e-newsletter. People are reluctant to give their e-mail addresses unless they know how you will use them. Do not sell your list. Keep it as a private in-house list for your company use only.

Secret No. 8: Don’t underestimate the time and staff resources required to produce your e-newsletter.
Even though an e-newsletter is a cost-effective way to market your products and services, it does require some time to prepare the content and manage the subscriber list. You can outsource some of these tasks to an agency that specializes in e-newsletter production. There are also other companies that can provide templates, track your e-mail statistics, and provide advice and help. They charge a small monthly fee depending upon how many names you have in your contact database. For small businesses, using an outsourced company is ideal.

So, consider adding an e-newsletter to your marketing mix of tactics. It’s an inexpensive way to keep your name in front of your customers, it provides credibility, shows your expertise in a specific industry, and promotes your business.

For more e-newsletter tips see our Website at http://www.kiwi-comm.com

KIWI Communications, Inc.
KIWI News