The Outrageously Simple Formula for eNewsletter Success



GOALS + VALUE = SUCCESS

Simple, right? As small business owners, our email marketing goals can be quite different and varied. Whatever your GOALS are, you won’t reach them if you don’t seriously consider the other side of the equation: giving VALUE to your subscribers.

If you don’t give value, you will lose your audience - whether you’re standing at the front of a room or sending out your newsletter.

What’s in it for your audience? Who are your readers and what would be useful to them? What can you give them that they can’t get anywhere else? Why would they take the time to read (and share!) your newsletter? You need to answer those questions very succinctly during the planning stage. Valuable content doesn’t happen by fluke.

You can execute flawlessly and put together a newsletter that looks awesome - and that no one wants to read. A good looking newsletter on its own won’t keep your subscribers engaged – give VALUE!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bragging Writes

Image
You'll see in this newsletter that success stories make great marketing content. There's positive emotion around a good story - we like to read them and share them. It's a bonus that they come in many different forms: testimonials, case studies, photos of happy customers or completed work, statistics, even video. Success stories can also be assembled in a lot of different ways. For example: written by you, or by your client spontaneous (such as on Twitter), or solicited about your products and services, or about your business itself (for example, a 10 year anniversary) short or long (useful for different purposes) numerical or graphic (such as statistics) Don't stop at collecting testimonials. There are many more ways to tell your story. originally published in Work Better, Not Harder March 30, 2016 Click to Tweet this Article
Keep reading »

Eliminating Waste and Ageism from My Writing

Image
In today's society... in today's busy world... our current technological society... and so on. I've written phrases like that more than once. And I've stopped because: 1. These phrases don't add any value to my writing. If I'm writing about the past, I'll say, "In the past..." or some such thing. Similarly if I'm writing about the future. Otherwise isn't the perception it's current? 2. Lots of people don't know a different society , don't remember a time before computers. Technology is hardly new. Anyone over 50 like me has actually been using it longer than anyone younger. Reserve space in your writing for words that really count, that add meaning to your writing. Eliminate what's left. Make sure every word works. Your readers will thank you for it and show you by coming back to read more. photo by Street matt / Flickr Click to Tweet this Article
Keep reading »

Learning the Hard Way has to Stop Sometime

Image
Burying my head into a new project that requires learning WordPress should give me tons of content for articles... if I had time to write. In fact, I considered documenting this new adventure in all its gory details via blogging and social media but, well, I'd rather put my head down and get on with it. I'm only stopping long enough to share something I'm doing differently with this project. I don't have time for learning things 'the hard way'. Been there, done that, loved it, wrote the blog. If I want to be more efficient, I need a shortened learning curve. This time I'm rewarding myself with 'the easy way'. If you're venturing into a WordPress project, I strongly suggest finding a WordPress virtuoso to consult with ( like I did ). You'll be surprised at how much less stress, more fun, less troubleshooting, and more efficient it is.​ I guess I can say I'm learning better, not harder . originally published in Work Better, Not...
Keep reading »

10 Signs this is Your First Newsletter

Image
photo by photosteve101 I'm such a newsletter critic. I think it makes me better at what I do - learning from others' good and bad examples. Here are the things that often stand out during my critiques: You didn't use a bulk email application. This is such a big mistake, it deserves its  own post  to list all the reasons why! You didn't include a  link to subscribe. If your newsletter is good, your readers will share it with their friends. Don’t make those friends have to hunt for your  sign-up form.  Not everyone is tenacious. You used a misleading  subject line. Perhaps you felt that you had to trick people into opening your newsletter. Don’t do this! Readers will feel like they've been duped if you don’t deliver on the promise in your subject line. I see  obvious errors. There are spelling errors and, oops, a hyperlink doesn't work. Always get another set of eyes to check your newsletter. Don’t forge...
Keep reading »

No Love from your Newsletter? Here's Why

Image
"My newsletter isn't doing anything for me." Over the years I've heard many different versions of this same sentiment, usually accompanied by a big sigh. A month or so later, the newsletters stop. A newsletter does not make a marketing plan. And sending out a newsletter is only a small part of a content marketing strategy . To be successful, there are other related things you need to be doing. Here's a checklist to help you identify what actions to take to improve your results. If you're not doing these things, that's why success is eluding you. Have a sign-up form on a landing page you can promote (i.e. with its own url) so you can actually get complete strangers as new subscribers. Promote your newsletter on social media, your blog, your website and everywhere else, including not online. If you don't actively build your list, it will stagnate. Actively share your newsletter issues on social media multiple times to extend your readersh...
Keep reading »

Make it Easy to Read Online

Image
A ‘read online’ link allows subscribers to click to view your campaign directly in their web browsers. There are two reasons that you want to include a ‘read online’ link in your newsletter. Most obviously, it’s helpful for subscribers who can't view the HTML version of your email or download images in their email programs. The ‘read online’ link provides a permanent url that you and your fans can use to share your newsletter, now and in the future. You can use this url to link back to your newsletter issue from your website and blog. This link is also a fallback option to social sharing links : readers can copy/paste the url to share on any social media platform regardless of what sharing buttons you include or don't. I receive a weekly newsletter from ColourLovers called Happy Huesday. It’s a wonderful newsletter filled with links to colourful, interesting articles. Every week I want to share it… and can’t. They don’t include social sharing buttons OR a rea...
Keep reading »

Colour of the Year for 2018 is No Shrinking Violet

Image
Purple is my favourite colour so I couldn't be happier about Pantone's latest announcement . Pantone says, "Inventive and imaginative, Ultra Violet lights the way to what is yet to come." Purple is an emotional colour and has always been considered a little tricky for marketing, tending toward the sentimental and feminine. I'm looking forward to finding ways to use it in my own marketing. How about you? Will you use more purple in 2018? Click to Tweet this Article
Keep reading »

A Different Kind of Feedback

Image
Most of us would agree that feedback is generally a desirable thing and necessary for continuous improvement. Yet there seems to be a whole area of performance that gets ignored due to little or no feedback: internet marketing. If you are ignoring your feedback (in the form of statistics), you’re missing two important things: Without a baseline to measure ongoing performance against, how will you know if you’re getting better or worse? Without feedback about your performance and information about people’s interests, how will you know what to do to improve? Below are some suggestions to help you get the feedback you need. They can all be applied to an enewsletter campaign but certainly have broader applications. Tracking codes Online bulk email applications will have this built in. You can also use services like Bit.ly and other URL shorteners. Within the application you will be able to view overall statistics and trends. Plus you’ll get more useful things, like how m...
Keep reading »

10 Reasons to Love Being a Small Business Owner

Image
photo:  Michael Lokner There’s nothing like a vivid reminder of your past life to cause you to take stock of your current situation and do a little comparison. That happened to me recently after having a catch up phone chat with someone I worked with 15 years ago. Marcia and I were talking about an industry, a work culture, and processes that now seem so foreign to me, yet at one time were so imperative. At that point in my life, I certainly never envisioned the lifestyle I enjoy now. I absolutely love being a small business owner and working with other similar people. Here are some of the perks that I especially appreciate about being a small business owner: Not having to wear pantyhose My garden is 25 steps from my desk I can go into the office at midnight if I feel like it Getting the whole team behind decisions is easy, when the team is two! Team building is easy, too I can work all day with my cat in my lap I don’t need a briefcase to take work home I can ...
Keep reading »

Too Many Items, Not Enough Action

Image
pivot - purge - plan - prepare - postpone The P words are overtaking our business lives in recent months! To make all those P's happen, we also have long to-do lists... longer now than usual. I know this because I've had chats with many small business owners over the past couple of months. Long to-do lists can be very stressful! What I know for sure is that there is no particular solution that works for everyone . (But, oh my, if someone could figure that out, they'd get super rich!) Change can suck - while doing the changing - even if we know our current practices leave a lot to be desired. It probably means trying different things and adapting new work habits. And habits are not easily broken; new ones are even harder to start. There are thousands (millions?) of apps and systems that can help us but actually doing the tracking of action items usually becomes an action item in itself. I'm not about to recommend something you should try... but I am going to give you so...
Keep reading »