Work Better, Not Harder

Wouldn't it be great if I had a magic bullet for you? The thing is, if I did, everyone else would be sending their newsletter on that day and it would no longer be magic. What I can do instead is give you some suggestions to help narrow it down. Is your schedule dependent on others? For example, if you're a real estate professional, you'll want to send your newsletter after mortgage rates have been adjusted so you can include that information. If you plan to curate content from certain bloggers, and they all post in the middle of the month, you don't want to plan your newsletter for the first week. Think about what, if any, information in your newsletter is dependent on others and plan around it. Send when your contacts are using their email. This means that if your contacts are opening your newsletter at work, you want it to arrive during a workday. And you typically don't want this to be right after a weekend or holiday when clearing out the inbox is a ...

If you're planning to begin blogging for your business, I'd like to shorten your learning curve. Because, oh boy, do you ever have lots to learn. The good news is that you don't need to know it all before you start, and learning as you go is fun. I asked a couple of award-winning business bloggers to give me their best advice for beginners so I can pass it onto you. Mary Jane Copps , aka The Phone Lady , has been blogging weekly for her business since 2009. Here's what she says: 1. Embrace a schedule. While it feels daunting to commit to a daily, weekly or monthly blog, staying true to a posting schedule will make you a better writer, and you will develop the ability to create and uncover great story ideas. 2. Be observant; write it down. No matter what the theme of your blog, things will appear in your life each day that can become a post. Stay present to every phone call, meeting and event. Great content is everywhere. But don't rely on your memory; keepi...

Whether you write for your blog, newsletter or social media - or all three - there are two approaches to creating your content: on the fly or by scheduling time . They both have to do with finding time to do it well . You can spend some time daily creating content by blocking off 15-30 minutes in your schedule every day. If there's a certain time of day that you're more creative, exploit that and preserve the same time every day in your calendar. Alternately, you can set aside a block of time each week. Of course, this means more time at once, perhaps a couple of hours. Creating content on the fly is a little more haphazard, and it's what I do a lot of the time - write when I'm inspired. I might read an article I clicked on from Twitter. Or I might have a phone conversation with a new client. Or someone might ask me a question. I most enjoy writing when I drop everything and do it while the idea is fresh. Now you might be thinking that's an inefficient way...

One question I get asked a lot is, “When is the best time to send my newsletter?” If the person asking has an hour or so, we might chat about how it can depend on a lot of things about their business, strategy and target market. Then I might tell them about the overall industry statistics . But really, do you pick Tuesday because it’s half a percent better than Monday? That will only make a difference if you have thousands of subscribers. Consider your own email habits. How do you vet that backlog of emails you find on Monday morning? Keep in mind that, if you aren't part of your target market, your habits will vary from your subscribers’ habits. Don't project your own judgments onto your readership. Ideally, you want your newsletter to arrive when your subscriber is using their email. And when they read is often dictated by where they read - at home, at work, or out and about. So, the answer is simple: figure out when your subscribers are using their email and s...

Melanie's newsletter The thought of designing a newsletter for a designer was a little daunting, but I jumped at the opportunity when Melanie Orr of Interiors by Melanie first approached me. I recently asked her to tell me how it's helping her small business and this is what she wrote... My newsletter guru, Linda Daley, recently pointed out that I've passed my three year anniversary of sending out my online newsletter . I hardly believed it, yet I know why I have been successful with this strategy: it has been such an easy and enjoyable monthly endeavour. It is also a very effective way to stay in touch with clients and reach out to new potential clients. My newsletter is the one strategy I am consistent with and do without fail. Linda schedules my issues for the year in advance and, because I have promised someone other than myself, I meet this schedule. This in turn ensures regular posting on media platforms, on my own blog, and updates to my website, as I sh...

You don’t leave on a road trip in the middle of a snow storm. And you don’t go on vacation to the Caribbean in August. You wait for the right conditions. In fact, you don’t really wait for the right conditions, you plan around them. It’s easy to forget this in our excitement to launch new business initiatives. One day I spent a couple of hours on the phone coaching someone about newsletters, including how important the timing is . I was still working late that night when I received her first newsletter at 1am. (1am is not a good time to send a newsletter - unless your subscribers are on the other side of the world.) Set yourself up for success. If you've spent a lot of time, effort and money working on a project, make sure you also place the same importance on the details of your launch . Plan to take advantage of the best conditions: timing, availability of resources and people, weather, geography, etc. “Haste makes waste.” Someone I worked with used to say this and i...

Keeping a consistent schedule is something we coach our newsletter clients about. Over time, consistency will show up as loyalty - from both sides of the equation. You are demonstrating your loyalty to your readers by creating and meeting expectations. Your readers become more loyal when you do that. Being repetitive is also important. Sales gurus say it takes 7 tries to get someone’s attention . Of course, I don’t mean that you should do the same thing 7 times. Be creative and try 7 different approaches. Over time, repetition will show up as diligence and tenacity . The key words to note are 'over time' because neither of these strategies is instant. photo by an untrained eye Click to Tweet this Article

photo: The Stakhanovite Twins We get asked this a lot, “When is the best time to send out my newsletter?”  The short reply is usually this: Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday between 9:45 and 10:15am. Then one Thursday morning I received 4 newsletters at exactly 9:45am. The fact is there is no magic answer - no set of best practices or generally accepted principles. There are lots of opinions though and we've seen many of them disproved through our own work. If you review overall average e-marketing statistics for time of day and day of week, no real trends stand out. See an example below. At first I found that kind of surprising but now it makes total sense - because email marketing is so diverse. More specific statistics, such as industry averages, offer some insight... but who wants to be average? This is why it's so important to know your target market! Where will your subscribers be when they receive your newsletter: at home, at wo...

PHOOEY on that, I say! I’m tired of hearing that to use Twitter ‘properly’ you have to be there to have conversations. Apparently some people have no problem being there 16 hours a day. Those are the Twitter divas… the ones who look down their noses at the rest of us who can only spare a half hour a day from our busy schedules to have these deep conversations. They’re also the people who have found a way to make money by being on Twitter. Or they’re unemployed and have nothing better to do with their time? Anyone with a REAL job surely can’t spare all that time. These Twitter divas assume that the rest of us are there for the same reasons they are. And if we’re not, maybe we’re supposed to be somewhere else? See, not everyone I want to connect with is on Twitter during that specific half hour I can spend there every day. Even if I spend 2 half hours, I’m still not going to reach very many people. Let’s get real. How many people can you have deep conversations with in a half hour ...

If what you have to share, show or write about isn’t great, don’t put it out there. That was one takeaway from Scott Stratten. I had a double dose of him a couple of weeks ago - read his book, UnMarketing , and attended his webinar. (Highly recommend!) I have to agree with Scott, but can’t let it rest there. It’s too easy to let that become an excuse for not showing up at all. We can plan to have 'great' to share. I feel strongly that keeping to a consistent 'content creation' routine has big benefits. A newsletter in particular becomes successful by establishing expectations over time - about the content, look and delivery. There is benefit in working hard to establish those expectations. A regular delivery schedule is an easy expectation to master. This holds true for other forms of content sharing as well. Slip once and it’s easier to slip again. Having a routine and deadlines keeps us focused. It’s easy to indefinitely put aside those things that don’t ha...

If you’ve been in business for more than a few months, you’ve had the discussion about accountability with at least one other business owner – and will continue to have that conversation with other business owners. We all struggle with staying focused and getting things done. One way that we combat this is by setting up systems of accountability. Our systems vary greatly, from detailed plans and deadlines to mastermind groups and more. One strategy that can be effective is bringing another person into your system to be accountable to. Telling someone else about your goals and deadlines is a step in the right direction. But accountability works best when it’s more than deadlines and reminders - when there’s the real potential for loss. That could be the loss of money, if we are paying someone to keep us accountable. It could be the loss of opportunity, if we aren’t acting fast enough. It could be the loss of integrity or trust, if the opinion of the person we are letting down is i...

Your website is about what you do and your blog is about why you love what you do. I wish I could say I made that up but I read it somewhere. It has really stuck with me though. What an easy rule to follow! For newsletters and email communication, your content will depend on your strategy and goals. Choose to send either a mostly promotional email or a mostly informational email. I recommend 80% information and 20% promotion – or vice versa. Having this focus makes it clear to your subscribers what to expect. You are better to send two separate emails than to send one email that is 50/50. Each type of email has its place. I can get just as excited about a shoe sale as I do about a new idea. What do your subscribers want to read about (or look at)? That is more important than what you want to write about. (It’s also the difference between blogs and newsletters.) Content creation is one of the big challenges for my newsletter clients. I always tell them that it gets easier...

A cool little online app that you can use to coordinate decision-making among a group of people... and it's really simple! You can ask for available dates for a meeting or ask for input to a decision. www.doodle.com (Thanks to Joan for this handy tool!) Click to Tweet this Article