Everywhere you turn these days, there’s a pop-up with someone trying to convince you to sign up for their email newsletter. Okay, the pop-up can be annoying — but the concept isn’t wrong.
If you haven’t yet jumped on the newsletter bandwagon, you may wonder what all the fuss is about. But once you examine the reasons behind this craze, you’ll want to kick yourself for not having started one earlier. Newsletters are an extremely powerful marketing tool.
Let’s take a closer look:
What is a newsletter?
A newsletter is a communication distributed to interested persons via email (in this case). The topic of the newsletter can vary but it should always relate to your business and provide information that is interesting and useful to your readers. You can have internal newsletters to share the goings-on of your company with your employees. You can have an external newsletter to share news and information with clients and potential clients.
How does a newsletter work?
Recipients of the newsletter sign up to receive it by entering their name and email address into a simple form on your website. An email marketing software program (such as MailChimp orAweber) adds the email addresses to a secure database. You enter the text of your communication into the program and the letter will distributed to the recipients at a time of your choosing. (I’ll be discussing the mechanics of creating a newsletter in more detail in subsequent posts.)
What are the advantages of having a newsletter?
Many. Here are a few:
1. Newsletters offer an opportunity to communicate with an interested audience.
By taking the time to subscribe to your newsletter, your newsletter recipients have demonstrated their interest in you and the information you’re offering to share. This means you have a good chance of getting your message across to a large portion of your readers. They want your message; they expect it. Your task is to provide them great content that keeps them wanting more.
2. Newsletters help build trust.
Newsletters are an excellent opportunity to demonstrate your expertise to your readers. When you offer strong, useful content on a regular basis, readers will grow to trust your knowledge and abilities. This can quickly translate into increased sales or other opportunities. But content is key. If you stuff a reader’s inbox with purely self-promotional material or poorly written nonsense, you’re going to lose your audience’s interest– and their confidence in you.
3. Newsletters remind readers of your presence.
Every business owner wants their business to be the first customers think of when they need a certain product or service. Having a newsletter is an excellent way to keep your business fresh in the minds of your readers, and subtly remind them of how valuable your product or service could be to them.
4. Newsletters can increase website traffic.
Newsletters are a fantastic tool for getting readers to click on your website links. Offering a hot new product or service? Written a new white paper? Got a particularly fantastic testimonial? Just add the link to these web pages in your newsletter and write compelling content that gets readers to click on it. Bam! Instant opportunity for new sales.
5. Newsletters can be shared.
One of the best aspects about email newsletters is that they’re easy to share. With a quick click of the “forward” button, readers can distribute all your fascinating information and advice to others. If your content really hits the mark, you may suddenly find yourself with a bunch of new subscribers.
Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? But I know that many of you are out there saying: “You keep mentioning having great content, fascinating content…I don’t know what I would write about!” Well, stay tuned for my next post. I’ll tell you exactly the kind of information makes for a good newsletter.
** Don’t have the time or interest to write the newsletter yourself? I can help. Contact me for a free consultation. **