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Compton Communications"An Internet Communications Agency"
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Articles
Building a successful e-newsletterPosted Sunday, May 25, 2003 Jim Walker of Sedgewick Road, one of America’s foremost authorities on branding, gives a great perspective on what it takes to be successful in creating brand and great advertising. He says that we can create anything, but people have to want it. Sounds simple, but think about it. So often we spend so much time creating our perfect newsletter that we lose sight of what our readers want. Readers are the measure of a newsletter’s success. E-newsletters are successful when they deliver content that readers want. An e-newsletter that takes advantage of the latest technology may be easier to create, simpler to edit and faster to get to readers, but if the articles are boring and uninteresting, readers will opt out. The first sign that your e-newsletter is not meeting reader desires is not when readers begin to unsubscribe, but when your open rate begins to decline. If your list manager program shows open rates, you should monitor your readership for each issue to see if the open rate is decreasing. If the rate is decreasing, you need to figure out why. A farewell letter with a form that asks reasons for unsubscribing may indicate shortcomings or areas in which reader expectations are not being met. CoolerEmail.com’s list manager program provides statistics with each issue. The open rate can show how many readers opened the email newsletter and the article linking numbers indicate what articles where viewed by readers. The statistics provide excellent insight into what portions of the e-newsletter are popular. Michael Katz in his E-newsletter on E-newsletters uses a great analogy about bees. Bees like readers are attracted to flowers for the honey. The spreading of pollen is not an objective of the bees. Readers are seeking good content. Readers are not trying to make your newsletter a success. They are trying to find some honey. |