Copywriting Services Spotlight: Newsletters
Newsletters are a great way to help you keep your customers updated on any company news, as well as promote new products and increase sales. With a wide range of newsletter and promotional mailshot options available and a number of newsletter programs to make creating and sending newsletters a cinch, newsletters are a vital aspect of copywriting services.
Newsletters – Copywriting Services for eMarketing
What factors influence the success of your newsletter creation and marketing strategies? Let’s take a look…
1. Concise, Well-Written and Helpful
Newsletters should give your customers relevant and newsworthy information simply, clearly and effectively. No one likes to be spammed with unnecessary information, or have to scroll down the page to find what they are looking for. Make it something customers WANT to read, and they will read it.
2. Timing is Everything
Ideally, newsletters should be sent out on a specific time of the month consistently. Even the time of day and day of the week could affect newsletter response. Recent studies have shown that roughly 80% of newsletters are read between 5AM and 5PM with about 62% being opened between Tuesday and Thursday. Use reliable mail software such as Aweber, or a free/low cost tool such as MailChimp and schedule newsletters to be sent consistently on whatever date you choose.
3. Adding Extras For Fun
You may use your newsletters to update customers on new deals or promotions, or simply to give them a breakdown on what’s been happening over the past month. Your main news story is the central force of your newsletter, but that doesn’t mean you can’t spice it up with additional features. Suduko, customer feedback, jokes, product of the month, employee of the month or any other extra features add value and interest, which will keep readers coming back.
4. Growing and Maintaining Your Mailing List
An awesome newsletter is pretty much worthless without a mailing list, and as such you need to develop your database on a regular basis. Simple tricks such as adding ‘send to friend’ buttons to your newsletter, and simple referral promotions can do wonders, and having opt-in subscription forms on your website, blog and even in your regular business email signatures will also help you boost your mailing list.
5. HTML vs. Text Mailers
This is a tricky one. Overall, HTML emails are best for monthly emails or newsletters which have a lot of content. Branding is essential on these, and you are also able to add images and colour. Promotion emails which are to the point and quick, however, can easily be text emails. These can be sent out for special events, such as a giveaway, or product launch, and are much simpler with a hard-sell approach.
6. Tracking Your Clicks
Newsletter software such as Aweber is a great way to ensure that you can monitor the clicks in your newsletters. This means that all links in your newsletter have a special tracking code, so every time a reader clicks one of these links, their click is recorded. You will be able to see how many readers have clicked through to your website from the newsletter, plus you can also see how many newsletters were delivered. Tracking is essential to monitor newsletter campaign success to help you continually improve your newsletter service.
7. Avoid Spam & Other No-Nos
The quickest way to ruin an e-marketing campaign is to spam your readers, sell their email addresses, send out an error-riddled newsletter or accidentally-on-purpose sign them up for messages from your partners. Newsletters are not about pushing, they are about gently coaxing. The focus should be on promoting, but also informing – it is a communications tool, and as such should not be abused.
Above all, your newsletters need to send out the right message to your customers. A well-crafted, nicely branded newsletter which keeps your readers’ attention throughout the entire email is one of the best marketing tools in the box and adds huge value to your online marketing campaign as a whole.