Why the hell do you have a newsletter?

Good question! How many of you have a company or organization newsletter? How many send it out regularly? Does it contain useful information or is it a sales letter?

Lets start with the basics. Why do you have a newsletter? To inform your clients right! Inform them about what? The newsletter should keep them up to date on latest trends in your industry or new services or products you may have. Inform them as to how your product can save them time/money or simply make their lives easier. Don't have it sound like a TV commercial.

How often do you send it out? Do you send it our regularly? I work with a lot of clients on "trying" to get their newsletters published periodically each month. Sometimes it like pulling teeth! The most common answer is "Don't have time to work on it!" Think about it for a second. Whom is the newsletter for? You or your readers (clients and prospects). Stop making the process about you and make it about your clients! After all aren't you suppose to make their lives easier? So put the focus back on the client/prospect and get going.

The last point I would like to make is... Is your newsletter mailing list growing? If not why? If it works and you spend the time and effort putting it together why not work towards a wider distribution? The mailing list should be constantly growing or it becomes stagnant. We will cover how to keep it growing at a later date....

Richard M.J. Jarosz
Publisher of the
Jersey Shore Community Information Bulletin

Do you have a Newsletter?

And is it productive? Are you using your newsletter as content for your website? Do you know your numbers?

What numbers?
There are many things you can monitor to keep track of your newsletter. How many subscribers do you have and how many are being added each week or each month? How many are actually opening and reading your newsletter? Is there an action item in the newsletter?

Just like the numbers for your website you should have access to these. If you use Constant Contact you have access to all these numbers. Now you just need to analyze and use them. If you do not have these numbers you may be doing your business and yourself a disservice. Remember it's always about the numbers.

Action Items
What action items can be in your newsletter? That depends on the type of newsletter you have. If it is a Cafe you might have a coupon that the reader can use next time they walk into you Cafe. If you are an informational newsletter, like the Jersey Shore Community Information Bulletin you can track each link when a reader clicks on one then to find out additional information about a particular event. Again this is feedback from your readers.

If you do not have these numbers I suggest you looking getting them...

Presented by
Richard M.J. Jarosz
Lone Keep Internet, Inc.