One of the best ways that you can spread the word about your business is to send out a regular email newsletter containing compelling information for your target audience.
Whilst it is OK to use your email client to send out newsletters when you are very, very small (make sure that you use the BCC field for email addresses, otherwise you may have a privacy complaint on your hands), you will soon find it imperative to invest in a more permanent solution – you will need to get your hands on an email marketing software package to handle your campaigns.
Email marketing software is fairly inexpensive and it is well worth the investment. I currently use Interspire Email Marketer (good Australian product) and have found it to be an excellent piece of software. It handles just about everything – online subscription forms, autoresponders, list management, email templates, bulk sending, bounce management, personalisation, click tracking, statistics, etc. There are plenty of other packages on the market and you can access these by Googling ‘email marketing’.
Once you have set up your software, it’s time to start thinking about the substance of your newsletters…
The following tips apply to email newsletters:
* Always use double opt-in subscription – that is, the subscriber needs to confirm their subscription by clicking on a link in a confirmation email sent to them automatically after signing up. This verifies that the email owner was, in fact, the person that opted to subscribe. Single opt-in is open to abuse.
* Write a catchy subject line – this will often determine whether a subscriber opens your email or not – remember, what’s in it for them?
* Personalise your emails by using the subscriber’s first name – most email marketing packages are able to capture these details for use in your email campaigns. Apparently you can increase your readership by up to 650% if you personalise your emails.
* Publish a subscription form in a prominent place on the home page of your website – explain why your site visitors should sign up
* For hyperlink text, always use bold, underline and blue colour – this is commonly recognised as a link and research suggests that these types of links are more frequently clicked than links with non-standard formatting.
* Make sure that the content is good – don’t just try and sell stuff – give advice and provide rich, original content that is readable and newsworthy.
* Avoid spam filters by avoiding spammy words and character combinations, such as FREE, $$$, Save, Discount etc in your subject line and email text.
* Keep the look and feel consistent from issue to issue. By keeping the look and feel consistent, you help to maintain and strengthen your brand with your subscribers. Use a template.
* Ask your customers to sign up for your newsletter in your shopping cart process.
* Use autoresponders to communicate with subscribers and build trust – for example, you could send an autoresponder one hour after a subscriber signs up to welcome them to the newsletter; and you could send an autoresponder 3 weeks after a subscriber signs up to garner feedback or to encourage contact.
* Studies show that there are increased responses from email campaigns sent on Tuesday or Wednesday
* For best results when sending recurring email campaigns, always send it on the same day at the same time. For example, every 2nd Wednesday at 3pm.
* Include a signature at the bottom of your email newsletter for that personal touch
* Include a one-click unsubscribe link in every email that you send out. In some countries it is illegal not to provide this function.
* Consider setting up an online course using multiple autoresponders that are scheduled to be sent on daily/weekly basis to your subscribers
* Test and adjust your campaigns by using different wording, positioning of images, heading effects to see which combination results in the most click-throughs
* Publish interesting information right at the top of your email, as this is the part that is visible when the email is first opened in the subscriber’s email client
* To attract subscribers, offer something free (like an ebook, a free gift voucher) in return for signing up
