 Marketing
Best Practices
A Winning
Recipe Seven Ingredients for an Effective Marketing
Newsletter
By
Dale W. Hutchings
A newsletter can be one of
the most powerful tools you can use to market your
product or service. But it has to be done right. How? By
following a tried-and-proven recipe for success. Here
are seven ingredients every newsletter should have to
give you the biggest bang for your buck in promoting
your business:
1. A Distinctive Name. There
is probably nothing wrong with calling your newsletter
simply, “The XYZ Company Newsletter,” but it’s about as
exciting as watching wet paint dry. At the same time,
unless your company’s name clearly explains who you are,
potential readers won’t have the foggiest idea what your
publication is all about, unless they take the time to
read further. Therefore, give your newsletter a title
that conveys for the reader the benefits he or she will
receive from reading it. For example, isn’t “Your Family
Law Consultant” a far more meaningful name for a law
firm’s newsletter than “The Family Law Firm of Smith &
Jones Newsletter”?
2. Headlines That Are Reader-Friendly. Headlines should
be short, concise and to the point. Use white space to
make your headlines more effective and easier to read.
White space will act like a magnet, drawing a reader’s
eyes to your headlines. White space above headlines will
also help to make your publication more reader-friendly,
separating articles from one another.
3. Frequent Use Of Sub-Heads. Articles should be as
short, as possible, but there may be circumstances where
you really need to say more to make your point. Longer
articles can easily be made more reader-friendly by
using frequent sub-heads. Sub-heads are an excellent way
to get the reader to “read-on.” It provides the reader
with an understanding of where you are going next with
your section.
4. Body Copy That Is Easy To Read. You would think this
would be obvious, but too often businesses use the wrong
font for their newsletters. Try to stick to familiar
serif fonts. Many studies have shown that serif fonts
(such as Garamond, Times Roman or Palatino) are easier
to read than san serif fonts (such as Arial, Helvetica
or Verdana). That’s because experts say that serifs
guide the reader’s eyes along from letter to letter.
5. Images! Images! Images! I have repeated this word for
a very good reason. Too often I see newsletters that are
90% text, and 10% art. Would you want to read a
newspaper that was strictly text with no images? Would
you buy a magazine that was 100% copy and no art? Then
why would you want to publish a newsletter that is heavy
in text and has little or no art? Strive for an image to
compliment every major article in your newsletter. If
you plan to have regular columns with each issue, then
develop some kind of art to go with these columns (e.g.,
headshot of person writing the column, an
artistic-looking header, such as “News Briefs” in some
kind of easy-to-read, yet distinctive type, etc.)
Whether it’s actual pictures, line art, or a combination
of both, it doesn’t matter. Just keep in mind: images,
images, images. It will greatly increase readership
potential.
6. Content People Are Definitely Interested In Reading.
Keep your “sales copy” – how great our company is,
specials, coupons, etc. to a bare minimum. Concentrate
instead on such subjects as:
-
Industry news, trends and
insight about your field. Short articles on these
subjects will help to build credibility for your
business -- a reliable new source for what’s happening
in your industry.
-
Success stories/case
studies. Make these kinds of articles highly personal.
Describe for your readers what the problem was that the
client or customer was facing and how your business’s
product or service was the solution. In doing so, try to
provide snippets of helpful information/advice (how-to
procedures, reference resources for finding out more on
this subject, etc.) that readers can use in dealing with
their own challenges.
-
New products or services.
Try to write articles on these subjects without taking a
hard-sell approach. Inform readers of the advantages of
your new product or service over the competition. Tell
them the history behind getting this product or service
to the marketplace – how much R&D was involved and what
the reason was for developing this product or service.
-
Surveys/studies. People are
always interested in the results of surveys and studies
that have been done about various professions or
industries. Do a little digging and publish interesting
results from various studies done in your field.
7. Consider Making A Certain
Portion Of Your Newsletter Fun. This approach will not
work for all businesses, but for many, injecting some
humor in one form or another can do wonders in enhancing
readership. Tastefully done cartoons, trivia contests or
humorous historical facts about your industry can add
just the right spice to make your newsletter unique.
Okay, now that I have given you the ingredients to
creating a successful newsletter, start cookin’.
Potential newsletter readers are waiting to hear you!
Just use this recipe and you won’t disappoint them.
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Dale W.
Hutchings, APR, who specializes in “out of the box”
marketing, has more than 30 years of Public Relations,
Marketing and Advertising experience and has had his own
practice since 2001. Dale can be reached at
hutch7@verizon.net |
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Article Published September
2007, Bay Area Business Magazine
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