Many question the value of e-newsletters. E-newsletters are only as effective as the value you give your audiences so they open, read, move on the call to action, and share. No good just having one just to have one. You are wasting your audience’s time as well as yours. I just went through my subscriptions in-box and unsubscribed from about 95% of the e-newsletters. I wasn’t reading them and they weren’t giving me value. People guard their in-boxes so when they agree to receiving your e-newsletter, make it count.
E-newsletters are part of a greater communications plan with specific goals attached to it. The biggest challenges I’ve seen is human resources and content. There are ways to streamline it to make it more efficient. E-newsletters can be time-consuming; however, it is a beneficial tool for organizations to communicate with stakeholders.
E-Newsletters are not all about selling.
Yes, that’s right. Your e-newsletters should not be all about selling, but sharing information that will help solve a situation your audience may have or entertain them. It needs to give value. You need to develop a balance between marketing and information.
Have an E-Newsletter Plan
Having a plan is critical to having a successful e-newsletter. What you need to create a plan:
• Define your goal
• Develop your list/audience
• Create a communications chart
• Develop a content calendar
• Select metrics
Content Curation
Sometimes it is hard to create unique content for your organizational blog. Content curation tools can be helpful. There are some free or low cost content curation tools available on the market that would allow staff to cut down on time spent on content curation without affecting the quality of content shared. Curation tools allow for comments while sharing content. There are some good content curation tools such as Trove, Paper.li , and ScoopIt.
Don’t forget monitoring platforms are content curation tools as well. There are some low cost or free tools for media monitoring. One such is Mention. It is very good monitoring platform. The free version is solid; however, if customized reporting is desired then it is $99/month. Free Google Alerts is good, as well as TalkWalker, which offers free alerts and a searchable social platform mentions.
Need help developing your e-newsletter? We can assist you in capitalizing on the value of e-newsletters.
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The Book
Social Media Crisis Communications: Preparing for, Preventing, and Surviving a Public Relations #Fail is now available in eBook format. Buy it now! (If you like the book, please leave a review; it is greatly appreciated)
TIME CRUNCH? Are you putting your crisis communications plan together and need help? Or are currently dealing with a crisis and need crisis communications assistance? Get help NOW. Contact Ann Marie at ann@mindthegappr.com or +1 302.563.0992 today.
