Final Thoughts for Pumping Up your Email Newsletter Opens Next Year
The Sprocket Report
At a recent presentation on social media marketing, someone asked the under-thirty speaker if email was still a thing. The answer was “Well, I don’t even look at my email every day, so I’d say ‘no.’” Okay. Then where do we go from here?
Our first reaction to a statement that surprises us is to check the research – and it’s a good thing we did! There are currently over 3.8 billion email users and that number is expected to grow to 4.4 billion over the next few years. People are still looking at their email and 4 out of 5 business folks are even looking at their email outside of business hours.
So maybe email usage is a generational thing? Turns out, it’s not! 92% of those 35 to 50 use email and 89% of those younger than 35 do as well, which make pretty substantial markets to be reaching. Sure, not everyone responds to email, but that’s why every business needs multiple marketing methods.
One of those methods could be social media. Promote the link to your newsletter sign-up, share links to your newsletter content and be sure to call out the people, products and businesses that appear in your newsletter with tags or hashtags.
Reuse your newsletter content to make the most of the creative effort. Post the content on your website to boost the use of important search terms. Quote yourself on Facebook and LinkedIn and provide a link back to the full article. Update old newsletter content and use it as fresh social media content. There is always someone who didn’t read it the first time. Or someone who didn’t connect with the message back then, but finds it resonates with them now.
Finally, make your newsletter part of a complete email strategy. Providing information and entertainment is how to get your audience engaged, but you have to keep moving them along that sales pipeline toward that “buy” moment. Most email services help you with personalization, scheduling, drip and trigger campaigns and all the other possibilities.
Yes, this all takes time and/or money. But you can start small and ease yourself into full-fledged email marketing or hire the help you need to test out the waters. Is your audience the 92% who do use email to stay in touch? Give us a call to discuss the possibilities. We’re happy to help!
Post Script: If you were wondering about what happened with last month’s experiment with using a headline analyzer, there were mixed results. The open rate of the email was actually down a bit compared to the last few campaigns, but the click-through rate to the article was actually higher. Of course, one shot is not much of an experiment, but that’s why we keep an eye on our analytics!
Kate Gingold
I have been writing a blog with web marketing tips and techniques every other week since 2003. In addition to blogging and client content writing, I write books and a blog on local history.
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I have been writing a blog with web marketing tips and techniques every other week since 2003. In addition to blogging and client content writing, I write books and a blog on local history.
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