3 Tips for Getting the Most out of E-Newsletters

With today's empowered and social-savvy buyers, the one-size-fits-all newsletters that marketers have employed for years are no longer very effective. Customer and prospect expectations are higher than ever, and this means that readers expect tailored, relevant messages delivered at the right time, in the right place and with the right information. Highly relevant, personalized newsletters may seem daunting to marketers being asked to do more with less, but the capabilities within digital platforms give marketers the tools they need to create outstanding communications. Marketing automation brings newsletter communications to a new level. Below are three tips for getting the most out of newsletter distribution: ● Nurture prospects through the sales cycle. Newsletters are frequently used as a touch point in nurturing prospects through the sales cycle. Often, they are a fantastic way to highlight the value your company can bring to the recipient's business. Popular content areas can include new white papers, tip sheets or eBooks, upcoming webinars, blog posts, videos and upcoming events. One great benefit of a continuous drip nurture featuring newsletter content is that the prospect may find out something about your business offerings that they did not know before, or they will find out about an important upcoming event. When it comes to content, don't be afraid to mix both new and repurposed pieces. Some recipients may not have seen a blog post when it originally was posted, so providing links to popular posts is a great way to get more use out of great content. A newsletter is also a wonderful mechanism for recruiting multiple content contributors within your company. Everyone from the marketing team, product developers and the C-Suite can be involved in content creation. Let your prospects see the faces behind your company, humanizing both your content and your business. Once that prospect becomes a customer, your automation can move them into a different newsletter track designed specifically for customers. Use this avenue to not only continue to engage with your customer base, but begin marketing additional add-on products or services. ● Get more personal. To better engage with today's buyer, marketers need to deliver highly personalized content. You want to deliver the most engaging content when and where the buyer wants to receive it, right? The best way to get more personal, ironically, is to get more automated. With automation technologies, marketers are able to build a single newsletter template and use database-driven dynamic content to deliver to a specific audience. For example, if you have a preference center integrated into your automation platform, you can include certain newsletter sections or articles only if the prospect has expressed interest in a specific product, service or industry. In fact, you can have multiple sections and only include the sections where there is a preference match. For example, Silverpop client Aquent sends up to 40 newsletters per month. With dynamic content, Aquent is able to provide personalized newsletters for its global sales force. Salespeople can easily access and approve their individualized newsletters and send via Silverpop Engage. With a large portion of the process being automated, the Aquent marketing department now has more time to develop other successful marketing programs. Features like Silverpop's Send Time Optimization (STO) sends messages when a recipient is most likely to be in his or her inbox, ensuring your message is top of mind when your buyer is checking their e-mail. Some Silverpop clients using STO see e-mail-generated conversions increase by as much as 40 percent. ● Design for a multichannel world. It's no secret that people are now accessing content on multiple channels and across multiple devices. In between checking the latest tweets and photos on Facebook, your buyers are accessing their e-mail on tablets and smart phones. Instead of just focusing on a mobile strategy, channel your efforts to a multichannel strategy. Ensure your messages render properly on screens of all sizes so your prospects have a great experience regardless of where they are checking their e-mails. Newsletters are an ideal way to showcase all of your marketing efforts, but they aren't worth much if they are falling on deaf ears. Use marketing automation and the techniques described above to increase open-rates, click-throughs and conversions. With automation, your newsletter strategy can be taken to a new level—putting your brand top of mind when it comes time for a prospect to make a buying decision and strengthening your relationship with your existing customers. PE Ellen Valentine is product evangelist at e-mail marketing service provider Silverpop.

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3 Tips for Getting the Most out of E-Newsletters

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