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Your Email Newsletter

Written by: Donald F. Pooley

Article Overview: A newsletter builds credibility, because it doesn't seek to sell you anything. Instead its aim is to inform, to educate, to build knowledge. It can therefore help you to build trust with your present clients and obtain referrals.

Your Email Newsletter

A newsletter builds credibility, because it doesn't seek to sell you anything. Instead its aim is to inform, to educate, to build knowledge. It can therefore help you to build trust with your present clients and obtain referrals.
A previous issue dealt with these aspects of both paper and email newsletters, and suggested you start with a paper one for a few months to establish a routine. This will also give you the chance to prepare material for the first few issues of your email version, and decide on its format.
Content is king, as I've mentioned previously, but there are some other things you can do to make your email newsletter effective.
1. Subject Line: As it's the first thing your readers see on the emails in their Inboxes, make it both familiar and interesting enough that they'll open your newsletter.
2. Black on White: People expect their email to be simple black text on a white screen, so don't try to pretty it up with colours, fancy text, or images. They'll distract the reader from your message.
3. Easy-to-Read Text: That's not too small, and doesn't have lines breaking in the wrong place so 2 or 3 words slop over to the next line. This means a 10 point monotype such as Courier, with a 60 character line length.
4. A Consistent Masthead: The 3 or 4 lines at the top of your newsletter give its name, issue number, date, and a link to your website or email address. Newspapers do this to put their readers at ease with the familiar.
5. An Introduction: Not needed for short newsletters, but is if it's longer than one page, to tell readers what they can expect. Ideally, it should grab their attention, and give them reasons to read on.
6. A Table of Contents: If you're covering more than one subject, a list of articles tells readers what they are.
7. Your Tone: Keep it personal and casual.
8. Contact Information: Somewhere in your newsletter there should be your name, because names are reassuring. They create a personal, human connection and communication. Include also, the different ways your readers can reach you: email, and postal addresses, phone and fax numbers. These seemingly minor things communicate openness, and hence nothing-to-hide credibility.
9. Administrative Information: Put this at the end: how to subscribe or unsubscribe, the recipient's email address (so they know which one they used for your newsletter). This is also where you put the information your regular subscribers already know, such as how often you publish, on what dates, and your copyright.
I subscribe to a lot of different newsletters just to find good stuff to use in TIP, and have had many of these points reinforced time and time again. Many newsletter publishers show they are amateurs by not following these simple rules.
Final rule: SPELLCHECK!
I've tried to adhere to all of these rules in TIP, so you can use it as a template. Which should save you some work*.

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