In this issue, we’re introducing a new concept of reviewing our customers and prospects newsletters so they can produce better, more informative marketing programs. As we begin this program, we are seeing many fantastic implementations of newsletter programs. And as I reviewed several of these, it brought to mind what each of these publishers is really working towards. They are, issue after issue, building a bond with their readers.
With this in mind, I’d like to share with you reflections that stem from some recent discussions I have had with prospective customers who were seeking to better understand the real benefits of a newsletter program.
Building a Bond That’s Uniquely Yours
On the surface, you could say that a newsletter marketing program creates a microcosm of the marketplace - a fishbowl for testing your messages, introducing new products, measuring product interest, providing support and educating your consumer. In a world where people are getting inundated with marketing messages no matter where they turn, e-newsletters are quickly becoming the preferred means for people to get the information they need to make informed decisions in their everyday life, at work and at home.
But there’s a deeper, less tangible element going on here that shouldn’t be underestimated.
Newsletters are the essential first step that you can take to build a permission-based relationship with your customers and prospects. They give you the opportunity to nurture a prospect from the day they give you their email address to the day they make a purchase decision. Newsletters are the first building block in this new relationship – and yet it simply involves a trade of the quickest, most anonymous aspect to a person’s identity, their email address.
Over time, you have the opportunity to broaden this connection, an opportunity that uniquely allows you to build the bonds of trust that leads to the possibility of obtaining more personal information. As you build this relationship, you can gather demographic and psychographic information and other bits of data that comprises the foundation of informative marketing that your sales organization will need as they qualify and target their selling efforts.
In this way, the newsletter can provide more immediate market intelligence that can be turned swiftly into action. This becomes an adjunct - and sometimes even an alternative - to sophisticated and costly CRM systems that are often too complex to administer and too expensive to modify to your ever changing business needs.
And all this started merely with an email address. A combination of letters and symbols that represents a significant opportunity yet needs to be handled with a great deal of respect.
Along the way, in each and every step, as you bring each person along the levels of permission and trust and build stronger bonds, you must always remember that no matter how many steps you have come along this path, the link that you have built over time can be severed in the blink of an eye - a click on the opt-out link and they may be gone forever.
