Even if your web site is not-so-well known, it may be help you to create a newsletter for repeat customers. Studies show that web site newsletters breed brand loyalty and repeat buying. Moreover, putting together a newsletter is easy to do, fast, and fun. So here are some general purpose tactics for organizing your newsletter and getting it out to past and future customers.

Build up a mission statement for the newsletter before you take any action. Recognize your target readers and what you are trying to get these readers to do. If you are just putting out an informational periodical about your industry, that’s fine. But if you are looking galvanize sales at your web site or your offline store; you need to acknowledge this — not just to yourself, but also to your customers. Being straightforward about the purpose of your newsletter will encourage people to trust you and potentially make more purchases.

Don’t send your newsletter “blind.” Include author attribution, contact information, your web site address, your email, and other relevant info. Remember that even brand loyalists won’t necessarily read every newsletter. People tend to skim mass emails for interesting tidbits or facts. You need to engage your newsletter readers almost immediately. Don’t dive into a discussion about your web site-based charity accomplishments — unless that information is the raison d’etre of your newsletter.

Instead, catch your recipients’ attentions by publishing an extraordinary fact or story. Make your newsletter germane. Make it different from other sources of information out in the Internet. Make it humorous, if possible, particularly if you are retailing products to young consumers. Keep it as brief as it needs to be. If you can cut the newsletter down to just two pages, do so. Make subscription and unsubscription easy for your visitors. If a customer has to go out of his or her way to unsubscribe, he or she may hold a grudge your against your web site and refuse to patronize your e-business again. That said, you don’t want to be too discriminating about who subscribes to your newsletter in the first place. Encourage everyone who shows up at your web site or buys from your web site to sign up as an automatic “benefit” of partnering with you. Don’t be ashamed of asking for signups. Be direct, be respectful, and be clear in your objective always.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 6th, 2008 at 6:33 am and is filed under Business, Information Technology, Marketing & Advertising, Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.