“You’re kidding me, right? This can’t be real currency, is it?”
Yes, this is a picture of a 100 Trillion Dollar Bill. From Zimbabwe. Issued a couple years ago.
Now worth nothing, as hyperinflation meant that 100,000,000,000,000 didn’t buy what it used to.
What does this have to do with your email newsletter?
Quite a bit. Follow along, please…
Does It Communicate VALUE?
It’s highly possible that everything in your email newsletter is valuable to you. That would be great if you were talking to yourself; talking to yourself is the opposite of what your email newsletter is supposed to do.
At some point, your customer/client/prospect/scraped email address WILL MIGHT read your newsletter. Communicating value to them means giving them something they may not have thought of, some information they wouldn’t have found out without you, or news that is timely (or a new twist on someone else’s news).
Does It Grab Attention?
Admit it – a One Hundred Trillion Dollar Bill is rather attention-grabbing. However, this doesn’t mean your newsletter must be inherently clever or creative to grab attention. Attention could very well be talking about THAT THING that the client/customer/prospect/scraped email address needs to know RIGHT NOW.
AVERAGE: “The latest news from XYZ Associates.” I have little interest, unless I know you or own shares in XYZ Associates.
BETTER: “8 tips for a stunning Valentine’s Day meal.” Now you’re talking – you have my attention with something timely (5 days left, gotta get something), helpful, valuable. Odds of getting your email opened: much better.
Do I even WANT your Newsletter?
Props to @unmarketing for raising this issue today, as well as to @jakrose and to anyone else I can namedrop with.
Jason started this, actually, with a simple tweet, RT’d by Scott:
“@jakrose When I give you my business card, that does not mean I want to be added to your your crappy email newsletter. Kthx”
The quid pro quo here is mis-interpreted WAY TOO OFTEN. This is why we use systems like aWeber to confirm that someone actually wants our crappy email newsletter.
If you take the approach that the exchange of business cards equals the agreement to share emails back and forth, START with a quick note that says “hey, I’d like to keep communicating with you through our email newsletter.” PLEASE.
Do I even want your Zimbabwean currency? I mean, can I do anything with it? Is there value there? Sure, you got my attention, but…
Final thought:
Those ads on the radio for certain email newsletter systems make it sound like signing up for the free 60-day trial will end up ramping your business up to success levels attained only by mere mortals. You need a strategy for your BUSINESS first. Then a communications strategy to go with.
Then, maybe, just maybe, a newsletter will fit into your strategy. Or maybe not.
Whaddya think?
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