First off, I want to thank my lovely subscribers for making me feel so utterly special for the past couple of days!! I hope you’ve had fun with your subscriber-only event. I truly appreciate having the ability to touch base with you on a personal level directly in your inboxes. I am enjoying coming up with ways to give back to you for being a loyal fan of Sharing Life’s Moments. I hope to plan out, even more, events/surprises for you in the months years to come. I hope you’ll continue to entrust me with invading your inboxes.
Blogging provides many opportunities and connections that you may not have received any other way. However, the truth of the matter is though it goes beyond what I get! I have had a blast helping others learn and grow their blogs together. I find that the more I give of myself, the more fun this journey seems to get.
Doing all the various things to increase traffic such as link ups (and being blessed with being featured), Facebook group threads, and even using the right keywords for SEO (search engine optimization), does not compare to making a connection with your readers via their inboxes. I have read that advice a thousand and one times throughout all of my blogging studies, but I never realized how true it was until now! You can’t always guarantee you’re going to reach your targeted audience via all the other methods as you can by having access to their inboxes. (I do realize that they are NOT guaranteed to read the emails either, but the chances are higher.)
Key points to take note in relation to newsletters:
- Make sure you’re giving them value when they open their emails from you.
- By value, I mean give them something that makes them eager to open your emails.
- Are you giving them something they can’t get easily somewhere else?
- Are you giving them a surprise gift/giveaway? (Which I do try to do that with my subscribers, and have plans of doing it more.)
- Are you giving them a book on a topic that interests them?
- By value, I mean give them something that makes them eager to open your emails.
- Highlight a few quality posts from the last time you sent out a newsletter.
- I stress only a few because if you do have a loyal reader then they don’t need to see all of your posts again in their inbox. IF you’re using it to only showcase posts, you’ve written then you’re not going to keep subscribers for long. (Hence, you’re NOT giving your subscriber any reason to stay on your list.)
- Give them something that will enhance their life based on the reasons why they signed up.
- One of the things I like about most of the newsletters I subscribe to is the fact that they come at a certain scheduled time and day (s).
- They use the same theme for all of their newsletters, and I can scroll down to the parts that matter most to me.
- Occasionally send out surveys to get to know your subscriber’s interest more.
- As your list grows, the needs of your overall subscribers may change dynamics. IF you’re like me and cover many different topics on your blog.
- Be sure you use headlines that are going to capture their attention amidst all the other emails they get in a day.
If you’re looking for some good quality newsletters worth getting in your inbox be sure to check out my post on 9 blogging newsletters you need.
What Programs to Use
There is a lot of controversies over which email marketing system to use. All of them have value and provide various features with them that make them worth using. I have gone between Aweber, MailChimp, MadMimi, and a couple other programs through the years. I always end up right back on MailChimp. I’ll be honest though and state that if my subscriber list ever gets big enough that I need to start paying a monthly service fee to use it, I’ll most likely give Aweber another look because it is the system the bigger bloggers use and it does come equipped with an LOT more bells and whistles than MadMimi or MailChimp offer.
I hope that these tips help you out with getting started with having a newsletter. When you gain newsletter letter subscribers, then you’re setting yourself up for success. It opens doors to other things which will be discussed at a later time.
What other tips would you suggest for someone who wants to use a newsletter?
Great post Crystal! I love my Madmimi and always wanted to try MailChimp too. I know you use it and love it. Your key points on right on too!
Thank you for the words of encouragement. Madmimi is really nice, but I prefer MailChimp and I think it’s due to it being the system I used from the beginning.
Great advice I need to follow too. I like my Madmimi. I tried mailchimp and just could not figure it out so for now, I will stick with madmimi. I have also heard a lot of good about Adweber like you say. Happy Easter.
Now Aweber to me was quite complicated to figure out. However, there are a lot of great tutorials available for Aweber.
Thank you for coming by and commenting.
Great advice, Crystal. I’ve been tweaking the format of my newsletter and will incorporate some of your tips!
I’m glad to hear you find these tips beneficial. I hope it makes a positive difference for you.
Thank you so much for stopping by and commenting. I hope to see you again soon.
I have been thinking a lot about the content in my newsletter and need to find a way to better connect with my readers through them. Thanks for the reminder that it’s not just to shove my blog posts in front if them again. 🙂
You’re welcome for the reminder. That to me is one of my pet peeves, and I have also fallen short on doing much better on it.
I think the major thing that keeps me from starting a newsletter is that I don’t know what that value-added incentive is. I haven’t decided what that extra is. So. That’s what I need to think on.
It’s a big thing to figure out. I am still trying to figure out what to offer extra too, but I do FINALLY after 3.5 years of doing this I have some ideas floating around my head.
Thank you so much for stopping by and commenting. I hope to see you again.