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Newsletters Are Back

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Marketing mavens have rediscovered the newsletter. After a period of what could be called benign neglect, when this once standard marketing tool fell out of favor and was sidelined, the reappearance of newsletters represents a long overdue acknowledgement of data-verified performance results. Without question, the newsletter has for several decades been among the most effective promotional and relationship-building resources in a marketer’s arsenal.

Some of you reading now may have once looked forward to receiving a favorite newsletter that was delivered by your postal service. Then, in the early 2000s, your humble newsletter demonstrated its agility and responded to the new technology known as email, and seamlessly adapted from hard-copy to digital format. In fact, it can be successfully argued that the multi-faceted, hard-working newsletter was the original email marketing content. The format has again demonstrated that it is an effective, and therefore valuable, component of well-conceived marketing strategies and campaigns. Marketing thought leaders have joined the cheering section, calling digitally distributed (i.e., email) content marketing as foundational to long-term business growth.

Newsletters by definition are communication tools that facilitate engagement and relationship development with readers—that is, current clients, past clients, prospects and also colleagues and peers who’d like to familiarize themselves with your business—and you. According to a 2026 report published by Newsletter Industry Statistics, 78% of B2B marketers use newsletters to generate leads and 60% say newsletters are their top driver of customer retention—which, BTW, invites repeat business. A well-composed newsletter can showcase your entity, and you, in many ways:

  • A platform for you to tell your brand story
  • Cultivate client relationships, inspire trust in prospects, re-engage past clients
  • Demonstrate your thought leader expertise
  • Nurture brand loyalty
  • Make announcements and updates
  • Present product or service spotlights
  • Generate website traffic and sales

Because your newsletter is capable of influencing more people than you may realize, and in more ways than you might imagine, it is imperative that you make it a good read. You have a story to tell; ensure that the information you share is relevant, timely and compelling. Spice up the text with a splash of appealing visuals that aligns with your narrative, using both still images and (short) video clips. Be sensitive to reader attention spans as you compose your newsletter: three pages, or about 500-600 words, is probably suitable for most but still images will expand the page count. Furthermore, your newsletter (and all of your marketing emails) should adhere to mobile device specs, because 60% will be opened on mobile. As for scheduling your newsletter, monthly is an acceptable frequency known to build and maintain reader engagement.

Make it relevant, visually interesting and personal

Before you commit to producing a newsletter for your Freelance entity, decide what you’d like your newsletter to do for your business? Would you like to increase brand awareness, generate leads, nurture relationships, or boost sales? In most cases it’s all of the above, but it makes sense to know your destination before you set off on a journey.

When you’ve clarified the purpose, you can confidently choose topics for articles and other content that will guide your creation of an effective marketing tool. Your customer relations management data will reveal what your clients want to know and, even better, can segment clients into groups based on relevant distinguishing criteria, such as for-profit or not-for-profit designation, pain points or goals that motivate clients to seek out your solution, purchase history, or frequency. By segmenting your audience, you can then tailor certain elements of your newsletter content to each group and in that way enhance the relevance, personalization, engagement and, ultimately, sales revenue generated. Artificial Intelligence software will optimize the insights provided by your CRM data, that can accurately pinpoint client preferences, priorities, behaviors and challenges. Moreover, AI software such as ChatGPT, Grammarly, Ideamap, or Microsoft Copilot, for example, can facilitate the brainstorming and idea generation process and present to you potentially dozens of interesting newsletter topics that would address the focus of your target newsletter reader groups.

According to data reported by Exploding Topics, approximately 72% of newsletter subscribers are motivated by a desire to either stay up-to-date with company happenings or learn about a topic of interest when they choose to subscribe to a newsletter. Surprisingly, when given the option of receiving updates about your brand by way of social media or an email newsletter that slips into their inbox, 90% of readers choose to receive your newsletter.

So there is your mission—identify headline topics that will be segmented by personalized interests and priorities and made available to readers based on what resonates most, as a way to encourage relevance and value that readers will associate with your newsletter, as well as your company. With assistance from your CRM and AI resources, you will learn which topics that a critical mass of readers would like to take a deep-dive exploration into, and also topics for which they’ll be pleased to receive just basic info. Lastly, readers will appreciate quick and visible access to links that announce upcoming events, perhaps some in which you’ll have a featured presence, such as a podcast, webinar, or teaching assignment. Ideally, your newsletter will function as a portal for conversation with your clients and prospects. Make it interactive by including a mix of content that they’ll anticipate reading every month, such as:

  • Links to your blog or other useful articles
  • One deep-dive article
  • Poll or survey
  • Product or service spotlights
  • Call-to-action
  • Special events—your speaking or teaching engagements, participation in charity events

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: courtesy of the Louvre Museum, Paris, France. Muse Reading Greek (Boeotia) circa 435-425 BC

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21st Century Email Marketing Tactics

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Email marketing is dead.  Long live email marketing.  The pervasiveness of spamming has forever damaged the reputation of email marketing and yet the practice refuses to quietly fade away.  I’ll say that’s because email marketing remains a useful B2B communication platform.  It’s just that marketers need to be smart about how to utilize this valuable resource.  Email marketing in the 21st century means content marketing that addresses topics that interests your clients and delivers value to them and to you.  When planning an email marketing campaign, content is king.

Content does not mean sending out a stream of tweets that describe banal banter such as what’s going on in your office today, accompanied by an image of your morning coffee and pastry sitting next to your laptop.  Your clients are not interested in “fake news” that results in a slew of annoying emails that feature revelations about your perspectives only and are filled with links to Instagram photos of what you found to be amusing as you walked to the post office.

Content marketing means sharing relevant information that will make your clients  become better informed and help them do their jobs better.  You accomplish that by producing original material that addresses topics that your clients feel are useful and distributing it on a consistent basis through your weekly blog or monthly newsletter,

The logistics of that distribution are up to you, whether you develop an opt-in email list and distribute content through a marketing service like Constant Contact or Mail Chimp, or if you post your blog or newsletter on a site like WordPress, that is visited by numerous readers, some of whom may be your clients.  In the latter scenario, there is usually an opportunity to subscribe to your content through alerts, individual emails or an RSS feed.

Regardless of your distribution platform, readers and clients appreciate an email /content marketing strategy that is customized and therefore more personal.  Developing an editorial calendar adds seasonal relevance to the topics that you present, for example, as does occasionally letting your content be influenced by the news or changes in government or tax policy.  It’s time-consuming, but the content that your organization provides weekly or monthly demonstrates your authority as evidenced by your expertise and judgment, as well as your opinions (don’t hesitate to have them!).  Freelance consulting specialists must always enhance the perception of our bona rides and content marketing plays a significant role.

As you write, learn to occasionally weave one or two of your products or services into the narrative because after all, the real purpose of producing and distributing content in B2B emails is to create billable hours (sales).  This could take the form of a client success story or news that you’ll appear on a panel, with a link to register embedded in your post.

If your email/ content marketing is sent through a marketing service as an individual email addressed to each subscriber, you are advised to pay particular attention to the subject line.  According to Silverpop’s 2016 Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study, the mean open rate of emails sent is merely 20 %, meaning that four out of five email marketing communications are deleted.  A 2015 analysis of over 40 million emails  conducted by Mail Chimp revealed that some of the most effective subject lines are (60 – 87% open rate) :

1. (Insert business name) Sales and Marketing Newsletter

2. Eye on the (insert business name) Update (insert the week or month time frame)

3. (Insert business name and date) News Bulletin

4. (Insert business name) Newsletter, with date

5. (Insert business name) Invites You!

6. Happy Holidays From (insert business name)

In 2014, Digital Marketer analyzed 125 million emails that the company sent that year and found that your business name, along with the words urgent, upgrade, alert, new, available, free delivery and newsletter are among the most persuasive. Oh, and what’s the secret to writing a good email subject line, along with using the key words that charm readers? Make the subject line describe the email topic!

So the moral of the story is, don’t dismiss email marketing as being hopelessly retro and inferior to social media posts.  Instead, think about how to update and adapt its use to fit your needs and the interests of your clients.  If your clients are among your Facebook friends on your Fan Page or they follow your tweets, then by all means continue.  You might consider how some of that content and images might be repurposed to become part of long-form content in a blog or newsletter.  Several recent studies have found that clients respond well to long-form content.  You’ll figure it out and reap the benefits,

Thanks for reading,

kim

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Headline Hooks That Reel In Readers

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Whether you’ve written an email,  blog post,  newsletter,  white paper or press release,  your primary job is to persuade your intended readers to read what you’ve written.  Anyone worth writing for is buried in potential reading material.  Prioritizing and skimming are the norm.  Use yourself as an example.  When sorting through business or personal reading material,  what persuades you to stop and read?  The headline!

The headline is the hook that reels in readers.  Dull headlines do not grab attention.  They do not resonate with or intrigue your intended readers.  They do not communicate the value of the content that you’ve spent time to research and write.  Package and sell your content with a headline that makes your intended readers know that your content,  email or press release contains valuable information.

Headlines alert intended readers to subjects of interest.  Attention-grabbing headlines cause us to read even articles that we may conclude are a waste of time and which we may abandon,  but the subject line was like a siren song to our eyes.  Consider what would be most appealing,  or alarming,  to your intended readers and also descriptive of the content.  The perspective from which you must create your subject line / title is from the intended reader’s ultimate vetting question,  “What’s in it for me”?

The right headline gets you more attention,  more readers,  more buzz and more results.  Keep these headline categories in mind as you create the headline for your next important communication:

I.     How-to headline

Content that instructs and informs will benefit from a headline that motivates intended readers to take action

  • Cold Calling Dos and Don’ts
  • Five Tactics Guaranteed To Make You A Better Networker
  • Headline Hooks That Reel In Readers

II.    Challenge headline

Headlines that pose a question that intended readers are presumed to want answered,  because they likely grapple with the predicament that the content addresses

  • Is Your Business Model Still Relevant?
  • Will Producing Content Take Over Your Life?
  • Would You Like To Scoop Your Biggest Competitor’s Biggest Client?

III.  Targeted headline

Needless to say,  targeting is the basis of marketing and customer outreach and the more specific the headline is to the interests of the intended readers,  the greater the probability that the content will be read

  • Financial Management Tips for the Finance Phobic
  • PR Strategies for Cash-Strapped Start-Ups
  • Teaching Brings Cash and Credibility to Freelance Consultants

IV.   Warning headline 

“Shock and awe”  headlines put intended readers in a head lock and drag them in,  often times even if they would rather not.  Many newspapers and magazines specialize in such headlines

  • What Your Clients Won’t Tell You About Your Sales Pitch
  • Why Your Advertising Budget is Only Money Down the Drain
  • You Can’t Retire On Less Than $2 Million

V.      Story headline

Entice intended readers with a headline hook that communicates the theme of your compelling narrative

  • A Back Bay Grande Dame Celebrates Her 125th Birthday
  • The Client Wore Black
  • From Living in a Car to Living at the Taj: An Uncensored Story of the Entrepreneurial Life

Thanks for reading,

Kim