Lessons

Lesson Info

Newsletter Types: Promotions

So that was the second type the third type of an email newsletter is promotion and I want to point out here that just because you choose one of these types doesn't mean you're stuck with them and in fact you could have a newsletter where you do all of all three of these but I think it's important to have an idea where you're going to major in you know are you going to consistently deliver articles? Are they going to be a regular and irreverent updates or are they going to be pretty promotional because that's the nature of your business and frankly that's what people want from you they don't need a story about how you took your dog to the pet grooming place this weekend they want to know about how to get the best deal on such and such that's ok ah promotion is persuasive there's always a call the action and it has a definite purpose it's not a hailed by the way here's what's new with me it's about I want to get you to do something I want you to see that it's good for you now you're goin...

g to do something and oh yeah it's time to buy so it's it's very clear what you're trying to get somebody to do and yes, there might be stories there might be teaching there should be all of that when you're selling we'll talk about that tomorrow but it has a definite purpose and you are leading people to a point of ok, I'm ready to buy I'm ready to go to the store I'm ready to get this thing that you want from me now I'll share with you some examples of email newsletters that exclusively do promotion remember we talked about before if you've got like a like a post type of update our newsletter that you wanted you want to probably give more than you ask, but there are certain businesses where doesn't make sense where you khun b promoting all day long and that's what people expect from you, it's what they've come to anticipate, you just need to make sure that you promised that on the front and in order for people to get it, you know, in order for them to go okay, yeah like I understand that you're constantly going to be trying to sell me something to get me to do something and that's honestly what I'm signing up for so examples groupon dot com this group on ever send you an email by the way they they send daily e mails you know, depending on the list that you signed up for, do they ever go? Hey how's it going way just want to give you ten reasons why coupons are good now like I get coupons or good I'm on group on I want deals don't don't persuade may don't talk, you just let me get the deal for the day very simple also, their e mails are very short, you don't think about the more frequency you have, the shorter the messages tend to be its here's what's new in your area or, you know, I mean there's, lots of different segments that they do, but here's something that you can go get the steal and by the way, it expires at this time, so go get it now another example of this where you're not really selling something but there's, there's there's not really any sort of content isa website called story cartel dot com, and this is a website that my friend joe and I started and really he started and I just helped him get the word out about it. But this is ah website for authors and readers and authors can put their books up on story cartel and give it away for a limited amount of time in order to get readers that will go review their book and talk about it. So it's like a free marketing tool where authors are generous with their books. Here's my a book, it's, an e book delivery service, and then they'll go leave reviews on amazon and that sort of thing, so every week, if you join the story cartel newsletter list and really most of the readers are readers not authors because they want free books that's kind of the hook is sign up for the newsletter and once a week we're going to send you the best books that we have you know and and you you go there and basically every week every saturday I think on email goes out and it says here the top five books or here's what's new it started cartel and there are these images of these books and a little description of the book and then there's a little button that says this is seven, ninety nine and it's crossed out and says free you click that button you go download that book so there's there's no teaching really there's there's nothing but you want free books this is why you signed up for it go get the free books and the business model is working with the author's you know and charging them to get access to the audience because authors understand certain others understand that if I want my books to sell, I need reviews and this is worth something to me to get my book out to these people and get them talking about it s o the business model isn't the people that are receiving the email which is interesting, you know, when we talk about different ways to do this, you don't necessarily have to pitch your readers but you can use that attention that you have with an audience and monetize in other ways we'll talk more about money tomorrow, but I want to encourage you to be thinking outside the box and think of unique ways where once you have the attention of an audience, once you have a tribe, you kind of do whatever you want I mean, you can find some really interesting ways to make it worth your while and I argue they have a responsibility to do that that as you do that you can spend more time doing this thing serving this community and that is a worthwhile endeavor another example would be like event promotion say you've got a local auditorium or something they've got an email list they're never going to send you a hey how's it going here's here's an update with us here's how we renovated the seats and we removed come, you know and on the floor and by the way, we have diet pepsi now uh now it's like, hey jay z is here this week you can buy the ticket now so anything that is event driven event base there's some sort of sense of scarcity having a promotion kind of newsletter might make sense or if it's just clear that your followers are customers and they're ready to buy from you and they're ready to go, I remember it was borders uh they used to do an email newsletter when they were in business on it was they had like weekly deals on books they had a certain discount code and they send it out every week and andi I would anticipate that and sometimes it would make me go buy a book but there wasn't you know they didn't talk about their authors and there wasn't a lot of informative content it was basically here's a coupon code go buy a book much like groupon so as we wrap up a few tips when you're thinking about the kind of newsletter that works for you and after this I want to do a little bit of workshop with you guys and with the online viewers I want to hear from you uh what you're thinking in terms of a newsletter type what makes sense for the kind of audience that you want to reach because when we're done you're going to go create it you're going to go make it um and you're going toe email that that one person or whoever you have subscribed to that we're going to have that ready and at least scheduled to go so I want you to try to stump me you know if you're going yeah yeah that sounds great but it doesn't fit what I'm trying to do um let's find a framework that works for you so when you're creating your newsletter when you're thinking about not just what to write and how to write it, but really what kind of news letter this is going to be so that when people talk about this email that they get from you, they say and she sends the best blank emails, you know, she sends the best top, you know, tips on this I look forward to x, y or z you want that? So what we're talking about here, in a sense, is branding we're trying to create a sense of expectation so that when you show up in their inbox every week, they know what they're going to expect, and they know what they can talk about when you talk about you, they know what to say, so decide what kind of news that you're going to have that's an important decision that you have to make and you might hodgepodge some of these together you might have a hybrid model, but I thing you should consider, uh, majoring in one of them. So what? What is kind of going to be your area of focus and and how can you go deep with your audience in providing that again set expectations? At the beginning, we've talked a lot about permission, and if, uh if observing to sound like a broken record that's ok, because you can't ask too much for permission, you can't build too much trust you can't over communicate expectations because some people will still forget and they go. I don't remember you talking about this, so you want to consistently set expectations and say here's, here's, what I'm going to do here is what I am doing here's what I've done now, I'm going to do it again next week that builds anticipation when you say here's, what you can expect from me, they get excited about what's coming next and you could do a good job once you've decided here's the news, a newsletter that I want to create here's, what I'm going to do here's, maybe the next four weeks worth of content, I've got an idea of where I want to go. I want to set expectations from my readers so that I can lead them on this journey and then of course, as always, you're goingto do what you said you're going to do. Permission doesn't work if you ask somebody to do something and then you go to something else. S o that's what that's uh that's what that's, what you want to do when you're setting up your your newsletter type so now that you know what to do, you know how to do it, you know where the log in on male chimp and get started, what are you going to do? And yeah and how can we help you? So I really like the weekly newsletter and I really like how you had said earlier it's that depending on which news letter you pick I like the one that's like this is special it's just between us I think it's important for my upcoming brands that my readers have that but since I have no content yet and I'm a little concerned with um not we certainly not wasting cut content on the email and then having sort of separate blog's so I guess I was thinking of having sort of that personal touch but then also and maybe talking a little bit about the summer of summarizing the block and then pointing them back is that a good go forward plan our question very confidently so are people waiting to hear what you have to say like do you have friends who can't wait for you to talk about what you're learning in this season of transition in your uh remind me the name of your block it's a great brand ever thoughtful ever thoughtful and you got the dot com for that which is awesome so I love that I love you know mash ups of words um what I would recommend that you do is you need to create content you're blawg because right now we go there it's playing right says coming soon you need to give people a reason to want out I want what you have to say, and the best way to do that is to make it public somehow the challenge with starting fresh with a newsletter, unless you already have an audience, is I don't get visibility because this is just in people's in boxes. So it's a great way to connect with people, but how do we how do we get visible? Once we've got some people we can spread and we can't afford it tweet about it, you know, we've talked about that, but until we get to that point, it's real hard to get traction, but what I think you should you have come is I think you should, uh, create you should start blogging immediately and get, you know, a few blood puts just upon their id, right? You're about paige on then maybe just a short blonde post that says, here's, what I think this is going to be about this is what the term ever thoughtful means to me. Ah, and here's. Why this is an important topic to me at this season in life and here's the journey that I won, I'd invite you on or something, and then what I want you to do almost immediately, uh, so you don't need it, you need to go create those block posts you don't have to do that all at once I want you to set up a new email list on melt him that's an r s s driven campaign with your blawg and I want you to reach out to all of your friends are ready to hear what you have to say and tell them that you're starting to write a newsletter don't really tell him about the blog's I'm going to start writing a newsletter and I'm going to share about what I'm learning ah in this season of life and I've already talked to you about this you know about this um and if you you wantto going to hear what I have to say sign up here so you've got the embedded for months on a landing page at that point and then what you're gonna do is you're going to start creating content on your block it is going to go out the email to your list and that's great and and as you start to get traction there on you start to get people engaged I mean, you could do that in a week, you know you've got these friends, you've got the website in twenty minutes you go create those forms on mel chin or less uh and you get your getting people on the list, then you start belonging and it starts going out to people the email then you might look at doing maybe one weekly email so that same list that's already getting your your blawg posts and just say here's something special for your weekend and it's just a quick little thought um here's here's a thought that inspired me here's a book that I'm reading it's it's just something special and you could even call that call it that something special this letters of the uh and so they're already hearing what you have to say uh uh your your brand is now visible and you because of the way you've set it up you do have their e mails where you can send that special newsletter so this is an example where we don't have to have the plan fully fleshed out ahead of time but if you set the newsletter in a way that gives you flexibility you can kind of tiv it as you go I think that's what I would do if I were you as I would start blogging I'd start getting that content out there and then I use thie the post method to get some traction deliver some convent to your readers get some visibility tell them to tell their friends and then maybe start sending those in a weekend or you know once a week updates and in that update you could link back to those previous block post and say by the way here's what's new on the block in case you missed it well, we would like to hear from some of you if you have some comments or questions for jeff definitely, but I'll give you guys a chance to think on it and we do have some questions great questions coming in from online do we have a few comments? We have some action takers here what we asked what do you thinking in terms of that newsletter type? Share it with us and engaging brand says weekly for them distinct from their blawg barb says weekly for the business monthly for their non profit. The stylist says I'm thinking about a little bit of everything updates promotions posting at least twice a month and then time capsule says they were thinking about a cross between posting and promotion. These people really think way I'm sure way also had user in the chat room named dot com peaceful calm that spelling which we love that name is well second prize, they said I tend to give general computer tips, email security news, peripheral tips and a bit of design info he's ah he or she is a print website designer do you think it would be a good idea to give the pros and cons of free services so people know why it's better to use a professional? The question I wish I could ask if if that if he's a professional that they want to hire it sounds like you said the implication yeah so yeah I think that there is er a right way to do that and uh oh I see what you're doing way to do that on I would do the right way to do that and the right way to do that is to identify with them we talked before about wanting to be with among your audience and so well you don't want to do is say I'm the expert and here's why you should hire people like me and I talk to designers who do this a lot I mean the design community the photography community they understand that there are a lot of people who have photo shop or a dslr who are trying to do what they're doing and and it's frustrating and you want to go those people aren't artists I'm an artist or they're not doing what I'm doing you need to look at what I'm doing the problem is of course you're going to say that because you know you've got a reason to say that uh you've got a financial uh you know reason to say that so what I think works is to identify with situation and say you know like I hired actually hired a graphic designer once and here's what the process was like and here's what I was looking for you have to be ableto put yourself in their shoes in some way um otherwise it feels like promotion and if you want them to hire you I think it's better to educate them on on the value that you offer through empathy verses saying here's what I can do for you because that feels like a pitch and it wouldn't work for the industry that I'm in if it if it does work for your industry great but the other you know the other side of what he's doing is writing computer tips that's great I mean that would be that's really good email fund or two especially if it's just really short actionable stuff it would even make better for an email newsletter than just you know, blawg post suppose it was unbiased so like how he phrases the pros and cons so he's not saying this was a very terrible using yeah yeah go ahead you know I mean you khun emphasize the negative people will trust you so I know that sounds kind of weird but if you can say I'm an expert on this and you don't say that part but you can any time you step up on stage people assume a certain authority and when you send an email or have a website or sort of blawg we'll assume that you kind of deserve to be there and what I found is it's very important to be vulnerable to show some of your scars especially for a service provider and their ways do that that don't undermine the integrity of your brand, you know? So for example, if you're a wedding photographer and I have a lot of friends for wedding photographers, uh, and you, we want to get to me to hire you, you know, for your service, um, but you want them to trust you as well, you know, then you might talk about you asked a great question, carol, you know what your biggest lessons from failure that you learned you could talk about, you know, the ten mistakes you made as a rookie, uh, you could talk about penn mistakes you made is a rookie web designer or a marriage and family counselor, or is a photographer, and you could say here the things that I might look for when you're trying to hire somebody like this, and it sort of implied I learned from those mistakes, I don't do that anymore, but yeah, I mean, I do think pros and cons is good where you are willing to go, you might not need this, and any time somebody who has something to sell can say that, and you could say it and mean it say I might not be right for you there's going to be some immediate trust there because I understand that now you're looking out for me, not for yourself all right, so we actually have been hearing from a lot of of folks that are just getting started but we want to actually talk to those who haven't established list for instance, vivian's says my nonprofit christian radio broadcast has an email list of about four thousand that's a pretty substantial list right? And they use male chimp all the time and yet their lives it is not growing their question is where do I look for the reason why yeah why is the list not growing what we might well we'll definitely answer this mohr way talk about keeping your list healthy tomorrow so part of keeping a list healthy is keeping people from un subscribing and the other part is, you know, continuing to grow that so why is your list not growing? Well, um it probably means that you're not getting enough traffic to your website or river it is you're getting sign ups and so it's it is growing but it's going very, very slowly so you've got four thousand people on at some point you had a lot of growth and then all of a sudden it kind of stagnated that's one reason another reason is that it is shrinking faster than it's growing, which probably means that you're not delivering the right kind of content oh, you're delivering too much or it's you know too frequently or your you're pitching too much, whatever it might be so you are getting list growth, but you're unsubscribe rate is higher than your subscribe rate, so that would be something to look at is how many people are subscribing we clear months later, however often I update versus how many people are unsubscribe ing and how many new subscribers am I getting? Look at your traffic how much traffic is coming in if I'm getting one hundred people on my website every day and I'm converting those people at a ten percent conversion rate, I'm getting ten people every day on my newsletter list that's not a bad conversion rate um, so the question is at this point, do I need to get more people to my list? I'm ok with that conversion, right? And I just need to find a way to get a thousand people there so that I'm growing, but what I really want to grow by, which is maybe one hundred people a day or do I need tio find ways to increase the conversion on? Maybe I do that the landing page, maybe I do that by offering a better incentive. Another thing to look at would be your signing bonus this was a challenge that I issued and I wanted you guys to be thinking about I'd love to hear from those who have an idea of what that might be but just because there's value in it for you, a free e book, a free report, whatever doesn't mean that your readers were finding value in it so it's hard to say. But those are some of the things that I would look at, what you're unsubscribe rate at. How much is it actually growing cause is it completely stagnated, or are just more people on subscribing, then are subscribing, and how much traffic do you have? And how well are you converting that traffic? And if that's just sounds like blow your hair back, kind of you know things, and it is confusing that's what we're bringing him in tomorrow to talk about the metrics that you should be watching, how to measure them well and then take action.