Like any consumer, you know what you want to see in your inbox. Spam immediately will be deleted. Useful items may be kept around for a little bit. If the item is especially good, it might even be saved into a folder for future reading.
So a company must be strategic in its email marketing and newsletters to consumers and members. One expert says the first step is to respect your audience.
“You have to ask yourself, are you delivering content that’s valuable?” said Ann Handley, chief content officer of MarketingProfs and author of “Content Rules.”
“Take your subscribers seriously and don’t abuse the relationship. People unsubscribe when you’re not providing value through what you’re mailing them. If you start from there, it’s an easier road when it comes to email marketing.”
A lot of thought goes into each MarketingProfs daily email newsletter, which is sent to roughly 423,000 subscribers and members. Every part in the newsletter is intentional, starting with the table of contents at the top, or “above the fold.”
This placement allows readers to easily view headlines and see the small abstract explaining each component of the newsletter. There’s also a great mix of content with every newsletter – blogs podcasts, suggested tweets for members to use, infographics, surveys and webinars.
“We want people to open the newsletter and we want people to love the newsletter,” Handley said.
