Your Newsletter Marketing Strategy: Five Things to Consider
Sending out a monthly newsletter takes a good deal of effort. You need to determine your goals and how to measure them, prepare your mailing lists, develop content, and make sure everything is delivered correctly. Can you confidently say that you are generating justifiable revenue from this effort -or are you sending out a newsletter because everyone else does?
With all the new technology available today, the term “newsletter” has morphed into a dozen different formats. You can certainly find one that fits your needs. One thing is clear-do not continue to send out a monthly newsletter unless you are getting a real return on your investment.
Some things to consider when evaluating your current newsletter:
1. Get an independent evaluation of your current newsletter strategy from a marketer you trust. Make sure to develop tangible success measurements. You need to know if what you are doing is actually worth continuing. Your communication with your customers needs to be personalized and targeted to sell. You are building a mailing list for a reason. Make sure that mailing list pays off.
2. Is a monthly format the right one? You may want something published regularly, or you may discover that a few targeted one-offs a year give you a greater return. Just like everything else you do for your business, you need to test and revise ideas, products and methods.
3. Take advantage of new technology. There are new ways to personalize your content and develop a dialogue with your customers that won’t be cost prohibitive. Consider using audio to announce your newsletter on your website or add audio in the body content.
4. Make reading your newsletter pay-off for your customer every time. Always offer discount links or other value-add information that separates your content from all the “value-free” content on the web today. Think about what the reader will be interested in, not what your company wants to tell them. Think about what they want to BUY, not what you want to SELL.
5. Use your support area to launch new newsletters. Many e-commerce businesses miss an opportunity to communicate with their customers when they go to the support area. Customers want quick answers. They also like knowing that the company cares about what they want and need. A newsletter that focuses on FAQs and support would be a welcome change from all the ‘marketing’ newsletters they receive. This idea is a simple one that only the most successful companies use. Don’t overlook a way to stand out.
Digital Media Works, Inc.(http://www.DigMediaWorks.com ) is an Internet marketing and design firm that specializes in solutions for e-commerce companies . . A seasoned 25+ year management/marketing professional , founder Stephanie Diamond is experienced in building profits in a broad range of product and services businesses . She created a line of multimedia software products that sold millions of copies for America Online .
Private Label Products: Trend For The Best?
Lately, private label products have made a tremendous impact on the U.S. market, affecting almost everyone, from producers to retailers to consumers. Private label products are products whose name or brand solely belongs to a specific retailer (e.g. Wal-Mart and Marks & Spencer). Let us say that you are in a grocery store. At first, you see all those gourmet sandwiches with brands that have long been familiar to you. Then you go to Marks & Spencer and lo and behold, now they are selling the same type of sandwiches too!
Private label products have grown significantly in Europe, especially in the Western half, and now it is making its mark in the United States. Private labels can be divided into sub groups: store brands are products where the retailer’s name is a strong factor in its packaging and marketing aspects; store sub-brands are products whose connection to the retailer is minimal; umbrella branding is a strategy where a retailer uses only one private label for different product categories and finally there are individual brands in which one private label is accorded to one product type.
The advantages are of course numerous, to all key persons involved. For the retailer, one of the most obvious pros would be the increase in sales. In addition, since it is his or her own private label, the retailer then has the freedom to create its own marketing strategy, have more control over its stock inventory and possibly use it to gain a more positive image to the public. And with a positive image, this would of course lead to stronger customer loyalty. Naturally, having a private label for one’s product would mean investing a lot of money so the retailer must be sure that it has the capital needed for such a venture. Secondly, most people still view private label products as something synonymous to lower quality products so this is another issue that the retailer must try to combat as they launch their new line.
For producers and suppliers, the advantages of producing private label products for a retail company is less visible but still present, nonetheless, For one, they get rid of most of the entry barriers of producer usually faces as they try entering a market because they’re supplying directly to the retailer itself. Secondly, for cash-strapped suppliers, manufacturing private label products will let them enter the bigger and higher end markets. The downside of all these of course is when a product does not perform as expected. Low profit could then affect the relationship between the supplier and retailer.
For the consumer, the advantages and disadvantages are almost equal. Most private label products are cheaper than branded products. This would translate to lower expenses for consumers, something that not everyone would doubt welcome. However, if the quality of the products is sub-standard, as some private label products are, maybe you are not getting the best of the deal as you have originally thought.
At the end, everything comes down to quality. Since price-wise, private label products have the upper hand, the only ace branded products have in their sleeves would be a more superior quality. However, if a reliable retailing company backs a private label product, the quality is usually equal to those that are branded. All one has to do is to CHOOSE WISELY.
Dr. John E. Neyman, Jr is an Author, Speaker, and President of http://UniversityofAuthors.com you may contact Dr. John at info@UniversityofAuthors.com
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