Last night's Povo blogger panel sparked an interesting debate about monetizing blogs and Big Bad Media Companies vs. local bloggers. Sam and Jacqueline wrote excellent recaps of the event (complete with photos), so I won't rehash it here except to welcome any new readers I met last night! (Pssst! There's also a YouTube video of me discussing how I started my blog.)
This morning I sat in on a webinar about making email newsletters work. It was a joint effort between ConstantContact and Ladies Who Launch. Now, I'm very happy with MailChimp as my email vendor, but I did pick up some interesting tidbits that I'll share below.
- Building your list. Many of the participants have traditional brick and mortar stories, so it makes sense for them to include a guestbook for email signups in their store. Those of us who don't have a physical space can include a signup box or link on our websites, email signature lines, and in social networking profiles like Facebook or LinkedIn (hint: I've also used my status on LinkedIn to announce "I'm getting ready to send out The Urban Museletter. Sign up here... ") There's also the strategy of asking people at networking events "Could I add you to my newsletter list?" (Then marking a y or yes on their business card.) They highly, HIGHLY discouraged marketers from buying lists to bump up your numbers, and I'd have to agree.
- The advantages of using an email service. I signed up with MailChimp, because I wanted to send out professional-looking HTML emails and didn't want to have manage my email list. Now, of course, the people leading the webinar want us to buy into the idea of paying for an email service, but they had other good reasons, too. For example, having a large number of emails in the BCC field is a red flag for spam in a lot of email programs. Using an email service can help ensure that your message reaches its intended recipient, because they've opted in. It also makes it easier to track open rates, clicks, and so on.
- Best practices. As the trainer, Heidi, pointed out, many businesspeople now read emails on a BlackBerry or iPhone, which means they may not see all the pretty graphics you've so nicely laid out for them. It also means that you only have a few words or characters to grab their attention. She suggested putting the most relevant information at the top (which many of us would do anyway), not relying too heavily on graphics, and using white space to make the email more readable.