Here are some great tips for creating effective enewsletters.
eNewsletter Design
Some people make the mistake of trying to cram as much information as possible onto each page. This makes the page look cluttered, and thus the design is not pleasing to the reader.
Instead, put one focal point on each page along with a couple of secondary items. Do not be afraid of white space. Leaving a wider margin and some blank space at the top and bottom of a page will make it easier to read and gives the enewsletter design a more pleasant look.
The Inspiration
If you need inspiration for your enewsletter design then pull out some newsletters that you have received in the past.
Even if you do not quite know why you like a particular style, you can still try to copy elements of that style.
Also, look at magazines to learn which fonts are easier to read, and to pick up on other design tricks.
Study the pages you are using for inspiration. How much white space is there? How much room between the columns? How large of a font is used? Pay attention to details.
There are also services and programs, such as MailChimp, that offer templates for enewsletters. You simply select the template you like best, add content and photos and your enewsletter is ready to go!
eNewsletter Content
For some, choosing content is the hardest part of an enewsletter.
What should you include? What should you leave out? Obviously, the most important thing is to get those on the mailing list to open the enewsletter.
To do this, you will need to include valuable content, not just fluff.
If there is no good information included in your newsletters, then future newsletters will probably be deleted before they are even opened.
You must learn about your audience and then include valuable content for that audience.
For example, if you are trying to reach business owners, then include content on new tax laws, tips to save on office expenses or how to handle difficult customers.
Keep It General
Unless you are writing to a very specific niche audience, then do not include content for such an audience.
For example, if your target readership is pet owners, then include content valuable to all pet owners rather than, say, horse owners.
No dog owners are going to bother reading your tips for training a horse. Another example is if your target audience is small business owners then stay away from writing for a specific industry (i.e. “How to Start your Restaurant with Less Capital”). Keep it general and speak to everyone in your target audience.
Try not to repeat your content more than once a year. Also, while the writing doesn’t have to worthy of a Pulitzer Prize, it should be free of spelling and grammatical errors.
One Last Tip
If you are not a good writer then hire someone to write your content. You need to keep your readers interested – and coming back.
That means that the content must be reasonably well-written. It is not very expensive to hire a freelance writer at sites such as Guru.com, and it is well worth the cost to have content that will keep your readers coming back.
