Using email newsletters to build relationships

Once marketers learned about email newsletters, everyone started receiving SPAM offers along with valid email newsletters. Email newsletters are one of the best ways to build a relationship with your customers. The customers that opt into your email list actually want to receive the information you have sent. Several businesses will use email newsletters to inform their customers about new changes and developments within the company and what people can expect for the future.

To gain responses to your email marketing campaign, it is important to work on building your customer list. Have an area on your web site where customers can submit their email address to be added to your list. When you take orders, always ask your customers for their email address so you can add it to the mailing list. While many people like the email newsletters, some customers may not feel the same way and they only want to receive email confirmations of their orders. If this is the case, try to hold 2 separate email list, one for notifications and the other for newsletters.

If you want to build solid relationships with your customers with email newsletters, you need to write solid content. The message line is also important because this is what your customers see first to determine if there is anything worthwhile reading in the actual email. Once they open the email, the content inside must be engaging and worthwhile to read. Think of your email newsletters like writing a press release, the first 2-3 sentences need to instantly catch the attention of your readers. The final sentence must give the customer an incentive to visit your web site or contact your company to purchase something. Use action words to help install a sense of urgency into your customers.

Most companies will write up a separate newsletter using a template and then copy it into the body of the email. Placing the newsletter into the body of the email is easier and it looks nicer. You can purchase programs that create newsletters for you for about $20 or you can enroll in an email newsletter web site for about $20 a month or so. They will handle everything for you, all you need to do is submit your email contact list and the content you want to go in the newsletter.

The company will issue some templates for you to choose from and then you simply copy and paste the content and they will send it out for you.

Some great ways to build relationships with email newsletters is to offer "how to" information to your customers. This will help to build your relationship with them because they are able to learn something and you are building your companies reputation in the industry.

The content in your newsletter should relate to your company in some way. Even if you want to write more of a lighthearted newsletter, you still need to find a way to focus on serving your customers with this information.

Get to know your target audience before you send out email newsletters. Some customers like to receive weekly emails while others prefer to only see information from your company once or twice a month. It is important not to overwhelm your target audience with too many newsletters, but you need to send enough so they know you exist.

No matter what you do, make sure the emails have engaging content so your customers will take a few moments to read them. If possible, write content that replies to some questions or concerns that have been addressed by your customers, this is a great way to work on building your relationships with them.