We're sure you’ve heard things like “newsletters are dead” and “newsletters don’t work“ many times before. We can say with fair confidence that anyone saying this is either simply doing it wrong or not doing it at all.
Not long ago, we had a conversation with Israeli Tech Ambassador, Hillel Fuld, who launched a newsletter. We met to discuss exactly this point: Who launches a newsletter in this day and age?!
So let's go back to the beginning and start with WHY you want a newsletter in the first place.
There are a number of reasons.
The most important reason for starting a newsletter is that it is the only communication channel that you can push out to your audience that you own (Assuming you don't have an app).
You can build an audience of millions on Facebook or LinkedIn or TikTok and then one day they (the platform owners) may decide that you violated their “terms of use,” lock you out of your account and just like that you’ve lost it all. It can happen to anyone.
With a newsletter, even if your provider cuts you off, you can always upload your list to a new provider and keep sending.
The next most important reason is that email is THE universally-accepted communication platform. Not everyone is on FB, but 100% of people on Facebook have an email address, which is required to open an account. The same goes for LinkedIn and other social networks. You may complain about some of your emails going to your recipients’ spam box (which can be fixed), but, on average, a smaller percentage of your social media followers will see your posts.
Another reason is that people read their emails from various devices and a host of, well, hosts. Your Facebook posts live only on Facebook. WhatsApp messages only on WhatsApp, and so on. With email, you can send to anyone regardless of what vendor they use. I can send from my Gmail using the Android client to your Apple email account you check in Outlook and it works. Try sending a Facebook message to your LinkedIn contact.
Do you want one more reason?
If you have an email list, that’s gold. Don’t save it for a rainy day. Use it! These are people who have shown they want to hear from you. Don’t keep them waiting. They’ll just forget you.
So now that we established why, here are a few tips to ensure a smooth launch.
Newsletters work and should be part of your overall inbound strategy.
Of course, B2B marketing is based on multiple touch points across numerous channels such as blogs, social media, industry reports, podcasts, paid ads, billboards (those big pictures you see along the highway) and many other components. Each business needs to decide what channels are relevant to their audience, but in most cases, a newsletter will fit nicely into that mix.
This blog is an outline for getting a newsletter off the ground. Of course, your content, subject, timing, and many other factors will affect the success of your newsletter, but this provides a good starting point.
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out to the Penguin team to help you get your first newsletter up and running.
If you’d like to keep up with the startup economy in Israel, you can sign up for Hillel’s newsletter.