Producing effective e-newsletters

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E-newsletters are a fantastic and cost-effective way for non profit organisations to communicate what they do, but I feel it’s an application that is underused and often misused. They are a great opportunity to shout about your achievements and keep stakeholders informed and engaged in what you do.

They are also an ideal way to speak to a large number of people in a short amount of time. But in an age of email information overload how do you avoid people pressing the delete button before reading it in the first place?

As someone who writes a regular e-newsletter but is also is a recipient of (at the last count) more than 30 different newsletters from various third sector organisations, I have carried out an exercise in what makes me read them as well as what doesn’t.

Here are just some of my personal tips – in no particular order:

Read e-newsletters from other organisations

Signing up to the e-newsletters of other organisations helps to get a sense of what they are writing about, what information they are trying to get across and how they are doing that. Think about the style and tone. Is it personal or corporate? What is the approach and most importantly how relevant is the content? Think about whether this e-newsletter is helping the organisation get their message across. As a reader does it inspire you to keep reading? Have you learnt anything new from reading it?

Sign up to your own organisation’s e-newsletter

What do you think of the content and what is being said? Is it communicating with the reader effectively?

Content, content, content

Content is critical. If you don’t think you have enough news for a monthly newsletter it is better to wait than to send out information for the sake of it. Do plan what you want to say. Ask your colleagues to provide content ideas and potential articles to give a broader voice for your organisation. Think about when you’ve got enough content and save stories for future newsletters.

Know your target audience

Who are your audience? Is it only supporters, donors, stakeholders, trustees, staff – or all of the above? Is it appropriate to send them all the same information or do you need to target it? Recieving irrelevant information can be worse than receiving no information.

The expectation for how we are communicated with is changing. In the not too distant future we will be communicating with different audiences in a more direct, targeted and personalised way. They will decide how they want to receive your information and in what format. E-newsletters will be an important part of this mix. Getting it right will be crucial.

Keep it fresh and regular

It’s important to think about when you send out your enewsletter and how often. A monthly or bi-monthly update is an achievable target. Anything more than that could be information overload and not sustainable. If you need to share breaking news, it may be appropriate to send out a special e-news update to your list.

When to send

In the last few months I’ve been noticing that I’ve been getting a lot of e-newsletters after 5.00pm on a Friday and even at the weekend. Research shows that emails received at these time have low open rates. Avoid sending newsletters at this time. Also avoid school holidays as a high proportion of your target audience may be away from email and might never get to see your newsletter.

The subject line

What you write in the subject area can make a huge difference to your e-newsletter. This is one of the hardest things to do (and the thing I personally leave until the end). A phrase that teases the reader could at least get them opening up the e-newsletter but don't try and be too clever as you might not get through spam checking!

Useful links

• 7 top tips to guarantee responses to your direct marketing (NCVO)
• 6 things to consider when sending email campaigns (NCVO)
  
• Best practice for building and designing email newsletters (Lasa knowledgebase)
• Why do email newsletters? (Lasa knowledgbase)
• Guide to bulk email (Lasa knowledgebase)

About sounddelivery

Jude Habib is founder and creative director of sounddelivery, a media production and training company for the third sector.

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