The idea for a newsletter arose for our small business when we were knocking around ideas on how to stay in touch with our customers.
The customers of our country/victorian gift shop love to hear about new items and products and activities that we have planned for the future, and our newsletter grew out of that idea.
One point to make here is that newsletters are not to be 100% marketing.
While it is a marketing tool, most people will not read it if it is filled with ads and nothing of meaning.
We worked hard to find a balance between providing articles that were informative or entertaining and other articles that would highlight how to use one of our products.
Each issue opened with a letter from the owner that started by saying, "Dear Friends.
" Our soft-sell approach worked very well.
From the very first issue our customers came in absolutely raving about the newsletter.
Most of them felt that we had written directly to them.
They loved the highlighting of the new products as well as ways to use other products that they had already purchased.
In addition we provided recipes and entertaining hints and tips to help them navigate the holidays with poise and elegance.
It got so that if were even a little bit late putting out our newsletter, we would get calls asking where it was! The best person to develop content for a newsletter for your small business is you.
You know your product lines and you know your customers.
By writing in a friendly, conversational manner, you will connect with your customers in a very personal level.
By speaking to them as if they were standing right there in front of you makes you so much more human in their eyes.
Receiving a communication from you that is friendly and informative is a truly powerful marketing tool as long as you have a good balance between information and sales pitches.
Go out of your way to make your customers feel special and you will find them to be very devoted customers.
The easiest way to start your newsletter is to look to your word processing software and see if there are any newsletter templates that you can use.
If you happen to have Microsoft Word Publisher, there are many newsletter templates for both 2 page and 4 page newsletters that take all the work out of designing the newsletter.
All you have to do is to provide the content and the photos.
While it may be fun to experiment with all the fun fonts you have available to you, the rule of thumb for newsletters is to have no more than three different fonts on any given page (this includes bolded and italicized fonts) so choose carefully and choose wisely.
Consider your audience.
If they are older, then make sure your font size is easily readable.
Consider having regular columns so that your readers know what to expect in each issue of the newsletter.
Most of our customers tell us that they sit down with our newsletter and a cup of coffee or tea.
This tells us that we hit the mark.
We also made a point of asking for input from our customers that helped us to further target what they wanted to see in the newsletters.
While newsletters are a marketing took for your small business, they are much more than that when you take it to a personal level and communicate with each of your customers on an individual basis through your newsletter.