email marketing: levels 2 and 1

The beauty of email marketing is that you send valuable content to people you know - and if they like what they see, they'll pass it on. In doing so, your customers and contacts endorse your company and effectively recommend you to their network. Your message and materials reach a wider audience (in level 3), spreading awareness and gathering new prospects. Neat, huh?

Of course, there are a few golden rules:

1. Make sure the frequency matches the pace of your business. If you're a travel company, monthly is enough to highlight new destinations and a special offer, for example. If you're selling clothing, quarterly is enough - in line with the seasons.
2. Put something interesting in! GIve readers something of value to them, they'll read it and pass it on. Even the most boring subject can be made interesting with a surprising/amusing writing style. Stephen Fry talks about some serious subjects, but could never be accused of being boring.
3. Make it easy to unsubscribe. That sounds counter productive, but if you don't, your next message will get marked as spam and you'll never be able to reach that person again.
4. Measure the response. Email marketing packages have some nifty tracking behind them - open rates, most popular articles, dwell time and so on. That information is great for improving response rates on your next issue too.

If email marketing has had a bad reputation, it's because those golden rules weren't applied. Do it properly and people will look forward to the next edition - vouchercodes.com is a good example; helping people to save money in a downturn.

Email marketing picked up where printed customer newsletters and magazine left off. It's cheaper and greener for your business and a great way to expand your network of prospects.