Yes, e-zines and e-newsletters can be a fantastic tool for branding, marketing, and building your business. There are pitfalls, of course.
Anissa DeGrasse touches on a few of them in her "Ezine Publishing 101" blog entry. In addition to taking care to be courteous so you aren't blacklisted by an ISP for "spamming" recipients, it's important to proofread your work.
If you're not normally a copywriter, I suggest you get in touch with someone who is. If you accept contributions from experts and colleagues, make sure to proofread their work too. Just because they know what they're talking about doesn't mean they are good writers or can spell well! Ali Brown (the Ezine Queen) and Lorrie Morgan Ferrero (Red Hot Copy) both offer free resources for writing effective copy and using e-zines as a sales tool.
One of the most damaging things I see from companies trying to sell me something is typos and grammatical errors in their e-newsletters. I may enjoy their tone and get good info from them, but do I trust them? Maybe it's just the editor in me...but I don't. These folks have to work a lot harder to earn my business, because I'm concerned about how they run things if they don't even run spell check in Word before they create their e-news.
Tone is important too. If your e-zine is meant to be an informative public relations tool, throwing in a sudden "hard sell" is going to be a shock (and turn-off) to your readers. If folks are accustomed to seeing sales pitches in your e-zine, they won't be as likely to unsubscribe as if you suddenly slam them with a "buy today or you're a loser!" spiel. On the flip side, if you truly do want to sell something via your e-newsletter, don't be afraid to issue a call to action and place shopping cart links in your correspondence. As your readers come to know your business and begin to trust you, they'll be hooked. Because you are offering an incredible product or service, right?
Just tell them so. Use the technology available to you as a tool to share the word about your wondrous widgets, explain the benefits of owning a widget all their own, and then remind them to pop by your website, send you a fax, or give you a ring to get their wondrous widget today.
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