Do you need a newsletter?

There is no question these days that every organisation needs to have website. But do all organisations also need a newsletter? While mobile technologies and social media may be talk of the town, newsletters do continue to deliver results for those organisations that deploy them wisely.

Today, e-mail newsletters have been around for 20+ years and some have become very focused, targeted and effective at using their newsletters to turn subscribers into new customers or strengthen their brand. Still, this recent tweet from Ian Truscott, VP WCM Strategy at Alterian caught my attention:

Just opened an e-mail – “Dear Client” – from a respected organisation. Go straight to trash, do not pass go, do not collect my attention.

In my view, this says much about how little progress we have made as an industry in terms of newsletters. Yes, I know that popular websites continue to crash under unusually heavy traffic, but a mistake like the above from a respected organisation just seems very out of place.

As with the rest of the Internet industry, most buyers start newsletter projects by looking at tools. As always, there is no shortage of these. You can look at tools as much as you like, perhaps the most important question is: do you really need a newsletter?

Instead of falling in love with tools, I urge you to start with the strategic questions: Who is your target audience and what are their needs? What are the measurable success criteria and how will you follow up on them? Who will own the newsletter internally?

I asked on Twitter if everybody needs a newsletter and received this intelligent response from IA and usability expert Eric Reiss:

As Tom Lehrer says, “If people cannot communicate, the very least they can do is shut up.” So the answer is generally, “no”.

What’s your view? When should organisations consider newsletters?

Full disclosure: We use iContact to send our newsletters and for email marketing. We pay list price for the service and we don’t do any consulting for vendors.