In an increasingly digital world, connecting with your market through printed newsletters is a simple way to stand out from your competitors. But printed newsletters are more than just a marketing gimmick to catch your reader’s attention, although they do that quite well.
Email inboxes are flooded daily with all forms of marketing messaging like digital newsletters, but research shows that printed newsletters are more likely to be read than digital ones. And once your customers, clients, or community have the newsletter in their hands, the content is more likely to stick around since helpful or meaningful content can be kept and viewed again if it is engaging or provides some value to the reader.
Printed Newsletters Advantages
When printed newsletters land in your reader’s mailbox, you’ve already bypassed one of the most challenging aspects of modern marketing – the spam filter. But getting the physical printed newsletters in front of your reader is just one of the printed newsletter advantages that businesses can look forward to when they swap digital with printed messaging.
1 Printed newsletters last. A physical marketing tool like a newsletter can be kept around indefinitely. When helpful content is included, the reader is more likely to hang on to the newsletter, extending the reach of the marketing tool. Printed newsletters allow businesses to keep their name and brand in front of their readers for a much longer time than digital marketing materials that may be filed away or deleted quickly if they even make it past the spam filter.
2 Customers recognize the investment from printed newsletters. Customers and clients understand that financial investment, no matter how small or large, comes with developing, printing and mailing a physical newsletter. Businesses know that you value them when you spend the money and time to create printed newsletters instead of a free e-newsletter.
3 Printed newsletters evoke a nostalgic feel that can’t be replicated with a newsletter in a digital format. Physically connecting with your customers is comfortable and familiar in a way that digital communication is not. Like holding a freshly printed newspaper or a crisp magazine, printed newsletters are reminiscent of a time before digital marketing when businesses planned and delivered content directly to the consumer.
4 Printed newsletters give authenticity and authority to your business. Professionally printed materials like business books, printed newsletters, or booklets give businesses an impression of expertise in their industry. By utilizing formally printed communication like a newsletter, businesses can harness this almost automatic impression to their advantage to help build their brand’s niche within the industry.
5 Printed newsletters are more likely to be seen than a digital version. Printed newsletters won’t get sent to a spam folder or become lost in a sea of emails, unlike their digital counterparts. And e-newsletters are simple to delete or even block, making losing a company’s future digital marketing and customer connection forever with a click of a button a real risk. By sending printed newsletters, businesses have a much higher possibility of their content being viewed by the intended reader than those sent digitally.
6 Printed newsletters complete a comprehensive marketing strategy. Utilizing different types of marketing is the key to reaching the right audience and doing it effectively. Many businesses are excelling at reaching their customers through social media, direct content marketing, and even online SEO strategies, but including print marketing in your plan can help to close the gap on the customers that are unreachable digitally.
Crafting Effective Printed Newsletters
Creating a newsletter your clients and customers love to receive will help you bring attention to your business while building trust and connections with your readers. Putting together an engaging message in an attractive package that will inspire your readers to connect with your business is the recipe for developing an effective newsletter.
Make it Personal
Human interest stories make newsletters compelling and give you the chance to spotlight employees, clients or customers or feature your own company’s leadership. They also offer the chance to loop in stories about industry innovators or even a celebrity connected to your business or industry.
Include interviews with company leadership or Q&A sessions with key personnel that customers may not be familiar with. Incorporating a shout-out to customers or clients as a thank you or acknowledgment for working with them is an excellent way to build relationships and provide free, organic advertising for other businesses that may find a way to reciprocate in the future.
Provide Interesting Tidbits
The newsletter doesn’t have to be 100% business focused. While industry or company content should make up the majority of the newsletter, consider sprinkling small bits of thought-provoking, surprising, or fun information throughout the newsletter. Including funny one-liners or thought-provoking statistics can personalize the newsletter and keep readers from being bored by reading the expected business-oriented content.
Teach Something
Use the space to give readers helpful how-to tips or steps to fix a common problem within your industry. Since the printed newsletter can be saved, readers are more likely to hang on to the physical copy if the content can help them solve a problem in the future, extending the likelihood of readers viewing your brand for a longer period. Including a useful or practical portion in each newsletter provides readers with something to anticipate with each issue and a reason to hold on to past publications.
Show Them Who You Are
A newsletter is a good place to reveal your company’s philosophies or stances on industry trends through short but impactful articles or stories. While staying away from overly controversial topics is a good idea, giving your opinion on industry topics can help you connect with your customers, clients and community that receive your newsletter.
One way to do this is to create content that shows your company’s values by spotlighting charitable causes you support with short articles or photos that capture employees participating in an event or activity. Or include an introductory message to kick off each newsletter in a conversational, warm tone in your voice so that readers can get to know the leadership behind the brand.
Stay on Brand
A newsletter provides a perfect platform to focus readers on your brand’s image. Keep the look and feel of the newsletter in line with your brand’s aesthetic. Graphics, fonts, colors and photography all contribute to how a reader perceives the company and the design elements of a physical newsletter all play a part in building your brand image with new and familiar readers.
Assess Results
After each newsletter is sent out, evaluate how well it resonates with readers by tracking the metrics from its call to action. If room for improvement is detected, make only one small change in the design, format, or style of the publication for each successive newsletter and continue to track the results to see what elements are working and which need improvement.
Printing a Newsletter Your Customers Will Love
Creating and printing a physical newsletter is a fun and memorable marketing strategy that can pay off in multiple different ways for most businesses. Customers love to receive informative material that they can use but they also like to be entertained with engaging content.
And when you hit the right combination of meaningful content and a call to action that stirs readers to connect with your company, your newsletter may just become an anticipated regular piece of marketing that you and your customers can count on. Dazzle Printing can help you transform your content into beautiful newsletters ready to be shipped off to your customers in just a few days.
Newsletter Printing Options
Creating an awesome newsletter that works for your business and shows off your brand beautifully is the key to getting the most out of your project. You can personalize production elements like choosing the right paper weight, adding a glossy coating to make included photos and graphics look great in the finished project, picking a standard or custom size or even using colored ink to make your newsletter stand out from other mailed marketing pieces.
Dazzle Printing also offers quick printing options as well as the opportunity to review a digital or printed proof before your project is printed to make sure your newsletters look perfect. Working with a trusted printer like Dazzle Printing will guarantee that you will love the way your project turns out so that you can use the well-known print newsletter advantages to increase your business and start building stronger relationships with your customers right away.
