Writeyness :: Info to snack on

Every web business should collect the email addresses of its visitors. However, not every website needs to send out a monthly email newsletter. Although it is possible to find articles of interest in pretty much any subject, if you sell janitorial supplies, for example, your target market may not necessarily welcome a monthly missive on toilet cleaners and mops.

However, an occasional email “blast” to your subscribers is always a good idea. All you need is a reason for mailing… a summer sale, an imminent price increase, a damaged stock blow out, a limited edition release.

A client of mine learned the power of an email blast like this when he decided to raise the price of his ebook, and emailed his list to tell them the bad news. The good news for him arrived in the form of a load of sales from a group of people who may not otherwise have returned to his site — simply because they hadn’t been given a reason to.

After all, people forget and move on. Email is your way to remind them and encourage them to return to your site. This client was kicking himself that he hadn’t emailed his list for several months. Now he looks for an opportunity every month or so.

All you need is an up-to-date, clean subscriber list, a compelling seling point and engaging copy.

I got an email from Amazon the other day. Amazon is, of course, the bee’s knees when it comes to identifying what individual customers are interested in, and using that data to suggest products to them.

In this email, they informed me that “Night Gardener” by George Pelecanos was now out in paperback, and they thought I’d be interested. I was, and I logged on and bought it.

I’m not alone in doing this. A large percentage of Internet users have bought something as a result of an email — 82% according to Postfuture, with 32% having made an immediate purchase. These figures are certainly big enough to make emailing your subscribers with relevant information and offers very worthwhile indeed.

(By the way, if you like hard-boiled crime fiction, filled with characters who ooze booze, angst, one-liners and bodily fluids in equal measures, as they either commit or solve crimes in the seedy underbelly of a teeming city (in this case Washington DC), then you should give George Pelecanos a try. It’s great stuff.)