Choosing a email marketing topic

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Email marketing isn’t rocket science. That is, unless you happen to be marketing rocket parts. I think it’s a safe bet you’re not. It’s simply having a strategy, good content and some helpful tools with which to do the deed. Oh, and an audience is nice to have, as well.

Begin your efforts by giving some quality thought to what you want to accomplish. Are you trying to build a subscriber following with tips, articles or other informational / educational content? Will you be using email to promote products, offer special deals or discounts? Will you use it to drive traffic to your site or simply send out the occasional greeting as a touch point. Odds are, it will be some combination.

For this series, I’ll be addressing informational / educational emails to build a subscriber base, drive site traffic and ultimately sell something.

My e-newsletter is about marketing. More specifically, it’s about marketing for independent professionals, freelancers and small businesses in the service sector. That was a no-brainer for me, since it’s what I do and what I write about. The trick here is choosing a topic that you have some decent knowledge about and will also resonate with your potential subscribers. The “and” in that sentence is important. If your topic doesn’t connect with your audience and fulfill a need or solve a problem, they either won’t subscribe or they’ll opt-out after a few editions.

Ensure that there’s enough information about your topic so you don’t publish a few and then find yourself wanting. It’s similar to starting to write a book, only to find out you only have enough info for a glorified pamphlet. Google up your topic and see what’s out there. Bookmark various sites, blogs, articles, etc. that you can use for research, links and quotes.

Do some audience research to learn about common challenges and problems. Find the “pain points.” Research can be done with Google, poking around with StumbleUpon, following on Twitter, Facebook and online discussion groups/forums. For the latter, About.com is a great source.  This is where having a niche comes in very handy. If you focus on an industry, check out the trade association sites, clubs and other business organizations. Look at industry magazines and related sites. Common problems and challenges will soon become readily apparent.

You might also consider conducting a survey. There are several free online survey sites such as SurveyMonkey and Zoomerang. Promote the survey on various discussion groups, social media outlets like Twitter and your own contacts. Plus, surveys will give you data – your empirical data – to use in your other marketing efforts.

Armed with this information, you can make a topic decision based on facts, not your best guess.

Next up is giving some thought to frequency. Will you be sending email every week? Two weeks? Once each month? More? Less? It’s important to keep an eye on your opt-out rates. According to email marketing service, Constant Contact, the industry norm is roughly 2% or less per email. A new e-newsletter will usually have much higher rates. Over a few months, you should be able to gauge typical opt-outs for your e-newsletter.

One tactic is to increase frequency while monitoring opt-outs. The strategy is to increase frequency to the point of an abnormally high opt-out rate for your newsletter. When you hit that, you’ve reached your list’s saturation point. Cut back the frequency a bit until your opt-out levels return to normal.

Once you have a solid topic you can tap into and set your initial frequency, it’s time to talk about list building. That will be the subject of my next post.

Please note: I am not an affiliate for any services mentioned in this series. Links are provided simply for your reference and convenience.