Healthcare as a Startup

Newslettering Vs Blogging – Why not both?

May 21, 2009 at 4:00 pm Justin Wilcox Leave a comment

Newsletters sent via email are great because they let you reach out to specific people, provide unsolicited value, and remind them that you’re out there. The downside is that when you email newsletters, the information inside them isn’t easily discoverable by new people.

Blogs on the other hand are automatically indexed by search engines and will virtually guarantee new people find your information. Of course, those new people may or may not people the people you really want to reach out to. So…

Why not do both? The purpose of both your newsletter and your blog should be largely the same: demonstrate expertise by providing value to your readers. In fact, the content should be largely the same as well. Neither blogs nor newsletters will be successful if you’re just shilling your services. If on the other hand you’re always providing value, readers won’t care what format it comes in.

Here’s what I recommend:

• Write blog posts once or twice a week
• Figure out which blog posts are most useful/generate the most traffic
• Once/quarter send out a newsletter with summaries and links to your five most popular articles

This technique will ensure you are not only sending out the most valuable information to your newsletter recipients, it will also remind them you have a blog and should lead to more subscribers.

When you get ready to send out your newsletter, check out the following services:

• Constant Contact – The “big name” in managing email campaigns
• MailChimp – Free if you’re sending to 100 people or fewer. Also offer pay/email pricing plan.
• iContact – Strong alternative

Good luck!
Justin

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