As newsletter writers and designers, we tend to focus on what we want to say and how we want our newsletter to look. However, one of the most important things you can do to put your best foot forward is to have your newsletter proofread. Notice that I didn’t say, proofread your newsletter – I said have it done for you. It is nearly impossible to proofread your own material.

Not always being one to practice what I preach, I will share a very embarrassing moment with you. Shortly after starting my first business, Dynamic Communication, I exhibited at a local chamber of commerce business expo. As a business newbie, I was doing everything myself, including proofreading my own handout (hastily prepared the day before the expo!).

Well, there I was, standing in my booth at my first business expo anxiously looking forward to a day full of meeting prospects and new clients, when a woman approached me. I gave her my most confident smile and even managed not to mangle my rehearsed elevator speech as I pushed my handout into her hands. Less than 10 seconds later, this woman gave me a look and some information that could have ruined my day – she told me that I had a spelling mistake in my handout. OUCH! Bad enough for a newsletter writer, but the mistake was that I had misspelled my company’s name! DOUBLE OUCH!!

Once I calmed down, and the red drained from my face, my creative mind kicked in and for the rest of the day I passed out my flyers telling everyone that the flyer contained a mistake – and if they could find it I would give them a free critique of their newsletter! However, right then and there I promised myself that I would never again rely on my own eyes to proofread anything my company puts out.

I want to tell you about an awesome resource that I use a lot: www.ProofreadNOW.com. ProofreadNOW is headed up by Phil Jamieson, and Phil and his team of proofreading experts will pore over virtually any type of document you send them and — in as little as one hour — they will send it back to you in perfect condition! It is an amazing, high-quality, and accurate service that I actually list as a benefit of doing business with my company. I tout to my clients that my newsletter service includes an outside professional proofreading service to make sure that their document is as good as it can be, and they view this as a value-added service, which it is.

So the Newsletter Guru tip for the day is, proofread, proofread, proofread – your reputation is on the line.By the way, I recently started a monthly ezine and you can sign up to receive a copy in your in box at www.newsletterpower.com.

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you’ve heard me say that how often you send a customer newsletter is the most important thing. It is more important than its style, color, size, name, or anything else you can think to ask me about. Some companies will send their customers a holiday card, a birthday card (not many these days!), and some might even send a quarterly newsletter. I consider this random, and while better than nothing, it is not enough to effectively build and strengthen client relationships. 

To determine the right frequency for your customers, ask yourself a couple of questions: “Am I communicating with my clients enough to convey how much I value them?” and “Am I doing enough to stand out among the thousands of marketing messages my clients receive every day?” 

Here is why a monthly newsletter is so important to your company: because it arrives every month, it is looked at as a regular “publication.” Think about it, magazines arrive monthly, and sometimes weekly; newspapers arrive daily; even bank statements arrive monthly! The point is that people see things they receive on a regular and frequent basis as having value, or at least important, and they generally anticipate them. Things like advertisements that arrive sporadically, including postcards and other marketing pieces, are just that — solicitations.  

So start off a new regimen accepting the fact that your customers will find more value in your newsletter if it arrives monthly.  

The previous concept is very important and worth rereading. In addition to frequency creating perceived value, frequency also increases brand awareness, which in turn will help to drive repeat and referral business. See how this works?! 

You may be surprised how many people resist my urging to do a monthly newsletter by saying, “It’s too expensive.” Quite frankly, this astounds me and I find it somewhat shortsighted. As a business owner, you need to figure out what you currently spend to attract new customers and clients, and also what the lifetime value of a typical client is to your business. If you can figure out what each new client costs your business, and what the lifetime value of a client is, I predict that you will start to see that building and maintaining these client relationships takes on a whole new meaning.  

To learn more about the newsletter marketing, you can sign up for my FREE 5-part course at www.nohasslenewsletters.com.