Archive for May, 2011
Great Web Content Writing
May 23rd
At one time or another, every successful writer asks themselves (or should) “What makes great email copy?”
We online marketing communication writers need to be ever mindful of the content we develop, its impact on those who read it (whether intentional or not), and how to make it better. The fact is that marketers are human just like anyone else. And this means that even the best of us can forget the key tenet of marketing: understand your audience. This simple yet inevitable fact sometimes causes us to write content that may achieve our business objectives (of our own companies!), but may not be relevant to our audience.
The truth is, content matters, a great deal in fact. As more and more email fills the Inboxes of our target audience, we need to continually make our email marketing messages stand out even more. That means understanding our audience – their needs, wants, motivations, interests, etc. And, perhaps more importantly, we need to put our audience ahead of our own priorities at all times. Which also means never falling too much in love with your own writing, but in whatever is most meaningful to recipients.
The Three S’s are recommended when developing email marketing More >
Great Media Exposure for Your Business
May 9th
I wanted to take a moment to talk a bit more about the last post below, about an article that I wrote for our team at Hat Trick Associates that focused on Email Marketing and it’s continued marketing viability, even in the face of new competition.
The reason for bringing up the topic again is certainly NOT to impress you the reader with how fantastic the article was, or how important it must have been to receive the coverage that it did.
Actually, quite the opposite.
Although no surprise, I do feel the information it contained was fairly interesting, and made for a good story…the truth is, with the right message and distribution, I could probably gain a similar amount of coverage for an article in YOUR industry, attributed to YOUR company.
And the coverage the Hat Trick article received was pretty cool, I will admit. It’s not every day that you write something that gets shared on Yahoo, CNBC, MSNBC, AOL…as well as lots of other niche websites, like the European Business Express, or the media powerhouse which is KAIT – Channel 8 in Jonesboro, Arkansas(!)
The great thing is, if a piece is written in the proper way – and shared via the More >
Think Email Marketing is Dead? Think Again.
May 3rd
From the Yahoo Finance story by Hat Trick Associates today:
With the advent of social media, mobile marketing and a host of other new, “sexier” communication channels, one might assume stodgy email marketing has gone the way of the Dodo bird or horse and buggy. But if anything the reverse is true.
“The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” Mark Twain
With all the hype surrounding social media and mobile marketing, it would be easy to assume that email is yesterday’s news, with little chance of keeping up with the other marketing methods now available.
But according to the numbers this assumption is incorrect. Email usage has remained remarkably steady, even in the face of new competition. Research shows that email is still the preferred method for receiving commercial messages of 74% of adults. This perhaps surprising statistic can help explain the continued proliferation of e-zines and other email marketing today.
It’s no longer true that the largest firms are the most likely to utilize email. As smaller companies outgrow their sole-proprietor beginnings, they increasing look for new ways to expand their business to support higher headcounts and overhead. Business surveys revealed that almost half of small businesses were using email marketing in 2010; More >

