News As Email

Any newspaper, television station, news Web site or other news outlet can and should have an email newsletter option, and ideally more than one. A newspaper, for example, can put out a newsletter aimed at sports fans that is topped by the latest sports stories and scores, with other news headlines below. The same newspaper can also put out a local news update, a national news newsletter, and several others, possibly including a TV "daily highlights" piece, simply by rearranging existing content. This costs nearly nothing to do once the basic template has been set up; dozens of Open Source and commercial programs are available that will automatically generate email newsletters based on human-set rules. This intense targeting is good not only for readers who have a specific set of interests, but gives ad salespeople a set of special, high-value sponsorship opportunities which they can offer to both new and existing clients.

Readers will not sign up for newsletters they do not know about, and advertisers will not sponsor them without a concerted, long-term sales effort. Successful newsletters do not happen overnight or without major investment of time and other resources, any more than newspaper or magazine subscribers magically appear out of thin air. Any news outlet that wants to see newsletters become a strong part of their business needs to promote them constantly, just like any other subscription-based service. Even a free email newsletter demands time from readers, and that time may be more precious to many of them than a minor subscription fee.

Just as a Web site that is promoted in print must promote associated print, or broadcast products in return, an email newsletter should help push readers or viewers toward your Web, print or broadcast offerings. Email newsletters can directly promote ad inserts in newspapers, for example, with Friday's email mentioning inserts scheduled to go in Saturday's paper. A local retail advertiser for whom an insert is a major investment might be willing to pay an extra fee to have that insert promoted via email. Or, if necessary, an offer to promote an insert or other major campaign with a special round of free email newsletter advertising might make a great deal-closer when an ad salesperson is dealing with a recalcitrant client and may create additional single-copy paper sales, too.

Email newsletter distribution may be instant you either click "send" or your system automatically sends newsletters at a predetermined time and they're in subscribers' email inboxes a few seconds later but you can never forget that the humans who decide to subscribe are no faster than the humans who subscribe to newspapers and magazines or watch TV. You will not build an email subscriber base overnight. It can take a year, possibly two or three, to get enough subscribers to make an email newsletter profitable.

How many subscribers it takes to earn that profit can vary so much from newsletter to newsletter that there is no way to come up with an easy formula for it. Obviously, a newsletter that runs nothing but stories culled from an existing Web site is going to cost much less to operate than one that runs original material. Ad rates can vary wildly depending on audience demographics and the skill levels of the people selling those ads. All these factors must be taken into account. Subscription build rates, too, can vary wildly depending on the intended audience and content, and on marketing cleverness and persistence, as can the number of people who unsubscribe for one reason or another and must constantly be replaced just to keep your subscriber numbers stable, let alone make them increase.

Emailing news can produce excellent profits, either directly through paid advertising placed in the newsletters themselves or by using emailed news to build Web site readership or, ideally, both. The big trick is to set up newsletters for the long haul and grow them gradually, rather than trying for a "big bang" start and being disappointed when they don't start pulling in major money right away.