Serial Storytelling  |  Brainstorming  |  Copywriting & Design  |  Marketing Intelligence
	Regularly publishing an e-mail newsletter with editorial content is one of the best and least expensive ways to stay in touch with existing and prospective customers. Such a newsletter can foster the same bond of trust between reader and publisher that many media companies enjoy. This bond of trust results in two benefits: (1) an increased receptiveness to sales pitches among the subscribers; and (2) faster subscription growth thanks to positive “word of mouse” among subscribers. A Classic Quid Pro Quo Creates a Win-Win Scenario Contrary to what most e-mail marketing experts will tell you, the more often you publish an e-mail newsletter with editorial content, the more often you can contact subscribers with standalone promotional e-mail messages (preferably from the CEO or another senior executive). In other words, your newsletter becomes both a selling tool in its own right and a device to facilitate something you normally could not do—send standalone sales pitches via e-mail. Although it seems counterintuitive, this phenomenon, which we call “serial storytelling,” stems from a classic quid pro quo—your subscribers express their gratitude for the quality content in your newsletter by listening to your sales pitches more closely. In short, more e-mail works better than less e-mail—provided that the increase in frequency is matched by an increase in editorial content that recipients find interesting and helpful. Referrals Replenish Your Marketing Database Free of Charge Subscribers who don’t buy anything from you, but persuade others to subscribe who eventually become customers, are valuable in their own right. In fact, referrals replenish your marketing database at a much lower cost than advertising. In some cases, referrals can become viral in nature and create an epidemic of subscriber growth that can obviate the need for advertising altogether—at least for lead generation. For this reason, it’s essential to facilitate and measure (to the extent possible) the referral process. Of course, referrals will only occur if you regularly publish editorial content. People are more inclined to tell others about a thought-provoking article than an advertisement. The End Result: A Permission Asset When you regularly publish an e-mail newsletter with editorial content, your marketing database becomes a “permission asset.” As a result, the existing and prospective customers who comprise your marketing database rarely forget that they agreed to receive e-mail messages from you. Anyone can gain short-term permission, but this long-term permission is what makes a marketing database truly valuable—i.e., an asset. You’re Busy. We Can Help. Creating an e-mail newsletter is easier said than done. We can help you every step of the way, from conception to production to analysis. Just as importantly, we can also help you create accompanying standalone promotional messages that take full advantage of our serial storytelling methodology. Contact us to discuss how an e-mail newsletter can benefit your company