Some time back I have written a post on How to send Blog feed updates via Aweber and I have been using this to send Email updates to my readers. As I already mentioned I’m not a pro in Email-marketing and I’m learning from my own experience.
Initially I thought blog broadcast (Email newsletter or every post) is a very important part of Email marketing, but I was completely wrong. This is what my stats says:
Notice the stats. 20 in the first line donates the number of people actually opened your Email and 4 is the number that people clicked on links inside Email. Now this is extremely low.
Now lets compare it with Email which I sent manually. This feature is known as broadcast feature of Aweber.
See the first line: 59 people opened this Email and 23 links were clicked. Obviously conversion was less but still CTR increased in this case.
Why Blog broadcast is not very successful?
Imagine your friend sending you an Email every day. How likely you might not open that Email after some time and will leave it unattended. This is normal action which I will take when I get Email from same person every day.
More over one particular reason was Email title was same every time and more over I have been sending one Email every day. This leads to lesser CTR and thus less traffic from Email list.
Though above justification can be overruled if you are sending one post every 3-4 days. This way less Email and more likely to get better CTR.
Why Broadcast feature or weekly newsletter is effective?
I’m subscribed to many bloggers Email list and I love getting Email once in a while. Most of them send me Email newsletter which is a digest of popular post in a week. Or they send me a broadcast which is Email with something important. Now in both the situation I open Email and take some action.
See the second image, you will notice no. of people opening your email newsletter is better and CTR increases. That is because that’s a personal broadcast where title of the Email was different and Email was about only one topic.
Conclusion:
- Daily blog broadcast decreases your Email newsletter CTR.
- Weekly newsletter and broadcast feature works better.
Everything mentioned above is something which I have learned from my personal experience with ShoutMeLoud newsletter. Though it may differ for you depending upon your niche and how you are sending Email newsletter.
Do share your experience with Blog broadcast feature of Aweber or any other Aweber alternative you are using?
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Article by Harsh Agrawal
Harsh has written 1211 articles.
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{ 18 comments… read them below or add one }
You’re absolutely right. I have done a similar test, and that’s why I ended up with a weekly newsletter instead. A lot more people open the email, and click on each link.
What I have been thinking about lately is the headline, if I should use a generic headline like “Latest from slymarketing” or “the slymarketing newsletter” instead of a headline related to the topic of the week. So far I am using the topic of the week, hence it’s usually different every week.
Thanks for your comment Jens..
I’m also working on headline at this moment..Trying to learn how I love to read and what titles make me click the Email…!!
More over I have also decided to come up with a weekly Email newsletter..Like I do here at SML roundup..Hope it might work..
Will continue sharing my experience..
That’s awesome. But do you know how many people are reading your SML roundup compared to the other posts?
I’m worried that if I use a generic headline, and only publish my newsletter once a week, few people will read it. But, on the other hand, I can test it and I’ll see the results fairly fast
I agree on that…I guess it’s time to tweak the post every Monday…
I can see less CTR in monday morning round up..and thanks for reminding me about the same..
Good info
Then let me update my readers by weakly
Do let us know how this change worked for you…
Hi Harsh,
You can configure so that blog/emails only go out when you send them, ie not automatically.
They stay in the queue until you publish.
This means you can select which emails to go and when, which should reduce issues if your blog is sending (too many) emails.
PS – schedule them for approx 10am to get more opens.
I have decided to send Email manually from now on…
Might increase my work but I believe result would be much better this way….
Or may be publish one best post of the week via Email…!!
Thanks for suggestion
I agree with your point on time..I usually keep it around 7 PM…Would change it to 10-11Am and lets see how it works out for me..
I agree with you. If you value your list, a much better way is to send them an email twice a week. More than that, expect a lesser CTR.
Just my two cents.
I agree with your views here..
I have started doing the same after above observation..
Very clear and i do definitely agree with what you have said there :
Great thoughts , thank you for sharing them
I’m also laerning email marketing and working on to build up a nice list. still more tips and guidance needed by you.
Is their any settings in feedburner to send updated weekly instead of daily?
I am still struggling to build my own mailing list and learn how email marketing realy works. Currently i have SendBlaster software to send bulk emails, but i am having problem of SMTP. Hostgator allow me to only send 500 emails per hour and if it cross the limit they can block the account.
Hi Bilal,
Get their VPS plan, they allow unlimited sends, provided they are double optin to avoid spam issues.
Best,
Erol
You are right. I have 2000+ email subscribers. But, I don’t get even 100 from the email.(just guess).
As rightly said, weekly newsletter is good.
Great Topic here,
I have actually had great success with the rss feature but mainly with the non-money making niches. I create rules with it though. First my headline is a “Whats New” type of headline. This separates the Monthly newsletter offered. I set the release to go out every 6 posts. This is due to writing many posts. I have not lost 1 subscriber doing this. The most important thing to always consider with your email marketing efforts is that you must be true to your subscribers and give them what you promised them when they subscribed. You can also test your list by segmenting to get a better feel on the response. One size does not fit all.
Again, Great Topic!
Rhonda G.
I’m saying it, because that’s probably the only posts I don’t read at SML (all because of the headline)