A Guide to Email Newsletter Software

Ranked #784 in Internet, #39,768 overall

An introduction to email newsletter software

Are you confused by the different software options for generating a newsletter delivered via email?

You're certainly not alone - and this site is starting to try and sort out what are the free and paid options and how they compare.

Plus tips on using newsletters and email.



Below you can find:
  • a checklist of things to think about when choosing email newsletter software
  • a list of free webware which allows you to deliver newsletters online
  • a list of paid software sites which can deliver email newsletters (note some are dedicated and others are a function within a bigger package)
  • lots of tips on what to do when using email newsletters

    Your review can be included here is if it is independent and unbiased. Reviews by Associates can also be included by Associate status must be declared. Please a comment and a link at the end to your review (note full html required and this will not be active).

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Checklist for choosing newsletter software

A basic checklist

This is what I've identified as a preliminary set of questions which should be asked when considering acquiring such software



  • Is it free - or does it cost you a monthly fee? Does the fee vary by the number of subcribers? How open and explicit is the software website about how much it costs?
  • Does it save you money and/or increase your standing? In other words, what's the real cost (in time/effort and presentation) of an alternative which doesn't involve specialist software?
  • Is it reliable? The general view seems to be that if you pay for a service then you get a better service - or at least one which is more accountable. Another view is that this really depends on how mission critical your e-mail is.
  • Does it provide for people to receive it according to their preference? For example, does it have an RSS feed and can be read in a feed reader?
  • Do you know what you need? Does it need to be:
    • an idiot-proof solution?
    • lots of time/effort/help to get your newsletter up and running - but it then needs to be simple and efficient for you to operate?
    • a webmaster who does all those fancy tricks with servers and mailing databases?
  • Most importantly, have you considered why you are sending a regular e-mail/e-mail newsletter?
    • Does the information you communicate need to be one-way or could it be interactive (ie with comments and dialogue)?
    • Must it be private - or could it be public?
    • Have you considered what are the other options for what you need to say?
That's far from a long check-list - but it'll do for starters. What do you think are the other questions which you need to ask yourself?

(Extract from: Which is the best e-mail newsletter software?)
Making a Mark: Which is the best e-mail newsletter software?
I've been discussing software for distributing regular e-mails and e-mail newsletters recently with various people. We've all been trying to work out which is the best e-mail newsletter software. So, naturally I thought I'd find out even more if I opened up the debate to readers of this blog!
Making a Mark: Selling art online - email newsletter software
Introduces this lens - and includes reviews of email newsletter software in the comments

An overview of the software

If I get a lot of comments I'll start to split out the product from its reviews to give more room for the latter.

Similarly I'm interested in hearing about sites which are providing more detailed and unbiased reviews of software - please leave a comment at the end if you know of one.

Please also note that I don't count affiliates as unbiased!

FREE newsletter software and webware

Free newsletter software is getting better and better as developers realise that the way to hook people into the priced plans is to provide an excellent service via the free service - but to provide better features and more flexibility and scope for customisation with the priced plans

But do you need all those features and customisation?

phplist.com : Homepage : home
Site Description:
phplist is an open-source newsletter manager.
phplist is free to download, install and use, and is easy to integrate with any website.
phplist is downloaded more than 10 000 times per month and is listed in the top open source projects for vitality score on Freshmeat.

REVIEW (Making a Mark)
This is FREE, it's an open source newsletter manager and 'free' by both senses of the word - libre: you have freedom to view it, change it, and redistribute it and gratis: it has zero cost. Got to be attractive! It's sponsored by tincan which is a web solutions company.
  • This is the features page. It looks impressive for free software at the very least in terms of the level of communication of its features (compared to some sites) and web 2.0 readiness. This one has an RSS feed which is certainly an option I'd recommend looking out for as many people now read newsletters in their feed readers rather than as e-mails.
  • You can see it in action here
  • These are the system requirements and here are the FAQs and tips re spam
  • Who uses it? It's used by Julian Merrow Smith, who is one of the very popular and very successful daily painters (Postcard from Provence). He's been sending out almost daily e-mails to his large blog/auction e-mailing list for the last three+ years. I also know I've often seen phplist credited at the bottom of other e-mail newsletters I receive. If you watch the site you'll notice it has references from different organisations who use it in the top right hand corner - I noticed Friends of the Earth who were lavish in their praise.
REVIEW (Lisa Call)
I use PHPlist for my newsletter. It's maybe not the most intuitive piece of software to set up and get running but as a software engineer in addition to an artist, it wasn't a big deal for me. I've heard from other artists it's a bit confusing and can take a couple days to figure out.
Pricing | MailChimp - The Forever Free Plan
ChimpEmail Marketing and Email List Manager,
MailChimp.com - The Forever Free Plan

Features:
* Store up to 2,000 subscribers.
* Send up to 12,000 emails per month.
* No expiring trials.
* No contracts.
* No credit card required.

If you want to upgrade to priced plans these are also very flexible and customer oriented (see below)

I'm noticing that more and more people are using Mailchimp.
GNU Mailman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Site Description:
Mailman, the GNU Mailing List Manager
Mailman is free software for managing electronic mail discussion and e-newsletter lists. Mailman is integrated with the web, making it easy for users to manage their accounts and for list owners to administer their lists. Mailman supports built-in archiving, automatic bounce processing, content filtering, digest delivery, spam filters, and more. See the features page for details.

Mailman is free software, distributed under the GNU General Public License. Mailman is written in the Python programming language, with a little bit of C code for security.

The current stable GNU Mailman version is 2.1.11, released on 30-Jun-2008.

REVIEW (Making a Mark)
  • This is free software
  • Who uses it? I don't know anybody who uses it - but you do see people who use phplist saying that phplist is better than Mailman. I do know people who have tried it and had problems.
FeedBlitz - The Email Marketing Service for Blogs, Social Media and RSS
Site Description:
Email Newsletters
Automatically create newsletters from your blog; send a newsflash; or build your own content with our editor. Track activity, segment your mailings, generate RSS & web archives, report in real-time and more. All at no extra cost.

REVIEW (Making a Mark)
  • Completely free - but includes some minimal level advertising. You pay for the premium service.
  • It can be used to develop e-mail marketing newsletters even if you don't have a blog - but do have an RSS feed.
  • Who uses it? People with blogs to send e-mails of blog posts to people who like to subscribe via e-mail. I used to use is an it as an option for e-mail subscription on both blogs. Given my recent problems with feedburner I'm thinking about putting it back as an option. It allows me to provide a daily e-mail newsletter for my blog and to provide automatic links to past blog posts.
Google Group
REVIEW (Making A Mark)
  • Google Groups are free and can be closed with just one person posting and lots of people subscribing. It's free.
  • Who uses it? This is used by a lot of people to send out regular e-mails about daily art and is used by Duane Keiser and many other daily painters. I'd rate as suitable for non-confidential stuff.
Welcome To Dada Mail - Mailing List Manager
An Easy To Use and Extendable Mailing List Manager

Site Description:
Dada Mail is a completely contemporary, mature and intuitive web-based e-mail list management system, which runs on most any Unix-like hosting account that can run custom CGI scripts (details). Dada Mail is also a conceptual art project. [More Information]

Dada Mail handles Closed-Loop Opt-in/Opt-out subscriptions, sending complex announce-only and/or discussion mailing list messages with an advanced, fault-tolerant mass mailing monitor, supports the archiving/viewing/searching/resending/syndicating (rss, atom) of sent messages and doing all this and a whole lot more with style.

Dada Mail can handle custom subscriber fields and you can use the information it captures for partial list sending based on a query and Dada Mail's email templating system allows you to create targeted and completely custom email messages for each and every one one of your subscribers.

REVIEW (Brenda)
Before setting up subscriptions for my e-mail newsletter, I extensively tested three different open source e-mail software programs: PHP List, Dada Mail and PoMMo.

Although I am quite familiar with HTML and CSS and have some distinct geek tendencies, I initially experienced difficulties with setting things up on PHP List. By contrast, Dada Mail and PoMMo are much more intuitive.

ALL require considerable fiddling around if you wish to customise the various pages that subscribers see (sign up, confirmation, update details, unsubscribe etc) to match the look and feel of your own website. However, if you can live with using their logos and layout, then customising the text content is reasonably straightforward.

Although I found the admin interface of Dada Mail and PoMMo much cleaner and easier to use, I ultimately returned to PHP List for its superior subscriber management. I like to be able to see when an inidividual subscriber has signed up and record what mail they have received and when. As far as I could see, neither Dada Mail nor PoMMo offer this feature.
.. poMMo .. .
Site Description:
the home of the poMMo Project! (formerly the bMail project)

poMMo is versatile mass mailing software. It can be used to add a mailing list to your Web site or to organize stand alone mailings. Unique Features such as the ability to mail subsets of your subscribers set it apart from alternatives. poMMo is written in PHP and freely provided under the [GPL].

Designed to be easy to use and powerful, poMMo provides flexible Mailing Management that everyone needs -- from Software Projects to Shoe Stores, to Marketing Firms, to pioneers of the Blogosphere... Let us know where you are using poMMo by visiting our In the Wild page.

REVIEW (Brenda)
Before setting up subscriptions for my e-mail newsletter, I extensively tested three different open source e-mail software programs: PHP List, Dada Mail and PoMMo.

Although I am quite familiar with HTML and CSS and have some distinct geek tendencies, I initially experienced difficulties with setting things up on PHP List. By contrast, Dada Mail and PoMMo are much more intuitive.

ALL require considerable fiddling around if you wish to customise the various pages that subscribers see (sign up, confirmation, update details, unsubscribe etc) to match the look and feel of your own website. However, if you can live with using their logos and layout, then customising the text content is reasonably straightforward.

Although I found the admin interface of Dada Mail and PoMMo much cleaner and easier to use, I ultimately returned to PHP List for its superior subscriber management. I like to be able to see when an inidividual subscriber has signed up and record what mail they have received and when. As far as I could see, neither Dada Mail nor PoMMo offer this feature.
Email Marketing Software - Your Mailing List Provider
Manage, send & track your email newsletter with YMLP's easy-to-use mailing list hosting application. Create a FREE account and send your email campaign within minutes.

Used by Tina Mammoser (The Cycling Artist) - and looks great!

PRICED Newsletter software and webware

These are the options for creating email newsletters. Priced plans generally offer more flexibility and features - but make sure you check them out against the best of the free options. Also make sure you're not buying features you don't need.

PatronMail
Site Description:
PatronMail is the e-mail marketing system created specifically for arts and non-profit organizations... and all types of creative businesses. PatronMail enables you to create professional e-mail campaigns, send them to your targeted lists, and track your results.
.
REVIEW (Making A Mark)
It is specifically designed for use by arts organisations. It has a stepped level of service for different sorts of organisations - charging $25 per month for smaller organisations. Which I guess has got to be cheaper than postage!
  • As some other solutions are free, I guess you have to decide how important this is to you and also how mission critical the software is.
  • Who uses it? It's used by national galleries and theatres in the UK over here (eg National Portrait Gallery).
Email Marketing Solutions from Constant Contact
Site Description:
Email marketing software that makes it easy to create professional HTML email campaigns with no tech skills. Sign up for a 60-Day FREE trial.

With SpeakUp! Email Marketing you can:

* Get started fast with customizable HTML email templates
* Create email campaigns in a snap with our easy-to-use Email Wizard
* Build, manage, and secure your email marketing contacts
* Send email marketing communications and be confident they'll get delivered
* Get results fast with instant tracking and reporting
* Extend the life of your email marketing when you add Email Archive
* Access a stock image gallery of 3400 pictures when you add Premium Image Hosting
* Get help every step of the way with FREE coaching & support

REVIEW (Making A Mark)
  • You get a free trial for 60 days and unlimited e-mails during that time but a limit of just 100 contacts so you don't get to trial heavy duty mailing.
  • Prices start at $15 per month for up to 500 contacts.
  • This has got a SafeSubscribe facility re spam so it's possibly more suited for organisations which don't have membership arrangements.
  • Who uses this? Constant Contact is used by Robert Genn (Painters Keys) - who sends a bi-weekly newsletter to thousands (and I suspect maybe tens of thousands) of artists and has been doing so for years. His letters turn up in my inbox on a very regular basis. [Update: it's also used by Duane Keiser (A Painting a Day) for his e-mail of his daily painting ]
Email Marketing Software & List Hosting Solutions from Sparklist
Site Description:
Email Marketing Solutions - Powerful, Fast, and Easy.

Sparklist provides companies world-wide with affordable hosted email marketing software. Our customers know Sparklist as an email solution that provides a simple interface, advanced functionality, powerful reporting, and extremely reliable technology. Our longstanding commitment to our customers' email marketing needs make us a leading choice for hosted email marketing and delivery solutions. With Sparklist's total self-service email marketing solutions, you'll have an affordable, secure and easy to use tool for delivering mass email marketing communications to your customers, right from your desktop.

REVIEW (Making a Mark)

Email Marketing Software, Email Newsletters and Autoresponders by AWeber
Site Description:
Opt-in email marketing is easy with AWeber! Send email newsletters and autoresponders. Get top-notch email deliverability and toll-free support.

REVIEW (Making A Mark)
  • These are the features; it also offers a risk-free 30 day trial.
  • This is the pricing (eg starts at $19 per month)
  • Who uses this? AWeber is used and recommended by Darren Rowse of Problogger - a top listed 'paid' blogger according to this blog post 5 Tools that I'm Happy to Pay for as a Blogger. He earns big income from his blogging so has street cred. and income to lose if he recommends something which doesn't work! Darren says
"For a long time I used a free newsletter service to send out weekly newsletters to many thousands of subscribers. However I increasingly found that you DO get what you pay for. Emails were not being delivered in greater and greater numbers and I was finding the service quite unreliable. Since switching to Aweber I've felt a weight lifted from my shoulders.

It works - every time. Emails are delivered in much higher numbers and the tools that Aweber offer are leave anything else I've used for dead. This is one tool I should have paid for years ago. Pricing varies depending upon how many subscribers you have but starts at $19 a month."

5 Tools that I'm Happy to Pay for as a Blogger.

REVIEW (Darren Rowse)
AWeber - a first impression review
Emma Email Marketing | Email Marketing Solutions | Email Newsletters
Site Description:
Create, send and track customized and stylish email newsletters to your customer or clients. Emma Email Marketing is a simple and affordable solution that allows your business the ability to track email campaigns, send trigger emails and more. Agency accounts and pricing also available.

REVIEW (Deborah Paris)
I use an email deployment service called Emma- (www.myemma.com). Its similar to Constant Contact but I think better. Inital set up fee includes your unique stationery design, then a low monthly fee thereafter depending on how many emails you send. Its spam law compliant with opt out features. Great tools for managing your list as well as statistics to tell you who received, opened, and what they clicked on. I highly recommend it!
Email Marketing Software :: Easy, Effective, Insightful :: Ennect Mail
Award-winning Email Marketing Software empowers you to create and send campaigns, manage lists, customize templates, and display hot prospects in real time.

Two options for payment:
Option 1: Pay-As-You-Go - 5¢ For each email
Option 2: Volume Bundles

Used by the Wholesale Matters blog
Email Marketing and Email List Manager | MailChimp
Priced plans available.
* monthly subscriptions recommended for those who send at least once a month. No contract and the price adjust automatically as your mailing list grows or shrinks
* pay as you go solution for sending out on a less frequent basis - price per email reduces as more emails are sent (price from $0.005 to $0.03)
* high volume plans for those sending out to millions of people!

REVIEW (Making A Mark)
  • very flexible plans for people at different levels of operation and sending to very different numbers of people on different frequencies
  • good for those who are aiming to grow and/or not sure whether a regular newsletter is what they want to do
  • lots of incentive to prune your mailing list as it gets out of date with the automatic adjustment to priced plans
  • this has become a very popular option for people who are sending emailed newsletters to me
    You can pay online using credit card or echeck (ie no paypal facility)

Reviews of email marketing options

reviews by email marketing options

Below are links to the reviews of the top providers of email marketing software by website email marketing options - who appear to be reputable.

Summary and comprehensive reviews are available. The links below are to the comprehensive reviews. The order of reviews is based on the number of points they scored out of 25 when this list was constructed

Benchmark Email Review | Benchmark Email Email Marketing
Benchmark received 24 out of 25 stars, the highest score an email marketing service can get in our reviews. Benchmark received five stars for Email Deliverability because they have both a real person and an automated tool checking your email for spam.

Best For: Companies who want to create online surveys/polls easily in their email marketing campaigns
GraphicMail Review | GraphicMail Email Marketing
GraphicMail scored 23 out of 25 stars, making it a great service with a couple of slight disadvantages. They offer a 20 MB of image hosting space, which is much more than our Industry Benchmark of 5 to 10 MB.

Best For: Users wanting competitive pay-as-you go pricing
GetResponse Review | GetResponse Email Marketing
GetResponse received an overall star rating of 23 out of 25, the highest score in our survey. They scored well on Email Deliverability and on Email Creation for offering more than 300 templates.

Best For: Beginners or other email marketers who need user-friendly email creation tools and flexible templates
Constant Contact Review | Constant Contact Email Marketing
Constant Contact received 22 out of 25 stars. They have great Contact Management and incredibly knowledgeable Customer Support.

Best For: Users who want Salesforce integration or a comprehensive contact management system
MailChimp Review | MailChimp Email Marketing
MailChimp received an overall star rating of 21 out of 25 MailChimp scored perfectly on our evaluation of Analyzing Reports by meeting every single Industry Benchmark.

Best For: Users who want A/B testing (ability to send split-test campaigns) and advanced features, such as social stats, co-branding, and inbox inspections
Emma Review | Emma Email Marketing
Emma received an overall star rating of 21 out of 25. They scored well in Analyzing Reports and have extremely helpful Customer Support.

Best For: Users who want to add design upgrades to create a one-of-a-kind email campaign
iContact Review | iContact Email Marketing
iContact received a star rating of 21 out of 25. They scored high for Contact Management because they allow you to directly import contacts from Outlook.

Best For" Users who want to integrate their email marketing with third-party applications, such as Drupal, Appointment-Plus, and WordPress
AWeber Review | AWeber Email Marketing
AWeber received 20 out of 25 stars overall. Their Customer Service support quality was their ultimate strength, as they received a perfect score in that category with a knowledgeable and friendly support staff offering every kind of support.

Best For: Users who want to get feedback about why someone unsubscribed from your list
GoDaddy Review | GoDaddy Email Marketing
GoDaddy's overall star rating was 20 out of 25 stars. They scored high for Email Creation for offering unlimited image hosting.

Best For: Users who want excellent email creation tools and customer support, as well as unlimited image hosting space

BOOK: Sign Me Up!

A Marketer's Guide To Email Newsletters that Build Relationships and Boost Sales

Published 2006
Amazon review profile: 3 reviews and an average rating of 4.5


(Product description)
This informative book reveals the secrets behind running a permission-based email newsletter program that motivates customers and prospects to sign up for your emails and respond to your messages. It shows you how you can use email to
* Sell more products and services
* Boost customer satisfaction and loyalty
* Attract new customers to your products and services

Sign Me Up!: A Marketer's Guide To Email Newsletters that Build Relationships and Boost Sales

Amazon Price: $3.99 (as of 06/03/2012)Buy Now
Used Price: $0.95

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Legal requirements for emailers

Do you know what you MUST do? Or what you can't do?

The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 establishes requirements for those who send commercial email, spells out penalties for spammers and companies whose products are advertised in spam if they violate the law, and gives consumers the right to ask emailers to stop spamming them.

The law, which became effective January 1, 2004, covers email whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a commercial product or service, including content on a Web site.

A "transactional or relationship message" - email that facilitates an agreed-upon transaction or updates a customer in an existing business relationship - may not contain false or misleading routing information, but otherwise is exempt from most provisions of the CAN-SPAM Act.

The CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business | BCP Business Center
Do you use email in your business? The CAN-SPAM Act, a law that sets the rules for commercial email, establishes requirements for commercial messages, gives recipients the right to have you stop emailing them, and spells out tough penalties for violations.
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: CAN-SPAM: Being Legal is Not Enough - A Rant #LBB #emailmarketing
Permission must be explicitly given to you by your subscriber for your marketing mailings to be successful and minimize complaints. Now, you can use the purchaser's email address without that permission for what are called transactional mailings (e.g. "Your order just shipped" or "How well did we take care of you?"), because they are relevant to that specific business transaction between you and the purchaser. You just shouldn't add them to your email marketing database and start hitting them up without permission, and you shouldn't use that email address outside the context of that transaction.

Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing

a series of posts by Ligaya Figueras

Ligaya Figueras specializes in business writing, marketing and media relations for visual and performance artists, writers, nonprofit organizations and specialty service providers. Follow Ligaya on Twitter at twitter.com/LigayaFigueras, or friend her on Facebook at facebook.com/ligaya.figueras.

Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing Part 1: Contact Systems
E-mail marketing service companies offer affordable, easy-to-use bulk e-mail services...
Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing Part 2: Developing a Mailing List
An effective e-marketing campaign begins with the creation of a quality mailing list.
Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing Part 3: Writing an E-Newsletter
Writing copy for your newsletter will be much less daunting if you break it down into manageable parts: pre-writing, writing, revising, and proofreading.
Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing Part 4: Achieving the Right Look
When you create marketing materials for the Web, you are making something that will be visible to many people. The appearance of your mailings can either make you look either like a pro or a hobbyist. Take the time to produce mailings that create a good impression; your good name depends on it.
Art Calendar | E-mail Marketing Part 5: Knowing When to Send What
In this age of online marketing, knowing when to send bulk e-mail communications is extremely important. Get it right, and you build the trust and familiarity that keep your support base willingly tuned in.

BOOK: The Magic of Newsletter Marketing

The Secret to More Profits and Customers for Life

Published March 2009
Amazon review score - 12 reviews and an average of 5 stars


(based on product description) The book focuses on the philosophy, strategies, and tactics for effectively marketing with newsletters to build your business. It shows you clearly both why and how to use newsletters to retain clients, get new clients, and boost client loyalty. It asserts that it is relevant to you - no matter which business or industry you are in - and will help you create a newsletter you can be proud of

The Magic of Newsletter Marketing - The Secret to More Profits and Customers for Life

Amazon Price: $18.95 (as of 06/03/2012)Buy Now
Used Price: $18.94

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation

List Building for Bloggers by Phil Hollows, the Founder and CEO of FeedBlitz

This is a series of posts written by series of blog posts about List Building for Bloggers (#LBB) written by Phil Hollows, the Founder and CEO of FeedBlitz .

Feedbiltz is an alternative to Feedburner for pushing out RSS feeds to subscribers which I use. It focuses in particular on managing RSS feeds for email marketing.

FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Why Aren't Email Lists Extinct in the Age of Social Media? #LBB
* Email subscriptions are WAY more popular than RSS.
* Email subscribers are your biggest fans.
* Email is everywhere.
* Email is accessible.
* Email is the most effective subscription mechanism available.
* Adding email subscriptions to your blog is fast and easy.
* Managing email subscriptions won't take up your time.
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Lists, Email Marketing and your Blog #LBB
Email Marketing: Terms and Terminology
Here are the basic email marketing terms and what they mean for you and your blog, no matter how you set up your email subscription delivery.
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Five Key Steps to Grow Your Mailing List #LBB
In this post you will learn about:
1. How to get subscribers
2. What to send your subscribers
3. When to send it
4. Listening to Unsubscribes
5. Promoting your list
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Growing Your List: Accelerating Subscriber Growth
In this post you will learn about:
1. The basics of online list growth.
2. Integrating with social media.
3. Email to a friend.
4. Creating and testing incentives.
5. Making the most of offline events.
6. The role of advertising.
7. Subscriber import.
8. Three things to never, ever, EVER do.

There's also a comprehensive set of action items at the end for you to use right now to better grow your list.
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Growing Your List: Improving Engagement
In this article you will learn about:
* Quality vs. quantity.
* Measuring engagement.
* The human and technical factors that affect engagement.
* The role of branding.
* Subject lines.
* Focusing your list.
* Custom fields, segmentation and personalization.

As always, there's a set of action items at the end you can apply now to improve your next mailing's effectiveness.
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Are You Getting to the Inbox and Avoiding the Spam Trap?
In this article you will learn about:
* What is spam
* What it takes to be labeled a spammer
* What happens if you are labeled a spammer
* Getting to the Inbox every time
o Permission
o Respect
o Relevance
o Compliance
* Improving the odds
o White listing
o Proactive subscriber management
FeedBlitz News - Email Contact and Social Media Marketing Automation: Mailing List Underperforming? Optimize it with these Tips!
In this article you will learn about:
* Prioritizing your Optimization Efforts
* Subject Line Tips
o The Short Attention-Span Inbox
o Keeping It Short
o Going Negative
o The Benefits of Keywords
o Numbers and Counts
o Actionable Subjects
o The Importance of Now
* Avoiding Attention Drains
* Your Email has been Opened - So What?
* Full or Partial Posts
* Measuring and Testing

BOOK: The Zen of Social Media Marketing

if you want to look beyond email newsletters

The main benefit of this book is that in a constantly evolving social media world it provides you with a way of keeping up to date - via a contantly updated book online which is accessible to those who buy the book

Amazon review profile: 76 customer reviews and rated an average of 4.5


(extract from the product description)
The Zen of Social Media Marketing outlines the most popular social media tools, from Facebook to Twitter to LinkedIn, and teaches you how to use them, step by step. She provides proven strategies for success from the businesses she works with every day, along with shortcuts and tips to help you make the most of your time and energy.

The Zen of Social Media Marketing is also the last social media guide you'll ever need: with the physical book you also get access to the exclusive online edition, which includes regular updates and video extras to make sure you're always on top of the latest in social media.

The Zen of Social Media Marketing: An Easier Way to Build Credibility, Generate Buzz, and Increase Revenue

Amazon Price: $12.48 (as of 06/04/2012)Buy Now
Used Price: $6.58

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

More TIPS for using email lists and newsletters

Art Biz Blog: Resources for your artist mailing list
Check out this week's Art Marketing Action newsletter to find out when you should add new contacts to your mailing list and when you shouldn't. You might also be interested in these resources. Know the U.S. CAN SPAM laws before you send commercial email Get people to sign up for your mailing lis
Art Biz Blog: How to Be Humble When You’ve Messed Up
Did you mess up with your mailing list? Artist Kirsty Hall wrote a humble and effective message to rebuild her list from scratch.
Art Biz Blog: Writing copy that sells
Alyson B Stanfield recommends

10 Keys to Copy That Sells! by Alexandria Brown
© 2001-2008 Alexandria Brown International Inc. www.AlexandriaBrown.com

Online entrepreneur Alexandria K. Brown publishes the award-winning 'Highlights on Marketing & Success' weekly ezine with 28,000+ subscribers.
Oreilly - 10 Journalism Tips For Bloggers, Podcasters & Other E-Writers
Blogs, podcast & e-newsletters make it easy for anyone to be a journalist. Here are some tips on how to do it well.
The Beginner's Guide to Starting a Newsletter | The Smart Passive Income Blog
If you're a beginner looking for detailed information about starting your own newsletter for your blog or website, you've come to the right place.
How One Little Minute Can Increase Your Email Open Rate | The Smart Passive Income Blog
Have you ever had one of those moments when you thought to yourself, It can't be that easy...can it? Well, that's what I thought after I learned this
The Beginner's Guide to Starting a Newsletter | The Smart Passive Income Blog
If you're a beginner looking for detailed information about starting your own newsletter for your blog or website, you've come to the right place.

Jakon Neilsen (Neilsen group) on email newsletters

Founder of and partner in the Neilsen Norman group / useit.com

According to Neilsen, users spend an average of 51 seconds reading a newsletter and only 19% read the entire newsletter

He's researched the use and design of newsletters and provides this information
- for free, via his Alertbox (recommended by me)
- as information reports (download for a fee0
- in workshops (for a fee)

The research and experience makes this source of information about general and specific usability on the internet one which is definitely worthwhile keeping an eye on.

Email Newsletter Usability: 165 Design Guidelines for Content, Subscription, and RSS News Feeds
Nielsen Norman Group Report: Email Newsletter Usability:
165 Design Guidelines for Newsletter Subscription, Content, Account Maintenance, and RSS News Feeds Based on Usability Studies

Usability report with Nielsen Norman Group's design and editing guidelines documenting best practices for e-mail newsletters.
$398 to DOWNLOAD a single 544 page report, $698 for the report and the right to make copies within your organization.
(No shipping/handling fees will be added: it's a download.)

His summary begins........

"Users have highly emotional reactions to newsletters. This is in strong contrast to studies of website usability, where users are usually much more oriented towards functionality. Even a website that you visit daily will feel like a tool where you simply want to get in and get out.

The positive emotional aspect of newsletters is that they can create much more of a bond between user and companyusability problems have much stronger impact on the customer relationship than they normally do."
Neilsen Norman Group - references to newsletter software
Neilsen Norman Group - Results from search on www.useit.com
Including:
  • web usability
  • Alertbox - Jakob's bi-weekly column on Web usability
Incompetent Email Marketing = Lost Future Opportunities (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)
Lack of personalization made an email newsletter completely useless to the recipient, damaging long-term customer relationship efforts.

Cites an example where 80% of the information was irrelevant for any given user.
ZDNet - Between the Lines - A guide to email newsletters and RSS usability
Larry Dignan and other IT industry experts, blogging at the intersection of business and technology, deliver daily news and analysis on vital enterprise trends.

"Jakob Nielsen and Amy Schade of the Nielsen Norman Group just published a 544-page study on email newsletter usability, including 165 guidelines for subscriptions, content, managing accounts and RSS-based news feeds. It's the third edition of the study, which the company has done about every two years so far.

One of the major findings was that users in the study spent 51 seconds on average scanning a newsletter, Nielsen told me. "The 51 seconds in extraordinarily valuable in forming a relationship with customer," he said. "
The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: Timely, focused online newsletter a valuable relationship builder
Timely, focused online newsletter a valuable relationship builder

Just two years ago, the average e-mail user was confused and frustrated when differentiating between spam and the then-emerging category of marketing newsletters.

BOOK: I'd Rather Be in the Studio: The Artist's No-Excuse Guide to Self-Promotion

Alyson B. Stanfield (Author)

This book is very much focused on addressing promotional activities of artists

Amazon ratings: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (30 customer reviews) | Like (15)


Publisher's description: "I'd Rather Be in the Studio! offers both practical and innovative approaches that help you get your art out of the studio and in front of buyers and collectors. Buy this book only if you're ready for the spotlight. Step-by-step instructions show artists how to write a better artist statement, attract blog readers, write a more compelling newsletter, and use social media more effectively"

I'd Rather Be in the Studio: The Artist's No-Excuse Guide to Self-Promotion

Amazon Price: $25.00 (as of 06/03/2012)Buy Now
List Price: $25.00

Usually ships in 24 hours

Website webware/software with built-in newsletters

Life can be simplified if your website software is able to produce newsletters. However the scope for designing the newsletters tends to be very limited

FineArtStudioOnline - Easy Artist Websites with Marketing Help
Site Description: FineArtStudioOnline - Easy artist websites and marketing help with a gallery of original artwork by artists. Find art in our member artists galleries.

REVIEW (Stacey Peterson)
I have my portfolio website through fineartstudioonline.com, and it comes with a built in email system. There's a page on my site for people to sign up for the newsletter (and choose html or not), and it manages the list for me. It's easy to send out my newsletter using the service, but it's lacking in the formatting department (not a lot of options), so I might start looking at some of these options. The again, it's so nice that it's seamlessly tied into to my website that I might just stick with it!
SiteKreator.com - Professional web site creation solution. - Compare SiteKreator Features
Site Description: SiteKreator provides a one-stop solution for creating captivating Web sites without any technical or artistic expertise necessary.

Business and Professional packages provide support for newsletters and mailing lists

Other Resources for Artists

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Making A Mark

Artist and author Katherine Tyrrell draws and writes about art for artists and art lovers.

Topics include: artists, art exhibitions, art blogs; art history; art techniques and tips; art business and marketing; art economy and making a mark with pastels, coloured pencils and pen and ink.

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Making A Mark reviews

a consumer's guide to quality and value in art books, art supplies and services to artists

Read reviews about art books, art supplies and other products and services used by artists.
This blog highlights:
- book reviews (art instruction and art history)
- reviews of art media, art materials and art equipment
- reviews of places where you buy (art shops, online art suppliers and art bookshops)
- reviews of other products or services used by artists
- summaries of good quality and relevant reviews by other practising artists
My aim is to try and identify good quality and good value.

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Comments and Feedback

comments are welcome - but please do not spam

ANYBODY can comment BUT please note that:
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  • Tom O'Leary Jan 27, 2012 @ 2:47 am | delete
    Hi Katherine. Looks like you've been busy doing your research on email marketing.

    Our GroupMail email newsletter software is used in over 160 countries and is available to install in English, Spanish, French, German and Polish. We offer a full functional GroupMail Free Edition that you can download and use as long as you want.

    GroupMail is regularly ranked as one of the top email marketing software solutions on the market by independent reviews like Top 10 reviews.

    Well done Katherine. Let me know if you have any questions about GroupMail or email marketing in general.

    Tom

    --

    With best regards from the GroupMail Team
    Tom O'Leary (oleary@infacta.com)
    -------------------------------------------------
    GroupMail Newsletter Software
    http://www.group-mail.com
    Celebrating 15 Years!

    P.S. We also offer email tracking at http://group-metrics.com
  • LisaCall Jan 24, 2009 @ 12:30 pm | delete
    I use PHPlist for my newsletter. It's maybe not the most intuitive piece of software to set up and get running but as a software engineer in addition to an artist, it wasn't a big deal for me. I've heard from other artists it's a bit confusing and can take a couple days to figure out.

Who is makingamark?

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I'm an artist and writer who enjoys sharing information about art. Making A Mark is rated #3 in the top 25 UK art blogs. I'm also a member of the Giants... more »

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