By Mike Braun

BizActions is the Best in Class Email Newsletter Service touching the lives of over one million clients, customers, prospects, and referral sources each week. As the Online Marketing Manager, Im constantly asked, Where can I get some ideas for content in my newsletter? Well here is the first of ten Relationship Content ideas. I discussed the concept of Relationship Content in my previous articl

Okay lets get the easy one out of the way first. Products and Services can be Relationship Content. You just have to look at it in a fresh light. You already write about products and services. What can you do to make that a bit more relationship building?

Sure you can showcase the actual product with pictures and specs and describe in generic terms how the benefits of the service will make the cost inconsequential. But bullet points dont even look friendly. They look factual. When you talk to your friends about some common interest, do you shout bullet points at them, or do you interject the feel, the mood, the event, the personal observations youve made and opinions youve formed? When you talk about your products and services, make it personal too.

How? Well, you or someone in your company has to have a story to tell about the product or service. Did you or a customer find some unexpected bonus that was unexpected? What was unusual about the sales or installation process with one of your clients? Any emergency scenarios? Anything go wrong that was remedied to show your, or the manufacturers, level of commitment? Would that client be willing to write a paragraph about the product or service and what its meant to them?

Just ask your staff or get your staff to ask your best customers. Make sure you get the whole story, including a quote or two you can use. Real quotes, like They were in and out in less than an hour and even brought donuts for the whole office, not manufactured things like It was the best product I ever tried and the company was very professional. Record the conversation if possible to keep the story straight. Dont worry about your staffs reluctance. Get one person to do it and the rest will come around when they see their co-workers name in print and they attention hell be getting from it.

Now Im not saying that listing features (even as bullet points) isnt important, Im just saying that too many details muddy the water in a newsletter, when there is a PERFECT way (at least with an electronic newsletter) to dispense that information after you engender interest in the product. With an email newsletter, you can insert a hyperlink that will take the reader to your web site or open a PDF file stored on your server.

You can send readers to custom landing pages that provide all the details about the product and service and even allow them to do things like see demos or enter a form requesting your sales people to contact them for a live demo.

You can quickly and easily, with very little effort, create enticing stories that draw interest in each facet of your business and then link to a relevant page on your web site. And of course getting prospects to visit your web site frequently yields even greater rewards. Coming up next is Educational Pieces in our Relationship Content series.

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