What is the most effective marketing system for newsletters? The general answer to this question depends upon your objectives in distributing a newsletter. Are you interested in keeping in touch with clients or generating more business? I have always been partial to marketing solutions that employ maximum synergy. In other words, there is maximum effect for the energy expended.

So You Would Like to Mail?

Direct mail is the easiest way to utilize newsletter marketing. Unlike letters—the stalwarts of most marketing campaigns, they more likely to be read before they reach the round file. Also unlike letters, they make solicitation, or asking for the business, a bit more difficult or indirect. A letter asks for the business. A newsletter (if well constructed) can uncover a need. Even more importantly, they can help position you as an expert if written as expert information and not “handy-homeowner” hints.

Determining to whom to mail these newsletters will be determined in large part by the following factors:

1. What are your primary and secondary targets? Don’t forget to include previous customers and prospects.
2. How automated is your mailing system?
3. What is the content of the newsletter?

Do not assume that the content of all newsletters are appropriate for all targets. If your newsletter contains handy homeowner hints, it may be appropriate for your previous customers, but certainly not financial planners. What information would be of interest to which segments of your target groups? For example, do you have sales articles that will help real estate agents and accountants build their businesses?

Mailing too expensive? Try faxing or e-mail.

One way of cutting down on the expense of mailing is to fax the newsletter. Faxing is cheaper than mailing and also arrives immediately. Winfax and other broadcast fax programs make faxing to many locations a simple process. Faxes are also likely to be seen by other players within the same offices, increasing the marketing impact.

There are also downsides to faxing. For one, you must make sure that those to whom you are faxing have agreed to receive your newsletter. Otherwise you will be sure to face angry phone calls from those whose fax machines you have tied up. And you may open yourself up to legal challenges. Faxing several copies to one office can intensify this reaction. The newsletter itself must be in a format that lends itself to faxing. Eight page full color spreads lose much translation through a fax machine.

E-mailing the newsletters enables you to reach each person individually—at very little cost—but the newsletter cannot contain graphics because the receiving machine may not have adaptable software such as Adobe Acrobat. E-mail newsletters must be simple, which means text only or you can develop an HTML format. Some people who do not read mail will peruse their e-mail (and vice-versa). The response to uninvited e-mails can be even stronger than the negative response to uninvited faxes, especially considering the publicity received regarding deadly viruses spread via this very medium. In addition, spam systems may block out even wanted material.

Personal Distribution

For some, delivering the newsletters as you make sales calls is still effective. How many times have you heard that the secret of selling is to focus upon value? Newsletters are a prime example of such value. If the newsletters can be designed to fit on one side of a page, they can be duplicated with product or service flyers on the reverse side. Combined production increases the probability that your flyers will be kept for a longer period of time. In other words—if you are visiting your target, bring something of value rather than a product flyer.

The question remains, do you want to blanket the town with your newsletters, or would you like to keep the distribution list more exclusive? Blanket delivery would maximize your efforts with regard to name identification (in a positive mode). Keeping the distribution list more exclusive would enable you to raise the value of the newsletters. I believe that every loan officer should have a sphere list of at least 3,000. You cannot have lunch with three thousand each month—so a newsletter is an excellent alternative.

Leveraging Newsletters

Whether you mail or fax your newsletters, your response is never likely to be more than the energy level expended. Shouldn’t the goal of every marketing program be an effect that is a multiple of your efforts? True synergy is achieved when your effort level is a two and your response level is a four.

How do we leverage our newsletters? There are two possibilities that come to mind very prominently. The first involves public speaking. Take a look at your newsletter. Does it provide a topic that is really of interest to your clientele? If the topic is not suitable for a dynamic presentation to your target, is your newsletter really of value?

The second method of leverage is to republish the newsletter. This will be more feasible if you write your own stories or work with a newsletter service that understands this particular need. Perhaps your clients would like to republish articles for their clients. Associations and newspapers are also sources to publish your newsletter articles. Why not have your newsletter (or at least part of it) distributed to thousands for free?

Response Mechanisms

Name identification is all-important with regard to long term marketing objectives, but nothing beats motivating your targets to pick up the phone and call you. Devising a response mechanism with your newsletter is what will make the phone ring.

For example, sometime in the past, we distributed a newsletter that focused upon using news releases. With this we distributed a sample news release, which was available to those who called our newsletter subscribers. Why write a newsletter without providing a response mechanism? Not sure what a response mechanism would look like and how it could be integrated into the text of a newsletter? If you would like to view a copy a newsletter and an accompanying response mechanism, email me at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and I will send you a sample. Hey, that is a response mechanism!

There is no doubt that a sales person could very well design a whole marketing campaign around the delivery of a great newsletter if it contained extremely salient information and utilized maximum synergy. This is not to say that one would choose to do just that—but the methods discussed within are likely to be much more effective than mailing letters or for that matter letting your newsletters collect dust on the edge of your desk. You cannot implement a newsletter system as an “aside.” It should be integrated into everything you do.

By Dave Hershman

Dave Hershman is the leading author and a top speaker for the mortgage industry with six books—including two best sellers for the Mortgage Bankers Association of America. His mortgage school is the only comprehensive advanced curriculum in the industry. For a schedule of classes, free marketing and newsletter samples, speaking information and articles by Dave, visit www.originationpro.com or call 1/800-581-5678.