Using Electronic Newsletters to Market Your Library Presented by Susan Briant, Director of the Haddonfield Public Library & NJLA President, on April 27, 2010

Using E-newsletters Today’s objective is to give you an overview of using electronic newsletters to market your library, pros, cons, and some best practices You will learn how to use your creative side and have fun!

Why use electronic newsletters to market your library? Inexpensive to use Easy to use Reaches large target audience (your subscribers and others) Can be tailored to smaller target audiences Attractive, low maintenance, and fun to create Easily archived Reduces postage and paper costs – environmentally sound

Features that might be cons Only % open rate ? Track record is not as well known as paper Those without cannot be reached by this format Works better with shorter articles Not for large newsletters with many pages Short attention span of people – what is the impact? Does it grab them? Jury is out. How much are archives used?

How does it work? Subscribe for a year or less– price depends on number of subscribers – free trial is available Select a template from many choices Choose your color schemes and borders, fonts Import graphics to showcase programs Import websites and link them in the newsletter Import your borrowers or other database- or add subscribers manually People can self select to subscribe or opt out Very easy to maintain database of subscribers

How does it work? Very easy to edit Use spell check before finalizing Give yourself time to finalize- proofread several times Access is with account name and password Access can be shared with multiple contributors

How does it work After content is finalized, follow procedure to archive and send Newsletter can be sent immediately or later Archive on your webpage Once sent, you receive confirmation as well as an activity report Once default template is set up, you can copy ahead for months

How is a newsletter put together? Plan your content list and it might be a few hours work Choose theme/ stories and organize accordingly Feature new & older services / staff / Friends activities/ people Tell your story – capture readers’ attention

How is a newsletter put together? Make a Table of Contents Advertise events – import photos for author programs Use color to emphasize Color borders to add style

Other features Reports are available with graphs, percentage of opens, clicks to links, bounces, etc. Works with Excel & ILS’s to import data Once sent, no edits can be made Newsletters may appear differently in various web browsers – experiment with colors for best viewing Help is available via and FAQs

How to guarantee success? Plan ahead to market your services and programs Solicit content from staff and public Allow yourself to be creative – try a wide variety of features Carry your camera & get great photos Remember to get release forms for your photos before posting any photos of the public to the website/ newsletter Tend to your subscription database

Let’s see some sample newsletters From our webpage at p/about/library-electronic-monthly- newsletter or p/about/library-electronic-monthly- newsletterwww.njla.org For more information or free trial, visit For questions,

New Jersey Library Association Thanks for coming Enjoy NJLA and be an active member