Who reads newsletters anyway?
For starters, I do.
Admitting to being part of an audience for newsletters may come off as old fashioned and, in some ways, I am, but that does not mean that I do not engage with other communication tools, or, more importantly, that newsletters aren’t relevant.
When I open my Gmail, I scan the subject lines of all the mail that has come in and get rid of the spam mail first. Then, I scan for any urgent mail, before looking at the newsletter from NYT, from a political party I subscribe to, or even The Body Shop. Sometimes I may get a newsletter from Thinx too. I open them all. I read them all. I am interested in what they have to say, and if they are no longer relevant to me, I unsubscribe from them.
Believe it or not, newsletters remain useful and relevant even in 2022. I believe that many organisations and even independent professionals can use newsletters to reach their audiences. Newsletters feature topics and information that would be of interest to employees of an organisation, if the intention is internal, or a wider audience if the intention goes beyond employees e.g., customers, investors, suppliers, and other interest groups.
For internal communications, newsletters allow you to reach employees with the latest events in the organisation without getting overly technical [in fact, I would avoid the technical in newsletters if you don’t want people to glaze over the information]. You can make organisational newsletters a little more interesting by featuring individuals from the organisation e.g., who recently got a well-deserved promotion, maybe someone just had a baby, or wish someone/people a happy birthday [it tells me that they are seen, they matter], or celebrate someone’s outside the workplace achievement. You could use the space to encourage employees to share a very short story to show off their creative writing hobby.
The point is that newsletters can be interesting, and you can add a personal element even in a company or organisational newsletter. The upside? A greater sense of camaraderie between workers and boosted morale.
If you choose to use a newsletter, you will have to decide what you want to use it for, whether it is for reporting, analysis, artistic, and curation purposes. Depending on your needs, you could create a personalised hybrid newsletter to suit you or your organisation.
With so many things competing for our attention, one may wonder if newsletters will still be relevant ten years from now? I suspect, yes - in some form.
Thumbnail image by Markus Winkler
