The messenger.

Build your customer base with an electronic newsletter

Most folks frown on getting unsolicited commercial e-mail, mainly because it has become associated with pornographers, scam artists and clueless losers. While you must distance your business from e-mail "spam," the real issue isn't the tool; it's what you do with it.

You can use e-mail newsletters and discussions groups to draw new customers to your business, strengthen your bond with existing clients and make customers voluntarily share tips and solve one another's problems. All of this can be done for a fraction of the cost of sending out a piece of regular mail--1/2 cent to 20 cents a piece compared with 50 cents to $2. You may even be able to get advertisers to pay to reach your readers if your list has 5,000 or more names.

ELECTRONIC PAPERBOY

Technically, you could send an e-mail newsletter from your everyday mail program, simplifying the process by creating an alias--a single name representing all the recipients' names and e-mail addresses. Most mail programs allow this, with possible limits on the number of recipients. So, putting "Dance Academy" in the "To:" line of the mailer will post the newsletter to all 37 students at your school.

You can host an e-mail list on your own using any of several software programs known as list servers (also called list serves; one of the brand-name programs is LISTSERV[R]), which automate the job of distributing the mail in each subscriber's preferred format. You'll want to let the person choose whether he or she receives plain text or an HTML-formatted newsletter, since many people can't receive HTML e-mails. Also, most list servers have group-speak features for registered customers who want to exchange information.

There may already be basic list serve software included in your high-end e-mail package, such as Ipswitch's Imail 6.0 for Windows 2000, available for free trial at www.ipswitch.com. Stand-alone list servers, such as LISTSERV, ListProc and Lyris, are more powerful.

LISTSERV (www.lsoft.com) from L-Soft is a very popular package for Windows, Unix, VMS and VM. The Lite version, for up to 500 subscribers, is $500. The Classic version offers a customizable Web interface, database integration and Web archiving. It varies in price ($625 or more a year) based on the operating system, number of lists, number of subscribers, mail processing (hosting) by L-Soft and other factors.

ListProc (www.listproc.net) was made for Unix, but may work on any system that lets you compile PERL scripts. ListProc can send group or individual messages, archive mail and provide subscription confirmation. ListProc is available for a free 90-day trial, but costs $2,500 for a license--less for nonprofits and companies that join the nonprofit CREN (Corporation for Research and Educational Networking).

Lyris (www.lyris.com) from Lyris Technologies is available for both Windows and Unix, and is free for an unlimited number of lists of up to 200 members each. It will cost you anywhere from $495 up to $7,495 for larger-size lists, private lists, a high-performance mail-sending engine (DNS cache, more simultaneous sends) and so forth.

Look at the type of functionality you want built into your list. Most e-mail lists are pretty simple. The average company newsletter probably isn't going to attract more than 1,500 to 2,000 subscribers a week--unless you've got a highly trafficked site or are having a contest.

If you don't have the technical ability in house, it's a no-brainer to outsource your e-mail newsletter. Businesses with smaller mailing lists should check out such free services as eGroups.com and Topica.com. Note: eGroups will maintain your list for free if you are willing to put up with advertisements on every posting. If you nix the ads, you will have to pay $5 a month per list (billed annually in advance). If you have a longer list, look into service bureaus such as SparkLIST. com and L-Soft's ListPlex.com, which has a nice little feature that lets you gather demographic data. ListPlex costs you $500 a year plus a setup fee and per message charges, while SparkLIST requires $50 a month minimum ($1 per 1,000 e-mails).

ENLIST SUBSCRIBERS WITHOUT SPAM

You can send an opt-in newsletter to those who have taken positive action to subscribe: checked a box on your Website, checked a box on your order form, filled out a card at your store, or signed and returned a promotional mail piece. Prechecking a box on your Website for the customer and asking him to uncheck it if he doesn't want to receive the newsletter is unacceptable.

People may not remember signing up for your newsletter until they've read a couple of lines, and their wrist-jerk response may be to delete your mail, call you a spammer and take their business elsewhere. Unfortunately, they've seen too much spam that began by stating it's "opt-in," and provided an "opt-out" e-mail address that does nothing but bounce mail. They may have heard that clicking a URL to "unsubscribe" to spam will actually confirm the existence of a live body at their account address, and get them added to more lists.

To combat the taint of spam on legitimate organizational e-mail, your first paragraph should be a statement such as: Crotch Rocket Digest is a monthly newsletter providing news and useful information to Kowabunga Motorcycle enthusiasts who have requested it. If you would like to be removed from the mailing list, send a blank e-mail message with "remove" as the subject to [e-mail].

Better yet, you can use the customization features of mailing list software to address recipients by name and tell them exactly where, when and how they subscribed. Rich Santalesa, head of the New York City-based consulting firm [e-mail] and editor of RichNet, "NYC's Thinking E-Zinc" (www.richnet.org), says it's important to include the subscriber's address as it appeared when he subscribed. Otherwise, he may try to unsubscribe from another e-mail account, fail and become irate at your company's "phony" optout method.

SAY WHAT

It's not just the recruiting method that sets e-mail newsletters apart from spam--it's their content. You're wasting time and money unless you have valuable, concise, professionally written content that speaks to subscribers in an appropriate way. A gentle touch and a sense of the personal help. People may quickly subscribe to your newsletter because of the topic, but they will quickly unsubscribe if you merely send them lists of "special offers" or otherwise try to disguise old-fashioned advertising as a valuable service.

Create unique content and present it in fascinating eye-bytes. For instance, Safety Alerts (www.safetyalerts.com) sends out a brief digest of new product recalls daily. Each summary headline in the newsletter has a hyperlink to the Website for more information on the recall. The Website is growing with the newsletter. It got 400,000 unique visitors in March--approximately 100,000 visitors more than the month before.

SafetyAlerts.com Director Paul Walsh says he receives countless e-mails from people, even pharmacists, about prescription and nonprescription drugs. However, the newsletter covers nearly every product category from cars to cribs to food and sporting goods.

Done properly, electronic newsletters and discussion lists can be an effective tool for keeping customers and clients informed of news, upcoming events, products and promotions. Remember to promote your newsletter in other company advertising and marketing materials, at your Website, in e-mails confirming orders and in messages exchanged within other quality newsletters. If people find your newsletter to be relevant to their lives, they will spread the word--forwarding it to their friends and family.