5 tips for outstanding B2B newsletters

If you’re a business trying to crack the B2B market, having a good newsletter tool up your sleeve can be the difference between make or break.

86% of business professionals prefer to communicate via email when discussing professional topics, while the click-through rate (CTR) of B2B marketing newsletters can be 47% higher than the CTR of B2C emails. To add fuel to the fire, over half of B2B marketers say that email marketing is their best performing strategy. 

As you can see above, having a confident and well-crafted email marketing strategy is more important than ever. They have been proven to significantly boost revenue, boost business and boost your success in the B2B field.

So without any more hanging around, here are five tips to help you create outstanding B2B newsletters.

Stay ahead of the curve

It’s worth remembering email marketing is rarely a linear beast. It’s important to stay up to date with technological advancements, which is where having a powerful newsletter tool comes into play.

These tools will help you create powerful email automations that enable you to plan for every single stage of the customer journey. This includes welcome messages to get your prospective client on board, to personalised marketing that makes them feel special, all the way through to lead nurturing and re-engagement campaigns that nudge old flames back towards the light.

These emails have got tremendous power because each one can be an effective way to build long-term relationships with clients; something that’s incredibly important across the business landscape.

Marketing automation will give you the power to create outstanding B2B newsletters. By targeting your audience in the right place, at the right time, with the right messaging, you can supercharge your business.

Offer your audience something

You don’t always have to offer your audience a physical reason for subscribing - and reading - your newsletters. You don’t need to provide discounts or free trials to get people interested, although those can certainly help. Think about moving into a more theoretical place. Share knowledge, show that you’re an expert. Teach.

Essentially, it’s really important to provide value with each newsletter. If you’re just sending out spam content for the sake of it, you won’t see results. Think about how many emails you get every day, and think how many you mark as read without even opening. 

We need you to avoid falling into this trap.

To do this, think about offering the following content in your newsletters:

• Free trials

It’s important to show prospects why they should be using your business over your greatest rivals, but you know what works way better than just telling people? Showing them! So get practical with your newsletter blasts and let prospects take control of your product for a short period of time.

• Event invitations

If you’re a knowledge-based company, holding events or webinars can be a really nice way to introduce your product or service to prospective customers or to inform existing customers how they can get the most from you. This can help you build rapport with customers, build those solid relationships and increase sales.

• Customer appreciation

Boost your engagement levels and feelings of loyalty between you and your customers with some well-written customer appreciation posts. Everyone likes to be told they’re valued, so don’t be shy, let your best customers know how much you love them.

Created personalised content

Any successful B2B marketing newsletter will be produced with a specific audience in mind. Segmenting your mailing list to achieve this level of personalisation isn’t as difficult as it seems and that’s all down to marketing automation.

Using these tools, brands and marketers can use segment builders to make sure every newsletter reaches the right audience and the most relevant customer profiles. Creating customer profiles can help you to send people information they want and need, as opposed to the information you think they want and need.

This is why it’s also important to understand your audience. Without this level of knowledge, you won’t be able to segment your audience properly.

Write engaging subject lines

First impressions count, which is why having an intriguing subject line can often make the difference between success and failure. It might seem like something that may not be a priority, a sort of ‘that’ll do’ after all the hard work has been done and the newsletter has been put together. 

Except, none of that will matter if nobody clicks on the thing in the first place. This is where subject lines can make all the difference. Here’s a quick little crash course in how to write engaging subject lines that compels your audience to click:

• Get to the point. Nobody likes having a long, rambling conversation and this is taken to an extreme online. Keep your lines to nine words, or 60 characters, max - and use no more than three punctuation marks.
• Action! Get a sense of action in your subject lines, so use words like join, help, save or change.
• Be humble. Send your thanks, congratulate customers new and old. Build wholesome relationships and a personal reputation.
• Urgency! Creating a sense of urgency can really help improve opens. People don’t like missing out, so dangle the hook and see them nibble. Try language like ‘don’t miss out’ or ‘ending soon’ in your next newsletter.

Be self-critical

This doesn’t mean you have to beat yourself up every time that open rate or click-through rate dips below a certain threshold. Rather, it means you should look to explore and analyse what works and what doesn’t so you can design the next newsletter armed with a bunch of helpful stats.

Each and every campaign needs to be tracked and measured so you can go back to the drawing board and optimise it. This way, growth can be constant and achievable. 

Set your benchmark, plug into that newsletter tool, find out your point of reference and tweak campaigns after that. Gathering data can be tricky and time-consuming, which is where platforms like APSIS can be invaluable.

If that all sets off a green light in your brain, then don’t waste any time! While you hesitate, your competitors could be getting ahead and stealing your clients. Talk to the experts at APSIS and arrange a free trial today!