How to Create a Digital Newsletter (from a Print One)

Last week we walked through the strategies for preparing a paper newsletter. As with most things, there is another use for this content: a digital newsletter. All the same rules for design and content creation still apply. But how do you get people to request your digital newsletter and what is the best means of delivery? You will need to sign up for an email service, and popular choices include Mail Chimp and Constant Contact, both work well.

You'll also need a clear plan of attack and a good depth of knowledge about your prospects. Creating a complete demographic of your target audience is important because it helps determine what your strategy is to acquire prospect name and emails. You also have to look at what you are selling. If your product is typically purchased over a long sales cycle, has a high price point, or is purchased by a critical buyer then you should use a personal conversion strategy. If your product is more of an impulse purchase, requires little research, or has a very low price point then this becomes a pure numbers game.

Personal conversion strategies are attempting to get a specific kind of prospect to engage you online. It involves creating a web presence that draws the client in slowly. This can be done by creating useful content, in-depth whitepapers and retargeting paid per click campaigns. Your objective is to give the prospect the feeling that you are an authority in your market and someone they can trust for answers. If you wait to ask them to participate in your monthly newsletter until after they have seen your content they will be likely to say yes. This means you will need to put the form where they can sign up on your blog.

Once you've amassed your list, you need to convert your print newsletter into a digital format. On your newsletter, you should add hyperlinks to the client success story, your social media profiles, and your website. Use Adobe Acrobat to create your digital newsletter because it will make formatting and inserting hyperlinks easier. Take the digital version of your newsletter and add it to your blog by chopping up the individual sections and creating a blog post. Here is an example of how my team adds our legal newsletter to our blog GNGF/blog. Now email your list the PDF of your print newsletter and include the link to your blog in the body of email just in case their email filter blocks the attached version.

Jabez LeBret is the author of the Amazon No. 1 bestselling law office marketing book How to Turn Clicks Into Clients. As a partner at Get Noticed Get Found, a legal marketing agency, over the last nine years he has delivered over 800 keynote addresses in six countries. His main area of expertise is managing Gen Y in the workplace, advanced Facebook strategies, LinkedIn strategies, Google+, SEO, local directory optimization, and online marketing. 

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