Your eNewsletter is Old School

Tweet
I still get many e-newsletters in my inbox. Many of them have very good content, but I am finding that I get more and more frustrated with the lack of social integration. I receive something interesting, I want share it with my network. If I were "old school", I would just forward that email to all my friends...yuck.

So I look for the share features that are starting to emerge. I received one recently that had a link to share it on twitter. I clicked it and got a twitter window with a very cryptic preformatted tweet (ugly headline, shortened URL, and a hashtag ad for the newsletter platform)...double yuck.

It got me thinking...as I look at these e-newsletters that were all the rage just 5 years ago, it is painfully obvious to me that it is time for these companies to "get social". I'd like to share some strategy and tactics just in case you find your e-marketing method "old school" and are longing for a way to break out and get social in 2011.

Here is my short list of recommendations. These were created with an event management company in mind, but probably translate well to anyone using e-mail marketing to promote their organization.

1. Leverage your e-newsletter into a ongoing twitter campaign
2. Build a community with your audience using a microblogging tool (maybe from Socialcast) and a community platform (maybe from Jive)
3. Update your website and communications with various "share" features (see this example blog)
4. Utilize YouTube and Flickr to share the excitement of your events with your audience
5. Encourage blogging from and about your events
6. Add a twitter hashtag to every event and promote it in all literature and communications. Register it on what the hashtag
7. Utilize a wiki to crowd source and then archive tweets, blogposts, and user generated content about your events

If you would like to expand on these recommendations, share example best practices, or just add you 2 cents, please tweet it or comment below.

Let's make a resolution to drop the "old school" e-marketing tactics of the 2000s and move full speed into the "new school" social media tactics of the 2010s.