Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Thanks CampSteve for your brilliant instight (as usual). No, I wouldn`t pretend to know about the history of poster design nor would I insult those who do by trying to put out the information. But this is not what this idea is about. Let`s say you own a drycleaners and you decide you would like to put up a website and try to draw in some local business. You call a local website guru who does just that. You`re now online. The website guru sends you a newsletter every month with marketing articles, articles about how to get the most from Google, search engine strategies, etc. General stuff that may would interest him. Its a general web marketing newsletter, full color, 8 pages, (or an ezine) and its branded with the website guru`s logo and contact information. Here`s the business model. The newsletter was written by me. I sell it to the website guru on a per month subscription basis AND I sell it to 100 other website gurus to give to their customers.

 

Here are a few more ideas...

 

Real Estate agent-General home improvement, design, how to newsletters for homeowners

Car dealerships- General car maintainance and car care

Dentists-General tooth care, problems

Landscapers-Gardening and landscaping tips

And on and on and on it goes...

 

It`s not meant to be an indepth look and an industry like most "newsletters: are but more of a general information "brochure" that keeps the website guru`s name in front of the customer while giving helpful tips and advice

 

However, if the website guru were to write this newsletter every week he would spend a lot of time (which equals money) doing it. By purchasing it from me he only spends a few dollars a month.

 

This model is actually already being done but the newsletters look like crap and you know (better than most)that people like beautiful color and design and they love that "poster smell and feel`.

 

You may ask just how I intend to write all these articles? I don`t intend to write them all. I will have writers do that on a per article basis.

 

 

Steve, after I wrote the last post it dawned on me what you were talking about "wiki-newsletters". So the premise is you who obviously know a lot about poster design, history, etc. would colloborate with others who do and write articles that would then be sent out in newsletter form. Interesting idea.

 

The gist of this idea is using newsletters to market your company. Ok. My thoughts in the above post went from me doing the one newsletter I am working on now to the future in which there will be other types of newsletters offered. i didn`t do a good job leading you along and I apologize for that. However, whether I write all the articles or not doesn`t matter. What matters in this business model is that there will be a finished product available to those who want it without them having to do any designing or content writing. That is what I am trying to convey. A complete, well designed newsletter available by subscription that can be branded specifically for your company.

 

Can I ask what purpose your travel posters serve? Is it marketing? If so then a company such as yours who are experts in travel poster design probably wouldn`t send out a newsletter about travel poster designing. The people who buy them don`t care. However, they obviously care about promotion and marketing. Now you could spend your time writing articles about promotion and marketing or you could simply buy a subscription to a promotion and marketing newsletter and then have it branded with your logo and company information. You may want to include a few examples of your latest work and maybe an article about how your company is doing or the latest projects completed. This is what this company will offer. Making sense yet?

 

First, the company that wanted a newsletter about nebulas (in this business model) would sell telescopes. Now nebulas may be beyond my mental capacity if I were talking to an astronomer but if i am talking to an amateur then they would want pictures, coordinates, general facts, all of which are readily available. I could write that content or have a writer do the research themselves and write it for me easily. I understand exactly what you are saying. I couldn`t write articles on cell mutations in blue baboons and sell that to anyone. However, I could sell a newsletter featuring blue babbons to a zoo so that they could send it to parents of six year olds. We`re talking general information, readily available to the average consumer, not techincal newsletters.

 

What i really need to do is coin a phrase for what I am proposing. I can see where the word "newsletter" can sidetrack you especially if you get subscriptions to technical newsletters written by professionals in a certain field.

 

Here are three article examples for a real estate newsletter I am working on.

1. Ten tips to a perfect interior paint job.

2. Staging tips that will help sell your home.

3. What does the mortgage crisis mean for housing prices?

 

All of these articles will offer good information to the general homeowners. The information is easily researched and I can write the articles myself. I do not have to dissect the mortgage industry, work for a painter, or take home staging classes to write this. So my answer to your question is, I will stay with non-technical subjects or make those subjects non-technical and I will write the content myself or hire a writer to do it for me.

 

Keep making me think CampSteve...

Thanks for the reply dhutchis. Creating and sending the newsletter is what I am currently researching. Turrnkey is the way to go.

 

As a small business, if i start by offering one or two different types of newsletters, say a marketing newlsetter with articles for small hometown businesses that would be sent out by marketing companies, web development companies, etc., or a homeowner newsletter that would be sent out by real estate agents, then getting 100 isn`t so difficult. Say 50 web companies and 50 agents.

 

The price I mentioned was off the top of my head (where a lot of crap resides. lol). I will need to research a pricing strategy as I go along.

 

Thanks again.

I just recieved my e-newsletter from SuN and they had the audacity (actually they hit it right on the head) to call my idea crazy. Well Thomas Edison was called crazy, Issac Newton, Gallileo, Columbus, Ford; i`m in great company!

 

It just might be crazy enough to work...