I’ve been writing Pivot for over a year now, so I thought I would devote this issue to explain why I do it. After all, it takes a lot of time to draft, edit and publish articles on two, and sometimes three, platforms. With a few exceptions, I’ve published one article a week. They usually run from 600 words to over twice that length and cover a wide range of topics of interest to professional services stakeholders and marketers.

You may be wondering why I–and my team–go to all that trouble. And in this world of LinkedIn and TikTok, aren’t email newsletters a bit, um, old school?

In actuality, Pivot has been an unqualified success on every front. I write Pivot for five reasons:

  1. I can speak directly to Hinge’s most engaged audience—people who have already joined our list.
  2. It allows me to write about a wide range of topics relevant to people interested in what we at Hinge think.
  3. It starts conversations. When I send out a new edition of Pivot, I often get emails from readers who have follow-on questions or comments. Some simply want to appreciate what I wrote.
  4. It keeps my firm top of mind. When one of my readers is ready to buy marketing or branding services, Hinge is at the tip of their tongue.
  5. It drives new opportunities and real revenue. It’s not uncommon for readers to reach out and begin business development discussions or request a proposal. Sometimes this interest is spurred by a specific article topic. Other times it comes from the accumulated trust built up over time after reading Pivot and other publications we produce. And here’s the really amazing thing: more often than not, there aren’t any competitors in the picture. We’ve been pre-qualified!

If there is one takeaway from this experience, it’s this: Teachers are marketers, and marketers are teachers.

Your clients are always on the lookout for answers to their business problems. When you freely share your expertise with the world, amazing things can happen. You establish good will and establish trust—and your revenue grows. It’s a smart way to invest your time.

Is a newsletter a good fit for your organization? That depends on whether you can commit to writing a thoughtful article on a regular schedule. Once you set a cadence for your newsletter, people begin to expect it—and even look forward to it. I’ve found that a weekly cadence works really well, but that might be too aggressive for many experts and firms. In that case, consider twice or even once a month. If you publish less frequently than that, many readers may forget about you, leading to fewer opens and more unsubscribes.

Let me pause for a moment and make one thing clear. When I say newsletter, I’m talking about a specific type—a single educational article. There are many other kinds of email newsletters out there, from company announcements to industry news to curated links of third-party content. While those may or may not have a place in your email marketing program, they don’t build long-term loyalty like an ongoing series of practical thought-leadership pieces.

You may be wondering why not simply publish the articles as blog posts? Well, you can! Newsletters articles can, and usually should, be repurposed as blog posts, too. That way, they target two audiences: 1) the people on your newsletter email list; and 2) people who search online for the topics you write about.

You can even take one more step and do what we do: publish the articles on LinkedIn to expand your reach even further. If you set it up as a newsletter your audience can subscribe, providing another way for people to be exposed to your expertise on a continual basis.

How Do You Publish an Email Newsletter?

Every email service provider (ESP) or marketing automation platform offers this capability. ESPs also include subscriber management tools, including automated handling of bounces and unsubscribes, as well as real-time analytics. Many will even allow you to test different subject lines when you schedule your send.

It’s often a good idea to add a subscription form to your website. This can live in the footer of your website, in offers across your site or in a popup window. To minimize friction, keep the required information to a minimum—just an email address is usually sufficient, though you could ask for a first and last name, as well.

As a reader of Pivot, you already appreciate the power of an educational email newsletter. It’s a great way to disseminate your expertise to a receptive audience, while contributing to your firm’s bottom line. And there’s no reason you can’t produce a newsletter of your own. If you can stick to the schedule you set for yourself and deliver interesting, well-written content, you’ll soon discover that there is a strong appetite out there for what you think and say. And you’ll discover, to your delight, that teaching is a fun and rewarding way to do business development.