Competing for a clinical professional’s attention can feel a bit like busking at mardi gras - you may be hitting all the right chords, but you get the distinct impression the message is getting lost in the noise.
But this is where a good Subscriber Update e-newsletter can work wonders.
Email marketing is almost as old as the internet itself, but it’s still widely used because it works. And done well it can become a cornerstone strategy for maintaining and growing an online following.
The key aspect is to zero in on knowing what your target market wants (i.e., links to the most important content) and get on with delivering it.
According to HealthPathways Chief Clinical Editor Graham McGeoch a good e-newsletter is a “Great way to stay in touch with changes in the whole health system that links me to details about the things I want to know about."
You may think it has to be a big bells and whistles production that’s going to soak up your precious time, but nothing could be further from the truth.
In fact, the best Subscriber Updates are the ones that only take up 30 minutes of your time once every 6 weeks, as Canterbury Community HealthPathways Coordinator Lisa McGonigle explains below.
Only update subscribers when you have something to update them about
Sounds obvious really, but when it comes to publishing an e-newsletter a lot of apprehension comes from the expectation that you have to consistently hit a tight deadline to maintain subscribers. Consistency is valuable, but actually having something to shout about is priceless.
“We usually put one out about every six weeks,” Lisa says. “But if there’s not enough good updates to tell people about I’ll wait another week or more. I’ve even waited up to 2 months to publish another Subscriber Update – but it’s worth it because you get to pack in more relevant content.”
Tip 1: Go easy on yourself. A Subscriber Update doesn’t have to be published to regular deadlines.
Invest time in Summaries of Change and your Home Page
How do you put together an e-newsletter in 30 minutes like Lisa? Invest time in making sure your Summaries of Change in Dot are clear and concise, and that the important updates on your Home Page are all in place.
“We can now bash out a Subscriber Update in about half an hour because the content is just collated from Dot and the Home Page. None of it is new content.
“The real trick is to know what to put on your home page. But if health system updates are important enough they should already be on the home page anyway.”
With new pathways or pathway updates, it helps if your CEs consider whether they should be listed in the Home Page or on the Subscriber Update when they take them live.
“If you’ve taken care of what’s on your home page and you’ve done good summaries of change, the work is done for you!”
Tip 2: An upfront investment in getting Summaries of Change and your Home Page right reduces time spent collating information for your e-newsletter.
Keep it short, simple, and to a single page
E-newsletters can vary in complexity and length, but all of them should be designed to meet the target user’s needs. As we’re targeting time-impaired GPs who have, quite frankly, better things to be doing with their time, the ideal Subscriber Update is really direct and uncomplicated.
“We don’t use pictures, not least because they have to be downloaded,” Lisa says. “How many times have you not read an e-newsletter because you have to click on the images to download them?”
“We (Lisa and Clinical Editor Denise Nicholson) cut down the summaries to one pithy line if we can - I find it’s a lot easier to do this in person – and we also make sure we have a nice balance of content in a straightforward structure. Just links to new pathways, updated pathways, and health system news all on one page.”
Tip 3: The more you add to a Subscriber Update, the more you may come between the GP and the content you want them to click on.
Find out more about Subscriber Email Updates.