One of the best reasons for improving your marketing content is to build authority in your field. Authority builds trust, and reading the right newsletters allows you to draw on the authority and expertise of others.
Along with blog posts and videos, email newsletters are among the most trusted forms of digital marketing content consumed worldwide. So, there’s good reason to read them to help you generate high-quality marketing content.
Whether you’re just getting started, or even if you’ve been at it a while, coming up with content ideas takes significant time and effort.
If you provide relevant stuff, readers will want more of it regularly. And consistent content output becomes a non-negotiable expectation on their part.
That means you’ll need plenty of ideas in the can at all times.
Subscribing to various newsletters will provide you with a steady flow of video or blog-worthy topics to inform your content marketing strategy.
In the past, we’ve written about content curation. But in this post, we’re going to do some curating for you by offering three newsletters that will prime your content marketing pump.
The 3 Valuable Newsletters For Content Creators
1. For The Interested.
Josh Spector may be best known for his advice on how to write newsletters. But there’s much more to be gleaned from his daily and weekly newsletters.
For example, his most recent weekly letter covered topics ranging from creativity obstacles to what happened to a successful freelancer when he stopped using social media for a year.
Another helpful link was Josh’s article: The Two Ways To Grow Your Audience: Do More or Do Less. Spoiler alert: most everyone struggling to grow is doing too much or too little.
Josh Spector’s advice for content creators is among the most solid and helpful we’ve found. Not only does he share valuable tips, but he also finds and shares rich resources around the web, like this one.
2. Ann Handley’s Total Annarchy.
One of the ways you can start improving your marketing content is to learn from newsletters what a good or even great piece of content looks like. Ann Handley’s fortnightly missive definitely falls into the greatness category.
She consistently serves up delectable content with humor, transparency, meaty advice, engaging stories. All with a big dollop of generosity.
Generous enough to tell you how she does it in her new How to Newsletter ebook.
And speaking of engaging stories, here’s how her most recent newsletter begins:
I’m in line at the Chinese takeout place. Just ahead of me is a little girl. Maybe 5? She’s with her dad.
It’s busy—because it’s the holiday season, and Chinese takeout is a tradition an institution.
Bottom line: Ann has this fantastic ability to pull you in with stories plain scary good writin’.
Once you start, you won’t want to stop reading Total Annarchy.
3. Dickie’s Digest.
That’s “Dickie” as in Dickie Bush, the creator of the wildly popular, successful, and heavily twitter-based workshop called Ship30for30.
His collaborator on the workshop is Nicolas Cole, one of the most-read writers on the internet and a brilliant teacher.
Both of them produce massive quantities of relevant, helpful content. So consider this newsletter your invitation to a great new wormhole of knowledge and productivity.
Perhaps the most valuable benefit of the work of Dickie and Nicolas is their insight into how to write online. Digital writing is a thing now. It has its own rules and its own style and format.
And, yes, it’s a whole new domain to learn. Welcome to the learner’s age:
“In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”
Eric Hoffer
Consider this a starter list
The three newsletter recommendations above will kindle your efforts to improve your marketing content, but you’ll want to add to the list over time.
But beware of the tendency to add to your newsletter list continuously. You’ll go numb to the list, and it will just become another source of info creep.
Instead, create a separate folder and route newsletters there automatically. Most email clients facilitate this, and the instructions will likely be similar to how it’s done with Gmail.
Avoid email overload:
You’ve got already got plenty of emails to decipher. So, decide what type of content or categories of information you want from your newsletters in advance.
Here’s a sampling to consider:
- Writing – whether it’s blogs, podcasts or shooting videos, or creating social media posts, it all involves writing. As a result, improving your writing skills is a high priority for successful content marketers.
- Content creation – consider this category a catch-all for learning how to shoot video, capture audio, and create visual content. Consider it your toolbox.
- Digital marketing – it’s a broad category and includes everything from case studies to Pay Per Click, so it can seem overwhelming if you’re new to the topic. Try to narrow in on 3 to 5 topics at first.
- Industry-related – keep tabs on what’s happening in your field and what your competitors are up to. Try to find sources that will update you when there’s a new product or service you may need to know about. Consider tangential sources as well. For example, if you’re in concrete construction, subscribe to an architecture blog.
Here’s an article on how to find newsletters for that fancy new folder you set up.
Protect your processing time
Making time to improve your marketing content is not going to be easy. But if you can form the habit now, it will pay off in the long run.
Consider your processing time as a way of “sharpening the saw.”
Create a document you can add to each week. There you can record the notes and ideas that bubble up as you read and the thinking it generates for you.
A great way to continue learning and understanding your business and your customer is to review this document regularly.
Over time, it will become less of a chore and more of a discovery process and an indispensable tool to help you brainstorm marketing ideas, refine content and connect the dots with your business and marketing strategy.
Let us know if we missed a newsletter that you find particularly helpful!
