I’m a bit of a hoarder. It requires management. The best way for me to limit the number of my draft email marketing articles is to review them after 12 months to see if they are out of date. Last weekend I reviewed a couple of half-completed articles from August 2020.

The basis of each was how to get email marketing up and running following the hardship of lockdown and other restrictions. You’d think there’d be a lot in common with the current situation. And you’d be spot on.

Back then, the common advice was not to avoid Covid-19 as a subject in newsletters as, an obvious prediction, it was likely to be an important factor for months to come: many months. I gave reasons why email marketing copy should be positive and rather light-hearted, but humour, always a little risky, might be a step too far with people struggling to keep their businesses afloat.

The most important thing we could do, I felt, was to provide solutions, even temporary ones, for the difficulties that anyone in email marketing would be suffering under. 

The advice remains the same, although now more because there will be other pressures in the near future, which are hard to predict. The suggestion to put yourself in your subscribers’ place remain. It should be easy enough. After all, we are in their place.

Oddly enough, it would appear that for email marketing generally, little seems to have changed, apart from the fact that we all have more experience on coming out of such events. There’s little chance of getting away with false optimism. It’s best to present the bare fact, whether good or bad, be it in a marketing email, e-newsletter, blog or website. Be brief, be precise, and get it over with.

Now is the time to explain what your experience was of the previous situations in the Covid era. Tell them how you can help. If you feel you have a product which will save them money, effort or keep them from disaster, tell them loudly. The biggest change in the last year has been what you have learned.