7 Reasons NOT To Publish An Ezine Using A Free Template
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A copywriting and marketing client of mine recently asked, “What do I get with my own template that I don’t get with a template or blank template?” Great question, and here’s the answer in seven parts.
1. Your own Web pages, to save to your computer desktop and to your Web server.
It may seem convenient to just “pop” content into content fields that generate pages for you. However, if the CSS-based template is housed on someone else’s server, it takes you extra steps to transfer the file to your desktop and then to your own domain name.
2. More control - create ezine pages in HTML, then edit them later.
Editing newsletter pages using a CMS template is actually more of a headache than people realize. I’m speaking of the systems where you are given different fields where you can “pop in” sections of your newsletter - so you’re going back and forth from your Word document to the template, cutting and pasting and editing line breaks and such as you go.
Each task takes four or five extra steps, as opposed to editing in a Web design program such as Dreamweaver, where each task takes one or two steps. Multiply all the steps you take to create your newsletter by five, and that’s a lot of extra (needless) steps, to create something that is a “cookie cutter” template that other companies are also using.
3. An ezine publishing solution that saves money.
Reinforcing my previous point: it takes far less time to create, edit, and publish a newsletter page in HTML than it does to mess around with a CSS template, copying, pasting and uploading photos. Time saved is money saved - whether you’re doing it yourself, or hiring a pro to do it for you.
4. It takes extra work to archive past ezine issues.
Lots of people think that folks won’t sign up for your ezine if they can read old issues live on your Web site. What’s actually funny is… people are MORE LIKELY to sign up after reading your past ezine issues. If you’re generating e-newsletters via a template that your mailing list host provides, you’ll have to develop some type of system where you remember to save and store the files on your own server. And that brings up the question of copyright issues… I have yet to see anyone housing ezine issues that have been created using someone else’s template.
6. Links to your article archive, product and service pages - tons of them!
Every good Web marketer publishes articles as a way to get his Web site indexed regularly by the search engines. It helps to build page rank and that gets you noticed higher up on the search engines. Therefore, if you’re collecting HTML-based ezine pages and publishing them live, that’s a ton of links pointing to your “deep content” as they call it. The more ezine pages you publish, the more links you’re generating that point to different places on your site (for example, what you sell). An ezine archive really helps in that area, so if you’re holding back on publishing one at the risk of using another company’s template, then you’re not taking advantage of the extra linking potential of your own, HTML-based ezine pages.
7. Stronger, more effective brand presence.
Take notice of the best looking ezine marketing on the Web - these professionals ALWAYS use a an original logo and newsletter layout, NEVER a standard template from an ezine list service. Original designs are tighter, cleaner, and speak volumes about the quality of work one can expect from your company. Thankfully, many permission-based email list managers offer their customers the option to cut and paste their own HTML-based ezine template directly into the broadcast form. So you still get the benefit of having your own ezine, while taking advantage of the many benefits a list management service brings.
Many home business owners create and publish ezines using a template that they’ve “borrowed” from their mail server company. But if you really want to go pro, then I recommend having your own ezine logo and format professionally designed.
Copyright 2007 Dina Giolitto. All rights reserved.
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Tags: ezine publishing, email newsletters, web marketing, email marketing, ezine templates
2 Comments
Tom Kulzer
April 3rd, 2007
at 6:27am
Dina,
I appreciate the continued education about the benefits of
responsible email marketing that you’re spreading with your
articles. Unfortunately I have to disagree with a number of
your points in the above article as they are factually incorrect
when discussing AWeber as you are.
“1) 1. Your own Web pages, to save to your computer desktop and to your Web server.”
Customers are free to backup and save their information to their
computer at any time. In fact, it’s encouraged. We even have
a global export function that’ll zip up all subscribers and all
newsletter content (including templates) into a single file for
easy download. No other service that I’m aware of makes it
this easy for customers to get access to their data and make
backups.
“2. More control - create ezine pages in HTML, then edit them later.”
I don’t understand how you take editing a template and make it
into 5 steps when using Dreamweaver is only 2. It’s the same
editing process and customers can even use our stock templates
to edit in Dreamweaver if they prefer. Templates are a resource
for new or smaller businesses that don’t have the resources or
knowledge available to create good looking email messages.
Creating a message that renders nicely in as many email programs
as possible is not nearly as simple as creating a webpage for
IE, Firefox, and Safari.
“3. Reinforcing my previous point: it takes far less time to create, edit, and publish a newsletter page in HTML than it does to mess around with a CSS template, copying, pasting and uploading photos.”
That just doesn’t make sense. The html/css that you create in
Dreamweaver is going to take just as long, if not substantially
longer to create than using a template.
“4. Links that point to your Web domain, not the Web site of your mailing list host.”
No links used in our templates point to any type of advertising
on AWeber. The only links in a template that could possibly be
there are the click tracking and unsubscribe link. Unsub links are
required by federal law and click tracking is entirely optional.
Both of which apply to customers using templates or using their
own custom design.
“5. The option to archive past ezine issues.”
We fully support creating archives automatically for both template
and non template customers.
“6. Links to your article archive, product and service pages - tons of them!”
See number 5 above. I have no idea how using a template has
any effect on this.
“7. Stronger, more effective brand presence.”
This I do agree with, absolutely. Using a custom created template
that matches your website’s general look and feel is definitely
better in the long run. But again, a standard template is a means
for a smaller business to get up and running. The benefits of
having an opt-in newsletter far outweigh the possible drawbacks
of using a template if the choice is to use one or not have an
email newsletter at all.
Cheers,
Tom Kulzer
CEO & Founder
AWeber Communications, Inc.
Web developer
April 4th, 2007
at 12:37am
Also there is this issue of patent ? If you are using some one’s designs and templates you never know whether it is free to use or whether it is copyrighted etc ?