Staff Newsletters – publish online or print hard copies?
Posted by Martina Mangan on July 07, 2009 in Internal Communications, Strategic thinking with 0 CommentsI sit on the fence when it comes to the Staff Newsletters. It’s not a weakness of character but the result of years spent working with my clients weighing up the pros and cons of their newsletter and the different forms that they take.
Whether you choose to publish online or to print hard copies is up to you and for the most part is defined by the profile of your target audience. What you need to ask yourself is which format best suits your target audience's needs and engages with them.
I decided to look at the benefits of both printed and online newsletters in the hope that it will help you to decide which option is best for your company.
E-Newsletters
I've long been a proponent of the e-Newsletter. In my mind, anything that allows you to reach out to your audience in an instant means that news can be communicated almost in real time. Anything that puts a spanner in the works of the rumour mill gets my vote!
In the current economic climate where everyone has their eye on the bottom line, there is a strong case for a move to an online newsletter. After the initial outlay for set-up, the cost of issuing each newsletter is minimal.
With an online newsletter you can have the back-end customised so that it can provide you with reports on critical information such as: how many people have read the newsletter, who, which articles got the most hits, who clicked on links, who forwarded information on, etc. This data can be used to decide which areas of the newsletter are well received, and which should perhaps be dropped.
Online newsletters can allow you to archive old issues, and with search functionality, older issues and topics can easily be retrieved without any trouble.
If your target audience is widely dispersed across the country or across numerous international markets, then an online newsletter will save the hassle of distribution. Likewise, if there is a requirement to communicate in many different languages, a number of different templates can be created to accommodate the language requirements.
It is so easy to use and manage. There is no special skill set required to maintain and update your online newsletter.
It's environmentally-friendly. Anything that supports the move to a paperless environment has got to be supported. However, because it is rather difficult to read very long articles online, there is a danger that the reader may print out a hard copy of the offending article.
Printed Newsletters
It may cost more, but nothing compares to sitting down with a cup of tea and flicking idly through the staff newsletter. Here are some other compelling arguments in favour of printing your newsletter:
It's great to be able to bring your newsletter home so that family members and friends can see photos of the people that you work with and get a sense of your company's activities or browse through an article you may have written yourself.
Now is a time of great change in many organisations. Resisting the move to an online environment is not necessarily a bad thing if it maintains a sense of consistency within the organisation.
Articles that contain a lot of information are much easier to read when printed in hard-copy.
A printed newsletter can potentially reach everyone. With the best of intentions there will always be someone who, for one reason or another, cannot access the online newsletter.
Often staff don't have time in their work-day to read the online newsletter, they are more inclined to find time to read a printed newsletter, whether it is on the bus home, or when they take a quite break from the monitor with a cup of coffee.
And finally, the best reason of all to stick with printed newsletters.... nothing can replace the lovely smell of a new printed book or magazine, it's something technology simply cannot replicate.
So, which one to choose... an online or a printed newsletter?
To be honest, as far as I am concerned, once you are using the format that ensures your newsletter reaches the target audience, then it really doesn't matter. The important thing is that you are communicating and communicating frequently. After that - the choice is entirely up to you!
Martina Mangan has been working in Internal Communications for the last 9 years. She is passionate about all aspects of employee engagement from strategy right through to implementation.Find out more at Martina's Profile. Don't forget to subscribe if you'd like to hear more!
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