In this day in age of overflowing inboxes of spam I've wondered if the e-letter is a good use of my time.
Then tonight the Studio 501c blog pointed me to an executive summary of a study on e-letters by Nielsen Norman Group. The key finding of the study:
- Users tend to glance at websites when they need to accomplish something or to find the answer to a specific question. In contrast, newsletters feel personal because they arrive in users’ inboxes, and users have an ongoing relationship with them. Newsletters also have a social aspect, as users often forward them to colleagues and friends
- The positive aspect of this emotional relationship is that newsletters can create much more of a bond between users and a company than a website can.