Start Your E-Zine Right: 5 Questions to Ask Yourself before You Begin

by Kendy Sproul

Congratulations! You’ve decided to publish an ezine. But where do you begin? As with anything, at the beginning.

Before you write your first word there are some decisions you need to make. Ask yourself these 5 questions:

1.     What is the topic of your ezine?

This may seem like a silly question if you are far enough along in the process that you know you want to publish an ezine, but you would be surprised how many ezines are out there that seem to have no solid topic. They seem to be there for the sole purpose of taking up space in their subscriber’s email inbox, of which there are few.

Don’t let this happen to you. It takes far too much work to publish an ezine to not have a specific topic of interest to the masses. And, yes, no matter what topic you decide to dedicate your ezine to, there are potentially hundreds or thousands of readers waiting to subscribe, if your topic is specific enough to capture their interest.

So, decide on a topic that is specific enough to generate interest but broad enough to allow you to fill unlimited issues with valuable information.

2.     What is the purpose of your ezine?

Although this may seem like the same question you just asked yourself, it isn’t. Here I want you to take a look at what you hope to get out of publishing your ezine.

Perhaps your intention in publishing an ezine is to create strong customer relationships. Maybe it’s to position yourself as an industry expert or an authority on a certain subject.

Or, maybe it’s simply that you want to provide yourself with an income through affiliation programs.

Whatever your purpose, make sure you have a clear idea of it in mind. I would suggest you even go as far as to write it down and keep it posted close to your desk so you can see it on a daily basis. This will help keep you motivated to keep on cranking out the issues, even when you are sick to death of doing so. Because, as I mention below, your subscribers count on consistently receiving your newsletters, full of new and exciting information.

3.     Where will you get your articles?

There are many options for filling each issue of your ezine with valuable information.

If you are a writer you probably plan to write all, or at least some, of the articles yourself. But if you aren’t there are some other options to consider.

Hiring a copywriter to write articles for your ezine is a very common and professional avenue to take. This takes most of the burden of filling each issue with quality articles off of you as well as the stress.

Another option is scouring free article content sites. This is very time consuming and depending on what sites you are perusing the article quality can be very poor to mediocre. Make sure if you go this route you thoroughly read each article and make certain it will reflect well upon you and your business when it’s published in your ezine.

I recently read a website that suggested subscribing to ezines and newsletters in a like category to the one you will publish and making a list of contributing authors to later contact for content in your own ezine. This, although seemingly time consuming, is a good suggestion if the articles were of top quality and you don’t mind either paying for them or at least providing a link and byline for the author.

4.     How often can you realistically publish your ezine?

I subscribe to many ezines and their publication frequency varies from several a day to a few a year. There is no publication frequency that is set in stone. However I do have some tips from my own experience as a subscriber.

Beware of publishing too often. I no longer subscribe to the ezines that flooded my inbox several times each day. Here’s why: No matter how much you may like someone or something, too much of a good thing is bad. Look at it as you would a phone call from your best friend. While you may look forward to chatting with him or her several times a week or maybe even daily, you would probably become annoyed if she consistently called numerous times each and every day. Pretty soon you’d stop answering the phone. So, avoid this. Don’t publish too often.

Beware of not publishing often enough. I subscribe to a couple ezines that claim to be “occasional”. While this doesn’t create a problem with my inbox it holds with the old adage: out of sight, out of mind. The purpose of most ezines is to keep your business in the sight and minds of potential and current clients.

Aside from that, I have several favorite ezines that arrive in my inbox either daily, weekly, or biweekly. These are never a bother and they stay in the forefront of my mind as I am reminded just often enough that they are there, supplying me with the valuable information I seek. These are the ezines I appreciate, the ones I’ll keep.

5.     Who will be in charge of your mailing list?

Although it is possible to manage an ezine mailing list yourself through your existing email program, I highly recommend you don’t attempt it.

You may be able to handle it in the beginning, when you only have a handful of subscribers, but as your list grows so does the issue of time. That’s not to mention keeping track of new subscriptions and unsubscribe requests (which need to be handled immediately). But, if you’re up for the challenge and this ezine is the only thing you have commanding your time and attention, by all means go for it.

However, if you’re like most of us and the thought of adding another stress to your life makes you cringe, don’t chuck the idea of publishing your ezine based on time constraints. There are other options.

An option used by most ezine publishers is an autoresponder. An autoresponder automatically sends prewritten email responses to visitors to your website who request information. This is true of unsubscribe cases as well. This takes the time and hassle out of keeping track of it all.

Now that you’ve answered these 5 questions you’re ready to get down to the nitty gritty business of putting it all together. So come up with a snappy title and you’ll be well on your way.