Are you spending your day browsing email newsletters? No, me neither. So, let’s assume the readers of your newsletter are just like you and me. What would make them pay more attention? Follow these top tips to give your newsletters greater stand out: Test, trial and no error: Email marketing software such as Mailchimp is a great tool. You can see how simple it is to drop content into the template, add a spreadsheet of mailing details and create...

This week saw the world premiere of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, a film telling a story where characters go on ‘a journey’. At the start Bilbo Baggins is just like us, living his ordinary life, but by the end he will have become a hero. As he moves through his journey he is transformed by the challenges he must face. For Bilbo these threats are much more serious than whether his pastry will have a soggy bottom. But that doesn’t mean every...

The psychology of the supermarket shop sometimes seeps into the mind of a client. We’re used to going in to pick up a toilet roll and waddling to the car with enough BOGOF rolls to insulate the attic. But getting more for our marketing pound doesn’t necessarily mean volume. Less often costs more. Because it’s much harder to come up with the three words that epitomize your brand (Coke Is It or Nike’s Just Do It), than it is to write a guide to...

This week I was asked what kind of work I would most like if I could work on anything. To my surprise I waxed lyrical about my current project. And realised it was because I have worked with the designer from the very start. So what? Well, it actually happens far less often than you’d think. It’s not uncommon for a writer to be asked to ‘give us 150 words for the panel on the home page’ where the template is fixed, the copy dictated by where...