This year’s Specialized Information Publishers Association conference in Washington promises to be another great value for publishers and their marketers.
It starts Sunday, May 20, and runs through Tuesday. It’s not to late to register.
You can access more information here
New York Times Magazine this Sunday will feature a fascinating profile of financial blogger Joe Wiesenthal. Given that blogs are the electronic grandchildren of traditional print newsletters, we thought you’d enjoy reading it.
A comment: One of the attractions of the newsletter business in the print era was that you could live a much nicer life than working for demanding media, such as newspapers, that operated off a normal schedule. That’s obviously not true in the blog era, at least for some.
The Postal Service hemorrhaged more cash in its fiscal second quarter (Jan. 1 – March 31), posting anet loss of $3.2 billion, compared to $2.2 billion for the same period last year. The losses will continue until key provisions of the Postal Service five-year business plan move forward, USPS said.
Without the impact of the non-controllable costs related to mandated retiree health benefit pre-funding payments and accounting for non-cash adjustments for worker’s compensation, the non-GAAP loss for the quarter was $486 million compared to $469 million for the same period last year, USPS said.
The losses are due primarily to legislative mandates such as the unique mandated pre-funding of retiree health benefits, and prohibiting management from making the needed operational and human resource changes required to address these issues under current laws and contracts. Also contributing to the continuing losses are the declining First-Class Mail and Standard Mail volumes. The Congress must act soon to pass legislation providing the Postal Service with the flexibility and speed needed to make the changes necessary for long-term financial viability.
“We are aggressively pursuing new revenue streams and reducing costs in areas within our control,” said Postmaster General and CEO Patrick Donahoe. ”These actions are not enough to return the Postal Service to profitability. The legislative changes outlined in our business plan will enable us to reduce annual operational expenses by approximately $22.5 billion by 2016 and set the stage for long-term financial stability so we can continue to provide secure, reliable and economical universal service to the American public.”
Postal Service actions to increase revenue continue to pay off in the shipping and package service lines of its business. Revenues related to shipping and packages totaled $3.5 billion, an increase of over 13% compared to the same period in the previous year, as volume increased 74 million pieces, or 9%.
Despite the growth and success of Postal Service shipping and package products, it was not enough to overcome the decline in Mailing Services. Revenue from Mailing Services, excluding Market Dominant packages, totaled $12.8 billion, a 3% decrease compared to the same period last year, on a volume decrease of 1.8 billion pieces.
The revenue reduction reflects the continued decline in First-Class Mail as consumers continue to turn to electronic alternatives.
The second quarter also saw a decline in Standard Mail, attributable to a decline in direct mail advertising spending across a number of sectors as sales prospecting slowed in certain sectors, advertisers used more selective targeting methods and competition from electronic advertising media increased.
There’s been quite a turnaround at the Specialized Information Publishers Assocaition. For the first time in more than a decade, Joel Whitaker wrote in The Newsletter on Newsletters, the trade group originally founded as the Newsletter Association seems to have found its way.
You can hear the interview here.
During the 30 years that Howard Penn Hudson published The Newsletter on Newsletters, a newsletter was easily defined: It was published on 8-1/2″ x 11″ paper, typically ran eight pages and was almost always “typewritten.” The “typewritten” appearance was intended to provide the feeling of a one-on-one communication from the editor to the reader. It typically didn’t have advertising.
Many newsletters today retain the historical page size, although almost all have switched from a typewriter typeface. Many personal letters today are “typeset” using such typefaces at Times New Roman, so most newsletters have also made the transition.
But the overall function of newsletters remains the same: To provide targeted, usable information of value to the reader. That’s true whether it’s a narrowly focused, subscription publication for industry insiders, a paid-content personal advice newsletter (usually on health or wealth topics), or a free publication used to promote a business.
Most printed newsletters retain the 8-1/2″ x 11″ inch format. Most still don’t have ads — although some very successful newsletters make a significant profit from advertising.
But many newsletters with time sensitive information are distributed by e-mail. Some others are created as blogs — Monday Note is an example. Thirty years ago, if Monday Note had been published, it would have been a newsletter. Today it’s a blog. But in editorial content, tone and style, it’s still a newsletter.
Regardless of the purpose, many newsletters are just part of a package. Dr. Julian Whitaker’s Health & Healing newsletter is the basis for a large health-supplement business. (Dr. Whitaker is no relation, as far as I know.) The newsletter also provides a way for Dr. Whitaker to promote his Whitaker Wellness Clinic. Likewise, Richard C. Young’s Intelligence Report not only provides actionable information to its subscribers but also enables its editor to promote his investment advisory business.
Both Health & Healing and Intelligence Report are consumer newsletters — their subscribers are individuals, not businesses. And when we say subscribers, we mean they pay cash money to receive the newsletter.
But the same thing is true of many business-to-business newsletters. Because they serve narrow niche markets, the subscription prices are higher than for consumer letters. They also typically have other things to sell beyond simply newsletters — in some cases the produce conferences, in others special reports, in still others they provide consulting services.
Some newsletters do not charge for a subscription, but they, too, have the goal of building business. Many hospitals, for instance, produce a newsletter mailed to every home in its circulation area. The newsletter provides solid health information and prominently features the hospital’s doctors. The obvious objective is to make the reader feel Hospital A is preferable to any other institution.
Finally, as noted above, many blogs are similar to newsletters. While some start out simply chronicling a person’s experiences — Leah Ingram’s Suddenly Frugal comes to mind — they often provide additional business opportunities. Ingram’s blog has led to three book contracts, for example, and has helped to increase her reputation as a freelance writer focused on frugal living and other family-related topics, including gift tips, etiquette advice and shopping suggestions.
The Newsletter on Newsletters focuses on the writing, editing and marketing of newsletters. We occasionally touch on producing conferences, but tend to leave that and other ancillary products to people with more expertise in those areas.