Guest Blogger Louise Boyd: “Louise is a professional copywriter based in Edinburgh and has worked in digital marketing for nearly a decade. While she has worked on copy for some very well-known brand, she particularly enjoys working with SMEs and start-ups to help them refine their tone of voice, messaging and content strategy. Louise also delivers training to help people improve their digital skills.”

Brother: Have you subscribed to that newsletter yet?

Me: No, leave me alone. I have enough emails clogging up my inbox.

Brother: But it’s the best newsletter you’ll ever read.

Me: I don’t have time. I’m busy. Shut up.

This was the conversation we had on a regular basis for, give or take, two months. Always on a Tuesday, because that’s when the email newsletter in question hits my brother’s inbox.

Eventually, he stopped pestering me. Instead, he forwarded the email, without comment, at around 6pm on a Tuesday evening. By 7 pm, I had read two incredible articles, watched an awe-inspiring video, subscribed to a fascinating new podcast and signed up to the Intelligent Change newsletter. The information contained in that email gave me some seriously healthy food for thought. The ideas I discovered within would crop up again and again – both in everyday conversations and my work as a writer over the next weeks and months. Somehow I felt that these ideas had enriched my understanding of life, the world and my place in it. From that day on, I too was evangelical about Intelligent Tuesdays.

Intelligent Change makes productivity planners and gratitude journals, or in their words ‘tools to positively change your life’. The company’s approach to email marketing is distinctly modern. They don’t try to sell you their products; instead, they invite you to join their tribe.

Seth Godin nails exactly why this is so important to businesses nowadays in his Ted Talk on tribes. Modern marketing isn’t about highlighting the benefits of a product or service as such (although obviously this still matters), instead it’s about building a community around your brand who share the same interests, values and passion for a subject.

Intelligent Change understands if we buy into their ethos and like them as a business, we will be loyal to their products too.

Here are some aspects of the Intelligent Tuesday newsletter that I reckon work really well:

Delivers value

The newsletter has evolved considerably since I first signed up. But importantly, it still packs a whole lot of value.

On the face of it, the Intelligent Change approach is deceptively simple: provide your potential customers with some of the best self-improvement tips from around the web. They don’t even have to spend the time creating the content, as it’s already out there – they just curate it. Intelligent Tuesday is a one-stop newsletter with all the cool stuff people like me (and my brother) are interested in. It adds value to both my life and my work. For me, that’s absolutely priceless.

Sets expectations

Everyone is busy. People want to know how much time they need to invest in something versus what they actually get back.

Intelligent Change do not take their audience’s time for granted. Alongside the description of each piece of content – video, article, podcast etc. – they include the time it takes to read, listen to or watch. For example:

Article (9 minutes)
Video (17 minutes)
Podcast (24 minutes)

Not only this, but the descriptive, benefit-driven subject line helps set expectations too. I instantly know if it’s worth reading (it usually is). Plus the newsletter hits my inbox at exactly the same time, on the same day, every single week. This consistency and expectation setting is essential in modern email marketing for building trust with your customer base.

Encourages sharing

In digital marketing, getting your content shared is one of the most effective ways to reach a new audience. At the end of every Intelligent Tuesday newsletter, you’ll find a simple call to action: ‘Forwarded this message? Sign up here’.

Because who doesn’t want to share all that incredible value with their friends – right, bro?

To learn more about digital marketing, taking digital marketing training courses is a great way to expand your knowledge.