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Live and Creative Newsletter Tactics from Funny or Die

Andy Shore Andy Shore found his way to Benchmark when he replied to a job listing promising a job of half blogging, half social media. His parents still don’t believe that people get paid to do that. Since then, he’s spun his addiction to pop culture and passion for music into business and marketing posts that are the spoonful of sugar that helps the lessons go down. As the result of his boss not knowing whether or not to take him seriously, he also created the web series Ask Andy, which stars a cartoon version of himself. Despite being a cartoon, he somehow manages to be taken seriously by many of his readers ... and few of his coworkers.

March 15, 2011 2 min read

Today on my lunch break I was watching a video on Funny or Die that a friend had sent me. Afterwards, I spent some time perusing the site until a lightbox popped up asking if I’d like to sign up for their newsletter. First off, this is a great tactic for growing your subscriber base. Chances are, if someone is spending time browsing your website, they may want to receive your email newsletter as well. Second, not only do I sign up for pretty much every newsletter ever now that I work for an email marketing company, I especially am a fan of Funny or Die. Obviously I signed up.

I immediately received their Welcome Message. This was good, because sometimes people forget signing up for a newsletter. I may be a little spacey at times, but even I couldn’t forget I’d just signed up for their newsletter.

The Welcome Message was well designed and had great content. A large, colorful banner welcomed me. I had to laugh when I saw the message, headlined in large bold letters that said: WELCOME MESSAGE. I guess you can never be too obvious. The message also told me to expect the newsletter each and every week, no matter the weather conditions.

As I kept moving down, I found the other places I could connect with Funny or Die on the web. This included my own FoD account, Twitter, Facebook and Mobile. Below that were some of the classic Funny or Die videos in case I’d missed any. That’s a great thing to include in any welcome message. A bit of “here’s what others have enjoyed and we hope you do as well.”

That’s it. Simple, to the point, and just enough color and design to make it interesting. Sometimes people over think things. Funny or Die gave us a great example on how short and sweet can be just as effective, if not more so.

Author Bio:

by Andy Shore

Andy Shore found his way to Benchmark when he replied to a job listing promising a job of half blogging, half social media. His parents still don’t believe that people get paid to do that. Since then, he’s spun his addiction to pop culture and passion for music into business and marketing posts that are the spoonful of sugar that helps the lessons go down. As the result of his boss not knowing whether or not to take him seriously, he also created the web series Ask Andy, which stars a cartoon version of himself. Despite being a cartoon, he somehow manages to be taken seriously by many of his readers ... and few of his coworkers.