To create a funeral home newsletter that your families truly want to read, it takes time and planning. You shouldn’t just send out the first thing that pops into your head. Instead, you should make sure that your email newsletter educates and engages your families.
We’ve compiled our top five tips for creating a funeral home newsletter that your families want to read. Let’s jump right into it.
Do I have your attention?
Your newsletter subject line shouldn’t be an afterthought that you quickly put together before pressing send. If done right, it could be the reason someone opens it, or if done wrong, the reason someone hits delete. Invesp found that the reason 47% of email recipients opened an email was solely because of the subject line. To make sure your subject line grabs your subscribers’ attention, you could try:
- Starting it with an action verb to grab your readers’ attention right away.
- Including the subscribers’ name to give it a more personal feel.
- Keeping it as short and sweet as possible so it’s quick and easy to digest.
Bonus tip! Death is a sensitive topic for many families, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have some fun with your newsletter subject line. Just make sure to do it tastefully and that you stay on brand and on topic.
Save the sales talk for later
Your funeral home newsletter should be educational, not promotional. It’s alright to educate your families about the types of services out there, but you don’t want to be too pushy about using your services. Instead, the goal of your newsletter should be to help families make educated decisions down the road, and if your funeral home plays a major role in that education, they’ll likely turn to you in their time of need.
To make deciding what to include in your newsletter easier, you should create a template to follow each time. (Don’t worry, most email automation platforms have pre-made templates that you can easily customize.) In your template, you’ll want to decide the main sections of your newsletter, such as ones for:
- Sharing your funeral home’s latest blog posts or ones related to the newsletter topic.
- Including a relevant resource for families to download.
- Updating your families about what your funeral home is up to lately.
Bonus tip! Don’t forget to proofread your content to catch any typos or grammar errors. Email automation platforms typically let you send test emails to make sure everything looks good.
Not sure what to write about? This blog post has our top newsletter content ideas.
Add some visual content to your newsletter
Even if you write great content for your newsletter, your subscribers may become uninterested if there isn’t any visual content to spice things up a bit. Vero found that email campaigns that included images had a click-through rate 42% higher than email campaigns without them. Let’s say your funeral home is going with the three newsletter sections above. You can easily add some images by:
- Including the blog posts’ feature photos to go along with them.
- Adding a photo of your downloadable resource, such as the cover if it’s a how-to guide.
- Sharing a photo related to your funeral home’s latest update, such as a picture of your newest employee.
Bonus tip! Your graphics aren’t limited to just static images. You could include gifs and videos in your newsletter, as well.
Let your families know what you want them to do next
Your families shouldn’t get to the end of your newsletter and think, “Now what?” By including a call-to-action (CTA), you can let them know what you want them to do next. Like when writing your subject line, you want to keep your CTA short and start with an action verb. Depending on your newsletter topic and goal, your CTA may be about:
- Following your funeral home on social media.
- Signing up for more free, educational content.
- Visiting your funeral home’s website to learn more about the topic.
Bonus tip! Play around with your CTA text to see which action verbs get more clicks.
Make sure your families know when to expect your funeral home newsletter
An easy way to get more email opens and clicks is to make sure your families know when to expect your funeral home newsletter. When choosing when and how often to send your newsletter, you need to consider:
- Picking the send date, such as what day of the week.
- Choosing the time of day to send your newsletter.
- Deciding how frequently to send it, such as weekly, biweekly, or monthly.
Bonus tip! Before settling on when to send your newsletter, do some A/B testing to see what dates and times get the most opens and clicks.
Stop letting families slip through the cracks with Growth Engine
Stop guessing what topics your families want to learn about and make data-driven decisions with Growth Engine! We partner with Growth Engine, so your funeral home gets access to key marketing features like insights about your families’ interests, a large library of pre-made content, and a marketing hub that handles pressing send for you.
Schedule a demo to see how Growth Engine can help your funeral home send newsletters, email nurturing series, and more.
