Most companies and organizations seem to set up these messages one time and then forget about it. And most also don’t give a lot of thought to what these messages say. Maybe a techie actually writes them rather than a marketing person.

Your welcome message is the first message that a subscriber receives so you want it to be warm, welcoming and informative. You also want the tone to match your organization’s overall tone.

Several clients I work with use GetActive Software and I think a really cool addition to the latest version of their e-mail marketing tool is the fact that if you have multiple e-newsletters, each can now have its own customized “unsubscribe” message. I am thinking of the many ways that you could use this feature. If you had both a weekly and a daily e-newsletter for example, on the unsubscribe message of the daily version you could say something like “Sorry to see you go. If you are unsubscribing because a daily e-mail is too frequent for you, consider giving our weekly version a try by clicking here to subscribe.”

Also think about your routine, automatic, operational type e-mails. How well written are those? Like many Americans, I’m trying to lose some weight. I recently signed up for Weight Watchers e-tools. I then forgot my password so I clicked on a link to ask their system to send me a reminder. I was struck by how well written and friendly it was. This simple message that said “Sorry you lost your password…….. We’re here to help……” really reinforced the Weight Watchers brand as a supportive organization.

So, if you haven’t taken a look at these types of messages at your organization for awhile, give them a once over. Do they reinforce your brand? Are you making the most of them as a communications touch point? Perhaps consider scheduling a regular review of these types of messages.