ENTER: My passion for email newsletters
By accident, I’d carved my path as a content strategist + copywriter for a busy newsletter.
I pushed newsletter design and format optimization, and told great stories that were actually read.
Copywriters don’t know everything… until they do. “We’ve got to spice up, shorten, embolden our subject lines!” I said.
Nope. Our loyal readers wanted the same damn subject line each month. How did we find out? We just asked.
Eat your heart out, copywriter.
Our opens routinely approached or surpassed 40%.
The newsletter was forwarded and warm replies were common.
The monthly talking points and stories changed, sometimes, minutes before hitting send because, well… can’t schedule a disaster.
Throughout, my overall messaging strategy was built to adapt and remained consistent: Take audiences to the scene of disaster, show our teams serving a heartbroken community, and rely on vivid stories and quotes from survivors and volunteer members.
This is one of the popular Team Rubicon newsletters (bonus visual at the bottom).
Simplifying esoteric data for hurricane responses
This graphic shared in the newsletter above highlights a few locations where Team Rubicon served communities with high Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) ratings in the wake of hurricanes.
SVI is a census-data tool the organization uses to launch operations and explain to audiences why our service is urgently needed in these communities.
