Newsletters are a great way to reach customers and prospects with information about your products and services. In spite of the superior communications value of newsletters, some marketers are wary of them because of the production, printing and distribution costs. Fortunately, there is a way to produce an effective newsletter for every organization’s budget.

Print It. Consider the traditional 8 1/2 by 11 four-pager. You can reduce costs by making it a self mailer. But print it in full color because color printing is very cost-competitive today and it adds lots of pizzazz. If you want to reduce mailing costs, consider downsizing your newsletter to a single page tri-fold format and letting it ride along free with invoices. You can even do micronewsletters on over-sized postcards to drive customers to your web site.

Email It. If you want little, if any, production cost, then an email newsletter may be the way to go. Keep the content short and germane to the reader's interest. Use bullets, bold heads and color to help them find their way quickly. You can embed your newsletter in the message window or use the message window as a cover letter for another type of file such as Microsoft Word or PDF.

Post It. If you have a lot of useful information to share with customers and prospects, think about posting the newsletter on your web site. Technically, this is not a newsletter because it is sitting there waiting for your readers to find it. You solve this problem by sending out an “ email alert” or postcard encouraging recipients to visit your site and check out the latest issue. This approach lends itself to a short easy email that opens quickly. What's more, the posted content of the newsletter represents a substantial update to your web site.