Two months ago, starting an email newsletter had, quite frankly, not even entered my mind. I know how ridiculous that sounds considering I write email newsletters for my clients, but for me it was always one of those things I’d decided I’d do…eventually.

So you can imagine my surprise when I signed up for a Personalized Twitter Strategy session with Marian Schembari and she basically said: You really should start a newsletter. I’m not one to argue with Marian (the girl knows her stuff), so I agreed to start a newsletter…eventually. I procrastinated by implementing every other suggestion she’d made about how I could engage more people on Twitter until finally the inevitable was staring me in the face. I’d resisted because I’d thought starting a newsletter would be a huge time-suck. There was the question of what to focus it on, what to call it, how often to send it out, what software to manage it with.

The not-so-simple process of getting started

When I finally got around to the newsletter, I took what I thought would be baby steps. I signed up for MailChimp and started poking my nose around. Then I dove (or maybe fell) head-first into what became quite the branding endeavor.

When MailChimp said, “Hey! You can create your own header for your newsletter” I went and got my logo and the newsletter name (Wordy Goodness) and meshed them into a pretty little graphic that would be on top of each newsletter.

When they said, “Here’s the link to your signup form!” I rewrote the copy they’d provided in each template. I could have just stuck with “To confirm your subscription, please click the link we just sent to your email” but that just didn’t sound like me. I rewrote (as much as they’d let me) of the copy on the unsubscribe form, even though I’m hoping not many people will click on that. I made sure the fonts and colors on each form matched the ones I’d been using on my site.

The YOU Filter

I was feeling pretty happy with myself. Getting started with my email newsletter even gave me an idea for a blog post about how we should seize every little opportunity to brand our business. If the signup form for your email newsletter supplies you with some generic copy, don’t settle for it. If you have to write a “Please do not disturb” sign outside your office, who says you have to use those words? And if someone stumbles upon a page that no longer exists on your site, why not find a way to tell them that other than “This page no longer exists”?

Let your voice pop up and charm customers with your unique personality in the most unexpected places—they’ll remember you for it. Before you do or say anything, pass it through the “You Filter.” Let your brand filter out all the generic gunk that’s floating about. Serve up a cup full of freshly brewed, customized goodness that says you know who you are and can’t help but show it.

So that’s what this blog post was supposed to be about. Until I pulled up my blog on my browser to start writing it.

Every last drop counts

You see, if you’ve ever been to the Inky Clean website, you’ll realize it doesn’t even look like a distant relative of this blog. *Update: The blog has since been redesigned (yay!), but here’s what it used to look like:

That’s because at the time I designed my website, I didn’t know enough about WordPress to make this blog match. So I picked the most unoffensive-looking free template I could find and left it at that. The result is that when you go from my site to this blog there is no brand continuity whatsoever. It basically goes from bubbly and fun to blah. Meh. Eh.

Not very memorable at all.

So there I was with this newsletter coming up in September, ready to send writing tips, special offers, links to this blog and Inky Clean’s latest news to subscribers. And I thought, if I worked so hard to brand the newsletter, why would I send people to this blog where the branding falls flat?

It was clearly time to keep filtering until every last drop had passed through my “You Filter” (or my Me Filter, or my Inky Clean filter, or…you get the point). So I went and hired someone to create a custom WordPress template for this blog that’ll match the Inky Clean site. I couldn’t be more excited about it, and I’m hoping that in the next few days the makeover will be complete.

I’ll make sure to let you know when it is (though hopefully, it’ll be pretty obvious). In the meantime, you can always sign up for my newsletter. Let me know what you think about the forms

Last week, it took me two hours to find the right facial sunblock online. A year ago, it would’ve taken me ten minutes—just a quick drive to my neighborhood pharmacy, picking up the same brand I’d used for years.

Why the big change?

About a year ago, I started copywriting for a new skin care line as they prepared to launch. I’ve written their web copy, bottle labels, product descriptions, brochures. Their goal was to make people rethink how they shop for beauty products and take a closer look at the ingredients. There are all sorts of potentially harmful chemicals in skin care products we see on shelves every day, in brands that many people trust (this video sums it up beautifully). Recently I also started writing for another beauty line that has a similar mission and because of this, sticks to natural ingredients.

There’s a point to all this, I swear.

Just yesterday, as I was explaining to my sister that many popular fragrances contain potentially harmful chemicals that are not listed on the label, I realized that I was the perfect example of a marketer’s dream consumer. I heard their message. I believed in it and made it part of my life. What’s more, I even passed the message on to others.

Clients often come to me with the concern that they don’t want to sound too pushy in their marketing copy (or sales-y, which has become a common term). When I initially sat down with the first skin care client, listening to how her products were different and how she was trying to improve her customers’ lives, it was enlightening. She didn’t need to be pushy because she knew exactly what problem she was solving for people. She had a genuine concern for their well-being and wanted to help.

The word “sales-y” has gotten a bad rap. We assume that to sell someone, we have to convince them, possibly even trick them, into thinking that they need what we’re offering. There’s a connotation of deception there, of sleaziness, of having to keep a person’s attention because they’d rather be doing something else. Those are clear signs of two things:

1) you’re targeting the wrong audience

2) you’re focusing on how they can help you instead of how you can help them

When people are truly loyal to a brand, it’s because they consider them a friend. That brand looks out for them, that brand helps them out every time. Instead of being pushy, the best thing we can do is listen to our audience’s needs and be that friend. Only then will they listen to your message and look for more of it. And, when they realize it’s not just talk, that your product can really follow through on the promise you’ve made, they’ll take it in and pass it on to their friends.

As I got my new sunblock in the mail today, I was actually grateful that there are companies out there looking out for their customers’ well-being. I changed my shopping habits and switched brands because I wanted a healthier alternative. Nobody had to convince me to make that decision. It was a matter of me wanting something, and of someone else having exactly what I was looking for.

How about you? What brands are you most loyal to, and why?