On and off for the past several months Rich and I have discussed sending out a survey to our loyal newsletter readers to see if they felt they were getting the most value out of our newsletter. However, it was never quite a top priority for either of us. There were always just other projects to work on and other tasks to do. Then about six weeks ago we noticed our readership had been down for our last couple of newsletters and decided it might finally be time to put together our survey.

We used used a survey service provided by Constant Contact, the same company we use to help us with our newsletters. To make the process as easy possible we largely used questions from a template provided by Constant Contact in addition to a few original questions of our own. (The only real problem was trying to determine the wording of a particular question where we weren’t sure if we wanted to gauge people’s “satisfaction” with our newsletter, or the amount of “value” they found in it; this might sound like a minor detail, but it was something there was a fair amount of internal discussion over.)

What we ultimately found after the surveys were sent and the results were in was very beneficial, and we thank all those who took the time to answer our questions, and we promise we will do our best to implement your thoughts, suggestions, and comments in our future newsletters.

Some of these findings suggest we should make minor changes, such as sending the newsletter on Wednesdays instead of Thursdays, having shorter article “teasers,” putting in more pictures, and, at least for now, sending the newsletter once a month rather than twice a month. Other results though have helped us make some very important decisions concerning the content we provide. For example, we found that our readers would like more case studies and more articles on industry trends. They also want clearer calls to action. And, they have convinced us to try to bring in the occasional special guest blogger.

Now, you may not see all these changes right away, but we guarantee we are working on them to bring you a better newsletter, one that, to paraphrase one of our respondents, is not just another information source, but something that compels you to act, adjust, and analyze your business.