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Most businesses start out their email marketing efforts by sending the same message to all their subscribers. It's easy, and it often gets great results. The next step beyond a one-size-fits-all approach is to be smarter about what content you send to each person.

Today I received an email that is a great example of targeted newsletters. The email was from FontShop, an independent font retailer and Campaign Monitor customer. FontShop sent me as a registered user the first edition of their Web & Interactive Design newsletter.

The idea is to discuss fonts as they relate specifically to the web — what works well on screen, for example. So how did FontShop decide I should receive this particular email? When I created a free account, I was given the chance to fill out a profile and select my professional areas of expertise and interest.

That information is obviously used to segment the total subscriber base into smaller chunks that can then be sent more targeted content. In Campaign Monitor, you can use our segmenting feature combined with some custom fields to do exactly this.

FontShop don't force everyone who creates an account to receive emails from them (or any form of marketing). My account also contains a subscription settings page, where I can select to opt-in or opt-out of emails and print brochures at any time.

This is a well considered setup, and should make a significant difference to the response rates that FontShop sees from their campaigns. I know I was very interested in what a web specific newsletter would cover.

Now that they are sending out these targeted emails, Fontshop will be able to take advantage of the report comparisons feature to easily compare opens, clicks and unsubscribes for each segment.

How could you make your emails more valuable to your subscribers? How can your subscribers be split into smaller groups?

Related information:

• Watch a video walkthrough on working with custom fields and segments
• Use the preference center to let people self-segment
• Signup for a free FontShop account