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Small Business Success Story: Justice & Young
By Matt Alderton Slivers and Scribble

Published July 24, 2007

W. Dale Justice explains how his small public relations firm gets big marketing results with a branded client newsletter.

W. Dale Justice is celebrating a birthday this month. Not his own, but rather that of his 10-year-old company, Justice & Young Marketing and Public Relations. A graphic artist by trade, Justice left corporate America in 1984 to start his own design and photography studio. He liked the independence that being an entrepreneur afforded him, but was running out of gas from going it solo. So in 1997, he partnered with a former colleague, Gene Young, who owned a small marketing consultancy. The two merged and built Cincinnati-based Justice & Young, a fresh entity that is quickly approaching adolescence a decade later. “We are marketers,” Justice says of his company, which has 15 employees. “We help our clients draw a clear line of communication between what they have to sell and what their target audience wants to buy.”

Marketing successfully requires a heck of a lot of research, according to Justice. More than that, though, it requires sincerity.

“Marketing to some is simply shouting how good their product is and how their products will attract the opposite sex, make your teeth whiter, simplify your life or make you perform better romantically,” he says. “Consumers have been trained not to believe mass advertising hype by the very people trying to sell them something. They will, however, believe a trusted friend, peer or fellow consumer. So our task becomes one of education, not solicitation.”

Small businesses and big ones alike are marketing in a game that has new rules, Justice observes. Those rules mandate that advertisements are out and conversations are in-which is exactly why Justice & Young publishes its own bi-monthly e-newsletter, The Compass.

Constant, Consistent Communication
As a marketing company, Justice & Young is under constant pressure to practice what it preaches. When it tells its customers, therefore, that brand awareness and loyalty-not gimmicks-are king, it must prove it not only with its words, but also with its actions. That's why the company started publishing The Compass three years ago. Its executive-level bi-monthly e-mail newsletter is a promotional vehicle in which the company collects marketing case studies, campaigns and strategies to share with its clients and prospects. It's an opportunity to stay constantly and consistently in touch with both current and future customers. “We publish thought leadership articles on current trends in marketing and public relations, and share best practices within the industry from the client perspective,” Justice says. A typical Compass article is one that the company wrote recently for its local business journal-and re-printed in its newsletter-about choosing an advertising agency. Far from an advertisement, it included tips on finding and selecting a marketing partner. “They may or may not choose Justice & Young, but the advice is universal,” Justice says. “It was tremendously successful. It not only educated by offering sage advice on the topic of agency selection, but it positioned Justice & Young as the expert on the subject. We were able to trace several new business opportunities directly to the article and the newsletter.”

The newsletter is an opt-in publication, meaning that readers must choose to read it. That makes it an incredibly valuable vehicle, according to Justice. “Unsolicited letters and cold calls are yesterday's prospecting tools,” he says. A content-laden newsletter, on the other hand, is something modern-day consumers both want and need. And when customers choose to hear your message, they're many times more likely to listen to it.

How to Start Your Own Newsletter
Justice likens a newsletter to a dripping faucet-it's always on, slowly building your brand as it drips with those who read it.

“If you want to reach a customer or prospect in a meaningful way, you must provide something of value to them,” Justice says.

For the same reason that blogs are becoming so powerful-they provide the author a means for engaging the reader directly with valuable information-e-mail newsletters are a low-cost, high-impact way for small business owners to market themselves to information-hungry customers.

To follow Justice & Young's example and start your own newsletter, consider these five simple steps:

1. Develop content. Before you can publish a newsletter, Justice says, you've got to have something in it. “What could you communicate to your customers that is valuable to them and not viewed as completely self-serving?” he asks. “What would make their lives easier, their businesses run more smoothly? What service does this information provide and why would it matter? Put yourself completely in your customer's shoes.” Start with a column about the state of your industry, or conduct a Q&A interview with one of your customers. If you can't find news, make news.

2. Find your audience. Don't worry about creating a newsletter that has millions of nameless subscribers. Instead, start with a newsletter that reaches just a few important customers. “If your message is well-researched, meaningful and valuable to your customer, it is amazing how few [readers] it takes to create real change,” Justice says. “Don't mass disseminate; target specific customers you would like to win. As a small business owner, how many new customers would it take to meaningfully change your business? One, two, a dozen, three dozen?”

3. Design your newsletter. Your newsletter doesn't have to be pretty, but it does have to be readable. Consider an automated solution such as Bronto, Constant Contact or JangoMail to help you create and build your e-mail newsletter; the same programs can help you manage your subscribers and communicate with them.

4. Distribute it. Your newsletter is useless if you don't send it to your readers. Justice recommends pitching one of your articles to your local newspaper and archiving your past issues online in order to get the word out to potential subscribers. “Enlist your sales staff and customer service reps to offer sign-up for your newsletter with every customer communication, including phone calls, statement stuffers, invoices and even on-hold messages,” he says. “The object here is to get the word out and attract people to opt in.”

5. Measure results. After publishing a few issues of your new newsletter, ask yourself if it's working. “Our newsletter has been published for three years,” Justice says. “We have in that time accumulated 500 recipients, some of which are probably competitors. We have as of now around 30 active clients. The addition of just three new clients in one year could have a dramatic influence on my business. Think small.”

Republished with permission, Small Business Resource Center, The Professional Network, Nielsen Business Media.

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