Feeds Aren't Replacing Email

It is no secret that I am an unabashed fan of email newsletters (when done correctly — if only more of them were). Last month web usability guru Jakob Nielsen released a new report on email newsletters and had some interesting things to say in the executive summary — I just came across it this morning, and no, I haven’t bought the whole 544-page report yet.

In particular, feeds aren’t replacing newsletters. While the report states the obvious in pointing out that people should stop using the phrase RSS since 82% of the users in the study had no idea what it means, more interesting was the lukewarm reception the concept itself is receiving among end users. Nielsen writes:

“Users had very mixed feelings about feeds. Some people liked viewing information from multiple sites in a single centralized location instead of having to go to each site. Some users also liked scanning a list of headlines without seeing any content that they didn’t ask for. A final benefit some users appreciated was the ability to determine when they would go and view their news items. This is in contrast with newsletter arrival times, which users can’t control.

“On the other hand, many users had negative feelings about feeds. People who are already suffering from information overload resent having to go to yet another source of information. In contrast, email newsletters arrive in a tool that people already use, so they don’t add yet another thing for over-burdened users to do. Email is also easier to archive for later use, whereas feeds have an ephemeral nature.”

Possibly this will change as RSS is “built in” to web browsers, which are a “tool that people already use.” However, I use both Firefox and IE7 interchangeably, and in both cases have used their built-in feed reading tools, and in both cases stopped doing so — not because of any conscious decision to stop but because it just never seemed that useful. (It might surprise diehard Firefox addicts to find that IE7’s subscription tools seem more elegant and intuitive than Firefox’s “live bookmarks.”)

So, what about stand-alone newsreading? Nielsen writes (emphasis added):

“SEVERAL PARTICIPANTS IN OUR STUDY HAD STOPPED USING THE FEEDS ON THEIR MY YAHOO PAGE. Many previous studies have found that users are reluctant to spend time customizing portals, so it’s not surprising that some users simply decided to stop looking at that part of the page rather than edit their preference settings.

“Finally, some users resented the fact that news feeds are divorced from the context of the publisher’s website. These users preferred the serendipity that came from visiting a full-fledged website that offered options beyond the current headlines.”

I am not surprised that people tend to abandon their customized feed pages like My Yahoo. Personally, it took me a couple years to get used to using Bloglines, but I finally do it. However, I pretty much use it to keep up with only about 20 blogs in one folder. There are about 200 other blogs I’ve subscribed to in other folders but I generally don’t open their feeds to look at new posts more than once or twice a month at the most. Compared to most bloggers who claim to track thousands and thousands of feeds these numbers must seem rather paltry but frankly it’s higher than I need. There are just too many blogs out there that confuse “frequent” with “interesting.”

Nielsen continues (emphasis added):

“News feeds are definitely not for everybody, and they’re not a replacement for email newsletters. Feeds can supplement newsletters for sites that cater to users who prefer a centralized view of headlines. These are primarily newspaper sites and other sites with a heavy focus on news and breaking stories, as well as sites that target Internet enthusiasts. FOR SITES THAT TARGET MAINSTREAM BUSINESS USERS OR A BROAD CONSUMER AUDIENCE, NEWS FEEDS MAY BE LESS IMPORTANT. Such sites might be better off emphasizing higher-quality newsletters and a choice of publication frequency.

“Also, our eyetracking of users reading news feeds showed that PEOPLE SCAN HEADLINES AND BLURBS IN FEEDS EVEN MORE RUTHLESSLY THAN THEY SCAN NEWSLETTERS. When you appear in somebody’s news reader, your site has a diminutive footprint that’s rubbing shoulders with a flood of headlines from many other sites …

“Feeds are a cold medium in comparison with email newsletters. FEEDS DON’T FORM THE SAME RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN COMPANY AND CUSTOMERS THAT A GOOD NEWSLETTER CAN BUILD. … Given that newsletters are a warmer and much more powerful medium, it is probably best for most companies to encourage newsletter subscriptions and promote them over feeds on their website.”

It’s been hip to write email off for years, but even while spam filters and short attention spans make good email marketing harder and harder, nothing else comes close in terms of relationship, delivery, and measurable results. As Nielsen concludes:

“Four years ago, in our first report about newsletter usability, we said about the future of email newsletters: ‘There may be none. Legitimate use of email is at war with spam, and spam may be winning.’ Although four years is a very short period in which to assess big trends, we now believe that this assessment was too negative. Email newsletters are so powerful that the best of them do have a future, despite ever-more adverse conditions.”

In other words, the problem with your organization’s email newsletter is not “email as a medium.” The problem with your organization’s email newsletter is the way you’re doing it.

UPDATE: Just read Ben’s post on RSS from yesterday. I agree with him that it’s a good idea for associations to start offering feeds before people start asking for them, not after. While it’s still an open question as to how feeds are really going to be adapted by our end users/customers/members, feeds are now so easy to generate it’s something we should all offer and monitor.

But don’t go swimming in the deep end of the Kool Aid. Unless your members are bloggers or podcasters or programmers or other geek enthusiast types, email newsletters, when well done, will produce better results for the foreseeable future.