How to write effective Process Education Mailers/newsletters?

How to write effective Process Education Mailers/newsletters?

Many a times working as a Service Manager we find ourselves in a situation when we have updates/observations which have to be shared with the larger audience i.e. Technical teams or users.

Under SIAM environment these technical teams /users might belong to different organizations hence making it a really cumbersome process to reach the entire audience.  

As we know that these technical teams are like customers for service management and fully aware customer is a boon for us since we have to spend lesser amount of time in auditing as compared to a situation wherein we need to guide them on every step.

We all know that for these small updates/common mistakes or FAQ we cannot call all the resources for a classroom session for two reasons:

1. All resources are billable and a classroom session might affect their productivity

2. It is a daunting task to reach out to the entire audience

Now what is the way out?

It can be dealt through sharing such updates/FAQ etc. through Weekly Process education snippets/reminders.

We can derive the following benefits from these educational reminders:

1. These snippets provides small piece of information which is very easier to understand.

2. These updates go straight to the email box of each individual hence this information is easily available when it is required which increases it value to our customers i.e. Technical Teams/targeted audience.

Remember Service Managers might not be available 24X7 so these small pieces of information works as a lighthouse for the teams in the hour of need.

3. As stated earlier this information goes straight to the email boxes of each individual which eases our dependency on the lead to share this vital information.

4. We also understand that we cannot call everyone for classroom session for small updates so it is the best way to communicate with the targeted audience. 

5. This information can be read/assimilate by the targeted audience as per their comfort so it will not affect the overall productivity.

We have also need to keep the following points in mind to make it more effective:

1. Keep it simple, easier to understand:  Avoid short forms remember not everyone is aware about the entire ITIL terminology.

2. Make it eye catching: Now this is interesting. How can an education email which is eye catching is more effective in comparison to an email which contains probably the same piece of information but is more plane or simpler.

The answer lies in human tendency to recognize information on the basis of its color/appearance etc. We cannot remember everything so human brain recognize majority of the information and recall on the basis of similarity of facts/situations.

For example how to make decrease the number of incident?

We cannot expect an individual to remember everything written on an education mailer that was sent 2 months back!

However he can recall that there was an education email (which might have caught his attention owing to its colorfulness/presentation among the heaps of email received on daily basis).

Following statement strengthen this fact (source The Human Memory -https://www.human-memory.net/processes_recall.html):

3. Selection of Correct target audience:  Selection of target audience is important. For example - an email sent to Service Desk regarding correct change categorization would not serve any purpose.

4. Searchable when required: Well we all know we receives hundreds of emails every day. Searching a correct education email (if there is no consistency) would be like searching a needle in a haystack.

This issue can be resolved through keeping the main subject of education email consistent for example- "Weekly Education Email /reminder -XXXX (Sub Subject) XXXXX

5. Ensure Usefulness: Information shared should carry some usefulness in other words it should contain information which can be used.

For example - An education email guiding how to create a new CI would not carry any weight for Technical teams than an email containing simple steps to extract report from remedy/service now.

6. Request and act on feedback: Service Management is not a science. It is based on best practice so we learn new things every day. Hence keep two way communication open which means we need to be ready for a feedback from the audience so that we can improve. For example - technical teams may want us to send some specific education mailer for correct remedy/service now code or they may want us to send what to do when no root cause is found for a problem record.