The Perfect Email Promo: Emiliano Granado

New York-based commercial photographer Emiliano Granado has been sending out newsletters since 2007. “It’s the one thing that most people react to,” and he’s recently started integrating social media like Tumblr and Twitter to enhance the “amplification” effect to get more people viewing his images and brand. He’s one of the few photographers we’ve seen that has a newsletter signup form on his website homepage (and that’s a good thing).

The first iteration was completely designed and dispatched by Emiliano in 2007, but he’s recently undergone a brand redesign which included a custom typeface for his name that he uses on his website, newsletter, and blog. “I remember very actively stealing ideas from people,” he says with a smile, “I don’t remember being influenced content-wise or tonally,” but the graphic design was influenced by other newsletters that he’s seen.

“Corey Arnold and I have a newsletter warfare. He’ll send one out, and I’ll be like ‘Dude, your newsletter looks so awesome,” and then I’ll send mine out and he’ll say, ‘Aw, you beat me!’” A little friendly competition helps push the creative boundaries of the newsletter.

Emiliano’s amicability is part of his marketing charm. Does he view a newsletter as an analytic tool to be dissected into open rates and click-thru rates? “God no!” he exclaims, “There’s hard minded marketing, and there’s a softer branded kind of marketing. One is immediate returns and results, click-thru rates, and how many jobs do you book. I don’t think that works at all for my business. My business is based on people thinking I’m awesome and I’m doing awesome work…there’s a long term relationship with my brand in order to hire me.”

He uses Campaign Monitor as his Email Service Provider, and the layout and formatting of his newsletters is consistent: “One big photo, whatever photo I like the best at the moment, and three news stories underneath. I usually wait to send out a newsletter until I have three good stories to talk about, otherwise it’s kind of BS…you’re not really saying anything. I try to send it out four times a year, and the day that the newsletter goes out, I get tons of hits. It seems to be the most effective, most memorable [technique].”

Freelance photo editor, Ashley Macknica, is a huge fan of the newsletter. “He’s got a couple different projects that show a range of what he’s been up to lately. It feels personal, and there’s a narrative with each of the images, and it reminds you of what he’s been up to. It feels like you got a little phone call from him, so I think it’s really successful.”

We like it because it’s successful in marrying great photography with great design in an authentic way. Ideally, he would dispatch the newsletter with greater frequency, but in only releasing the newsletter when he has new work that he’s proud of, he maintains his brand identity.

Wanna learn more about e-mail marketing? Download our free guide “Email Marketing for Photographers.”