"Member News from behind the blocks" emails

I think a newsletter was a smart move. With e-mail newsletters it's always best to have an opt-in list, but we're all members so it's not like they just harvested random e-mails and spammed us. If you're not into it, unsubscribing isn't that hard. If USMS has big plans for growth they need to communicate with and engage the current members on a regular basis. Not every day or anything like that, but an email once or twice a month is pretty unobtrusive. I would imagine moves like this would help retention and make it easier for people to recommend masters as being worth the $40 to their friends. Without some kind of internet outreach most swimmers only hear from USMS every 60 days via Swimmer Magazine, that's not going to cut it for a lot of people... especially people like me that train by ourselves. Plus there is a ton of great content on the usms.org site that most people would never see if you didn't tell them that it was there. You have people writing articles on a regular basis for the site that take 3 or 4 clicks to find, this content needs help from a newsletter to actually get read by more people. Being registered in South Pacific Masters I get a regular e-mail from them that I find to be full of really valuable information. I welcome the idea of getting similar communications from USMS to keep me up on what's going on with masters. I think it creates a lot of value, especially for the folks out there that don't venture onto the forums or the USMS site.

I think a newsletter was a smart move. With e-mail newsletters it's always best to have an opt-in list, but we're all members so it's not like they just harvested random e-mails and spammed us. If you're not into it, unsubscribing isn't that hard. If USMS has big plans for growth they need to communicate with and engage the current members on a regular basis. Not every day or anything like that, but an email once or twice a month is pretty unobtrusive. I would imagine moves like this would help retention and make it easier for people to recommend masters as being worth the $40 to their friends. Without some kind of internet outreach most swimmers only hear from USMS every 60 days via Swimmer Magazine, that's not going to cut it for a lot of people... especially people like me that train by ourselves. Plus there is a ton of great content on the usms.org site that most people would never see if you didn't tell them that it was there. You have people writing articles on a regular basis for the site that take 3 or 4 clicks to find, this content needs help from a newsletter to actually get read by more people. Being registered in South Pacific Masters I get a regular e-mail from them that I find to be full of really valuable information. I welcome the idea of getting similar communications from USMS to keep me up on what's going on with masters. I think it creates a lot of value, especially for the folks out there that don't venture onto the forums or the USMS site.