How to Write an Email Newsletter: Ultimate Guide
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An email newsletter is a powerful marketing tool every business should consider.
But getting started can feel confusing, and knowing how to make your newsletter great is even more of a minefield. Not anymore. You’ve found a full guide on how to write an email newsletter, perfect for marketers at the start of their newsletter journey.
A newsletter is a regular email that goes out to anyone who subscribes. Usually, that means customers, clients, readers and fans.
It generally contains helpful tips, announcements or promotions, keeping subscribers in the loop and keeping the brand at the top of their minds.
Ultimately, email newsletters are a great way to build and maintain relationships with a warm audience. In other words, those people who have previously shown an interest in your organization and what it has to say.
You can send email newsletters daily, weekly, monthly or on an ad-hoc basis, but it’s best to turn writing and sending into an ongoing habit for better brand awareness.
Anyone with access to WiFi, an email service provider and a subscriber list can write an email newsletter.
Usually, email newsletters are written by copywriters, or email marketing specialists or agencies. They’re suitable for solopreneurs, medium to large businesses, non-profits, global organizations and anyone else looking to engage with their audience.
People who are already aware of your brand and want to receive regular updates or advice are most likely to subscribe to your email newsletter.
Hubspot polled 400 consumers and found that the main reasons for subscribing to newsletters include discounts, announcements, news, educational content and promotions.
It’s important to understand what your readers are looking for, and then ensure your newsletter provides it to them.
If you’re considering newsletters as a way to keep your audience engaged, this guide is for you.
Here’s a step-by-step of how to write an email newsletter, starting with a holistic view of your newsletter and ending with some guidelines for individual emails.
Consider why you want to create a newsletter. Do you want to position your business as an authority by sharing your expertise? Are you trying to build a community, increase brand awareness or boost traffic to your website?Your newsletter could include general news and promotions from your company, or could hone in on a specific vertical aligned with a suitable audience base.
The best email newsletters balance around 90% of educational content with 10% of promotional content.That’s because your subscribers don’t want to be sold to all the time.Instead, your main focus should be on sharing valuable, educational and exciting information that provides your readers with value.
Bring the ultimate time-saving tool into the email newsletter creation process: an email builder.Email builders like Publicate are key to the design process. They contain hundreds of pre-made, highly engaging newsletter templates you can easily customize with a drag-and-drop interface and are packed with time saving features.The ideal option for anyone without coding or design experience, and businesses who want to save money on outsourcing, an email builder makes it easy to create on-brand newsletters that follow email design best practices.
Enhance the user experience by keeping newsletters uncluttered.Avoid over-explaining in rambling emails. Instead, give readers a taste of your message and send them to another source if needed, such as a blog, landing page or product page.Use white space and small blocks of text for an engaging, easy-to-digest design.
The US’s CAN-SPAM act, enforced by the Federal Trade Commission, says there must be a clear way for subscribers to opt out of your email marketing.While this may feel like the worst outcome, an ‘Unsubscribe’ option actually keeps your email list clear and helps you maintain an engaged subscriber list. In other words, you only keep talking to the people who want to hear from you and might eventually buy from you.
The best newsletter writing examples have been thoroughly tested, tweaked and optimized.
Test designs across multiple email clients and devices (smartphones and desktops) before sending them to your subscriber base. It’s important that the formatting looks good, no matter where your subscribers are opening emails.
Make use of analytics to track what’s working well for your brand.
Some email builders like Publicate also include advanced analytics to help. They track engagement regardless of where you send your newsletter, even on Outlook and Gmail, so you maximize engagement by monitoring elements like open, click rates and heat maps.
With detailed audience insights, you can experiment with content and discover what resonates most, continually improving the performance of your newsletters over time.
It’s hard to tackle how to write an email newsletter without knowing what kind of newsletter you want to launch.
Here are some newsletter ideas to inspire you:
By now you should know what you want to achieve from an email newsletter, and the type of newsletter you’ll send out.
That means it’s time to learn how to structure your emails.
Consider crafting each email with two or more sections. Each section should be relatively small (walls of text are a no-go) and should focus on one point or message.
Aim to give maximum value and use your content to drive readers toward your call-to-action (CTA). A good CTA is formatted as a button in a bold color.
Feel free to use images, GIFs and videos in your newsletter. Just don’t overdo it, as this can increase loading times – no one has the time for slow-loading emails!
Let’s break down the key components that make up any good email newsletter.
Your newsletters should include:
This section covers how to write an email newsletter that will be well-received by your subscribers. Follow our best practice tips to make sure they look forward to seeing your email in their inboxes.
Too much text and too many images can be overwhelming.
Keep emails brief to hold your readers’ attention and focus on the key action you want them to take. If you need to expand more on a point, link readers to a blog or webpage.
Send test emails to yourself and a friend or colleague before sending them to your entire subscriber base.
This is an opportunity to make sure all links work, check for typos, and make sure your email renders well across devices and email platforms.
75% of consumers use their smartphones most often to check email.
Don’t lose this sizeable audience segment with newsletters that render poorly on mobile.
The good news is you can create email newsletters with an email builder like Publicate, knowing all templates are responsive by default and are tested on over 57 email clients and devices. In other words, they’ll look great whether opened on a desktop, tablet or smartphone.
The best approach is to send newsletters often enough to be remembered, but not so often that it’s annoying.
Monitor your newsletter frequency to find the right balance. Aim to be consistent, so readers know when to expect your communication.
The only way to know how to write an email newsletter is to also know what not to do.
Avoid these 4 things for the best chances of newsletter success.
You have lots of value to give, but avoid letting your newsletter’s word count creep too high. Anything below 250 words is most likely to be read all the way through.
The best newsletters encourage readers to take action (from sending an enquiry or clicking through to a blog post).
Focus on leading readers toward your desired action instead of giving them a novel to read. Aim for no more than three short paragraphs.
Consider what your audience wants to know and tailor your content to that.
Always strive to add value: How can you save your audience time, grow their knowledge or connect with them?
Choose one main call-to-action per newsletter and stick to that. Ask yourself, what is the one thing you want your reader to do from reading your newsletter, and then focus the design and content around that.
You can share this via multiple links throughout the email, but they should all direct recipients to the same place. This ensures a clear path and prevents confusion.
You’re busy, we know, but don’t let your newsletter slip!
Send newsletters regularly to keep your brand top of mind.
Top tip: Use email newsletter templates to speed up the process, so you can spend less time designing and focus on sharing the content that matters.
It’s time we rounded up everything you need to know about creating an email newsletter.
Use this section as a sort of checklist to help you create the best newsletter for your brand.
Email newsletters keep you connected with your audience. From building relationships to growing your business, they’re a content marketing tool no one should skip.
Now you know how to write an email newsletter, all that’s left to do is come up with an idea, sign up for an email builder like Publicate and get started.
