As a former marketing manager for two different tech startups, I learned first -hand that e -mail newsletter can be an incredibly powerful tool in the toolbox of a marketer.
In this article I have put together a comprehensive checklist that you can use to start with your e -mail newsletter strategy.
If you are based on my own experiences as well as expert tips and the latest data-controlled knowledge, you will find everything you need to know about designing, completing, completing and sending your own email newsletter.
How to start an e -mail newsletter
The creation of a great e -mail newsletter is not just about bringing some content together.
You have to correct the copy, create convincing calls, design the email so that it works for several inboxes and devices, avoid spam trigger, brainstorming-click lines and much more.
You also have to make sure that you are legally compliant. And if you mess up part of your e -mail, there is no cancellation as soon as you have sent it to your subscribers – the pressure is on.
The good news is that if you follow the following checklist, you can create a convincing, effective newsletter.
Ready to get started? Here you will find everything you need to know to create an e -mail newsletter that is tailored to your business or personal goals.
Step 1. Select an e -mail newsletter platform.
The first thing you have to do is the best e -mail newsletter platform for your budget, your goals and your technical skills.
Drift Kings Media offers One of the best e -mail marketing tools You can send optimized, well -designed newsletters. It is part of Marketing hubA collection of marketing automation software for small previous companies.
Step 2. Define the goal of your newsletter.
Find out the types of newsletters that you can send in our free e -mail newsletter guidelines.
As soon as you have selected an e -mail newsletter platform, it is time to think about your goals. Think about why you are investing in your newsletter and how it fits your larger content strategy.
As Marketing expert Ammar Mazhar explains: “With clear goals, it can be easier to determine the effectiveness of the campaign and make the necessary adjustments to improve performance.”
Mazhar continues: “Goals also help to reconcile the e -mail marketing efforts with the general business objectives and to ensure that the campaign matches the goals of the company and the target groups.”
The main goals of your newsletter can:
- Fahrenblog or website traffic
- Create leads
- Acquire more e -mail contacts
- Promotion of your products and services
You should also define some important performance indicators or KPIs for each of your goals. It is important to go about “how many people have opened my e -mail” and instead find KPIs who are closely linked to their business goals.
Of course, E -Mail -Office can be a great indicator of the performance of a newsletter -but you shouldn’t be the only number that you follow.
According to a survey of 2023 Drift Kings Media, one of three marketers reports that the click rate is one of the two best metrics that they are pursuing when measuring the performance of an email campaign. If you are not sure where to start, you will find some more e -mail marketing metrics that are worth considering.
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Step 3. Select a template and collect your content.
If you have not yet designed your own emails, I recommend dealing with prefabricated templates that can save you a lot of difficulties across the board. And if you use Drift Kings Media, you can easily prepare templates directly in the E -mail tool.
As soon as you have a template, you must of course come up with some content.
Depending on your goals and the cadence of your newsletter, you may have to be proactive in order to find content. For example, if you only want to send a newsletter once a month, the bookmark relevant links can be a good option during the month.
I always recommend searching your company’s blog, social media accounts, offers for lead generation, internal newsletter and training documents for inspiration.
Do you need inspiration for the content you can include in your newsletter? Lifting spots E -Mail newsletter -Lookbook Lift some of the best e -mail newsletters from all industries to plan your e -mail newsletter.
Step 4. Personal your template.
No matter how good your template is, creating a great newsletter requires certain personalization. Lifting spots Marketing hubYou can adjust your template by clicking on elements and editing the specifications in the left area.
Personalization does not mean that your template should be conspicuous. Even newsletters with minimal text and color formatting can do well. Instead of adding many unnecessary custom functions, the recipients can make the best designs easy to scan the e -mails and click on interactive elements.
Pro tip: I like to use lifting spots Ai -E -Mail writer To help me design newsletters. This tool can generate a first draft of your copy, and you can then select a template that meets your requirements.
Another key component of an e -mail newsletter -template is mobile responsiveness.
Most internet users are on a mobile deviceMobile-friendly email design not negotiable. So make sure that it looks good, regardless of the screen size when personalizing your template.
Step 5. Monitor your e -mail newsletter size.
If you send a regular e -mail, you don’t usually have to worry about the size. However, when it comes to e -mail newsletter, it is important that you have optimized factors such as size, width and solution of your e -mail.
Most providers pay in A Newsletter size Of 600 pixels wide, with another 30 pixel body pads on all sides. If this adaptation takes place, the content may not look very good in your newsletter. It is therefore important to ensure that your newsletter design fits into this standard 600 pixel width.
E -Mail height (or rather, length) is a little more flexible: Ultimately, your e -mail can take as long as you want, and e -mail clients are probably not distorting the design.
If your e -mail continues for and continued, people click much less on their website or other CTAs. In addition, e -mail clients with sensitive spam filters can mark your e -mail as spam if it is excessively lengthy.
If you are not sure how long it is too long, a rule of thumb that I found to be helpful is to ensure that your recipients will not take more than a second to scroll until the end of your e -mail. I also recommend sending an e -mail preview and downloading it to check the size. This is what it looks like in Mail Mail:
In general, it is unlikely that the download below 100 kb from e -mail provider such as Google Mail or Yahoo!.
Step 6. Add your body content.
Now it’s time for the funny part: to fill your template with words and pictures. This will be the meat of your e -mail newsletter, so it is worth spending the time to perfect it.
Ben BerkleyManaging editor for The hustle and bustlesays it should be clear to your audience what type of value from the newsletter can be expected – but make sure that your content is not predictable. In this way, readers never know what they will get, but “they know that it will be worth theirs during the reading.”
If you are not sure where to start, this comprehensive guide offers some helpful tips and tricks for creating e -mail newsletters. I also love these E -Mail newsletters that you can look for for inspiration.
But in general I found that the copy of the copy is briefly and flush an effective way to promote click sticks (although there are certainly many exceptions).
In addition, including numerous pictures, can help support your copy and to engage your readers. You can also consider using generative AI tools such as Chatgpt to create a first draft.
In a 2023 -hubspot survey among marketing experts, it was found that 43% of the global marketers believe that generative AI is helpful for writing copies for e -mails.
Don’t forget to work thoroughly to your e -mail content. You may even want to share it with a teammate to get a fresh set of eyes and catch mistakes that you may have missed.
As soon as the email has been sent, you can not repair these embarrassing typing errors.
Step 7. Add personalization tokens and intelligent content.
When I get an e -mail newsletter that feels as if it had only been written for me, I open it, click on the links and share it with my friends. If it feels like a trustworthy friend or mentor to take the time to put together a thoughtful content with only the things I am interested in, it is a recipe for the commitment.
As a senior content writer Rebecca Riserbato explains: “One of the main advantages of the e -mail marketing is that your content can be very personalized for the needs of your audience. Your e -mails can contain variations, including various images or subject lines, to increase your commitment. You can even create segmented lists based on geography or commitment levels. “
So what does it take to create a newsletter that really feels personal? Here are three of my favorite strategies.
1. Segience your e -mails.
The first strategy is to include your e -mails in several groups. In this way, you can select content that is specific for each audience instead of sending everyone the same.
As a digital marketing expert Maggie Douglas describes in her Comprehensive review The e -mail segmentation “If you get your e -mail marketing properly, your customers receive relevant e -mails with information that you actually want. This personalization leads to more conversions, more purchases and happier customers. “
2. Use personalization token.
Next use you Personalization token To greet individual recipients by name, congratulate them on an anniversary or birthday or refer to certain topics that you are most interested in.
If your marketing software supports personalization -wins, this is generally pretty easy to implement -and can significantly improve your conversion rates. In Drift Kings Medias Marketing Hub you can add personalization tokens by simply clicking on “Personalization” in the upper navigation bar.
Pro tip: I don’t like to use too many personalization tokens. It’s all about balance: a bit of custom content is good, but you don’t want to crawl out your recipients, especially because Data privacy is an increasing concern of consumers.
3. Use intelligent content.
After all, it is another good way to personalize your e -mails. Intelligent content enable a segment of their audience to show a content and show other audiences to other content.
An intelligent CTA could, for example, enable potential customers to see a CTA for talking to a sales employee, while existing customers could see a CTA to get tickets for a only customer event.
None of the two audiences would like to see the CTA of the other audience, and with intelligent content like this, they can only show each person the CTA that is relevant for their needs.
Step 8. Select your subject line and your sender name.
Most of us tend to concentrate on the body of an e -mail, but the subject line and the sender are just as important. I even found that these two key elements are sometimes even more Critical because he determines whether a receiver even opens the e -mail.
There are a number of approaches to take into account for the sender. Some marketers like to stick to their company names, while others prefer to use their own names. Whatever you choose, make sure that it is easy to recognize so that your recipients are not confused who they are and why they receive their e -mail.
Subject lines are a little more difficult. The brevity is important, and an immediately implementable value promise can make a subject line more click value. A study by Detresponse recommends to keep your subject lines below 70 characters.
But sometimes a surprising or unusual subject line can also be a great way to attract people’s attention: for example, a subject line that only reads “not cool, boys” can be very effective in the drive clicks.
This article offers over a hundred examples of subject lines that you can use for inspiration, but at the end of the day these are all just a starting point for your own creativity. So start with these ideas and best practices, but then carry out A/B tests to see what swings the most with your audience.
Step 9. Alt text and plain text included.
There is more about an e -mail than what most of us see. Inclusion of a simple text version and old text for all images is crucial to ensure that your e -mail is accessible to all readers.
Alt -Text is the text that is displayed when a image is not properly loaded, and it is also the text that is read out loud for users who are relying on a screen reader.
Since some of your users may use screen readers and not load all e -mail providers correctly, it is important that you have recorded a clear, useful old text. In this way, you can also be able to follow the e -mail content, even if the recipients cannot see the pictures.
This is particularly important if your e -mail image contains. If you rely on a picture for controlling clicks, your conversion rates without an old text suffer.
In addition, some e -mail clients cannot display HTML design elements correctly. To ensure that users can continue to read their e -mails with these customers, they must also create e -mails that also look good in plain language.
This means that you can ensure that links are easy to click and that it is clear what your e -mail is about, even without photos and formatting.
Step 10. Make sure you are legally compliant.
In addition to marketing considerations, it is also important that your e -mails meet with relevant laws and regulations. For most organizations, the two most important laws that marketers have to worry about are Can-Spam and GDPR.
- Can-spam is a law of the United States, according to which a footer in the e -mail newsletter records with the mailing address of your organization and an easy way to cancel future marketing emails.
- GdPR is a similar, but more comprehensive European data protection law, which (among other things) requires that marketers only send e -mail newsletters to people who have expressly opted for this. In other words, wherever you collect email addresses on your website, you cannot automatically check the “opt-in” field for users who live in Europe, you have to deliberately check this check box yourself.
As Denys KontorskyyFormerly a content author for e -mail delivery platform Mailtrap, explained“Just like every law, you are faced with a punishment if (e -mail marketing regulations are not followed). In this case it is usually … a strong fine. “
In addition, you will end up with various block lists that damage your reputation at E -Mail service provider and customers. “Before you send something from your e -mail list to the people, it is important to understand what can be included in your e -mails,” says Kontorskyy.
Step 11. Test different browsers and e -mail providers.
E -Mail providers do not read all e -mail code. An e -mail that looks good in Gmail in Chrome could look terrible outlookFor example. Therefore, I always recommend testing e -mails in the most popular browsers and e -mail providers.
((Pro tip: After StatistaThe three most popular E -Mail services are Mail, Yahoo! Mail and Microsoft Outlook.)
If you have HubSpot, you can test your e -mails for various providers directly in the e -mail newsletter. Alternatively, you can create e -mail accounts for yourself on the websites of different providers and install different web browsers and then test everyone manually.
Step 12. Send your e -mail.
The moment of truth! Make sure that all of your e -mail recipients have subscribed to get this e -mail, and your e -mail contains branding and legal compliance that it is worth, it is time to send click. Then wait for the data to penetrate.
Step 13. Analyze and ittery.
A few days forward quickly. How did your newsletter appear? And what should you do next?
To answer these questions, check how your e -mails were carried out in the goals described at the beginning. Use a tracking tool to see which on the left in your e -mail received the most clicks and which design elements have probably contributed most to your destinations.
Once you have this data, you can use it to inform how to put together your next e -mail newsletter. Regardless of whether your next send in one day, a week, a month or a quarter, you can use these data -controlled knowledge to make every newsletter better than the last.
Create your e -mail newsletter
E -Mail newsletter are an important part of a scalable e -mail marketing strategy.
With all the steps that I shared above, you are on the best way to create a winning e -mail newsletter strategy that ultimately helps you to convert further leads and expand your company.
Note from the publisher: This post was originally published in March 2014 and updated for completeness.