How to write a newsletter

How to build a newsletter?

1 – Insert your sender

2 – Subject

3 – Content: What to write in a newsletter?

4 – Sending

Make it something people want to read

This one should be obvious, but I get emails telling me someone’s life story or things I couldn’t care less about all the time. It’s a waste of my time.

Your audience doesn’t care about your life or your problems. They only care about how you can help THEM with THEIR life and problems. 

It’s just human psychology.

By the same token, don’t only send ads to your list. (Unless that’s why they opted in for, then give them what they want.)

Ask yourself: If I got this email, would I care? It’s hard to be objective, but try.

Fix your open rates

Getting people to open your emails is half the battle.

MailChimp ran a study of their customers and found the average open rate across all industries on their platform is just 20.81%.

In other words, only a fifth of your subscribers will open your email.

Luckily, you can improve that drastically by:

1. Writing great subject lines.
2. Building trust with your audience that your emails are worth reading.
3. Using your name in the “From” address instead of a brand name.

Put another way, here’s an equation:

Interesting Subject Line + Audience Trust = Open Rates

Be consistent in your delivery

This one’s easy! Don’t send so many emails you annoy your audience, but don’t be a ghost, either. Find a schedule, and stick to it (within reason).

Don’t send three emails one week, then none the next. Stay consistent.

If you’re a statistics-driven person, note that a HubSpot study which shared open rate medians also looked at the median open and engagement rates based on the number of emails sent per month.

Here’s what they found for impact on open rates for their customers:

It seems the sweet spot is between 16-30 emails per month (an email daily or every other day).

Keep it short and simple

Hemingway tool can be used for highlighting lengthy, complex sentences and common errors; if you see a yellow sentence, shorten or split it. If you see a red highlight, your sentence is so dense and complicated that your readers will get lost trying to follow its meandering, splitting logic — try editing this sentence to remove the red.

The final tip before we dive into the nitty-gritty: Don’t tell your life story!

Keep your emails no longer than 3 to 5 paragraphs. Use short sentences and simple, easy-to-read wording. Try to write at a seventh-grade reading level or lower (you can use Hemingway Editor to check your content’s reading level).

4 steps for writing your first newsletter

1. Decide what you want to share

The first step is to figure out what you want to say or share.

Some ideas include:

• New content you created (blog posts, videos, infographics, etc.).
• Other people’s content you found relates to things your list cares about.
• Projects you’re working on.
• New product launches.
• Discounts and flash sales (use sparingly).
• *Mini blog posts (emails that are written well enough to be a blog post on their own).

*Mini blog posts are the only emails I’d ever send that are fairly long, because they provide lots of value. For example, Kai Davis often sends his list mini blog post emails:

2. Write a draft like you’re writing to a specific person

Whenever you write an email, you should always write as if you’re writing to a specific person. This could be a persona you made up to act as your ideal subscriber, or it can be someone you know.

Either way, write the email as if you’re writing to that person. This will help you make it more personal and interesting than if you just wrote to “everyone.

3. Send to a portion of your list first

Before sending your newsletter to all of your subscribers, consider sending the draft you just proofread to a small chunk of your list (10-15%). This will help you see what kind of open rates the email gets, and make sure everything works OK

4. If all is well, send to everyone

Finally, if everything sent OK and you didn’t get any warnings or people emailing you back saying something is broken or doesn’t make sense, send it to your entire email list.