Let me guess. You’re either a small business owner who’s discovered that you need to do way more writing than you ever planned to (or maybe you were hoping to avoid it entirely) . . .
Or you work for said business owner and the part of your job description that includes “other duties as assigned” has just been clarified to involve writing the company email newsletter. And perhaps now you’re wondering if it’s a good time to find another line of work.
But even if you don’t like to write or haven’t had much experience doing it, the guidance and tips provided below will make creating an email or digital marketing newsletter for your customers much easier. With a little help, you can be the hero who creates an email marketing newsletter that enhances your brand, creates new business leads, opens a channel to more and better customer communication, generates greater website traffic, and improves sales.
What is a good strategy when writing an email newsletter?
It’s easy to become initially overwhelmed when trying to create a newsletter. So rather than jumping right into the nitty-gritty of how to create an email newsletter, let’s first address how to approach the task itself.
Before you start to write your email newsletter, first determine what you want it to achieve.
Before putting pen to paper (an outdated saying, but it has a ring to it that “putting fingertips to keyboard” lacks), it’s a good idea to determine what you hope to achieve with your newsletter. Generally speaking, on top of any business goals you may want to meet, such as establishing yourself as an expert, generating new leads, or staying top of mind with past clients, you’ll want to educate or entertain your readers so that they remain engaged and keep reading.
Once you know your goal, you can select the type of newsletter best suited to your purpose (shout out to Ghost for this taxonomy):
- Reporting: This type of newsletter promises a unique viewpoint or exclusive coverage readers can’t easily find elsewhere.
- Analysis: People read these publications for their in-depth examinations and assessments of topics that can help them thrive in their professional lives.
- Artistic: If you have a unique perspective about something in the world that others would appreciate knowing about and learning from, then this style of newsletter is a great way to share it.
- Practical: Many readers enjoy and appreciate being taught how to do something that dovetails with their interests.
- Curated: In a world of information overload, you can help people focus their attention by providing a select list of topic-specific links along with a summary of each one.
A curated newsletter of content you’ve collected is an efficient way to provide value to your audience.
If you’re new to writing newsletters, I suggest you start with the last option—the curated newsletter. It’s one of the best newsletter formats, and is growing in popularity, because of its efficiency and how it helps readers cut through the noise. Additionally, if you’re not a confident writer, it requires minimal effort and skill. You simply collect content you’ve found on the web that supports your goal and the interests of your readers and add your opinion or a few words explaining why the information would be beneficial to them.
When putting together a curated newsletter, there are two exceptionally important rules to keep in mind:
- Always include the link to the original information. It’s bad karma to try to pass someone else’s ideas off as your own.
- Don’t copy and paste pictures from any article or blog without permission. If you do, you’ll likely violate someone’s copyright. Instead, download images from the many sites that provide free photos, graphics, and videos, such as Pexels, Vecteezy, Pixabay, and Unsplash.
Whichever type of newsletter you choose, be consistent. No rule says you can’t create more than one newsletter but ensure that each delivers what your audience comes to expect.
What should be included in a small business newsletter?
When you create your own newsletter, there are six basic elements you’ll need to include to make it appealing and useful.
Newsletter headers
Your newsletter headers work like quick summaries of what follows. Make them clear, descriptive, and specific.
When developing a header or title for your email newsletter, you’ll want to follow these two principles:
- Choose clear over clever. There are lots of imaginative newsletter header ideas you could come up with, and while creativity is to be encouraged, it’s better when a title gets right to the point. Let your readers know from the start what content and value they can expect rather than have them wonder.
- Be specific and descriptive. If you have a niche, include it in your title. For example, “Tips for Home Repair” gets points for being clear, but “Easy Home Repair Tips for DIY Weekend Warriors” says much more about what readers can expect.
These same principles should be applied to the headers you use for the sections and articles included in your newsletter.
Graphics
Graphics give your email newsletter an element of visual interest.
An eye-catching graphic will grab your audience’s attention even more than a good title. As I mentioned above, to avoid possible copyright infringement, use a free online resource to select photos, illustrations, infographics, diagrams, videos, and more. Just be sure that the images you include in your email newsletter are relevant to the information you’ve provided.
If you want to take a deeper dive into the persuasive power of graphics and how to use them, and discover more free resources, tips, and tools, click here for more information that’ll point you in the right direction.
Relevant information
Speaking of relevant information, the best email marketing newsletters are ones that provide exceptional value to their audiences. From your audience’s point of view, interesting content related to your business is appropriate, but the value of it depends on it being some combination of educational, entertaining, useful, or unique.
Call to action
Don’t leave your readers hanging! Make sure you include a call to action that tells them what you want them to do.
Let’s not forget that we’re talking about writing an email marketing newsletter. Marketing’s purpose is to get people engaged with your business through some form of action, whether that’s joining your list, visiting a webpage, participating in an activity, signing up for a deal, downloading a lead magnet, setting an appointment, placing an order, or something else. Make sure you include a clear call to action that’s easy for your readers to complete.
Links to social media
Consider previewing the next issue of your email newsletter on your social media accounts with an invitation to subscribe.
One of the many advantages of creating an email newsletter is that it gives you the opportunity to provide your audience with easy-to-use links to additional information. While you can include links to your website or QR codes to a landing page, you should also offer links to your social media pages with an invitation to follow you—it’s another way to connect with your target audience.
Mechanism to opt out
You should always get someone’s permission before sending them your newsletter, but that doesn’t mean they can’t change their mind. A law enforced by the Federal Trade Commission makes it mandatory that you include in your email an obvious way for recipients to opt out if they choose.
Tips for writing your email marketing newsletter
Now that you have information about the types of newsletters you can create and what you should include in yours, let’s talk about the fundamentals of actually writing your newsletter. When we’re done, if the idea of putting a newsletter together still seems unappealing, either because writing just isn’t up your alley, you don’t have the time, or you’d rather have someone else take care of it for you so that you can stick to running your business, then you can check out our automated digital marketing solutions. We’re the experts, and we’ll handle everything for you—no stress needed.
Make it highly readable
How your email newsletter looks is as important as the content it contains. Make it easy to read and attractive.
Keep your writing simple. This means using familiar words, being well organized, sticking to short sentences and paragraphs, and including headers and plenty of space so your writing doesn’t look crowded. You know your audience best, so write in a way that they’ll understand and appreciate. Consider using a style guide to help you maintain a consistent format, even if it’s only a short list of dos and don’ts that you put together for yourself.
Give it an attractive design
Your email newsletter is a part of your branding, so it needs to be consistent with the look and feel of the rest of your marketing collateral. Have it reflect the same colors, fonts, and style you use elsewhere to make it instantly recognizable as belonging to your business.
From color to font style, ensure your email marketing newsletter looks like your other marketing collateral.
If you aren’t sure where to begin, there are services that provide email newsletter templates you can use to design your newsletter. Many of them are free or offer a free version alongside a more robust paid option. Here are just a few:
Make it personal
Whatever flavor newsletter you decide to create, find ways to make it personal to your audience, yourself, and your business.
Your audience will appreciate personalized content relevant to their needs.
When focusing on your customers, consider including examples, stories, and case studies highlighting problems you helped to solve and their happy outcomes. If you are reporting, analyzing, or curating information, make a point of explaining how the material can or does affect your readers or what opportunities it presents to them. You might also consider including staff highlights, such as introductions of new hires, recent achievements, and personal profiles.
How to promote your email newsletter
You want people in your target audience to agree to receive your newsletter, and the best way to do that is to invite them to subscribe.
- Promote your newsletter in your email signature line.
- Place a sign-up button in a conspicuous spot on each page of your website.
- Use your social media pages to give a sneak preview of your next issue, and include a link to join your subscriber list.
- In your initial communication with new clients, whether it’s in an email or face-to-face conversation, describe what they can expect from your newsletter and provide them with a way to subscribe.
Make the whole “email newsletter thing” easier
If you’re still unsure about your skills or the amount of work necessary to create your own email newsletter, we’ve got your back. ReminderMedia offers many automated solutions that relieve anxiety and make life easier while ensuring you stay in consistent contact with your customers or clients.
- Local Events is a biweekly email newsletter that offers hand-curated live and virtual events full of exciting and entertaining opportunities for your recipients to enjoy themselves (and thank you for).
- Branded Posts features four different email newsletter themes you can choose from with curated content branded to you and sent to your audience every two weeks. You also have an enormous library of prewritten content to satisfy every interest and taste that you can schedule to post on your social media platforms whenever and as often as you like.
- The Digital Magazine is delivered directly to your recipients’ inboxes and is filled with high-quality, interactive content they can share.
- Landing Pages will capture new leads when they sign up for your newsletter. Include the link in your email and on your website. We’ll also create a QR code you can include on a postcard that, when scanned, will take them to your sign-up page.
Each of the above is a personally branded solution—these are your publications—that works to keep you top of mind for repeat and referral business. We’ve bundled all four into our Digital Marketing Platform and, when you click here, you can get your first month of unlimited access for less than the cost of a medium soy latte with cinnamon. Check it out!
