Designing Your Newsletter
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Whether you’re creating your first newsletter template or polishing one you have, these are some ideas for designing and organizing your document.
I subscribe to a bunch of different author, publisher, and company newsletters. It’s good to peruse a sampling to get ideas of how others present information and what content they include. Make note of what catches your eye and how it appeared on the page.
It helps me to sketch out (storyboard) how I want my content to look and what sections I want to have. Most newsletter services have templates that you can use to make the design easier once you know what you want to include.
My newletters go out quarterly, so I usually have some sort of seasonal theme to go with each one.
Include a give-away if you can. You can put this in the subject line to build some buzz and hopefully, entice readers to open it to see what’s inside.
Your subject line needs to be short and interesting. People get hundreds of emails a day, and you are trying to make yours stand out.
I always have some kind of introduction that is a welcome to new followers.
If you write a blog, look through your posts to see if one or two can be repurposed in your newsletter. I do interviews of other authors on my blog, and in each newsletter, I feature 10 to 12 of them. My hope is to introduce my readers to some “new-to-them” authors.
Vary the content. Think of interesting things to share. People are looking for information and entertainment. All of your content shouldn’t be “buy my book.”
Make sure that the fonts and colors that you choose match your branding.
After you add all the content, photos, and graphics, send a test draft to yourself. Make sure everything looks the way you intended. Proofread all content. Check all forms and links to make sure they work.
My newsletter software has a scheduling feature, and it offers suggestions for the best time to send a newsletter. (Usually, you don’t want it to go out first thing on Monday morning when mailboxes are already full from the weekend.) I schedule based on the most optimum time. Since I’ve been doing this, I have had a better open rate.
Be prepared. You’ll get some unsubscribers each time you send a newsletter. Don’t take it personally. People sign up for all kinds of things, and then they clean up their email boxes later.
Look at the analytics page a week or so after you send a newsletter to see what you can glean from the data. It should show you things like how many went out, how many opened it and when, how many unsubscribed, etc. This can help you with planning your content and your schedule for your next one.
Your newsletter subscriber list, like your website, is yours and you manage the contacts. It’s valuable. Your social media sites are a key part of your marketing strategy, but if they shut down or ban you, you have no way of reaching your followers.
