Mailchimp Partner & How to Write a Newsletter

We are proud to announce that we are now a Mailchimp partner! Although they have a wide variety of services available, we mainly use Mailchimp for email marketing communications in regards to managing weekly newsletter campaigns for clients as well as our own bimonthly newsletter. In general, newsletters are an effective technique when it comes to updating your audience on what your business is currently engaged in and staying educated on current affairs as a consumer as well. Although they may be beneficial to a company and its audience, it can be tricky to master the recipe for a great newsletter without much trial and error. In honor of our new partnership and all that we have learned throughout the process, we have constructed a list of five steps that you can take to create your own successful newsletter. 

Step 1: Identify Your Objective

Before you even begin to design and write your newsletter, it is essential that you ask yourself what you hope to achieve through this process. It can help to determine both long term and short term goals for your business as well as actions that you can take to accomplish them. Two main aspects to think about when establishing your objectives for your newsletter are: what do you hope this will do for your business and who is your target audience.

Step 2: Plan Frequency & Platform Details

Once you have a better idea of your aim for this project, you can start to focus on more of the logistical elements. Before your first newsletter is even seen by the public, you should have a plan in place regarding how often you are going to distribute your newsletter. An easy yet efficient way to hold yourself accountable to this upload schedule is to create a calendar that includes deadlines for when you want each newsletter to be finished as well as all anticipated upload dates. You can arrange this calendar to reflect the first few weeks after your newsletter is launched and review your analytics later on to learn when to set your regular upload schedule. Besides scheduling, you also need to determine what platform you are wanting to broadcast your newsletter on. You can choose between electronic methods such as email and non-electronic methods such as direct mail. 

Step 3: Outline Theme & Important Topics

Now that the details are all sorted out, you can start to brainstorm what needs to be included in each installment of your newsletter. With each newsletter, it is important to decide on one main topic that can act as the overall theme and around five to six related sub topics to discuss throughout it. Some important elements to include in each newsletter could be upcoming events, monthly specials that your business is offering, projects you are currently working on, restock announcements, and products or services that you wish to highlight. If you feel that your newsletter is overly promotional to an extent that your audience might not want to read it, you can include client testimonials or relevant tips and tricks for your readers to try at home to make it seem less like one long advertisement. The main thing to remember when designing your newsletter is to keep it concise. 

Step 4: Get Creative with Your Layout

Since you now know what information needs to be included, you can start to arrange the general layout for your newsletter. One common mistake that people make in creating their newsletter is to have large paragraphs of text without any gaps in between. To ensure that your layout looks more like a newsletter and less like a novel, you can add eye catching images and graphics throughout your design to help break up long text blocks. You can also make your newsletter stand out amongst the rest by creating headlines that will engage your audience and leave them wanting to learn more about the topic you will be covering. Another approach to sparking the attention of your readers is to experiment with different colors and fonts. 

Step 5: Make it Interactive

With all of the planning and designing done, you are finally ready to give your audience a chance to connect with your newsletter and brand on an entirely new level. One common technique that businesses use to make their content more interactive online is to include clickable links within their content. If you are discussing a new product that is available to your client online, insert a link they can click that will take them to a page with more information about it on your website. You can also increase engagement outside of the newsletter by cross promoting your social media accounts and including your contact information where they can reach you if they have any questions. 

If you need help setting up a Mailchimp account or creating custom newsletter templates for  your business, feel free to contact us anytime!