How to send the perfect email newsletter

• Updated on: 2017-11-22
• Read original article here

How to send the perfect email newsletter
March 29, 2017 McKenzie Gregory
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I’ll admit it: As someone who regularly writes about email marketing, I have a love-hate relationship with the so-called “newsletter.” 
 
It’s not that there’s anything fundamentally wrong with email newsletters – it’s just that they're often what give our industry a bad name. Many marketers will throw a few text links into a template that isn't optimized for mobile, then proceed to blast their entire audience with an irrelevant message. Worst of all, there's no real goal behind it: They're just adhering to some send cadence that was decided 10 years ago and hasn’t been questioned since.
 
However, email newsletters are still a practical (and necessary) choice for a lot of brands. And done right, they can actually be some of the best, most effective campaigns to hit your subscribers' inboxes. So here are a few different newsletter formats your brand can experiment with, plus some inspiration from brands who are doing them exceptionally well. 
 
 
The new-and-improved “wall of copy” newsletter
Historically, this has been something we’ve actively preached against. And if you’ve worked in email marketing for a while, you’ve likely heard some iteration of this advice a thousand times: “People don’t like words, they like pictures. Use imagery over copy.”
To some extent, that’s true. Most people are only scanning – especially on mobile, which accounts for  over half of all opens  – and would prefer to get the story of your mailing through images rather than text.
But here’s the thing: Best practices change over time, and email marketing isn’t a static medium. These days, several big-name brands have revitalized the traditional newsletter with emails designed purely to be read in the inbox. With mobile-optimized designs, streamlined templates and an emphasis on sharing news stories IN THE INBOX rather than sending people a million hyperlinks, these campaigns provide an at-a-glance update on politics, tech, culture – you name it. 
Here are a few examples of  what I’m talking about: 
 
Remember: This format only works given a few conditions: 
Your primary goal isn’t for people to click through. Putting it all out there gives people little incentive to leave their inbox. The majority of these email newsletters aren’t sent with the aim of generating traffic – they feature ads or sponsored content that act as a revenue driver. 
You’ve set the right expectations in terms of cadence and content. All three of the brands I mentioned make it very clear through the signup process and in their welcome emails how often they’ll send and what their campaigns will contain. 
You’re genuinely solving a problem for people. With so much noise on the internet, email newsletters like these make it easy for subscribers to get a quick glimpse of what’s going on in a clean, curated fashion.
 
The traffic-generating newsletter 
 
Let's say you DO want to generate traffic site traffic from your email newsletter. If you've been having trouble getting subscribers to click through, one of these two things is likely the culprit: 
 
A. There's no incentive to engage because all of the pertinent info is already there (see the "wall of copy" newsletter). 
B. You don't provide a clear path of action for subscribers to follow. 
 
Here's an example. Before they came to us, our client Visit Philadelphia used to send an email newsletter that looked like this. 
 
The “here’s what you missed” newsletter
 
This is something you’ll see a lot in the B2B world: Many brands send out a regular newsletter to keep their audience up to date on all their latest and greatest content, company news, product releases, etc. 
 
The key to nailing this type of send? 
Make it visually engaging. Since this is something you're sending regularly, it's worth spending some time really thinking about and fine-tuning your newsletter template. And as always, THINK MOBILE. 
Try to keep your layout consistent so subscribers know where to find what they're interested in each time you send. 
Use a better subject line than “[Date] Newsletter” or "[Brand Name] Newsletter." Outline the value contained in each campaign – "Get our new guide," "Hear an exclusive announcement," etc. 
 
This isn't exactly a fair standard since they're known for email design, but our friends at Litmus recently sent a gorgeous example of this sort of newsletter.