A Guide for Creating the Best Newsletter Content
Are you looking to create the best newsletter content for your subscribers?
Creating great content for your newsletter is essential to its success. To retain a subscriber base, you must include the best newsletter content you can create. If you don’t, subscribers will effectively unsubscribe and go elsewhere to find the content they want.
If you lose subscribers, you lose your authority in your niche. You also lose the chance to make more money with your newsletter if you have monetized.
Some newsletter creators get the money in their minds and quit creating the best content because they only care about the money. Make sure you don’t make such a regretful mistake like that.
Focus on creating the best newsletter content you can create, and you will see greater success than ever imagined. And if you need help with that content, that’s what this guide was created for.
A Look at Companies Creating the Best Newsletter Content Today
One of the best ways to start creating awesome content for your newsletter is to look at media companies that are already doing a great job.
These companies have successful newsletters that reach thousands upon thousands of people’s email inboxes daily. Find those newsletters, subscribe to them, and then start dissecting them to understand what has made them so successful in terms of content.
We will review three successful newsletters and break down their content to understand why they do so well.
Skimm Your Life by The Skimm
The Skimm is an online media brand that provides information to women to help them make confident decisions. They have made it their mission to help women live smarter.
The newsletter we will focus on today is called Skimm Your Life which focuses on everyday problem-solving and using smart products.
Here is an example of the Skimm Your Life Newsletter.
Upon looking at the example newsletter, I have found multiple ways The Skimm uses the best content to make its issues successful.
Aside from the perfect design, which targets an emotional response to money according to color-based psychological marketing techniques, the site has a perfect setup for mobile device users. There are a few lessons here.
(1) You should create a friendly design that provides an emotional connection to the niche or topic of your newsletter.
(2) You should put your mobile users first. Your design should be 100% mobile-friendly. Use short paragraphs and write in a way that allows readers to scan rather than sit there and read a big block of text. More than 90% of your subscribers will read your newsletter on their phones.
The newsletter header provides an eye-catching animated logo from the start with the date of the article and the ability to read it on your browser. For two reasons, using a header that quickly catches the reader’s attention is important.
(1) You should use a consistent logo or header to form a brand around your newsletter. Your subscriber needs to be able to get used to spotting your brand.
(2) An eye-catching header will help grab the email subscriber’s attention, and they will consider reading the rest of your email.
The introduction paragraph is short a sweet. It contains a proper copy that lures a reader in. It also gives a theme for the issues of the newsletter through its copy. A few words and statements with a powerful emotional connection are “convenience” and “fave items that make life a tad easier” because they inform the reader that the newsletter’s contents will be focused on providing information to make their life decisions easier. This is an example of the value which is a benefit because it serves to make life better.
Then the issue breaks down its best newsletter content in the form of various different easy-to-scan sections. There is a section for shopping, a spotlight on female entrepreneurs, information about books, and trending topics related to the niche found on the internet.
The newsletter ends with some basic credits, CTAs to subscribe to more newsletters within the network and listen to related podcasts, and then the basic footer information, including the ability to unsubscribe and that stuff.
I’m not a woman, so I don’t have a feminine connection to some parts of this newsletter. But I can say that it’s a perfect example of how you can create the best newsletter content. It aligns with the trend of their niche, the content is easy to scan on a mobile device, and the issue’s theme provides value to the reader.
Every newsletter issue you create should be like the one above.
Morning Brew Daily
Morning Brew is an online media company that educates and informs its audience about business, careers, investing, and money-making opportunities. Morning Brew is a daily newsletter.
Check out this issue of Morning Brew as we dissect it to figure out why it’s so successful.
The newsletter starts with its familiar logo, which helps you identify the media company’s brand. But what I like about the header is how they’ve integrated the sponsor (AMPERE) into the header. It’s made to look like it’s a part of the logo almost. That’s a great way to include your newsletter sponsor if you have one.
As always, the newsletter starts out with stock market information. It’s set up in a way that makes it easy to interpret without much explanation required. Then it gives you a quick breakdown paragraph of what’s trending in the market.
This is a great example of creating the best newsletter content you can create because it gives subscribers daily information about the stock market, impacting their lives and investing decisions.
It moves on to a quick, resourceful article about the economy. Then we get some more information about their sponsor or partner that’s included below the newsletter logo in the header. That’s a great practice because it informs you of a company called AMPERE from the start, putting that word as a visual in your head. Then shortly after some of the first content, you’ll see AMPERE again and be able to learn more about it.
The newsletter gives you some interesting headlines from around the world, mainly focusing on the niche of the newsletter – business, investing, careers, and money.
As the newsletter continues, we see an exciting tech article about a trending topic surrounding ChatGPT. It’s good that Morning Brew is targeting trends in their content since that is likely a topic subscribers will have heard about and would likely want to read more about.
The newsletter then breaks to another sponsor and does so in a very inviting way with an eye-catching photo and a brief statement of copy about the sponsor. The ad blends in with the rest of the newsletter and is probably read and consumed like the rest of the content.
The newsletter concludes with various sections that appease the people who are subscribed to it. The content within the sections is short, but the value is added to each of them. This makes the whole issue easy to read on a mobile device which is likely more than 90% of how subscribers consume the newsletter.
The newsletter ends with credits to contributors and the basic footer information that all newsletters typically and should include.
The Hustle by HubSpot
The Hustle is a business and tech newsletter that is under the online media giant HubSpot. The newsletter claims that it gives you the latest in business and tech in under 5 minutes. This is another great example of a daily newsletter that creates the best newsletter content possible for its particular audience and niche.
Check out this previous issue of the Hustle, which we will be using to determine its content worth.
The newsletter starts out with its eye-catching logo that helps paint its brand to subscribers. It then lists the introduction to the newsletter right after the logo and gives a little table of contents of what to expect in the issue you’re reading.
It also includes an eye-catching CTA for its daily podcast show.
You’ll see the main story of the newsletter. It will then show you what’s trending. It gives you some snippets of interesting topics to read about further. There are more stories related to the subject of the newsletter’s issue. A free resource is contributed. Some fun around-the-web facts are given. And my favorite part is the shower thoughts section.
And that’s the end, folks!
You can literally scan all of that in less than five minutes. You can sit down and read everything in about five minutes. That’s the kind of newsletter you would want if you have a busy day and you need something quick about business and tech.
And they deliver just that, just like they said they would, in five minutes or less.
And the sections like Shower Thoughts create a unique value opportunity that people can look forward to each time an issue is sent to them. I’m a subscriber of the Hustle and always look at that section first.
The Hustle is a great example of a quick-read email with the best newsletter content for tech and business.
What do the Skimm, Morning Brew, and the Hustle have in common?
Aside from creating the best newsletter content for their particular niche, these newsletters have a lot in common.
A media brand owns each newsletter, whether it’s a parent company or the same name as the newsletter. You find existing content about the niche on their website without subscribing to an email newsletter.
Each newsletter has a purpose, mission, and values that define what the newsletter is about. There is an obvious niche for each newsletter. The niche focuses on topics that are very relevant to today’s society. The topics are trending for generally most people, no matter their interests.
All three newsletters use a common brand name, heading, and template.
Each of the three newsletters optimizes mobile devices by using shorter paragraphs, scannable content, and quick-to-read issues.
And lastly, each one of these newsletters has thousands to millions of subscribers because they have focused on creating the best newsletter content they can create and maintain creating that sort of content, some daily.
How You Can Create the Best Newsletter Content in 8 Steps
Welcome to the only guide you’ll ever need on creating the best newsletter content you can possibly create so that your newsletter can be as successful as possible for years to come.
Step 1: Define Your Audience
The first step in defining your newsletter audience is to have a niche already in mind.
A niche is a topic or subject that your newsletter will focus on. It can be one specific topic, such as “hiking,” or it can be multiple topics, such as “hiking, biking, and kayaking.” You just need to determine your niche before you can define your audience.
If you’re having trouble coming up with a niche, chances are, you’re looking in the wrong direction. Don’t make the mistake of choosing a niche based on how popular or trending a topic currently is. You should choose a topic that you know a lot about.
That’s why choosing a niche is advised based on your biggest passions and interests in life.
You typically will know a lot about your biggest passions and interests. That means you’ll have plenty of ideas to write about in terms of that niche. If you choose a topic you don’t know much about just because it’s trending, you will have difficulty keeping an active newsletter.
Other creators that know that topic better than you will pass you up like you’re standing still.
Choose a niche on a topic you know something about. Then check to see if there is a market for it online. If there isn’t an audience present, it might be best to go with a different passion or interest that has an audience.
You can find your audience by determining the content you will write about.
My newsletter focuses on tips for creating newsletters, building online communities, and starting your own blog. My audience is beginners and those who are continuing to learn the ropes of newsletters, communities, and blogs. I’m not targeting experts in those areas with my content, so they’re not a part of my defined target audience.
Once you identify what you will write about within your niche, you can start looking for that particular sub-audience within the main audience you already identified when determining what your niche will be about.
Create an avatar or a buyer persona for your sub-audience by determining what makes the perfect subscriber to your best newsletter content. Create that person individually. Then you can start to cater to people who match that description as your audience.
You might need to survey people, study your competition, look for trends, review analytics, and research. You might need to take a few weeks or months to conduct your research to find the best audience avatar for your newsletter.
Take whatever time is required and be patient so that when you create your best content, you’ll have nothing but success.
Step 2: Set Goals for You and Your Audience
When you define and set goals for yourself as the newsletter creator and your audience as the newsletter consumers, you’re setting yourself up for success by creating a strategy.
Any successful newsletter creator or online media brand will repeat that creating a strategy greatly helped them win with their newsletter success. Strategic planning for anything will always bring about more success than events and things without strategic planning.
You should strategically create goals for yourself and what you want to get out of creating and maintaining your newsletter.
There are many reasons why we would create a newsletter. Maybe it’s to help develop expertise and authority within the niche. Maybe it’s to create a list of contacts to which you will later try to sell products and services. Maybe it’s to create a function for sponsored content so that you can make money. On the making money note, maybe you aim to turn your newsletter into a full-time career or a full-blown company.
Whatever the case is regarding what you want from having a newsletter – you need to define those wants and turn them into goals.
You also need to strategically set goals for your readers, too. Defining the goals for subscribers is important to create the best newsletter content geared toward your subscribers. If you don’t understand what they should want to get from your newsletter, you don’t have a defined audience, and you have failed at the first step of this process.
There are many different goals that you might set for your subscribers.
Your newsletter may be created to inform them of trending topics in the niche. It might exist to provide information that will improve their lives concerning the topics you cover. Your newsletter could exist to give a subscriber free consistent resources having to do with the subjects you write about. The newsletter could be for entertainment purposes only.
No matter what type of person you want as a subscriber, you need to define their goals of subscribing to your newsletter so that you know who exactly to market your newsletter to from the start.
But not all goals are good goals. Goals should be measurable. That’s why it’s important to use a goal strategy that gives you analytical results that you can use to create the best newsletter content and run a successful subscription program.
Choose SMART Goals.
SMART goals are a strategic goal-setting formula. SMART is an acronym for the formula. It stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-Bound.
The SPECIFIC factor focuses on what exactly you’re trying to achieve with your newsletter. This is where you define EXACTLY what you want to get out of it and what you want your subscriber to get out of it.
The MEASURABLE factor is how you will know when you have achieved your goals. What will be the PROOF that your goal and your subscriber goal have been met?
The ATTAINABLE factor is meant to determine if the goal is ACTUALLY possible to achieve. You have to thoroughly plan each goal and have objectives leading to different successful outcomes as the goal is working to be successfully reached. Think of it like adding smaller goals that will help complete larger goals.
The RELEVANT factor has to do with your goals of providing relevant GROWTH to your brand as a whole. If you are successful with your newsletter, what will it do for your brand as a whole? Will it earn you more expertise recognition? Will it earn you more money? These questions should be integrated into your goal-setting strategies.
The TIME-BOUND factor will help you determine your DEADLINE for successfully completing and achieving your goal-setting strategies and the overall success of your goals. A set date for completion will help you stay motivated to do what you set out to do. Nothing should ever be indefinite.
Setting goals for yourself and your audience will make you see success and failure in real-time, which will help you prevent yourself from wasting time.
Step 3: Develop Your Best Newsletter Content Strategy
You must first create the best newsletter content strategy to create the best content possible.
After you define your audience and set goals for you and them, this task shouldn’t be too challenging for you to achieve.
You need to determine your key topics and the theme of your newsletter. Sometimes it’s best to look at other successful newsletters and see how they have set up their content topics and themes. You should experiment by all means to determine which key topics and themes work best for YOU and YOUR AUDIENCE. But as a final step, you do want to choose a consistent format to start sending so that you can give your audience something familiar to expect, which helps to differentiate your brand from others.
Decide what content types you wish to add. We go over this more throughout this article. But content types are things like articles, snippets, headlines, videos, images, etc. It’s always good to use a combination of different types of content as long as you’re adding value to it rather than just using each type as a content filler.
Decide when you will send your newsletter out. How often do you want to send it? Make sure you consider the work that has to go into crafting each issue. You want each issue to be better than the last, which takes time and dedication to succeed. Some newsletters are sent daily, but they often have a whole team of people creating them as their main job. If you did it yourself, sending a newsletter once a week or even once a month would be easier.
Whatever email schedule you choose – make sure you’re consistent about it. If you send a newsletter out on Friday at 12:30 PM CST and plan to send one every week, ensure the next one goes out on Friday at 12:30 PM CST. Creating consistency will give your readers an expectation of when to go check out your new content.
Consistency will lead to success because it will essentially help you with brand development through subscriber expectations.
Like with goals, your newsletter creation should have a TIME-BOUND objective. Create an editorial calendar to say on track and be able to complete your newsletter on time every time. Set a deadline for each section you plan to add and an overall deadline for when the newsletter should be completed, edited, and sent. Having a deadline will motivate you to get the job done. Use services like Todoist or something like that to send you alerts about completing your newsletter deadline tasks.
After you develop your strategy for creating the best newsletter content possible, make sure you stick to it to succeed.
Step 4: Create Scannable Content that Keeps Readers Reading
Creating a mobile-friendly newsletter will ensure you can keep your subscribers subscribed and read each issue you send out.
More than 90% of your subscribers will read your newsletter via mobile. It doesn’t matter what niche you are in. I promise this will always be the case. I know most people who no longer own computers or laptops because their smartphone does everything they need. That’s the norm out there.
Create for a mobile-first environment, which means you must focus hard on creating the best newsletter content that is completely scannable and easily read quickly.
Think about the Hustle talked about above – five minutes or less! They have millions of subscribers, probably because of that very feature.
So, try to make sure your content is to the point and concise. If a subscriber has to sit through a read everything just to get an answer, they’ll probably quit reading and may even unsubscribe as a result.
Format your newsletter with white space, headers, sub-headers, and bullet points. All of these formatting features will help make your content read better on a smaller screen from mobile devices. You should also write shorter sentences and keep your paragraphs short, too.
Use a responsive theme and clear fonts that can be used and read without the subscriber adjusting their screen magnification. The idea is that your newsletter is created so easily that the subscriber can scan it while moving the screen to get to the end of the newsletter.
Make sure you optimize images for mobile devices. They need to be clear to understand visually, and they need to load very quickly. Slow loading and hard-to-see images will be a huge turn-off for any subscriber.
Make sure links and Call-to-Actions are clear and concise. You should also ensure that they are easily tappable. If it takes too much effort to open a link or a CTA on your newsletter, don’t expect to have a very good open rate.
Try to test your newsletter on various mobile devices if you can. Your goal should be to make it friendlier on a mobile device than it would be on a desktop.
Step 5: Pack Every Issue with Complete Value
To keep your subscribers happy and subscribed to your newsletter, you must constantly and consistently provide value in every issue you send them.
It all starts with your subject line. You must craft a subject line that is easy to spot out of the crowd of inbox messages. It needs to be eye-catching and beneficial to the reader. You power words, emojis, and a sub-header subject line that backs it up. Make this pop because it’s the make-or-break session of your open rate. You might want to experiment with the subject line until you find the right groove.
Your introduction is your hook. It’s best to keep it concise and to the point. But you want to grab the reader’s attention and encourage them to keep reading.
Ensure your content selection aligns with your subscribers’ interests, needs, and pain points. They want to see the best newsletter content you can make. You can create that sort of content for them before anyone else. Don’t create for yourself. Don’t create for your sponsor. Create for your subscriber because they are what matters the most.
Many different types of content add value. You can use one type or multiple types. After experimenting and finding your best content type, you just want to ensure you find a consistent groove.
Educational content has always been valuable to people wanting to learn new things. The trick is finding the topics that are hard to learn and creating an easy way to learn them through your newsletter. If you can teach someone something that they’ve struggled with learning in the past, you’ve improved their life, which is a perfect example of value.
Practical advice and tips are another great way to provide value to your content. If you can give advice and tips that will improve your subscriber’s life, save them money, allow them to make more money, or help them with a problem – they’ll be hooked to your content. The advice and tips need to be the best, though, and they must be well thought out.
Exclusive insights and expertise make for great newsletter content. If you can provide something exclusive to your audience that no one else is providing, then that means you’re providing original value, and that’s a big deal.
Any kind of visual material you put in your newsletter should also add some kind of value, whether it’s meant to make a reader smile or laugh, to astonish them, or to assist them with something. The visual must appeal to the value of what you’re trying to provide with your newsletter.
Try to keep everyone in a personal tone. Write as if you’re talking to the reader face to face. Use words like “you” and “me.” Greet them by name at the start. Make them feel enjoyed, and allow them to contact you if needed. I suggest making it as easy as just replying to your newsletter email.
Ensure any links, sponsored content, or CTAs are just as attention-grabbing and compelling as the rest of your content. They should all feel like they’re a part of your format but still pop out a little bit more to encourage action and engagement. You might need to evaluate your anchor text and use better words. You might want to add a better copywriting formula to your CTAs. Do some A/B testing and determine what works best for your newsletter and audience.
Before you hit submit, audit every sentence you wrote. Every sentence should add value. If a sentence doesn’t add value or anything like that, get rid of it because it’s just a waste of real estate.
Step 6: Tell a Story and Welcome a Story
There are many different methods of integrating copywriting into your newsletter. Copywriting helps to connect emotionally with your subscribers and persuade them to do something.
Some of my favorite copywriting methods include AIDA, which stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action, and PAS, which means Problem, Agitate, and Solve.
But the best formula to add to your newsletter to become exceptionally person with your subscribers is telling a great story.
Storytelling is the tool for creating the best newsletter content you’ll ever be able to create.
Humans thrive on stories, especially when we can directly relate to them. We care more about hearing a great story than we do seeing the latest analytics of something. And you should take advantage of that in your newsletter.
Many key factors typically make a great story.
You’ll want to start by creating a narrative for your story. This is a theme. You can do this for each section of content on your newsletter, or you can create a generalized narrative that will add a theme to the entire newsletter and connect everything together through storytelling.
You must create a captivating hook for your stories. The hook will grab the reader’s attention and make them want to keep reading. The hook is how marketers successfully get people to click on ads and purchase products. Your hook is meant to get attention and keep that attention. But like with fishing, fish can escape the hook easily, so you must ensure that your content keeps subscribers hooked.
Sometimes people make the mistake of saying the first part is the hook, and that’s it. In reality, your whole newsletter should be one big hook.
The best story is an emotional story. Have you ever read a good story that made you smile? How about one that made you tear up? How about a story that made you angry? Have you ever read something that made you want to immediately get up and act? These stories all have something in common – they invoke an emotional reaction within their words. Always target the emotions of your subscribers when telling a great story. Emotions lead to purchases, subscriptions, conversions, and other actions.
To add to emotional reactions, try to also add in senses. You know, like tastes, smells, sounds, and touch. You might think that’s impossible for an email newsletter, but it isn’t impossible at all. You add these senses through your words while activating an emotional response. It will make a subscriber remember the familiarity of that sense, and they’re emotionally connected to it. It’s one more thing that will make them happier, sadder, worried, or angry.
If a visual such as a photo or even an embedded video can add to the story, use them when appropriate. In some cases, visuals may be all you need to tell a story. This would especially be true for photography and travel newsletters. Ensure the visuals are of the highest quality, visually appealing, and quick to load.
Try to implement anticipation and cliffhangers into your storytelling tactics when appropriate. Anticipation will help hook your subscribers to the content and keep them focused. You can even add cliffhangers to certain sections to anticipate the ending result in the next newsletter issue. There is nothing wrong with ending the newsletter in a position where they will have to wait for the next one to get the results. Many newsletter creators do this with quizzes and trivia-type content.
Your story will only work if it’s relatable and relevant to the reader. You have to write for them, not you. They need to be able to feel like they can be in the shoes of what you are depicting with your story. When it relates to them, you have their attention and their emotional activation to buy or act on something.
And always try to end your story with an ability for them to share their story and how it relates to yours.
Step 7: Use the Best Newsletter Content Formats
There are many different types of content and formats for newsletters.
It’s best to find what content type and format works best for your audience and consistently stick to them. This way, people become familiar with your brand and can set their own expectations about what they will get in your newsletter.
The traditional newsletter is typically text-based. This is when articles with article formatting are the main type of content. This might be the best format to use if you want to provide analysis, blog content, or tell a story.
Many newsletters use a format of showing curated content. This is when newsletter creators mainly send issues with handpicked blog posts, news headlines, special offers, and stories around the industry and put snippets or links to them in the newsletter saving the subscriber’s time of trying to find it all on their own time.
Visual formats focus primarily on visual content and media. You’ll see many images, videos, and graphical content like infographics and memes in these types of newsletters. Many newsletters that are primarily focused on visual content are entertainment newsletters and even photography newsletters.
Hybrid newsletters typically consist of all the different formats combined into one. They’ll use text-based content, curated items, visual media, and other formatting types. Many of the best newsletter content of today focuses on using this hybrid-style method.
The product-focused format is when a newsletter solely focuses on a product or service that the creator provides or sells. This format is meant to earn sales and can be easily applied to a hybrid format as a section.
Now that you’ve seen a few of the best formats for a newsletter, it’s time to explore the many different types of content you can add to make it even better.
Informative articles are going to be one of your biggest assets as far as creating the best newsletter content goes. These articles are best served when they get to the point quickly, are concise, and are quick to read. These articles should solve problems and answer the toughest questions within your niche. Articles like this are valuable because they make your subscriber’s life better.
Curated content about your niche or industry is great content to share with your subscribers. But don’t just choose any type of content on the internet. To effectively share the best-curated content possible, you must research and find the best content for your audience. Find content that makes you go “huh” and share that with your audience. Find the best content available, and that’s how you’ll do well with sharing curated content.
Try to share exclusive content in your newsletter. This is the type of content that can’t be found anywhere else. Your audience won’t find it on your blog. They won’t find it on your products or services. It’s only available in your newsletter, and that’s another reason why they should subscribe and remain subscribed. Otherwise, they’ll lose access to your awesome exclusive content.
I wanted to do whatever I could to improve this article. So, I initially added the mini-case studies of the three successful newsletters. That added value to the topic of this article because you were able to see some great examples that you can possibly relate to. Examples of things like testimonials and case studies make for excellent content for a newsletter. You just have to ensure that it’s interesting to your audience and something they would love to read.
People love to hear from the experts and get their questions answered. Try adding exclusive interviews with industry experts in your niche. You can provide this type of content in text, audio, or video. You could also add a subscriber Q&A section where you or an industry expert answers questions your subscribers ask.
Putting the subscriber questions up at the end of the newsletter and promising the answers in the next issue is a great way to end the newsletter with a cliffhanger and some anticipation.
Events can be pure gold for a newsletter. I have a local outdoor recreation newsletter. I feature various events around the region that outdoor enthusiasts can add to their itinerary when hiking, biking, and camping in the area. It was a huge success that got me all sorts of positive feedback, shares, and even more subscribers. If events in your newsletter can be added, I definitely recommend adding them.
It’s best to provide a mixture of different types of content in your newsletter as long as each adds value and plays a role in the story to your subscribers.
Step 8: Analyze and Ask For Feedback
Your newsletter analytics can provide a story about how effective your newsletter content is. Feedback from your subscribers will only intensify the story so that you can focus on creating the best newsletter content that you can create.
Analytics often intimidate people. You might see them as hard to understand. You might think you have to be an ace at math to read your analytics.
The truth of the matter is that it doesn’t take long to fully understand your analytics, and the more you avoid looking at them, the more opportunities you will miss out on making your newsletter content better. You might even miss out on saving your newsletter from dying altogether.
So, let’s look at the most important metrics that will help you determine how good your newsletter content is doing.
The OPEN RATES metric will give you a percentage of your subscribers who are actually opening your newsletter emails. A higher percentage means more subscribers are opening the newsletter.
If you want to understand why people are not opening the newsletter, you can always segment those who don’t open the newsletter. This means sending that group a specific email, such as telling them that you will unsubscribe them since they appear to no longer want your newsletter. That might make them change their mind and continue to want it.
Most of the time, people are not opening your newsletter email because either it’s (a) hitting your spam folder or (b) the subject isn’t very eye-catching. You should try to remind your subscribers to add your email to their contact list to avoid sending it to their spam folder. And you can make your subject lines better by adding value, power words, and emojis. You have to make them stand out.
The CTR metric shows you the Click-Through Rates of your newsletter. This gives you a percentage of subscribers who are actually clicking on links you provide in your newsletter issues. If you have a lower CTR percentage, you may need to address the copy on your Call-to-Actions (CTAs) and the anchor text for your links. Remember, the best way to get a click is to show that clicking the link will add value to their lives.
The CONVERSION RATE metric is for when you have specific CTA goals for your newsletter. Maybe you want to convert subscribers into paid subscribers. Maybe you’re trying to sell a product. This rate will give you an idea of how many subscribers act on your CTAs.
The BOUNCE RATE shows a percentage of emails that were not delivered to the recipient. Failures can be permanent or temporary. Most of the time, the emails don’t exist anymore. But your list quality could also be an issue, so ensure you’re not spamming anyone with your content.
The SUBSCRIBE/UNSUBSCRIBE RATES are metrics showing new subscribers and those unsubscribed after every email you send.
Your ENGAGEMENT metrics show how long people spend on your email, engage with the contents of it, play videos, and look at images. You can generally even get a heat map of what portions of the newsletter your subscribers are looking at the most.
If you include social media sharing in your newsletter, you should be able to track shares through each channel you include in your analytics. This can be helpful with any social media marketing strategy you have in place.
Lastly, subscriber feedback is extremely important for analyzing and optimizing your newsletter content. I have been creating a quick survey for every issue of my newsletter. I asked my subscribers what they liked about the issue, what they didn’t like, what they wanted to see added in the next issue, and what they felt the overall score of this issue was. This feedback has really helped me shape my newsletter and curate it more toward the needs and wants of my subscribers.
Analyzing your newsletter metrics and feedback will help you create and optimize your best newsletter content strategies.
Your Newsletter Shouldn’t Be Your Only Benefit
Creating a newsletter may be all you want to get into, and that’s fine, but if you’re looking to grow even further and have more money-making opportunities, then you shouldn’t just do a newsletter and nothing else.
There are a few great other outlets to accompany your newsletter if you so choose to utilize them.
A blog is a great way to continue to develop your expertise and authority in your niche or industry. By posting a few times a week, you can get plenty of new attention while promoting your mailing list and getting more subscribers. A blog can be monetized using most of the methods that you would use to make money with a newsletter.
An online community is also a great way to develop your expertise and potentially make money. You can offer your community for free, require payment to join or a hybrid style with a free account with limited access and a paid upgrade for full access. An online community would be an excellent way for you to connect and network with your newsletter subscribers.
A paid newsletter option is another idea. You might offer your newsletter for free, but you could provide a more frequent or feature-packed issue at a cost. You just have to make sure that you create the best newsletter content that’s worth paying for. Some paid newsletters turn into full-blown newsletter companies like Trends.
These extra content creation outlets can help you create the best newsletter you can create.
And that concludes my guide showing you how to create the best newsletter content to keep your subscribers returning for more and more. If you enjoyed reading this guide and would like to support my efforts in creating it, please share it with others, especially on social media. Be sure to follow me on Twitter for more tips and resources about creating your own newsletter.
About the Author
Shawn Gossman has created content, blogged, ran online communities, and shared a passion for digital marketing for over twenty years. Shawn believes the best way to help content creators, businesses, brands, and marketers is to give away more than you sell. The same advice is recommended for the readers who follow this blog. Shawn also offers various services for extra help in content creation and blogging.
Grow your online brand with exclusive tips from me sent right to your inbox!