What is an email newsletter?
An email newsletter is a scheduled email sent to a list of subscribers who have opted to receive them from you. The frequency of these emails can be monthly, bi-weekly, weekly or even daily and their primary purpose is to engage recipients by delivering valuable content, such as news, updates, tips, and promotions, that aligns with their interests.
If you want to get a more detailed understanding of email newsletters or want to know how you can start a newsletter from scratch, you can check out our guide below.
💡 Related guide: What Are Email Newsletters and How to Get Started
What's the difference between a newsletter and email marketing?
People often use these two terms interchangeably, but they're not the same thing.
A newsletter is one type of email you can send as part of a broader email marketing program. Its main job is to inform and engage, not to sell. Think of it as a regular check-in with your audience: news, updates, tips, or a roundup of content they'll find useful.
Email marketing, on the other hand, is the umbrella term for any email sent with a commercial goal, like a promotional campaign, an abandoned cart reminder, or a product launch announcement. The call to action is usually direct: buy this, sign up for that, book a demo.
How to create a newsletter
This guide is directed toward those who already have a newsletter and would like to speed up the creation of a newsletter edition. That implies that you already have an email list and are already using an email service provider to create and send newsletters.
If you haven't started building a list yet, skip ahead to the How to build your first email list section below, then come back here.
Now here is how to create your newsletter:
1. Choose the idea or theme for your newsletter
Every newsletter needs a core idea or theme that ties its content together. The theme could revolve around a trending topic, an educational piece, or updates about your brand or industry. A clear theme not only captures your audience's attention but also provides direction for creating cohesive content.
For example, a tech company might focus on "The Future of AI," a fitness brand might build a monthly issue around "This Month's Training Trends," and a solo creator might simply pick one question their readers keep asking and answer it in depth.
2. Choose the correct template for your theme
Your newsletter design should reflect its theme and purpose. Define your color scheme, layout, and overall visual style based on the type of content and images you plan to include. Having this clarity early helps you pick the right template.
For instance, if your newsletter features a lot of visuals, choose a layout that emphasizes images. On the other hand, go for a clean and minimalistic design that prioritizes readability for text-heavy content.
If you're using an ESP for this, you usually have 2 options. You can either create a new layout from scratch or pick a pre-built template if the ESP has a template library like Mailmodo's.
3. Curate or create content
The content you choose is the heart and soul of your newsletter. It's what will ultimately engage your audience and keep them coming back for more. So, you must incorporate diverse content types, such as text, videos, and infographics, to keep readers interested.
Based on your chosen theme, curate relevant content like articles, statistics, or stories that align with your audience's interests. If you're creating original content, you can focus on content like educational insights, actionable tips, or engaging narratives, and with online tools available to check plagiarism free, ensuring your content stays unique before publishing has never been easier. A travel newsletter might include destination guides and packing tips. A B2B SaaS newsletter might round up product updates and customer case studies. A personal newsletter might just be one honest story from your week.
4. Enhance visual appeal
Once done with the content, you need to make your newsletter look catchy. For this, you can use graphic elements like images, logos, GIFs, emojis, and even interactive widgets like polls, buttons, games, or forms in the newsletter.
These additions will not only make your design more engaging but also increase readability and visual appeal. Take a look at this interactive image carousel as an example.
💡 Expert Tip: When you add images, GIFs, or interactive widgets, include alt text to ensure your newsletters are accessible to all readers.
5. Review, iterate and send
Before sending out your newsletter to your entire subscriber list, take the time to review every aspect thoroughly. Check for grammar errors, ensure colors and layout are consistent on different devices, operating systems, browsers and email clients.
You can also send the newsletter to your colleagues, supervisors and friends to seek feedback and catch any overlooked issues. This allows you to experience the newsletter from the recipient's perspective and identify any potential issues with functionality or display.
Additionally, before mass distribution, if you're confused between two versions of your newsletter, you can do A/B testing to identify which one works better and send it to your entire list.
Once you've sent the newsletter, you must also track if your newsletter was able to achieve the goals you expected it to. You can do this by tracking important metrics like open rate, click rate, etc., in your email provider's analytics dashboard.
💡 Expert Tip: Subscribe to newsletters from your competitors and industry leaders. Analyze the content, design, and overall approach of various email newsletter examples to draw inspiration for your own strategy.
How to build your first email list (if you're starting from scratch)
Before any of the steps above are useful, you need people to send your newsletter to. Here's how to get your first batch of subscribers the right way.
Start with permission
Never buy an email list or scrape addresses from the web. Every subscriber should actively opt in to hear from you, whether through a signup form on your website, a checkout flow, or a lead magnet.
This matters for two reasons:
It keeps you compliant with laws like CAN-SPAM, which require clear permission and an easy way to unsubscribe.
It means the people on your list actually want to hear from you, which is what drives good open rates later.
Simple ways to collect your first subscribers
You don't need a big audience to get started. A few reliable ways to build your first 50 to 100 subscribers:
Add a signup form to your website or blog. Keep it short like name and email is usually enough.
Offer something in exchange for an email address, like a free guide, checklist, or discount code. This is often called a lead magnet.
Use your existing channels. Share your signup link on social media, in your email signature, and on any landing pages you already have traffic to.
Ask in person or at checkout, if you run a physical store or events. A simple sign-up sheet or a prompt after purchase works well.
Import contacts who've already given consent, such as past customers or event attendees who agreed to be contacted.
Once you have even a small list, you can start sending and grow from there. A newsletter with 50 engaged subscribers is more valuable than one with 5,000 people who never open it. Once your list is in place, head back up to the steps above to put together your first send.
Your email service provider (ESP) is what actually gets your newsletter designed, sent, and tracked, so it's worth making sure you have a good one in place rather than just any one. Here is what you should actually compare when buying new on:
Ease of use: Look for a drag-and-drop editor if you're not comfortable with code. Most modern ESPs offer one.
Template library: A good starting template saves hours of design work, especially for your first few sends.
Automation features: Even basic automation, like a welcome email for new subscribers, makes a noticeable difference in engagement.
Analytics and reporting: You'll want to see open rates, click rates, and unsubscribes at a glance so you know what's working.
List size and pricing tiers: Most ESPs charge based on how many contacts you have, so check where the free plan cuts off and what the next tier costs.
Customer support: Especially useful in your first few months, when you're likely to run into setup questions.
Now that you've equipped yourself with the knowledge to create captivating newsletters along with the best practices to follow, the only thing left to do is to start creating your newsletter. If you seek a place to start, Mailmodo is a great choice that offers email newsletter templates that you can customize and use.
You can start by using Mailmodo's AI Template Generator. Simply describe the type of newsletter you want to create such as a weekly update, product announcement, or educational guide and the AI will generate a complete template with suggested layout, content blocks, and visuals. You can then refine it using Mailmodo's drag-and-drop editor to match your brand style perfectly.
