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What You Need To Know To Create Your Newsletter Planning Template
Avoid Writer’s Block by Creating a Plan for Your Newsletter
Lenore Sterner & Linda Hwang
August 16th, 2024
This article has been updated to maintain its accuracy and relevance
Being a content creator is a tough job.
I don’t know about you; but, sometimes, I get hit pretty hard with a case of writer’s block. Most of the time, I get stuck on one question: What am I going to write about?
One of the best methods that I have found to get myself past that initial first challenge is to plan ahead and decide what I want to write long before I ever sit down to write it. By doing this, I save myself so much time in the long run – because I’m not having to make decisions in the moment.
I’ve already decided what to write, what my goals are, and how each piece of content fits into the bigger picture of what I’m trying to achieve.
Sounds pretty nice, huh? Today, I’m going to talk to you about developing your own newsletter planning template so that you can spend more time writing and less time procrastinating.
Table of Contents
To put it simply, a newsletter planning template is a document or spreadsheet or even a calendar that you create for yourself to plan your content and track your content’s performance.
How you create the template is unique to you and your preferences, but no one wants to set that up every time you create new content.
Creating a template for yourself gets you organized, helps you plan ahead, and keeps you on track toward your goals.
You’ve already done the hard part – building the foundation of your business! Now, it’s time to flex your creative muscle and create a plan to keep your audience up to date with your business.
How do you do this?
You build your strategy and create a template for yourself to continue making great content.
To stay relevant, you want a strategy that will ensure that you’re maximizing your subscriber base. With a well-thought-out newsletter planning template, staying relevant is a breeze!
Here are the super-basic steps of newsletter planning:
Define your goal(s).
Identify your audience.
Determine your content strategy.
Build out your email list.
Choose your email template.
Start your email campaign.
Define Your Goal(s)
First, you need to determine your end goal. What is it that you want to achieve?
Just as important as defining what you want to achieve is defining a measurement of success. What Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are you tracking, and how are you using them?
Consider using KPIs like open rates or click-through rates to measure your success.
Identify Your Audience
Who are you speaking to in your newsletter posts? Knowing your audience helps you to plan what you want to say to them, because you already know the content that they are looking for.
Determine Your Content Strategy
Ask yourself the following questions: How often are you going to send an email? What kind of content do you want to create?
Take the time to build your strategy and make the decisions now as opposed to when you’re in the thick of content creating. That way, you can focus on creating, rather than thinking about how you are going to create.
Build Out Your Email List
Building your list and growing your community is such an important part of your newsletter strategy. In fact, it may be the most important part, as you need an audience to send your emails to!
Choose Your Email Template
Decide how you want your newsletter to look. Then, build a template that you can use again and again. beehiiv’s no-code newsletter builder lets you create stunning newsletters in a snap.
Start Your Email Campaign
The last step is to get started with your first campaign. But if you’ve already taken the time to build out your plan, sending your first newsletter will be a breeze.
Building your newsletter planning template will help you stay organized with creating and releasing your newsletter. You’ll be able to pinpoint what topics you’ll want in your newsletter, which target audience to send it to, how you’ll structure the newsletter’s layout, and more.
Your newsletter content plan will be as unique as you. However, there are a few key things every plan should include.
Offer multiple different stories: When you’re structuring your newsletter, offer multiple different stories, so you can increase your chances of hooking your reader.
Don’t flood your newsletter with too many call-to-actions (CTAs). This will only overwhelm your readers.
Always present the most crucial information first.
Use images to help enhance your newsletters – but only a few so that internet service providers won’t flag you as a spammer!
Find a balance between the graphics and content within your newsletter: The 80/20 rule (80% content, 20% images) is a good place to start.
Stay compliant with legal requirements: For example, does your newsletter include an unsubscribe link and a physical address?
Content is king in 2024. Let’s be honest; your email will get trashed, or readers will unsubscribe if your content is lacking. To prevent your newsletter from getting to that point with your readers, ensure that your content strategy is on point!
You can download a content planning calendar from Smartsheet to help you structure and organize what content you’d like to feature in your newsletters, or you can check out other options.
Below, we have compiled some of our favorite tools for newsletter content planning, all of which offer templates to help remove any concerns you may have when creating your newsletter!
beehiiv
beehiiv is an all-in-one email marketing platform that offers an amazing newsletter and website builders to help enhance your content!
You can customize your newsletter with drag-and-drop features and quickly add content from other sources like YouTube, Instagram, or Twitter.
Plus, beehiiv has analytics features to track who opens your newsletters and how they interact with your content.
Another excellent feature beehiiv offers is A/B testing, so you can test different newsletter versions.
beehiiv gives you so many options to create memorable content, every time, without having to reinvent the wheel. Here’s how some of the top beehiiv newsletters use templates to simplify their world-class content creation.
Check out how Big Desk Energy keeps a retro PC vibe with their templated emails:
Creator Spotlight uses a cream background to emphasize the black typography and orange accents:
(Psst: in case you haven’t heard, Creator Spotlight just launched a new podcast called Tasteland. Go be one of the first to check it out!)
Finally, Arnold’s Pump Club keeps it simple with a white background for a big impact. Who said that simple has to be boring?
Mailchimp
Mailchimp is one of the most popular options out there for newsletter planning templates. It has features like drag-and-drop customization options, pre-built templates, and analytics capabilities, so you can track how users interact with your newsletters over time.
Mailchimp also allows you to segment users based on their interests or demographics, so you can tailor your content accordingly.
Constant Contact
Constant Contact is another excellent option for those looking for an easy way to plan their newsletters. The platform offers a wide range of customizable templates and tools that allow you to A/B test different versions of the same email until you find what works best for your audience. Constant Contact also has robust reporting features that track users' engagement with your content over time.
Drip
Drip is another popular choice for creating effective email campaigns tailored specifically for e-commerce stores or small businesses looking to grow their customer base through targeted emails sent directly from their website domain name (no third party involved).
Drip also allows users to automate tasks, such as setting up welcome series emails or abandoned cart emails, without manually sending them each time someone signs up or leaves something in their cart.
Hubspot
HubSpot Marketing offers an email marketing planning template that breaks down what each of your email newsletter topics will be. It also gives you the option to put in email send dates. For big-picture planners, this gives you a high overview of your email campaigns for the week or month.
With this template and HubSpot’s marketing platform, you can drill down to see which email newsletter performed well and which didn't.
Also, HubSpot’s marketing platform offers a variety of customizable templates for newsletters that you can easily edit with drag-and-drop features. It also has an AI tool that helps you create engaging content by suggesting keywords and phrases in your newsletter copy.
Whether you’re new to creating newsletters or looking for more advanced options, there’s a solution out there that suits your needs perfectly!
Newsletter planning templates provide an easy way to plan your newsletter ahead of time – saving you time and energy for creating your content.
If you’re looking for an all-in-one email platform with which to start your email newsletter journey, beehiiv is a fantastic tool to help you grow your audience. Why not sign up for your free trial today?
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