Simple Email Newsletter Copywriting Tips That Get Results

In today’s fast-paced online world, having the skill of email newsletter copywriting is becoming more essential. 

Copywriting involves having a blend of creativity and strategy, allowing you to convey the perfect tone, message, and call-to-action to inspire your subscribers.

But before I dive into the email newsletter best practices, let’s make sure you’ve completed some essential steps first. 

Disclaimer: Please note this post may contain affiliate links. This means I may receive a commission if clicked at no extra cost to you. Though the opinions remain my own

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Essentials Steps to Complete Before Sending Emails

Before we can dive into the email newsletter copywriting tips, let’s quickly cover the two most important steps you’ll need before starting to send any type of email. 

Set up your email service provider

Having a reliable email service provider (esp) is critical for sending successful email marketing campaigns. 

Personally, I’ve used both Mailerlite and Convertkit, but have now transitioned both of my businesses to Convertkit. 

You’ll want to ensure that whichever email platform you choose, that it’s able to do the following:

• Ability to easily collect email addresses through opt-in forms
• Track subscriber performance through analytics (like open & click-through rates) 
• Makes it easy to segment your subscribers (we’ll cover this next)

Most importantly, pick the one that works best for you and your budget. 

Segment your list through tagging / grouping

Segmenting your email list is a game-changing strategy that can significantly boost the success of your email newsletters. 

Rather than treating all subscribers the same and sending the exact same emails, even tweaking a few words here and there based on what you know about them can make the world of a difference. 

You can segment your email list based on…

• Interests → Which resource(s) did they sign up for? 
• Behaviors → Which emails do they open? Which links have they clicked?
• Demographics → Are they a parent? Are they digital shop owners? 

You can easily segment your subscribers by using features like tags, groups or segments in your esp. Each one may use a different term but the outcome is the same. 

The more your segment your list, along with good email newsletter copywriting, the better your emails will perform. 

To keep your email platform organized, check out my Implementation Workshop on How to Optimize Your Email Marketing Program. 

Simple Email Newsletter Best Practices

People’s inboxes are getting more and more crowded daily, which means in order for your emails to perform, you need them to stand out. 

It’s not just about delivering an email, it’s about truly connecting and understanding your audience to compel them to take action. 

To achieve this, certain key elements come into play, so let’s cover what these email newsletter best practices are to help you increase conversions. 

Related Post: High Converting Email Swipes for Online Business Owners

Catchy subject line

The subject line is your first opportunity to make an impression in someone’s inbox which means it needs to grab their attention. 

It also needs to be relevant to the content inside the email. 

Please don’t use clickbaity types of subject lines where the content inside has nothing to do with what the subject line said. These are annoying, unethical and can lead to unsubscribes from your ideal audience. 

To make your subject line even more effective, consider using the preview text strategically. This additional snippet of text appears underneath the subject line and is like a glimpse of what’s inside.

Here’s an example of what a subject line and preview looks like on mobile via Gmail: 

[screenshot → create an email in Canva to show both]

Need a quick subject line to send in your next email? Scroll down on this page here to have one generated for you. 

Easy to skim

Studies have shown that the majority of people don’t actually read emails – they skim. However, different people skim different parts of your email which means your emails still need to be good. 

Some email newsletter copywriting tips to help make your email more skimmable are: 

• Make your font size a bit larger (size 16 or 18)
• Break up text and leave plenty of white space
• Use different font colors to highlight important text 
• Add headings or subheadings when possible 

Doing so will make your emails easier for your subscribers to stay engaged until they reach the end of the email (instead of simply closing it out). If you can’t keep your subscriber attention, it’ll lower your conversion which is the opposite of what we want. 

Related Post: How To Format Your Blog Posts

Clear call-to-action

A call-to-action (CTA) is the driving force behind conversions. Make your desired action crystal clear and strategically place multiple CTAs throughout the email. 

A CTA could be encouraging them to click a link, download a resource, hit reply, make a purchase etc. If you’re wanting your reader to click a link, you could experiment with linking and underlining text, adding a button or linking an image within your email. 

While many marketers recommend having no more than one CTA as an email CTA best practice, there may be times when having multiple is just fine. Don’t be afraid to break some email marketing rules from time to time. 😜

Appropriate use of urgency

If the goal with your email is to make sales, consider adding in a sense of urgency whenever it’s appropriate. 

You can use a countdown timer like Deadline Funnel or Countdown Hero to provide a genuine deadline for when something will expire (like a limited time sale or offer). 

Creating this sense of urgency can be a powerful motivator for action, give a little FOMO and encourage the reader to make a decision. 

However, urgency isn’t always needed for an email to be high-converting or to inspire readers to take action, it’s just one of the few factors that can help. 

In fact, over-using urgency can turn off some of your readers so be sure to save this for whenever there’s real urgency involved. 

High-converting copy

Ultimately, the success of an email boils down to writing really good copy. The messaging you use and the way you present offers to your audience determines whether they’ll take action on not. 

So yes, the final email newsletter copywriting tip is to have good copy. 

Personally, copy isn’t my strong suit which is why I like to have my copy reviewed by a copywriter, especially when gearing up for a launch. 

But besides having my copy reviewed, I also avoid writing from scratch whenever possible. 

Using email swipe files is especially helpful to avoid writer’s block and save time when writing high-converting copy, especially when the email swipes were written by a copywriter themselves. 

It Can Be Simple!

And there you have it. The simple email newsletter copywriting tips that even beginner online business owners can follow. 

Now, if writing emails sounds overwhelming because maybe you have noo idea what to even say, this $9 membership is for you. I’ve been in it for years and it always helps get rid of writer’s block and makes it easy to get an email written in 20 minutes or less! 🤯 

Saving time and helping you avoid overwhelm is what I’m all about. So if you haven’t yet, I invite you to tune in to the Cheerful Productive Chats Podcast here, where I release a new episode every Wednesday.