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5 Newsletter Myths

Newsletters are such an amazing tool for any business, and that’s why I’m running my 5 Day Newsletter Fix to help you get started with yours.


If you want to reach more people, increase sales and give value to your audience a newsletter is a brilliant way to do it.

Over 5 days I’ll teach you how to create your landing page, design your newsletter, understand the legal bits and most importantly SEND your first newsletter!

I’m so excited to get started on 12th April so if you’d like to join us there’s still time to book your space.

Places are limited because I’ll be reading everyone’s newsletters before they go out so if you’d like to book yours click here!


In this blog post I want to try and debunk some of the biggest myths I hear about newsletters.

Most of these are things that I thought myself before I started, and as much as anyone told me otherwise it wasn’t until I actually got going that I realised they just aren’t true.

They might be things that are standing in your way and stopping you from taking the first step to launching your newsletter, so lets figure out which ones are true or false!


Myth 1 - You need to send a weekly newsletter


I probably have a part to play in this as I know I talk about sending my newsletter every week. At the beginning I decided that was going to be the frequency I was happy with and so far it’s been working really well. My newsletter is called The Social Sunday and it goes out on a Sunday every week.


This is what works for me, but it absolutely doesn’t mean that is what will work for you.

You might want to send it every 2 weeks, every month or even just a few times a year. Decide what works for you and stick to it so that your audience knows what they’re getting into when they sign up to your email list.


Myth 2 - It's only worth sending if you have a massive list.


When I think about this myth I like to think about a ’50 people in a room' post that my coach Alice posted.


50 people is a full room, 250 people is a lecture hall, 800 people is how many we had in the parade at Pride. Imagine doing a talk in front of all of those people?

I did and it was amazing!

I started my list with just me and Tom subscribed and it's grown gradually over time. I only want people on my list who want to be there, so I'm in no rush to grow it full of people who will leave a few months down the line.

I believe slow and steady wins the race when it comes to growing an email list especially if you are a small business.

Myth 3 - You have to write new content every time.


I know I say this a lot, but reuse your content! Send your subscribers to a blog post, a new product or a story about your week.

I find that a lot of my newsletters will come from a conversation I’ve had that week, so I try not to put too much pressure on myself to come up with a brand new idea every Sunday.


People think is that a newsletter has to be really long. It doesn’t!

The truth is a newsletter doesn’t even need to have words, it could be a video, a podcast, a blog, or a link and it certainly doesn’t need to be long.


Think about your audience or even better ask them what they want to see.

Don't over complicate it, if a social media post has done well that week then expand on the points you made.

If your podcast got some feedback that you hadn’t thought about, use that for your next newsletter too.


Just remember that not everyone sees everything that you post, so it’s definitely okay to reuse your content and it’s especially okay if it’s started new conversations that you or your audience haven’t thought about!


Myth 4 - It's really techy and complicated to start a newsletter.

Now I will say that this is a myth(ish) because I'm sure you can make it really complicated, but it doesn't need to be.


My newsletter is on Mailchimp. I’d used it before for clients, I find it really simple and easy to use.

You might want to have a look at another platform that you find more simple, or get started on Mailchimp and then move over further down the line.


The good thing is that you can start a newsletter even if you are at the very beginning. Lots of these platforms let you create your own landing page so customers can put their details in without you needing your own website.


As with everything when it comes to marketing, I try to make things as simple as possible and ask myself, what is the most simple way I could do this?

For me it was making a template in mailchimp, telling people I had a mailing list and just starting! There was no fancy design or complicated technology involved.

Marketing is a simple as you want to make it, so start small but just get started.

Myth 5 - No one opens them anyway


For some reason some people seem to think that email marketing isn’t worth it because people don’t open their emails anymore anyway.


Maybe that is true for you, but email marketing has a huge return on investment and that is purely because of people opening their emails.


According to Mailchimp the average open rate across all the industries they analysed is 21.33%


My open rate is 49% across last year. So how can it be true that no one is opening their emails?


When I did a poll this week about the newsletters my followers like to read, a couple of people said the only one they read is mine. Which is really lovely to hear.


But there are lots of factors that are included in this. The subject line, the time you send it, the consistent value you give.


You might have a newsletter that flops and that’s okay. But if you keep showing up, keep giving value each time and keep supporting your audience, you will grow and your open rates will increase. The hard part is getting started!


I’d love to know if you have any other myths that are stopping you from starting your first newsletter. Let me know my Instagram stories!


Don’t forget, if you’d like to sign up to The 5 Day Marketing Fix, places are limited and you can sign up here.


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