Send a simple monthly newsletter

A short monthly email keeps you in mind with people who already know you, without depending on whether a social platform shows them your posts. This guide gives you a simple format to reuse every month, so writing and sending it takes under an hour.

Before you start

• A list of people who have agreed to get emails from you. If you don’t have one yet, step 1 covers how to start.
• An account with an email marketing service. Many have a free plan for small lists, for example Mailchimp, MailerLite, Kit, or Brevo.
• Rough notes on your month: new work, questions customers asked, anything coming up.
• About an hour.
• An AI chat tool such as ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini for step 3.

Want to do it yourself?

Difficulty

6 out of 10

Estimated completion time

1–2 hours per issue after list setup

Skills you’ll need: Use an email platform, manage consent, edit a concise draft, and send a test to check links and formatting.

I’ll do it myselfI’d rather get help

How this helps your brand

A consent-based newsletter gives existing followers a direct way to hear from you again. Connecting website signup to the correct subscriber list and linking useful pages can support repeat visits and relevant enquiries.

1. 1

   Step 1: Only email people who said yes

   Send your newsletter only to people who agreed to hear from you, such as through a sign-up form on your website, a box ticked at checkout, or a clear “yes” when you asked. In many countries, emailing people who didn’t agree is against the law, and it also gets your emails marked as spam.

   Send it through an email marketing service, not your normal inbox. These services add an unsubscribe link and your business address to every email, which many countries’ laws require, and they handle people who unsubscribe for you.

   For website signup, choose the subscriber list or audience in your email service first. Add its hosted form or supported website integration and check which list it writes to. Record the connected account and the consent wording shown to the visitor. Keep general contact enquiries separate; receiving a service request is not a reason to add that person to marketing.

   If you have no website, the email service may provide a hosted signup page you can link from your profile or share directly. Use a supported connection rather than copying private subscriber details into an AI chat. If your setup needs a connector, verify its exact new-subscriber event and consent fields before relying on it.

   Tip: Starting from zero? Add a sign-up form from your email service to your website, and mention the newsletter at the end of a job: “Want a short email once a month with tips and offers?”

2. 2

   Step 2: Use the same simple format every month

   A fixed format means you never start from a blank page, and readers learn what to expect. Three short parts are enough:

   • One useful tip for your customers, in a few lines.
   • One piece of news: something new, a recent job, a change coming up.
   • One clear next step: book, call, visit, or reply to the email.

   Tip: Keep it short. A newsletter people can read in a minute is one they’ll keep opening.

   Illustrated exampleA whole newsletter in three short parts

   Example monthly emailWillow Garden CareA simple watering tip for warmer days

   Hello from Willow! Here’s a little help for your garden this month.

   1. One useful tip

      Water the soil around your plants, rather than the leaves. Aim for the roots, where the water is needed.

   2. One piece of news

      Our spring garden tidy-ups are now open for booking.

   3. One clear next step

      Reply to book a garden tidy-up.

3. 3

   Step 3: Draft it from your notes

   Paste your notes for the month into an AI tool with the prompt at the end of this guide. It shapes them into the three-part format and gives you subject line options.

   Then edit it so it sounds like you. Check every date, price, and offer. AI sometimes adds details you never gave it.

   Tip: If you used the guide “Teach AI your brand voice”, paste your voice guide in first. The draft will need far less editing.

4. 4

   Step 4: Pick a clear subject line

   The subject line decides whether people open it. Pick the clearest option, not the cleverest. It should tell people what’s inside: “Three ways to keep your boiler happy this winter” beats “October news”.

   Keep it short enough to read on a phone, and don’t use all capitals or lots of exclamation marks, which look like spam.

   Illustrated exampleLet the subject line explain the value

   Same email. Two ways it could appear in an inbox.

   Too vague

   Willow Garden CareApril newsThe reader has to guess what’s inside.

   Clearer

   Willow Garden CareA simple watering tip for warmer daysNames the useful tip. 37 characters.

   Keep the promise: the email should deliver the tip named in the subject.

5. 5

   Step 5: Send a test, then send it

   Send a test to yourself first and read it on your phone. Tap every link. Check the sender name is your business name, so people recognise it.

   Then send it, or schedule it for a day and time your customers are likely to be reading email. Pick the same day each month so it becomes a habit for you and for them.

   Test joining before testing the newsletter itself. Use an address you control on the actual website form or hosted signup page, complete any confirmation step, and find the subscriber in the intended list with the expected status and consent record. Then send a test through your email service, check the relevant website links, and use its test subscriber to check unsubscribe handling. Remove or label test entries so they do not distort the results.

6. 6

   Step 6: Look at what people clicked

   A day or two later, look at the report in your email service. The most useful number is clicks: which links people actually tapped. Open rates are less reliable than they used to be, because some email apps open messages automatically.

   Also read any replies. If a tip got lots of clicks or replies, do more of that next month.

   Illustrated exampleUse clicks to choose the next useful topic

   April newsletterExample link-click report · two days later

   Read the watering guide

   24 clicks

   Book a garden tidy-up

   9 clicks

   A useful clue for next month

   The watering guide got more clicks. Try another practical garden tip and check what readers reply.

   This is a separate sample campaign with two links. Clicks show interest; they do not tell you how many bookings were made.

I run [what your business does] for [who your customers are]. I send a short monthly email newsletter to customers who signed up.

Here is how I write (my voice guide, or a couple of things I’ve written):
[paste]

My notes from this month:
[paste your notes: new work, customer questions, news, anything coming up]

The one thing I want readers to do: [for example: book for spring, reply with a question, visit the shop]

Please write a newsletter under 250 words with:
1. A one-line friendly greeting.
2. One practical tip for my customers, based on my notes.
3. One piece of business news, from my notes.
4. One clear call to action, for what I want readers to do.

Then give me five subject line options under 50 characters. Make them clear rather than clever.

Also write a one-line post I can share on [platform] to invite people to sign up.

Use only what’s in my notes. Don’t invent news, offers, discounts, dates, or prices. If something is missing, write [ADD DETAIL] instead of guessing.

Also give me a setup checklist for website or hosted-page signup into my chosen email-service list, including the connected account, consent wording, confirmation status, and a controlled signup test. Keep service enquiries separate from marketing subscribers. Include newsletter-link and unsubscribe checks using a test address I control, and never claim a list connection is working without evidence.