How to Set Up Email Newsletters With Constant Contact

After setting up your Constant Contact account, you will want to set up and send an email newsletter to your email list (if you have one yet). Here’s how:

Step 1 – Start with a Template

Look at the email templates that are available. Constant Contact provides hundreds templates to choose from, so that you can have a professional email newsletter in HTML format as easily as possible.

Simply select the “Newsletter” category to start with a template that’s designed for these types of campaigns.

If you don’t care for the templates, you can always create your own or edit one that is available. Designing your own template requires no HTML knowledge, as Constant Contact has a drag-and-drop interface for creating email templates.

With your template, add your company logo (if applicable) and choose colors and fonts that will match the type of message that you are trying to communicate. The “mood” of your company needs to be conveyed in this design, whether it is formal and professional, or loose and fun.

Step 2 – Write an Attention-Grabbing Subject Line

You need to come up with an enticing and informative subject line, as you’re competing with dozens of other brands that are flooding your audience’s inbox.

It needs to be enticing to give readers a reason to open it up and read it in the first place. At the same time, you will want to be informative enough so that the recipients know where this email is coming from. They decided to opt-in to this newsletter, so the subject line needs to communicate that this is coming from that newsletter.

This is also a good time to configure the “from” name on your emails, as it will also help your readers know where the email is coming from and ensure their comfort in opening it.

Step 3 – Get Personal

Now it’s time to personalize the email to address the recipient directly using Constant Contact’s tools for doing so.

This allows you to make the newsletter very personalized instead of a “mass email” feel.

Here’s a look at how Constant Contact lets you personalize the recipient’s name by generating a placeholder tag:

I don’t want to veer too far off our main topic here, so you can just refer to Constant Contact’s knowledge base article for more specific instructions on setting this up for your newsletter.

Step 4 – Integrate and Import

Integrate your social networks with Constant Contact to maximize the effectiveness of your newsletters and ensure it aligns with your overall branding strategy. This is also crucial for boosting your social reach and aligning your brand messaging across all digital channels.

Constant Contact allows for you to include icons that will link to your Facebook page, your Twitter profile, or LinkedIn page. This can widely expand your exposure to the reader.

You can also import an existing email list from many different common databases for Constant Contact to address. Once this is done, you can group subscribers into different categories to send separate and focused emails to each of them.

Step 5 – Preview, Edit, and Send

Once your newsletter is done, preview it to make sure that everything is formatted and designed correctly.

You also have the ability to test it and ensure that it is not blocked by spam filters.

Then it’s just a matter of clicking send to push it out immediately. Or you have the option to schedule the delivery for a later time.