Email newsletter for a small business: what to send

A small business newsletter works when it tells your regulars something they would be sorry to miss: what is new, what is coming up, and one good reason to come back this month. Send it once or twice a month, keep it short, show one or two of your best photos, and ask for one thing. Here are eight kinds of emails that fit almost any local business, a sample you can copy, and the rules every one of them must follow.

Start with people who asked for it

A newsletter is only as good as the list behind it. Gmail's guidelines for senders are blunt about this: make sure recipients opt in, do not buy email addresses from other companies, and do not send to people who did not sign up. Avoid sign-up boxes that are ticked by default.

Good places to ask, with a clear "Want our news by email?":

• the checkout counter or the booking confirmation
• a small card in the bag or on the table
• a sign-up link in your Instagram bio (more on that in Link in bio: what a local business should put there)
• the end of a job, when the customer is happiest

Two hundred people who chose to hear from you are worth more than two thousand addresses from a spreadsheet.

Eight emails worth sending

You do not need all eight. Pick the three or four that suit your business and rotate them.

1. What is new this month. A new service, a seasonal menu, fresh stock, a new team member. Say you run a nail salon: the fall colors, with a photo of each.
2. The date to remember. An event, a class, a tasting, a holiday schedule. One date, one place, one link to book.
3. Behind the counter. How something is made or done. A bakery shows the 5 a.m. shift, a roofer shows how a leak is found before anything gets replaced.
4. One useful tip. Something your customers ask you all the time. A bike shop explains how to check tire pressure. A groomer explains how often a double coat needs brushing.
5. Subscribers first. Early access to bookings or a new product, a day before you post it on social media. People like being first more than they like coupons.
6. A customer story, with permission. A finished kitchen, a before and after, a regular's favorite order. Ask before you use anyone's name or photo.
7. The quiet-week nudge. Slow Tuesdays, an empty calendar after a holiday: tell people there is room and why now is a good time.
8. Thank you, and what is next. End of a season, a business anniversary, a look at the next few months.

Notice what is missing: a list of every service you offer, and "Our March newsletter" as the subject line. Neither tells the reader anything new.

What one good email looks like

Short enough to read on a phone while waiting for coffee. One subject line that says what is inside, one photo, a few sentences, one button. Here is a hypothetical one for a garden center, piece by piece:

Everything in it is specific: what arrived, why it matters, when to come, what to do. If your photos need help, read How to take good product photos with your phone.

How often to send

Once or twice a month is a rhythm most owners can keep, and it is often enough that people remember you. Weekly works if something really changes every week, like a menu or new stock. Much less than once a month, and people may not recognize you when you finally write.

Spam reports matter. Gmail asks every sender to keep the spam rate it reports below 0.3%, recommends staying below 0.1%, and warns that a high spam rate leads to more of your mail being classed as spam. The best protection is simple: send only to people who asked, send what you promised, and make leaving easy.

The rules every marketing email must follow

In the US, marketing email falls under the CAN-SPAM Act, enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. The FTC points out that it is not only about bulk email: it covers every commercial message, including business-to-business ones. The main requirements, from the FTC's guide:

• Honest sender details. The From, To and Reply-To lines must be accurate and identify your business.
• An honest subject line that matches what is inside.
• Say it is an ad when it is one. The law leaves you a lot of room in how, but it must be clear.
• Your physical postal address in every email: a street address, a registered PO box or a registered private mailbox.
• A clear way to opt out, and you must honor it within 10 business days. You cannot charge for it or ask for more than an email address.
• You stay responsible even if someone else sends the emails for you.

Each email that breaks these rules can bring its own penalty, so it adds up fast. Messages that only confirm a booking or an order the customer already made, such as an appointment reminder, count as transactional and are exempt from most of these rules. A newsletter is not one of them.

Gmail adds its own rules on top. Every sender has to set up basic email authentication, and anyone sending 5,000 or more messages a day to Gmail addresses must offer one-click unsubscribe. A small business list is far below that number, but under CAN-SPAM every marketing email needs a clear way to opt out anyway.

This is general information, not legal advice. The FTC's CAN-SPAM guide, linked below, has the full rules and answers to common questions. For anything unusual, such as texting customers or emailing patients, talk to a lawyer.

Look at clicks, not opens

Your email tool will show an open rate. Take it with a grain of salt. Apple's Mail Privacy Protection, which iPhone users can turn on, "prevents senders from seeing if you've opened the email message they sent you." For everyone who uses it, your tool simply cannot know whether the email was read, so the open rate is a rough guess at best.

Clicks tell you more. Say the "book now" button got 12 clicks and four people on your list booked that week: that is a newsletter doing its job. Track replies too: an email that makes people write back is a good one.

If you would rather not write them yourself

Our Email Newsletter service is $129 a month on top of a plan: two newsletters a month, written and designed for you from your photos, offers and news, in your brand colors. They are sent from your own email tool, you approve each one before it goes out, they go only to people who signed up to hear from you, and opens and clicks appear in your monthly recap. If you only send a few emails a year, writing them yourself with the ideas above will do the job. See the monthly services.