As long as I could remember, writing was the simplest tool I used to organize my mind. It only got better as I got older, to eventually becoming an extension of my own self. But how do I channel this extension into something fruitful for my career?

After some research, I stumbled upon the medium of newsletters - an evolving platform that felt like a modern twist on the well-known practice of blogging. As a young English student and a passionate writer, any concept of reaching an audience seemed like a far-off dream. I dove in, unsure of my audience, my niche, or even my voice, but I took that crucial first step - just sitting down and writing.

While the journey was chaotic and full of errors, the hardest part was getting started. Courage was key, and as I began crafting newsletters, I realized it’s more than just sending emails. It’s about building a rapport by understanding the power of your written word.

In this step-by-step guide, I will help you craft a newsletter that reflects not only who you are but the community you seek to create, through content, tone, and organization that is engaging. Let’s dive in!

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Who Are You? What Do You Care About?

So you want to take the first step? Let's look at what you need to get off the right foot. In order to write something that is truly capable of engaging your audience, you need to care about what you write about - care being the key theme here. Why, you ask? 

Feeling apprehensive going into writing as someone who isn’t sure what they have to say, or if anyone would even be interested? You can be rest assured, with the explosion of content-driven platforms, there is an audience for pretty much anything you can think of, provided you have a unique perspective. Individualism is our species' greatest commodity, and you as a human, whether you know it or not, are hardwired for standing out. The only obstacle in your way? That would be your willingness to discover who you are, what you care about, and consequently that determination to succeed. 

So caring innately about providing your perspective would shape what you are going to write about. When you care immensely about your corner of the world (or the internet), you see the challenges in that space, that people in that corner suffer from. You also get to see opportunities that others might have overlooked, and present them to your audience, because they could also benefit from it. And when you can document these challenges and opportunities in the written form, you automatically are building content worthy of anyone’s attention who is working in this corner.

But how do you find these people who might be interested? Coming up next.

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Where Do You Spend Your Attention? 

According to Smart Insights Digital Marketing, nearly 5.4 billion people utilize social media. That is nearly 64% of the entire global population. And if you are under the age of 30, that percentage goes up nearly 16% (Pew Research Center). If you consider attention as one of your most expensive assets, where are you spending it? What does your ‘For You’ page on Tiktok or Instagram Discover page look like. Where are you commenting and liking on? Take note of content that draws your attention in. If you have an alternate perspective of the content you see, and you feel compelled to share that perspective, that’s exactly the content you ‘care’ about. 

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What Is Your Attentive Niche? What Do They Have in Common?

No judgement, but let’s assume you spend a reasonable amount of time on social media. Let’s take stock of who your favorite content creators are. If you don't know, take a peek at your follow list. If you don't follow anyone, go a little further and take stock of what you like and comment on often. Every social network would provide these statistics in the activity portion of your account settings. 

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Discovering Your Attentive Universe

1. Pick 3 content creators whom you feel are consistently piquing your interest, or at least creators to whose handles you have returned atleast thrice in a given week. 
2. Write 100 words describing what it is they post about. 
3. Come up with 3 aspects all three content creators have in common - Write in your own words, do not beat yourself up on the details.
4. Describe in three points this content appeals to you and your interests.  

For example, all three points are rooted in nature, and spending time in nature is either something you already practice or something you aspire to practice more. 

5. Do not limit yourself if you have found one point of interest, take it. If you have found three, even better, more to explore!

Elna Cain talks about this approach in detail in her excellent Youtube video resource on how to better narrow down your writing niche.

Assessing the Market

Once you have taken stock of your social media attention, let's take this a little further. You have figured out one of the most important aspects of what it means to be a modern consumer. Now we need to figure out where your footing is as a newsletter creator, which means figuring out what the space you will be living in.

Once you have discovered the intersection of your interests (on a scale of 1 to 10) it's time to explore those niche corners of the internet, and like any explorer, the first step is curiosity, and finding answers to a couple of questions. 

1. Who is dominating the space? 
2. What kind of content are they creating? Long-Form? Short Form? Daily? Weekly? 
3. Is there a common tonal approach? Is it funny, authoritative, inspirational, educational?
4. What is the separation between larger and smaller creators? 
5. What topics receive more traction?
6. What platforms are most utilized? 
7. Where is the content most saturated? What is the untapped white spaces about which no one is creating content about?

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There is no quick and easy cut that guarantees you success by simply analyzing and asking questions. But remember that your writing is only as strong as your research. You can not write what you do not understand. Do not limit yourself by getting lazy, or even worse, psyched out by the potential for competition. 

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Discover Your Potential

By now, you have a good idea of what (topically) you want to write about, and a glimpse of what the space looks like. Here lies the rub: we talked about individualism earlier, remember? So we need to differentiate ourselves from what we researched about, so let's diversify ourselves, shall we? 

The next step is simple: Identify three areas or subtopics within your chosen topic(s). For example, if I were choosing something like running, I would explore subtopics which no ones write about: like staying consistent and the mindset shift it requires to take to running every day. Again, keep it simple: what aspects of your chosen topic interest you the most? Why is it important to write about this? Why is no one writing about this?

Once you have discovered your subtopics, run them back and reassess what the space looks like. 

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Try Your Hand

We have laid our foundation, and we now have a less murkier idea of the domain we want to write about. The next step is simple: give it a shot. Write something for each of your subtopics, even if it is just 100 words from a ChatGPT prompt you found online! You won't know until you try, see where you struggle, so get away from the morbid blinking cursor on a blank page, and get some ideas flowing.

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Who Are You Writing for?

Making the transition from writing for yourself to writing for an audience is a mindset shift. To reiterate the point from earlier in the article: The key ingredient to starting any newsletter is not marinating what people will think, how you will make money, or even what you're writing. 

The key ingredients are care and courage. Without the care you have for the niche you are covering, and the courage to take a unique perspective on this niche, none of the other elements matter. And when you start putting the care and courage into your writing, you will start discovering that there is an audience who will come looking for these two elements in your content. By catering to an audience, you have the opportunity to build a community, a place where not only your readers feel safe but somewhere, you do as well, where your care and courage to share this perspective develops and grows with your audience. 

The key to discovering your audience is recognizing that you are your reader. 

Let’s understand what your audience is looking for. Most likely, you are going to be producing content that you enjoy consuming. Hence the likelihood that you are choosing to write something for your audience that you are not interested in is slim. So let’s start by taking stock and ask yourself a few questions. 

1. What demographic do I exist within?
2. What content am I drawn to? 
3. What kind of values are demonstrated in the genre of content I consume?

Discovering your audience is also an act of vulnerability. Not only does it ask you to take a peek into who you are, but it forces you to open yourself up to the potential for diverse opinions on the topic. As a result, based on the answers to the questions I just asked, prepare yourself to what larger community do you fit into by asking these questions about your future audience: 

1. Do people who engage with similar content share the same values? 
2. What seems to be the overarching theme of why people tend to engage with this content? 
3. If there is a comment section on the content, what themes are consistently showing up? 
4. What are the demographics of subscribers/followers/audience engagement?

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Tony DeFilippo explains the process of learning how to adapt your writing for an audience in a short 3-minute video on YT

What Are They Saying?

Is your audience only talking about the topic you are interested in on a specific channel like Instagram or Substack? Unlikely. If they are so passionate about the topic, they take that passion across to all the channels they frequent. So let’s take an audience-first approach to understanding which channels they might engage in to discuss and debate about this topic.

Yes, I get it, you consider Reddit and Quora the cesspool of the internet. But truth be told, these open forum sites are key to accessing the pulse of the culture you are looking to write about. Unlike comment sections, these spaces are invaluable in offering unfiltered spaces of conversation, where individuals can spark conversation on the most specific of topics within your niche. 

So how do you get started? Gummysearch is an incredibly helpful tool for researching the interests associated with the subreddit of your target audience. This site is an excellent program that allows small creators the opportunity to access organized and relevant subreddit information like keyword tracking, competition analysis, and pain areas. 

And if you want to get really wild with visualizing how these topics are related to each other, Anvaka can help you do that with a topical map on how your choice of subreddits is organized. Provide a subreddit niche to get started, and you would be lost for the day. 

While similar to Reddit, Quora is structured around questions with answers from both professionals and regular users. Quora is particularly excellent for understanding common questions within your topic and spotting where knowledge gaps exist. While it can take some time to sift through content, it’s an excellent resource for figuring out how to position your content.

Learning Their Language

Why is learning the colloquial language of the community so important? When you learn their language and the way they describe their challenges, using the same language in your copy makes it instantly relatable to them. When they read your newsletter every week, they would say “This one gets us!” and would refer more people in the niche. 

So pay attention to how they describe your niche in their own words. By analyzing your audience's language, you can gain key insights into their way of expressing their motivations and pain points, and subsequently learn how to use this language in your writing. 

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Distinguishing Your Unique Value Against the Grain

As you have already realized, the newsletter industry is an incredibly saturated market. That being said, success in this space is almost completely dependent on your ability to distinguish yourself against the grain of competition already present. To maintain a base community, there needs to be a general understanding of how you bring value and differentiation to the table. 

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Defining Your Unique Selling Position (USP)

In simple terms, your Unique Selling Proposition (USP) is what sets you apart from everyone and everything in your specific niche. Your USP is what makes you stand out.

How do you define your USP? Start by asking yourself:

• What makes my experience and perspective unique from others?
• What makes my writing style unique yet accessible against others already in this niche? 
• What is it that I am aiming to solve for my audience that is still unsolved? 

Remember to keep it simple, and be honest with yourself! Your USP could be very specific - it could be your broad understanding of 16th-century power dynamics in Florence, Italy, or it could be your dry wit. The more you turn into the small crevices of knowledge and expertise that make you unique, the easier it will be for your readers to connect, engage, and find value in what only you uniquely write about. 

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Communicating Value Before the Email Is Opened

Now that you have figured out your USP, the next step is to figure out how to hook your audience before they have begun opening your content. This means presenting your readers with so much value that they absolutely need to engage. 

Your initial points of entry will come in the form of subject lines and preview texts, which are your only shot at cashing in the attention of someone with a full inbox. Visualize your subject line in your inbox. What grabs your attention? What doesn't? When you take a minute to think about it, you will realize how crucial these brief seconds are, like a writer stretching out their hand, demanding you to lock in. No one is going to let you guide them to where they need to be taken. So a simple and generic subject line like ‘Newsletter Update’ or ‘This Week’s News’ is not going to cut it, period. You need to spark curiosity in a way that communicates a need for knowledge and  a promise of value, such as: 

1. How Yoga Will Improve Your Quality of Life in Just 1 Class
2. 3 Resume Tips That Will Get You Your Dream Job Tomorrow

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But as I stated earlier, your subject line is only 60% of the story. Your preview texts are just as important. You have a slim line of opportunity once the audience’s attention has been grabbed by the subject line, so your preview texts need to reel them in. Think of your subject line as the drinks at the bar while you're waiting for your table, and the preview texts as your appetizer to your audience. These two aspects give them just enough of a taste of what's inside, leaving your audience satiated for the main course.

The end goal is simple - get them to open the email. At the same time, you don't want to deceive your audience through click bait, but you do need to let them know you have an offer - of value they can't resist.

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Highlighting Benefits for Readers and Their Network

Your current readers are your first and foremost priority. Having said that, a successful newsletter writer would think outside of the boundaries of their initial target audience: how does your content benefit not just your current community, but their own larger web of communities as well? While there is inherent value in your content being useful to just a single individual, what is even more priceless is when your content's impact can cast a wider net. 

How do you gauge that? Start by adding a line at the end of every newsletter saying something along the lines of “If you found this helpful, pay it forward and share it with someone who might appreciate this issue” or “Know anyone who needs a little nudge? Send them to LetterStack with this link”. 

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Designing, Writing, and Organizing Compelling Content

The writing is undoubtedly the critical part to a newsletter’s success. However, once you begin to understand your audience, it's time to navigate how you optimally design your newsletter in a way that keeps your readers engaged while building a consistent experience that keeps your audience returning to every email you send. 

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Crafting Engaging Content

Your reader’s inboxes are full to the brim with forgotten subscriptions, various spam, and the occasional scam, so competing for their attention is no easy feat. So respect their time by making sure your content is purposeful and valuable without over-explaining yourself. The TLDR Newsletter Network team does a great job with concise content, accessible subject lines, and time stamps that can engage readers and deliver value in 5 minutes or less.

Keep your readers on their toes by using an active voice. Instead of something like ‘You will be sent updates every Monday’, let them know what is already going to happen ‘You will get updates every Monday’. While tweaks like these feel trivial, an active voice and clear style keep things immediate and engaging. 

The difference between a good writer and a great one is simple: storytelling. While facts and tips are great, the ultimate way to make your content intriguing and relatable is to weave your reader into a narrative that begs them to stay till the end. 

Let’s say you are writing about overcoming procrastination. Instead of just providing tips, be vulnerable and share a story of when you struggled with a bout of procrastination and the personal experiences that brought you back. Stories are what build relationships and establish communities. In many ways, they are a key part of what makes us human. Allow your readers the opportunity to not only learn from you but to connect and be a part of your story as well.  

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Editing and Publishing Your Copy

Any writer will tell you there is no such thing as a single draft, I don't care if you're the modern William Shakespeare, good writing is always rewriting. Once you have your outline and finish that initial draft (which I hate to say comes after a ton of preliminary rewriting) go back and polish your content. Check for grammar, spelling, and clarity. Tools like Grammarly or the Hemingway app are your best friend. Another tip I find incredibly useful is continuously reading your content aloud, a key tool in helping you catch those awkward run-on sentences, or funky word combinations- the goal is a clean, crisp, white wine of a read.

Organizing Your Newsletter Template

Building a structured newsletter template makes your reader instill a sense of familiarity and builds trust that keeps your audience coming back. In designing your newsletter, you need to be conscious of how each edition you publish is uniform across the board- consistency is key here in building an air of recognition that helps your readers identify you against your brand. Key elements include, but are not strictly limited to: 

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Color scheme

Choose your brand colors to maintain visual consistency and build a mood for your reading experience.

Typography

Choose clear, readable fonts that match your brand personality. Remember that blunt points express rigidity and a serious tone, while a more rounded font communicates a more playful disposition.n

Header and Footer

Include recognizable branding at the top and bottom with important links and contact info in the footer.

The Lion's Roar newsletter is a great example of how organizing your newsletter can boost both brand and reader accessibility. This Buddhist-centric publication shows how effective content layout, color, and typography can enhance the functional and aesthetic experience for casual readers and regular subscribers at the same time.

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Structuring Your Content

 By organizing your site into a predictable structure, your readers will know what to expect.  Keep it simple and consistent. 

For example, a common and useful content curation structure like the following is a good starting point: 

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Anatomy of a Newsletter Structure

• Introduction: A brief, personal note that sets the tone. 
• Main Content: exploration and elaboration of the featured topics or stories
• Quick Tips: Actionable and bite-sized section of advice for your readers that just want to take a simple skim for quick wins.
• CTA: A clear call-to-action prompting readers to take the next step, like clicking a link or subscribing to your content.
• Links Worth Clicking: Curated content similar to your own from around the web that your audience will find interesting, furthering your content reliability.
• Footer: Includes your contact information, social links, and any necessary legal disclaimers or unsubscribe options.

By utilizing an organizational structure as above, you will create a rhythm, making your newsletter feel familiar and easy to digest for your readers. A well-organized template ensures your readers can quickly find what they’re looking for. 

Optimizing Visuals for Speed
As writers, we often forget that visuals are crucial in driving and curating a compelling newsletter. For a lot of people, too many words can be exhausting, so utilize visuals for your potential audience. Optimize your image selection to drive and enhance your content, and be deliberate in choosing the right format. Also compressing images with tools like TinyPNG is always the right choice in ensuring your images are responsive and display well on both desktop and mobile devices. 

The ByteByteGo tech newsletter is an excellent example of a well-designed model on how bright visuals and graphics can further optimize your content. 

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Crafting a CTA That Gets Results

The growth of your newsletter hinges on one obvious yet essential thing: expanding your audience reach. Every issue is an opportunity to open the door to new subscribers and grow your community. As a result, a great Call-to-Action (CTA) is essential in guiding your audience to your optimal active response. It could be to refer more readers, visit your site, or sign up for exclusive offers. So you want your CTA to feel less like an ask and more like an irresistible offer. Keep your offer clear, concise, easy to follow yet impossible to ignore. 

One great example of an effective and action-oriented CTA comes at the end of Daniel Roman’s newsletter ‘The Newsie’ as below.

Don’t forget that placement is key here. A strong CTA typically fits best at the end of your email, once you have conveyed your key message across. 

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Boosting Your CTA With Social Proof 

One great way to add credibility to your CTA is to include social proof through testimonials of happy subscribers. 

For example:

• 20,000 of our readers are getting invaluable business tips every week. Don't miss out, but more importantly, get ahead! 
• “This newsletter completely changed the way I approach my life—practical, actionable, and always on point!” Sarah, a happy subscriber. 

Join thousands of readers like Sarah and get exclusive tips straight to your inbox. Subscribe now!"

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Conclusion

Writing a unique and effective newsletter that reflects is an ongoing journey. Getting into the weeds of what your audience needs also compels you to get to understand your own identity. While understanding your audience is key, you can't get there without knowing who you (your first and most important reader) are first. Designing engaging content is essential, but figuring out your unique writing style is just as important. Every step you take in shaping the newsletter is remembering what differentiates your perspective from other newsletters. 

To recap, your mission is clear: provide continuous value, research your audience well, and nurture a community that eagerly anticipates your emails. With the actionable tips and insights from this guide, you are prepared to create a newsletter that not only grabs attention, but also keeps your readers coming back for more.

Ready to take your newsletter to the next level? Join us at Letterstack.co for exclusive tips, resources, and support. Let’s help you craft the kind of newsletter your community can’t wait to open!