How to Send a Newsletter: A Complete Step-by-Step Guide: A Step-by-Step Guide
Sending a newsletter sounds simple until you realise how many things can go wrong between hitting publish and landing in someone's inbox. This guide walks you through every stage of the sending process — from final checks and authentication to scheduling, deliverability, and post-send analysis — so your newsletter actually reaches the people who signed up for it.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Choose and set up your newsletter platform
Before you can send anything, you need a platform that handles list management, email rendering, and deliverability infrastructure on your behalf. Pick one that matches your list size, technical comfort level, and budget — options range from Beehiiv and Kit (formerly ConvertKit) to Mailchimp and Substack. Don't just sign up and wing it; spend time configuring your sender name, reply-to address, and unsubscribe settings before you touch a single email.
Authenticate your sending domain
If you're sending from a custom domain — which you should be — you need to set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records in your DNS settings. Without these, inbox providers like Gmail and Outlook have no way to verify you're a legitimate sender, and your emails will either land in spam or get blocked outright. It's a one-time technical task that pays dividends every single send.
Write and finalise your newsletter content
Your content needs to be done before you think about anything else in this process — no tweaking the subject line while the email is half-written. Use a consistent structure so readers know what to expect, and make sure every link you're including actually works and goes where it's supposed to. If you're using images, optimise them for email: keep file sizes small, include alt text, and don't rely on images to carry critical information.
Write a subject line and preview text that earn the open
Your subject line and preview text are the only things standing between your newsletter and the bin — they decide whether the email gets opened at all. The subject line should be specific, honest about what's inside, and ideally under 50 characters so it doesn't get truncated on mobile. The preview text isn't just a bonus; it's a second headline, so use it deliberately rather than letting it default to whatever appears first in the email body.
Segment your list and select the right recipients
Blasting your entire list every time is a fast route to declining engagement and rising unsubscribe rates. Before you send, ask whether this particular newsletter is relevant to everyone on your list or just a subset — new subscribers, buyers, readers from a specific region. Sending the right content to the right people consistently is what separates newsletters with 40% open rates from those limping along at 15%.
Send a test email and review it properly
Send a test to yourself and at least one other person, and check it across multiple email clients — what looks perfect in Gmail can be a broken mess in Outlook. Read every word as if you've never seen it before: check for typos, broken links, placeholder text you forgot to swap out, and images that aren't loading. Test on mobile too, because the majority of your subscribers are almost certainly reading on their phones.
Schedule or send your newsletter at the right time
Timing matters, but not in the mystical way some marketing blogs suggest. What actually matters is consistency — if your readers expect you on Tuesday mornings, be there on Tuesday mornings. That said, avoid sending late on Fridays or over weekends unless your data says otherwise, and if your list spans multiple time zones, use your platform's time zone sending feature to hit people at a sensible local hour.
Monitor performance and act on the data
Once the email is out, your job isn't done. Check your open rate, click-through rate, bounce rate, and unsubscribes within the first 24–48 hours — these numbers tell you whether your subject line landed, whether your content drove action, and whether anything technical went wrong. Use what you learn to inform the next send, not just to report a number in a spreadsheet.
Pro Tips
- Set up a dedicated pre-send checklist and actually use it every time — subject line, preview text, links, segmentation, test send. Checklists feel bureaucratic until the day they stop you sending a broken email to 10,000 people.
- Warm up a new sending domain gradually. If you've just set up a custom domain, don't blast your full list on day one — start with a few hundred emails and scale up over several weeks to build sender reputation with inbox providers.
- Use a seed list — a small set of test email addresses across different providers (Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail) — to check rendering before every send. What you see in your platform's preview is not what every subscriber sees.
- Keep your plain-text version clean and readable. Many email clients and filters process the plain-text version of your email, and it's also what accessibility tools rely on. Most platforms generate one automatically but it's worth reviewing.
- If you're resending to non-openers, change the subject line significantly — not just one word. And wait at least 3–4 days before doing it, so you're not hitting the same people twice in quick succession and burning goodwill.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
- Skipping email authentication entirely and wondering why open rates are terrible. SPF, DKIM, and DMARC aren't optional extras — they're table stakes for reliable deliverability in 2024.
- Sending to your entire list regardless of relevance. Irrelevant emails train people to ignore you or unsubscribe, and high disengagement signals to inbox providers that your emails aren't worth delivering.
- Treating the preview text as an afterthought or letting it default to 'View this email in your browser'. That's prime real estate that influences whether someone opens — use it.
- Sending without doing a real test across devices and email clients. Emails render differently depending on the client, and a layout that looks great on desktop can be completely unreadable on mobile.
- Never looking at the post-send analytics. Opens, clicks, bounces, and unsubscribes tell you exactly how your newsletter is performing — ignoring them means you're flying blind and making the same mistakes on repeat.
How Aldus Makes This Easier
Aldus helps newsletter creators send with confidence by keeping your pre-send workflow organised, tracking what matters after you hit send, and surfacing the performance data you actually need to improve — without drowning you in dashboards. Whether you're sending your first issue or your five hundredth, Aldus makes the process less chaotic and more repeatable.
Frequently Asked Questions
What's the best time to send a newsletter?
The honest answer is: it depends on your audience. The conventional wisdom points to Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday mornings, and that's not bad general advice — but your own data will tell you more than any industry benchmark. If you're just starting out, pick a consistent time and day, stick to it for a couple of months, and then look at your open rate data to see if adjusting makes a difference. Consistency beats optimisation in the early stages.
How do I stop my newsletter from going to spam?
Start with proper email authentication — SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records on your sending domain. Beyond that, maintain a clean list by removing hard bounces and consistently inactive subscribers, avoid spam trigger words in your subject lines, and make sure your unsubscribe link is easy to find. High engagement rates (opens and clicks) are the strongest signal to inbox providers that your emails belong in the inbox, so focus on sending genuinely useful content to people who actually want it.
Do I need a custom domain to send a newsletter?
Technically no, but practically yes if you're serious about it. Sending from a Gmail or Yahoo address limits your ability to authenticate your domain properly, which hurts deliverability and makes you look less professional. A custom domain — even a simple one — gives you full control over your sender reputation and signals to both inbox providers and subscribers that you're a legitimate operation.
How large should my list be before I start sending?
There's no minimum. Some of the best newsletters started with ten subscribers and sent consistently from day one. Waiting until you have a 'big enough' list is just procrastination dressed up as strategy. Start sending to whoever has signed up, treat them as well as you'd treat a list of 100,000, and grow from there. The habits you build early are the ones that stick.
How often should I send my newsletter?
Often enough to stay relevant, not so often that you become noise. For most newsletter creators, weekly or fortnightly works well — it's frequent enough to build a habit with readers but not so relentless that you run out of things to say or start sending filler. The right cadence is ultimately the one you can sustain with quality content. A consistently good fortnightly newsletter beats an inconsistent daily one every time.