For nonprofit organizations, email newsletters are important in providing a direct and reliable channel of communication with your supporters, donors, volunteers, and other stakeholders. It allows you to share important updates, fundraise for causes, showcase success stories, promote upcoming events, push calls to action, and much more!
Because email newsletters are vital for nonprofits, we recommend revamping them at least annually to keep them fresh and optimized for your audience. We’ve compiled five steps to undergo an email newsletter refresh strategically:
- Evaluate your current newsletter
- Define your goals
- Segment your audiences
- Improve designs & layout
- Optimize your calls to action
Evaluate Your Current Newsletter
Start by assessing your existing email newsletter. What is working and what is not? Review metrics such as open rates, click-through rates, and conversions to identify areas for improvement. What type of content gets the most clicks? How are your newsletter open rates compared to other nonprofits? With this information, you can optimize your content to fit the interests of your audience.
Define Your Goals
Determine the objectives for your refreshed newsletter. Are you aiming to increase engagement, drive donations, share impactful stories, or promote events? Clearly defining your goals will guide the content and design decisions.
Segment Your Audience(s)
Non-profits often have diverse audiences with varying interests and engagement levels. Segmenting your subscribers based on factors like donation history, volunteer activities, or areas of interest enables you to personalize your newsletters and deliver relevant content to each segment.
Improve the Design & Layout
Refresh the visual appeal of your newsletters to catch readers’ attention and improve readability while also staying on brand.
- Use a clean and uncluttered layout with clear headings, subheadings, and bullet points.
- Incorporate visually appealing images and videos that reflect your mission and impact.
- Ensure your newsletters are mobile-friendly as many subscribers access emails on their smartphones.
Optimize call-to-action (CTA)
Clearly define the actions you want your subscribers to take and make your CTAs prominent.
- Use persuasive language and design to encourage click-throughs, donations, event registrations, or other desired outcomes.
- Strategically place your CTA buttons near the top and near the footer of the newsletter to increase the chances of clicks.
- Consider using urgency or offering incentives to drive engagement.
Nonprofit Communications Strategy in Action
We recently followed this process to refresh our own newsletter, and we love the results! Along with our client highlights, team updates, and news round-up, we’re especially excited about our new Communications Corner where we share tips, tricks, and resources. To stay in the loop on all things FCP, be sure to sign up for our mailing list below!
Partner With a Trusted Nonprofit PR Firm
Need assistance refreshing your newsletter or developing a communications plan for your nonprofit? Full Court Press Communications is a full-service nonprofit marketing agency that has years of experience providing nonprofits with public relations, media relations, crisis communications, and more. Contact us today to get started.