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Starting a newsletter can be quite an undertaking and also very rewarding. If you have a special interest or group you are looking to start a newsletter for there are a few things you should do before you start. Organize your plan and if you are going to have other people to help you, be sure to include them on the planning from the start and share ideas with each other.
Before you begin your newsletter, decide what it will include. Will you sell advertising? Will you charge a subscription rate or will it be a free newsletter? Will it be paper or e-mail? How often will you publish your newsletter? Will it be a weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, etc. and will you be able to publish it consistently and on time?
If your newsletter is going to be paper, are you going to produce it yourself? There are many inexpensive desktop publishing programs you can use to produce a newsletter. It can get expensive to print them out yourself, though. You may want to consider making your original copy on your own home computer with a laser printer or other high quality printer and then having a print shop run off the copies for you as toner and ink cartridges can be very expensive.
E-mail newsletters are more cost effective and you won’t have the issue of graphics or layout to deal with. If you are web savvy, you can also post newsletters on a web site and simply send the link through e-mail, then you can include pictures, graphics, animations or anything your imagination can conceive.
Now that you have decided how you will produce your newsletter, you will need contributors. A well-rounded newsletter will have articles from many different writers to present different points of view, share experiences and ideas and give your readers opportunites to learn more about your subject. A good place to advertise your need for articles is the Internet. There are many writers’ groups and message boards where you can advertise and you should have no problem getting writers to contribute work in compensation for a copy of the newsletter. Of course if you can turn a profit on your newsletter you will be able to pay for articles which will ultimately increase the quality of your newsletter and its popularity among contributors. If you don’t have access to the Internet, you can advertise your needs on store bulletin boards, other newsletters, church bulletins, etc. You can also post notices to writing classes in local colleges.
Now, you’ve got a way to produce your newsletter and contributions to fill it with. Make sure every contributor gets a copy of the publication and start publicizing to gain readers. Again, internet message boards are great place to advertise your newsletter and you can gain a good deal of word of mouth advertising from your contributors. If you plan on charging for your newsletter, you may want to consider giving away a few issues for free to get people interested in it. You can print up flyers or buy inexpensive ad space in magazines or other newsletters related to yours for extra publicity.
Don’t forget to run your newsletter as a business: you may be able to deduct your expenses on your tax return so keep any receipts for materials and costs as well as any income you have gained. Keep quality in mind as well, it will bring your readers back again and again, and you will quickly gain interest in your newsletter.
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