6 Content Sections Every Newsletter Needs

DEEP DIVE

Most people struggle to write newsletters because they don't have a template.

A template should be made up of multiple sections and design elements you put together to build your newsletter, step by step.

Once your template is created you don't need to create from scratch. With a template, you know what content is going in your newsletter and where.

You just need to write and edit.

Here are the 6 main sections you should have in your newsletter template:

6 Sections Every Newsletter Needs 

There’s dozens of newsletter section types. It’s overwhelming.

I recommend looking at other newsletters for inspiration.

Create a new email and subscribe to 10-20 newsletters. Swipe the templates of the sections you like the best. 

I’d start by checking out Morning Brew, 1440, The Hustle, and Axios. 

You’ll notice each of these newsletter are made up of 6 key sections: 

Introduction Section

This is where you grab the reader's attention and tease out what’s to come. 

Many times the newsletter content is teased out in a bulleted list like this:

Curated Section

This is where you share the best content, news, and resources you found that week or day — depending on your sending schedule.

A curated section will increase the CTR of your newsletter, which improves engagement, deliverability, and inbox placement.

This section can be styled a few ways. It can be a link dump or you can add context and include commentary and takeaways. 

Here are a few examples: 

Sponsored or Promotional Section

This is where you either promote a sponsor or your own product/service.

The copy here should be 50-100 words. Images are optional.

Here’s an example from Link In Bio which comes in at 62 words. 

Main Content Section

This should be original content that does at least one of these things: 

• Educates

• Entertains

• Informs

• Tells a story

Most newsletters should keep this under a five-minute read time (500-1000 words). Readers prefer shorter newsletters. 

But there’s many exceptions of 5k-10k+ word newsletters that readers love too.

Remember that most people are using their phones to read newsletters. Think about the reader's experience and use 1-3 lines per paragraph.

You don’t want big blocks of text in your newsletters. It’s harder to read on a phone. 

Outro Section 

This section should consist of a CTA for your product or services. You can also use this section to share free resources. 

Below are some examples:

Poll Section:

​​This is where you collect feedback from readers.

I recommend using the “5 star, 3 star, 1 star” rating format.

Aim for a 75% or higher “five-star” or “love it” rating.

I run my newsletter on beehiiv which makes it easy add a poll like this.

If you don’t use beehiiv, create 3 images and link to 3 survey’s where you can collect more feedback.

Now let’s talk about content…

Writing a High-Quality Newsletter In Less Than 2 Hours 

Content is your greatest growth lever. If you publish and and distribute amazing content consistently, your newsletter will grow.

This, of course, takes time.

But once you have 5-10 newsletter issues published, AI can help.

These are the AI tools you should use: 

• Chat GPT - To refine, edit, and proof-read content. 

• Claude - For writing original sounding content. It has the most natural voice. 

• Perplexity - For research, curating news/links, and finding current events for your newsletter. 

Create Once. Distribute Forever.

Every newsletter you write should be repurposed into 5+ social media posts on 1-2 platforms.

Your newsletters should also be published as a blog and optimized for SEO.

This is how you get discovered.

Publishing an email newsletter alone won’t grow your audience. You must utilize discovery platforms like X, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, and search engines.

If every newsletter you publish is repurposed into 5 social posts on two platforms and one blog post, you’ll publish…

• 520 social posts per year

• 52 blog posts per year

If that content is great, you’ll grow.

How to Create a Content Flywheel

I’ll walk you through what each piece of social content should be.

Post 1 and Post 2: 

Pre-CTA

24-hours before publishing

This can be the same on LinkedIn and Twitter (or other channels).

It tells people about what your newsletter covers. The pre-CTA needs to create on one of these 3 things to get people to subscribe: 

1. FOMO

2. Urgency

3. Curiosity 

Here’s an example: 

Post-CTA

Immediately after you send your newsletter

Post-CTA’s  tell people about your newsletter content after it was posted. Here’s an example below: 

If you want more in-depth strategies on Pre and Post-CTA’s, I wrote about it here and curated a go-to list of Pre and Post-CTA examples . 

Post 3-5

These posts can be a variety of things. Here are some ideas: 

• Thought leadership quotes – especially useful if you interviewed someone (example) 

• Memes based on topics covered in your newsletter (example)  

• Mini-deep dives on aspects of your newsletter. (example)

• Twitter threads (example, example) 

• Create infographics (example) 

Hope this helps!