How to create a newsletter for a small business — from sign-up form to first send
Creating a newsletter starts before the first line of text: your own sender address, an authenticated domain and a sign-up form that collects consent in a way you can prove later. Here are the eight steps in order. The requirements are read from EU law, Google’s and Yahoo’s sender guidelines and the email tools’ own help pages.
Creating a newsletter does not start with writing. Before your first subscriber you need three things: your own sender address, an authenticated domain and a sign-up form that collects consent in a way you can prove later. This guide goes through the steps in the order in which they are worth doing. The requirements are read from the law, Google’s and Yahoo’s sender guidelines and the email tools’ own help pages, and the points about writing are advice, not measured results.
The short answer: eight steps
- Your own domain and sender address, for example news@yourcompany.com, not a gmail.com address.
- An email tool chosen for your list size, budget and needs.
- Domain authentication with the SPF, DKIM and DMARC records your tool gives you.
- A sign-up form with double opt-in and a link to your privacy notice.
- A welcome email that goes out automatically after confirmation.
- A newsletter template: a recognisable sender name, an honest subject line, contact details and an unsubscribe link.
- A test send to yourself before the first send to the list.
- Tracking: clicks, unsubscribes and the spam rate. The open rate only as a rough guide.
1. Your own domain and sender address
A newsletter is sent from an address on your own domain. Google’s sender guidelines prohibit impersonating Gmail in the From field and say Gmail applies a DMARC quarantine policy to these messages. According to MailerLite’s help page, a free email provider’s domain cannot be authenticated either, because you have no access to its DNS records. Choose one address for the newsletter and keep it the same, for example news@yourcompany.com. What your own domain means on free plans is covered in the free email marketing comparison.
2. Choosing an email tool
Choose the tool for what will happen to your list over the next year, not for the length of its feature list. Three questions narrow the options: how many subscribers you expect, whether you need automations on a free plan and whether the tool has to connect to an online shop. Prices at three list sizes and each tool’s limitations are collected in the comparison of email marketing software. If budget decides, see the cheapest email marketing tools by list size, and if you sell online, email tools for online shops.
The tool alone does not guarantee that messages arrive. According to Google’s sender guidelines, Google does not accept allowlist requests from email service providers. Authentication, the list and unsubscribing are the sender’s responsibility whichever tool you use.
3. Domain authentication
Authentication is done once, after you have chosen the tool. According to Google’s sender guidelines, everyone sending to Gmail accounts must set up at least SPF or DKIM, and an unauthenticated message may be marked as spam or rejected. Senders of more than 5,000 messages a day to Gmail accounts need SPF, DKIM and DMARC. Yahoo’s sender best practices require SPF or DKIM from everyone, and both plus a DMARC record from bulk senders.
In practice the tool gives you DNS records to add to your domain’s settings. DMARC is a single TXT record named _dmarc, and Google’s DMARC guide recommends starting with the policy p=none. The table below is read from each tool’s own help pages, and every cell links to the help page.
| Tool | SPF/DKIM/DMARC records from the app | DMARC guidance |
|---|---|---|
| Systeme.io | Yes | Yes |
| EmailOctopus | Yes | Yes |
| Brevo | Yes | Yes |
| MailerLite | Yes | No |
| Mailchimp | Yes | Yes |
| GetResponse | Yes | Yes |
| ActiveCampaign | Yes | Yes |
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Yes = the help page describes the feature. No = the help page says it is absent or points to an external tool. — = not found in the help pages; that does not mean the feature is absent.
During the same DNS visit it is worth setting up Google Postmaster Tools: you add your sending domain and verify it with a TXT or CNAME record. It is where you will later see the spam rate (step 8).
4. Sign-up form, double opt-in and privacy notice
Under Article 13 of the ePrivacy Directive, email may be used for direct marketing to natural persons only with their prior consent; in Finland the rule is section 200 of the Act on Electronic Communications Services. Under Article 7 of the GDPR, the controller must be able to demonstrate that consent was given. The law does not prescribe the method. Double opt-in, where the subscriber confirms the sign-up by clicking a link in an email, shows that the sign-up was confirmed by someone with access to the address. According to the German Federal Commissioner for Data Protection, it is necessary whenever a newsletter contains advertising, and the Norwegian and Danish consumer authorities recommend it.
Check the setting in your tool, because the defaults differ. Double opt-in is on by default in MailerLite and in ActiveCampaign’s sign-up forms, and off in Mailchimp, GetResponse and EmailOctopus. In Brevo and Systeme.io it is chosen per form.
How unconfirmed subscribers are handled varies too. According to the MailerLite and EmailOctopus help pages, unconfirmed subscribers do not count towards the subscriber limit. According to ActiveCampaign’s help page, on accounts created on or after 3 November 2025 all contacts count regardless of status, and Systeme.io deletes an unconfirmed contact within 24 hours.
Next to the form, add a short description of what you will send and a link to your privacy notice. Under Article 13 of the GDPR, information about the processing is given at the time the personal data are obtained, and under Article 7 the subscriber must be told before giving consent that they can withdraw it. Withdrawing must be as easy as giving consent. Ask only for the email address and the details you will actually use.
5. Welcome email and automation
The double opt-in confirmation email is the newsletter’s first automated message. Say in it who is sending and why confirmation is needed. Then build a welcome email that goes out right after confirmation. Say in it what the newsletter covers, how often it arrives and how to unsubscribe. That way the subscriber recognises the sender when the first actual newsletter arrives. Check your tool’s price list to see whether automation is included in your plan.
6. Newsletter structure
Build one template and use it every time. Its parts are below.
Sender name and subject line
According to Google’s sender guidelines, the sender name must identify the sender rather than the topic of the message, and a subject line must not start with “Re:” or “Fwd:” unless the message is a real reply or forward. Article 13(4) of the ePrivacy Directive prohibits disguising or concealing the sender’s identity, and in Finland section 203 of Act 917/2014 also requires the message to be recognisable as marketing on receipt. Use your company name as the sender name and say in the subject line what the message contains.
Content
Start with one main point and one link you want the reader to follow. Write the main message as text, not as an image alone. Google’s guidelines prohibit hiding content with HTML and CSS.
Unsubscribe link and required information
Under Article 13(4) of the ePrivacy Directive, the message must include a valid address to which the recipient can send a request that the messages stop. Yahoo’s sender best practices require bulk senders to include a clearly visible unsubscribe link in the body of the message, and Google requires one-click unsubscribe from senders of more than 5,000 messages a day. Check the unsubscribe link especially in a template you built yourself. Put your company name, contact details and the unsubscribe link in the footer. The data protection side of unsubscribing is covered in the guide to email marketing and GDPR.
7. Test send and first send
Send the finished message to yourself first, ideally to two different email providers and a phone. Check that the sender name and subject line display correctly, that every link works and that the unsubscribe link removes the test address from the list. Finally, sign up for the newsletter with your own address through the form and go through the confirmation and welcome email as a subscriber would.
If you are moving an old address list, do not send to all of it at once. According to Google’s sender guidelines, suddenly doubling your sending volume can lead to rate limiting or a drop in reputation. The same guidelines say plainly that you should not buy email addresses from other companies.
8. What to track after sending
Track three figures: clicks, unsubscribes and the spam rate. Google’s sender guidelines tell senders to keep the spam rate shown in Postmaster Tools below 0.10% and to avoid ever reaching 0.30%. Yahoo’s limit is 0.3%. According to the Postmaster Tools help page, the data only covers messages sent to personal Gmail accounts, and at low sending volumes data may not appear for every day. A low figure can also mislead: if Gmail already routes a large share of your messages to spam, few messages reach the inbox to be reported. According to the same page, Postmaster Tools flags unsubscribe handling as needing work if unsubscribes are not processed within 48 hours, and in Yahoo’s sender guidelines the deadline is two days.
Read the open rate with caution. Google says it does not track open rates. According to ActiveCampaign’s help page, opens from Apple Mail Privacy Protection are not treated as engagement, and EmailOctopus’s help page says an open is not necessarily the most reliable sign of activity. A click tells you the reader did something because of the message.
As the list grows, check your tool’s next price step in good time. MailerLite vs Brevo compares two tools’ prices and free plans side by side.