how to start a newsletter

When I set this topic for the SEO boot camp on Friday, I wasn't sure what I would write about. When Sunday morning rolled around, I suddenly started cleaning out my pantry (whether it was procrastination, or I thought I would write a pantry-cleaning-not-to, I'm not sure), but inspiration struck about an hour ago, and I've been trying to get a spewy boy to sleep since then (spending the weekend spewing the week of your fifth birthday is pretty hard to deal with, especially when nothing.comes.out. Oh, it's been a challenging weekend here!)

Back in July, when I was organising the recent pram and high chair giveaway, I had the crazy idea that I would do the giveaway via newsletter, drumming up subscriptions with a big prize. And the theory was good. But the size of the task scared the crap out of me, so in true Cate-style, I ignored it while we went away, and came home and lost my mind, and it was only as I was writing the actual review post that I remembered my grand plan.

Fortunately for me, Bec from Bloggers Bazaar had a random thought last week and acted on it, starting up a facebook group that I stumbled upon (my post about facebook groups was totally self-serving) and set the challenge to start a newsletter (which also just happens to be one of my goals for Clever Cookie School of Blog, which starts tomorrow!)

So, here are my top tips for starting a newsletter

• check out this post from Bec at Bloggers Bazaar. I'm pretty technically savvy, but I hate watching videos online, so these steps laid out one by one had me toggling between tabs and setting up my first list in no time.
• decide how often you'll send a newwsletter. I'm starting with once a month. It seems like a nice doable number.
• pick a date for the first issue. I'm going with September 15th. My wedding anniversary. Middle of the month.Only one week to procrastinate.
• JFDI. Michelle Bridges has a lot to answer for, but the sentiment behind this one rings in my ears constantly. Just do it. You can sign up for my newsletter here.

What do you like to read in newsletters? Do you have one?