Electronic Newsletters - Free AND Easy!

Here is an fast and easy way to send out a completely professional looking e-newsletter to your members on a regular basis - without spending a dime. All you need to start is Microsoft Word and Outlook (also works with Outlook Express), and a list of your member's email addresses on your computer.

 

To start, RIGHT CLICK HERE FOR FILE and select "Save As..." or "Save Link As..." Save this file to your computer, do NOT change the name. Be sure to put it in a place you will remember (e.g. My Documents). Do NOT save it by left clicking and opening then saving - it won't work correctly that way!!! Once you have this file saved, follow the steps outlined below...

 

Instructions for Setup & Use
STEP ONE
Open Microsoft Word, then open the file you just downloaded.  Do NOT just double click on the file to open it outside of Word, its a specialized file.  You must open it within Microsoft Word to make it work.
STEP TWO

In the upper left, you will see INSERT DATE HERE. Click on that text, type in the date of publication. To change the title and listed source of the newsletter, simply click on the text, and modify it as you would any other document by deleting and replacing text.
STEP THREE

Review all of the information in the left column. Any links you see, you can RIGHT CLICK on them and choose "Edit Hyperlink" to change the actual link, and the display text to whatever you want (e.g. your own website and any info on it). Be sure to change the address and contact information to your own.

STEP FOUR

You may want to save this file at this point, as a template for future e-newsletters. Just go to File, Save. As you create more newsletters, save each by choosing File, Save As, and note the date or volume/edition number in the file name.

STEP FIVE

Putting it all together...click into various articles to change the topic names and article text. To remove an extra article, just highlight and delete it. To add articles, its easiest to just copy an article, position your cursor where you want it, and paste. Then edit the various text/titles. If you don't have articles to publish, try searching in www.realtor.org and copy articles (be sure to list the source as directed!). Another great source is www.internetcrusade.com, but always - remember to ask permission and give credit where it is due. And don't forget...your leadership is a great source for articles! A monthly 'Letter from the President' is always nice.

Note - on the top of the left column (contents), you should relist all the titles of the news articles you've put into it once you've put it all together. Or delete this contents list for more ease of use.

STEP SIX
At the bottom of this sample newsletter is a listing of classes...you could change this to 'upcoming events'. Delete and modify this file as needed to suit you.
STEP SEVEN
Near the top of the newsletter you will see a Volume# and Number#. You can use this numbering system or change it to Edition number for each publication...either way, its handy for compiling. Or, delete that text entirely to have one less thing to modify each time.
STEP EIGHT
Once you have your first e-newsletter completed and ready to send, save it again. Be sure to give it a unique name to denote which edition it is.
Setup & Prep is Done...Now to Send it!
STEP NINE
Whatever file you have your member's email in, open it now. This could be a word document, excel file..it doesn't matter. As long as you can 'copy' all the addresses.
STEP TEN
To send this out to membership (test it on your own email first to ensure nothing got messed up), go up to FILE, SEND TO, MAIL RECIPIENT.  Thats not 'for review', not 'as attachment'.  Just 'MAIL RECIPIENT'.
STEP ELEVEN

On the email to/from/subject that comes up on top, click into the 'TO' line, and type in your own email address.  Then click on the 'CC' word itself, which will open your address book.  Then load all of your member's email addresses into the BCC line by copying and pasting them directly from your member email file. Some AEs might have these already loaded in your address book, if so just select all their names from the address book itself.

TIP ONE...For ease of use in this part, remember your keystrokes...CTRL+C is copy, CTRL+V is paste. Otherwise you might have a hard time finding a 'paste' option in your address book.

TIP TWO...It's ok if you don't have the ; sign inbetween emails, Outlook with take care of that for you (Outlook Express does requires you put ; after each).

Use of the BCC line important to make it seem personalized to each, and prevent each recipient from seeing each other's email addresses.  This is a simple mass email trick thats incredibly good to know.  Test it on yourself or another trusted person to see the effect.

Click OK to get back to your newsletter.  Put in a good subject line (Such as ABC REALTOR News).  DO NOT put in any text into the introduction field.
LAST STEP!
Click "Send a Copy", which you will see right above the "To:" in Microsoft Word. That's it, you did it.

Have fun with it!  It will take you an hour or so to customize all the links to your own website etc, but once you do, you never have to change them again.  Just the articles themselves.  Be careful when changing titles to not mess up the formatting, this may take some trial and error (remember your undo button...). Do NOT try to add images...it will cause problems for those whose email programs reject graphics.  This is entirely text based for a very good reason. 

This may seem complicated the first time...but after that, its a complete breeze! If you run into problems, feel free to drop me an email at toni@techabytes.com, I'll be happy to help you.