5 Steps To Write A Club Newsletter Your Members Will Love To Read In 2023

Being able to communicate clearly and effectively with your club members is crucially important to your club's success. Clear communication keeps members in the loop with what’s happening in the club. It will help keep them satisfied and feel like they are getting value for their membership dues.

There are many great ways to communicate with your members. Still, one you should definitely have in your arsenal is the newsletter. So, let’s talk about the best ways to make your club newsletter the best it can be. 

1. Define The Who, When, And Why Of Your Club Newsletter

The first step to creating an awesome club newsletter is to define who your audience is and what they are interested in. You should also determine how often you will send out new newsletters and what you hope to gain from these newsletters. 

The first part of this should be easy. Your audience will likely be your club members; you already know what interests them. You may also want to consider a newsletter for prospective members to encourage them to join your club. Whatever you decide your audience will be, remember to keep them in mind as you continue down this path. This way, you can ensure that your newsletter will be exactly what they are after. 

Regarding how often you will send out newsletters, this really comes down to personal preference and how much free time you have to pour into this. You could send newsletters every week or once a quarter if that’s what you want. Personally, I’d recommend a monthly newsletter. This way, you still communicate with your members regularly but not so regularly that they get burnt out on your constant communication. 

Finally, defining why you are sending out these newsletters would be best. Are you trying to grow your club, increase member retention, add value for your members, just keep members updated or something else entirely? Whatever the answer is, this will be key to helping you choose what content you put in your newsletter. 

Once you’ve defined these few essential things, then we can move on to the next step of creating an outstanding newsletter. 

Deciding On Your Newsletter Format

As I said for the purposes of this article we are specifically talking about an email newsletter. However, this is the stage where you should decide on the format of your newsletter. You could choose to do an email newsletter, a printed newsletter or a PDF one. Whatever you choose, make sure it is one that suits your needs and you club best. 

2. Create a Visually Appealing Club Email Newsletter

When it comes to putting together an email newsletter, ensuring that the newsletters are visually appealing, read well and easy to follow is super important. Decide on the format and layout, including headings, sections, and visuals. Craft attention-grabbing headlines for each article or section to entice readers to continue. Use images, infographics, and design elements to break up text and make the newsletter visually appealing. Maintain consistent fonts, colours, and logo placement to reinforce your club’s identity. 

To demonstrate how important design is, below are two newsletters for a running club. One uses plenty of white space, consistent colours and fonts, and the other doesn’t do any of that.    

Now, which one of these are you most likely to read? 

If you can do it without disrupting the newsletter layout, consider using multimedia in your email newsletter. Embedding videos, podcasts or interactive elements may help draw more interest to your newsletters. This can be great, but ensure you only do so if it doesn’t make your newsletter too busy or overwhelming. Sometimes, less is more.   

3. Make Sure Your Club Newsletter Has Quality Content

There is zero point in having the most excellent-looking, most lovely formatted newsletter if it has nothing to say. Your newsletter should be helping your members (or prospective members) get the most out of your club. Your newsletter should provide valuable and relevant information about upcoming events and important updates. Also, consider including tips for your members and even shouting out members who have achieved something particularly impressive. 

Whatever you decide to put in your newsletter, make sure it is quality content and valuable to your members. It’s worth noting that in this article I will primarily be talking about digital newsletters sent via email. Though quite a lot of the information will also apply or can be adjusted to apply to traditional printed newsletters, and PDF newsletters. 

Use Engaging Writing

In your newsletters, you should write as engagingly as possible. Keep your writing as short, sharp and as clear as possible. Keep your sentences short; don’t use seven words when four will do. Doing so will make your writing easy to follow and increase the chance of your members engaging with it. 

For example, here are two different versions of a text about an upcoming club event.

Embrace the symphony of motion and endurance as we beckon you to partake in our upcoming marathon race—an odyssey of footsteps that will paint the streets with determination, uniting souls in the pursuit of boundless horizons.

Or

Join our latest marathon to challenge yourself and have a blast.

You’re writing a newsletter, not a novel; there’s no need to go all artsy. 

4. Finalise Your Club Newsletter

Once all that is done, you’re on to dotting your I’s and crossing your T’s. Include calls to actions in your newsletter. This may be a button that says “Read More” and, when clicked, links to a full article or a “Register Now” button that links to your event registration page. This will help encourage your members to engage more with the newsletter and your club.

Remember to personalise your newsletters to better engage with your members. The best way to do this is by using the “Dynamic Fields” available through the Member Jungle System to ensure that your newsletters personally address all of your members. Also, if your newsletter has an introduction section, it may be worth updating this for each new newsletter. This will help ensure your members keep engaging with all your new newsletters because no one wants to read the same thing 100 times.    
 

 

5. Track How Your Members Are Engaging With Your Club Email Newsletters

Finally, using the Member Jungle system, you can monitor how your members are engaging with your newsletters. You can track what percentage of your members are opening and what time of day they do so. Using this information, you can continue to improve your newsletters and make them suit your members even better. 

If you are sending out PDF newsletters rather than emailed ones, once your newsletter is ready to send you can upload it to the Document Library and then send out a push notification to let your members know about the new newsletter.  

Other Ways To Improve Your Communication With Your Members

If you follow those five simple steps, you will be well on your way to creating a newsletter that your members will love to read.  

If you are curious to see if newsletters are the best option for communicating with your members, have a peep at Are Newsletters The Best Way To Communicate With Club Members?

If you are looking for more ways to improve your communications with your members, read Why Your Club Should Be Using Group Chats.