Tips for Composing Email Newsletters

1. Save your work frequently.

Writing a newsletter takes more time and is a little trickier in formatting than a standard email message. For this reason, it is a good idea to save your work frequently by simply clicking the "Save" icon on the Outlook or Outlook Express tool bar. Then, if you do make a mistake you can return to the last good version that you saved.

2. Test the newsletter by sending a copy to yourself or to a colleague.

Before sending your newsletter out to the hundreds or thousands of people on your mail list, first make a copy of the finished newsletter by saving it and selecting Edit >> Copy to folder. Make the copy in your Inbox or Drafts folder - wherever you normally save your messages before sending them. Then send one copy to yourself or to a colleague. If it comes through looking good (fonts, spacing, images, etc.) then you can publish it to your list. If it needs further editing, do so and then repeat this test mailing process.

3. Replacing titles or other placeholders

Sidebar with handles

When you want to replace a title or other placeholder text, DO NOT highlight all of it and start typing. This could cause you to accidentally delete some of the formatting information. Instead, place your cursor inside the text and use the backspace key to back up to the beginning of the line. Then type the next text and finally delete any remaining text that was part of the placeholder.

4. Removing the sidebar table

To remove (delete) the sidebar that is part of your newsletter template, position your cursor slightly above and to the left of the upper left-hand corner of sidebar. Click once and you should see the eight small squares (handles) that mark the perimeter of the sidebar and the white space that buffers it from the text (see illustration on right). Press the Delete key and the sidebar will disappear.

5. Moving the sidebar table to another location

To move an existing sidebar higher or lower in the newsletter, select the sidebar as described above. Position you cursor in line with the left-most three handles. Your cursor will take the form of "move" symbol - two double-tipped arrows at right angles to each other (see illustration on right). Click and drag the sidebar up or down in the newsletter to the position you want.

Sidebar with handles and move cursor

6. Adding a new sidebar table

Position your cursor on the left margin opposite where you want the top of the sidebar to appear. Click Insert >> File and select the sidebar file in your "My Digital Stationery" folder. Click once on the file and select "Insert as text" in the dropdown list below the "Insert" button. This will place an empty sidebar on the right side of the newsletter.

7. Adding an image (picture) to your newsletter

To add an image, click Insert >> Picture and select your image file. In the picture insert window you can align the image and you can also use the horizontal and vertical spacing parameters to control how close the text comes to the image.

8. Inserting a hyperlink into your copy

To add a link to a web page in your stationery or newsletter copy without displaying the actual web address, simply highlight the text you want to be the link and then click Insert >> Hyperlink. Type (or paste) the address into the URL field in the popup window and click "OK". Here's an example of how a link in a sentence should look.

9. Controlling the space between lines

In some templates the default line spacing is double space. If you want to force a single space line separation, simply hold down the "Shift" key while you press the "Enter" key.

This trick also works if you want to force blank lines between items in numbered or unnumbered lists. For example, here is the way a list looks when you just hit the "Enter" key between each item.

1. This is the first item.
2. This is the second item.
3. This is the third item.

And here is the way it looks when you hit "<Shift>Enter" and then "Enter" after each item.

1. This is the first item.

2. This is the second item.

3. This is the third item.