Email marketing newsletter templates come in a handful of distinct formats, and choosing the right one matters more than choosing colours. This article compares five formats an established firm can use, the briefing, the question and answer, the single story, the market update and the curated roundup, and explains which suits each kind of firm and why. It then shows how to save your chosen format as a reusable template on the levelpartner.ai platform.
Format one: the briefing
Three short items, each a headline and two sentences, each with a link to read more. Best for agencies and consultants whose clients want to know what changed in their field this month. It is quick to read and quick to write, but it rarely produces replies, because no single item goes deep enough to provoke one.
Format two: the question and answer
One real question from a client or prospect, answered in 200 to 300 words by a named expert. Best for consultants and mortgage brokers whose value is judgement. It produces replies because readers recognise the question and want to ask their own. The trade-off: you need a steady supply of good questions.
Format three: the single story
One case, told start to finish: the situation, what was tried, what worked. Names are removed or used with permission. Best for agencies and consultants selling complex work. It builds trust well but takes the longest to write.
Format four: the market update
A short summary of what moved in your market, with one chart or figure and a plain-language explanation of what it means for the reader. Best for real estate firms and mortgage brokers. Readers keep these emails. The trade-off is accuracy: every figure must come from a source you can name, and stale data damages credibility.
Format five: the curated roundup
Five links to useful things others have published, each with a one-line comment on why it matters. The easiest to produce and the weakest at building your own authority. Use it only as an occasional break from one of the other formats.
Say a brokerage has used the briefing format and gets few replies. It could switch to the question and answer format, built around one question its advisers heard that month. Suppose replies rose from two or three per send to around 20 on a list of 4,500, most asking about the reader's own situation. Each of those would be a potential review appointment. The reply numbers are hypothetical.
Before you start
Pick one format to begin with and commit to it for at least six issues; readers need consistency to form a habit. You need a branded master layout, a named author for each issue, and a sending day you can hold every month.
How to set it up
- Go to Marketing, Emails, and open the Templates tab.
- Open your master layout, or start a new template.
- Drag in a short intro Text element for the author.
- Add the section blocks your chosen format needs.
- Add placeholders for the author's name, role and photo.
- Add one Button element as the call to action.
- Click Save Template and name it, for example NEWS-QA.
- In Contacts, use + Add smart list for consented subscribers.
- From the template's three-dot menu, choose Create Campaign.
- Replace each placeholder, then send a Test Email.
- Click Send or Schedule and set your fixed sending day.
What newsletters are for in a 10 to 250 person firm
A newsletter keeps you present between buying decisions. When revenue is flat, many lost deals are not lost to competitors but to forgetting; a prospect who was not ready last spring is ready now and has forgotten your name. A good newsletter prevents that.
It replaces sporadic news emails and social posts that most clients never see. Time per issue ranges from about an hour for a briefing to half a day for a single story. Agencies, consultants, mortgage brokers and real estate firms should each choose the format that matches how they win work.
For the layout side of newsletters, see our template for an email newsletter. To reduce the writing time, read about the email newsletter creator and how to run an automated newsletter for recurring content.
Mixing all five formats in every issue. A newsletter with a briefing, a story, a market chart and five links is long, unfocused and hard to write every month. Pick one main format.
When not to send a newsletter
If you cannot sustain a regular schedule, do not start one. A newsletter that appears three times and stops tells readers your firm does not follow through. Run occasional campaigns instead until you have the capacity.
Troubleshooting
Issues take too long to write. The format is too ambitious for your capacity. Switch to the question and answer or briefing format.
Readers unsubscribe after a few issues. Content is about your firm rather than their problems. Shift the balance towards the reader.
Market update figures are challenged. Always cite the source in the email and date the data.
Nobody replies. The call to action is vague. Ask for one specific thing, such as their own question for next month.
Frequently asked questions
Which newsletter format works best?
The one that matches how you win work. Firms that sell judgement do well with questions and answers. Firms that sell on local knowledge do well with market updates. Firms that sell complex projects do well with single stories.
How often should a business newsletter go out?
Monthly suits most established firms. Fortnightly can work if you have the content and capacity. Less than quarterly is too rare to build a habit.
Can I use free newsletter templates from elsewhere?
You can paste external designs into the builder, but check they render well on mobile and match your brand. The format, not the layout, is what makes a newsletter work. Our guide to email marketing design covers layout choices.
Should the newsletter come from the firm or a person?
A person. A named author gives readers someone to reply to and makes the newsletter feel like correspondence rather than a brochure.