Creating a Dynamic Email Newsletter (FOR FREE!)

Being the eternal cheapskate, I always try & find tricks for running my business on the low budget. My latest promo tool is creating pretty (i.e. with pictures) email newsletters, something I'd always wanted to do, but didnt want to pay a monthly fee for like companies like Constant Contact. Since I have a bit of experience doing html & web page design through dreamweaver, I knew something was possible. I googled a few techniques & came up with what has been working for me for the last few months here are two methods I've used. Keep in mind I use gmail to send my emails, so adapt this to your own email if needed:

Easy No-HTML method:

this method uses the EtsyMini (or images on your webpage) to create a very basic addition of linkable images on your email newsletter...
setup your etsymini as desired. I like the thumbnails version as I dont like how the text turns up on the gallery option. Then starting at the etsy promo text below the images, highlight up to the images with your mouse-

on a mac, press command + 'C' (command is the little apple button next to the mouse) to copy the image. on a PC, press ctrl + C
this copies the highlighted portion into your clipboard.

go into your email & hit command + 'P' (or ctrl + P)
this will paste the images & bit of text into your email.

from there, I add in the text I want, clean up the etsy text I'd copied over,etc.
I like to add the line at the top "click 'view images below' to view email". as a default, email programs dont always show images in emails, so this helps guide those who arent used to image based emails.

Tips & tricks:

I like my emails to be a bit more dynamic, so I design mine in dreamweaver. I add a themed banner, tables, etc. They can be then posted online (however you upload your own personal website pages) & copied from that, as shown above.

Collecting Email Addresses:

there are various methods for collection email addresses from customers. I use http://www. notifylist.com to collect mine. The website gives you html coding that you can then load into your personal site. My personal one can be seen here- http://rachaelsudlow.com/newsletter.htm

from there I keep all my email addresses in a 'google group', which is part of the email 'contacts' area. that way I can easily compose to the whole group when I need to send out a newsletter.
my latest newsletter, done in photoshop