Email Newsletter
Email is the only marketing channel you fully own — no algorithm, no ad spend, no platform risk. This course gets you set up on Mailchimp and sending consistently in under two hours.
- Create a free Mailchimp account and set up your mailing list correctly
- Import your existing contacts and add a sign-up form to your website
- Use the 5-part content formula so you always know what to write
- Send your first newsletter and understand what the stats mean
The only marketing channel you truly own
Facebook can change its algorithm overnight and cut your reach to almost nothing. Google can update and drop your rankings. Instagram can suspend your account. None of that can happen to your email list — it belongs to you, it goes wherever you go, and nobody can take it away.
Open rates for travel email newsletters average 20–25%. That means a list of 300 opted-in contacts delivers 60–75 engaged readers every single send — people who are actively thinking about their next holiday while reading your email. No paid ad at this budget level comes close to that.
The hardest part is starting. Most agents either think they don't have enough contacts to make it worthwhile, or they start and then let it lapse. This course solves both problems: it gets you set up quickly, and it gives you a content formula so simple that writing each email takes less than an hour.
Email reaches more of your audience than any other free channel
When you post on Facebook, roughly 2–5% of your followers see it. When you send an email, 20–25% open it. For a list of 300 contacts, that's the difference between 6–15 people seeing your message and 60–75 people reading it in full — every single send.
What you need
- A list of past client and enquirer email addresses — even 20–30 in a spreadsheet is a perfect starting point
- A Mailchimp account — free at mailchimp.com, no credit card required for the free plan (up to 500 contacts)
- Your business name, address, and email address — required by law for bulk email marketing
- Your Travelgenix website URL — you'll add a sign-up form to it in Step 5
Starting with a very small list?
Don't wait until you have 100 contacts. Start now with whatever you have — even 20 people. A list of 20 grows to 200 faster than you'd think once you start actively collecting addresses and have a sign-up form on your website. The habit of sending consistently matters far more than the starting size.
Setting up Mailchimp and sending your first newsletter
Create your free Mailchimp account
Go to mailchimp.com and click "Sign Up Free." The free plan allows up to 500 contacts and 1,000 emails per month — more than enough to get started. Fill in your business name and details when prompted.
Set up your Audience (your mailing list)
In Mailchimp, your contact list is called an "Audience." Go to Audience → Manage Audience → Settings. Set your:
- From Name — your business name (e.g. "Sunshine Travel Co.")
- Reply-To email — the address clients should reply to
- Business address — required by law; appears in every email footer
Import your existing contacts
Go to Audience → Add Contacts → Import Contacts. Upload a CSV or Excel spreadsheet with columns for First Name, Last Name, and Email Address.
You can legitimately import past clients you've had a genuine business relationship with — this counts as a legitimate interest basis under UK GDPR. Do not import cold contacts who have never dealt with you.
Create a sign-up form for your website
Go to Audience → Signup Forms → Embedded Forms. Mailchimp generates a small block of HTML code. Copy it and send it to whoever manages your Travelgenix website — ask them to add it to your homepage footer or a dedicated "Join our list" page.
Add an incentive in the form copy that gives people a reason to sign up: "Join our Travel Insider list for exclusive deals and destination inspiration — before they go public."
Choose your template — keep it simple
In Mailchimp, go to Campaigns → Create Campaign → Email → Regular Email. When prompted to choose a template, pick the simplest single-column option available. Clean, uncluttered layouts perform better than busy ones — and they're much faster to write.
Add your logo at the top and set your brand colour (your Travelgenix teal: #0089AB). You'll reuse this template every send — you only need to set it up once.
Use the 5-part content formula — every time
Consistency is what builds an email list that your clients look forward to. Use the same structure every send so readers know what to expect:
| Section | What to write |
|---|---|
| 1. Opening line | One warm, personal sentence. What's happening this season, a client story, or something you've been excited about this month. |
| 2. Deal or highlight | One featured holiday — destination, headline price, and a clear "Find out more" button linking to your website or a deal page. |
| 3. Destination story | 3–4 sentences about a destination you love right now. Not a hard sell — genuine enthusiasm. "Three reasons we're obsessed with Albania in 2025." |
| 4. Useful tip | One practical piece of travel intelligence. A new airline route, a visa change, best time to book for summer, a packing tip. Something they didn't know. |
| 5. Call to action | One clear, simple invitation: "Ready to start planning? Reply to this email or call us on [number]." One CTA only — don't confuse readers with multiple options. |
Write a subject line that gets opened
Your subject line is the only thing that determines whether people open your email. Avoid generic lines like "Our latest newsletter" or "Holiday deals inside" — these are instantly forgettable.
- Curiosity:"The one destination everyone should visit before 2026"
- Specificity:"Last-minute sunshine from £499pp — this week only"
- Personal:"I just got back from Sri Lanka and need to tell you everything"
- Urgency:"Summer 2025 availability — 8 weeks left at this price"
Set your sending schedule and stick to it
Fortnightly is the sweet spot for most travel businesses — frequent enough to stay front of mind, infrequent enough that each email feels like an event rather than background noise.
Best days and times: Tuesday or Wednesday, between 9am and 11am. These consistently produce the highest open rates for travel emails. Pick one slot and use it every time — your readers will start to recognise it.
Set a recurring calendar reminder two days before each send date. That's your writing time. Block it and treat it like a client meeting.
Review your stats after every send
In Mailchimp, after each send go to Reports and check three numbers:
- Open rate — aim for 25%+. Below 20% suggests your subject lines need work.
- Click rate — aim for 3–5%+. Low clicks mean your content or CTA isn't compelling enough.
- Unsubscribes — 1–3 per send is normal. A sudden spike means something in that email missed the mark.
Over time this data tells you exactly what your audience responds to. Do more of what earns high opens and clicks.
Growing your list — the four easiest methods
- Add a sign-up form to your website homepage and footer (Step 4)
- At the end of every booking conversation, ask: "Can I add you to our email list? We send destination ideas and exclusive deals fortnightly."
- Promote your list on social media once a month: "Want to hear about deals before anyone else? Link in bio."
- Add a sign-up link to your email signature — every email you send is a low-friction sign-up opportunity
Travelgenix tip
Ask your Travelgenix account manager about adding your Mailchimp sign-up form directly to your booking confirmation and enquiry response emails. Every client who books or enquires is a warm prospect for your list — capturing them at that moment, while you're top of mind, dramatically improves sign-up rates.
For more experienced marketers
Segment your list from day one — even if it's tiny
Mailchimp lets you tag contacts with labels like "Honeymoon," "Ski," "Family," or "Luxury." Even with 50 contacts, start tagging. When your list reaches 200+, you can send targeted emails — ski deals only to ski clients, honeymoon content only to newlyweds. Segmented campaigns get 50–60% higher open rates than unsegmented ones, and they generate far fewer unsubscribes because the content is always relevant.
Set up one automation — the welcome email
In Mailchimp, go to Automations → Welcome new subscribers. Create a single welcome email that sends automatically the moment someone joins your list. It should introduce who you are, what you specialise in, and what they can expect from your emails. A welcome email gets four times the open rate of a regular campaign — because it arrives when curiosity is at its peak and the subscriber is most engaged.
Repurpose every email as a blog post
Every newsletter you write is also a piece of SEO content. After sending, paste the destination story section of your email into a blog post on your Travelgenix website. Add a title and a few extra sentences. You've now published a piece of content that can attract search traffic for months — with almost no additional effort. Over a year of fortnightly newsletters, that's 26 blog posts written almost accidentally.
Email mistakes that kill list growth
- Sending too often — more than once a week feels like spam for most travel businesses
- Every email being a hard sell — aim for 80% useful and inspiring, 20% promotional
- Sending from a personal Gmail address — this gets flagged as spam and damages deliverability permanently
- Not previewing on mobile — over 60% of emails are read on phones; use Mailchimp's mobile preview before every send
- Long walls of text — keep emails scannable with short paragraphs and one clear image
Your fortnightly email habit
- Two days before send: write your email using the 5-part formula — aim for 250–400 words
- One day before send: read it back on your phone — does it look right? Is the subject line compelling?
- Send day: schedule or send at 9–11am Tuesday or Wednesday
- Day after send: check your open rate, click rate and unsubscribes in Mailchimp Reports
- Ongoing: ask every new client and enquirer for their email address and permission to add them to your list
What to expect and when
| When | What to expect |
|---|---|
| Week 1 | Account set up, contacts imported, first email sent. Open rates on new lists are often higher than average as fresh contacts are most engaged. |
| Month 1–2 | List grows via website sign-ups and word of mouth. Open rates settle at 20–25%. First direct enquiries from newsletter readers start coming in. |
| Month 3–6 | Consistent sending builds recognition — readers start looking forward to your emails. Expect 1–3 bookings per month you can directly trace to the newsletter. |
| Month 6–12 | Your list becomes a reliable background source of repeat and referral bookings. Every past client added compounds the value over time. |
| Year 2+ | A well-maintained list of 500+ engaged contacts generates a steady stream of warm inbound bookings with no ongoing ad spend required. |
Lesson completion checklist
📄 Download the Course 03 Workbook
Content formula template, subject line swipe file, monthly planner, and stats tracker — all in one printable document.