Newsletter: what it is, what it's for and how to send one
The bulletin that lands in your subscribers' inboxes, explained from start to finish
A newsletter is a bulletin that a company, a media outlet or an individual sends by email, at regular intervals, to people who have subscribed to receive it. In Spanish it is called boletín, boletín informativo or boletín electrónico. It helps you stay in touch with your readers or customers, share useful content and announce news and offers.
One of the most effective digital marketing tools is undoubtedly the newsletter.
The vast majority of companies use it to keep in touch with their customers, get to know them better and inform them of the latest news.
On the other hand, web users often subscribe to different newsletters from their favorite websites, brands or blogs so that they don’t miss anything and are constantly updated.
But for it to be totally effective, you need to know how to use it very well and get the most out of it.
What is “newsletter” in Spanish? Fundéu recommends boletín and, if you want to be more specific, boletín informativo, boletín electrónico or boletín digital. If you use the English word, write it in italics. In Spain it is mostly used in the feminine (la newsletter), although the masculine (el newsletter) is common in some Latin American countries.
A newsletter, or bulletin, is a publication sent by email at regular intervals to everyone who is interested in receiving it and has therefore voluntarily subscribed to a mailing list.
So we can define a newsletter as a digital informative bulletin: a periodical publication (daily, weekly, monthly) sent by email to a database containing a large number of subscribers.
The usual frequency is weekly or monthly.
However, depending on the type of content, daily and fortnightly newsletters are also common.
It is important that the newsletters are attractive and relevant to the target audience and that online privacy and data protection rules are respected.
You can classify newsletters by their content and by how often you send them. These are the most common types by content:
| Type | What it includes | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Content | Articles, guides or videos that are useful to the reader, with no direct selling | A blog’s weekly roundup |
| News | Launches, improvements or company news | An app’s new features |
| Promotional | Offers, discounts or featured products | An online store’s sale |
| Curated | A selection of links from other sources, with a short comment | The top 5 industry news stories |
| Internal | Information for a company’s team | The monthly employee newsletter |
If you want to learn more about the last type, we have a dedicated entry on the internal newsletter.
In terms of frequency, the most common are the weekly newsletter and the monthly newsletter. Media outlets usually send daily newsletters, and some brands choose to send one every two weeks. What matters is keeping the pace you promise your subscribers. You’ll find more ideas in our post on the ideal sending frequency.
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Design, send and analyze your newsletters with Mailrelay’s drag & drop editor, no technical knowledge required.
To do this, it must include a series of elements that should never be missing, such as:
- The goal. Before launching a newsletter, it is important to set certain goals or figures you want to reach (number of sales, actions you want to boost, number of new customers, etc.).
- Logo or corporate image. Although it may seem logical, the logo should never be missing in order to maintain the coherence of the visual identity. It is very important that the message you want to convey and the context in which you will do it are uniform in order to offer a very professional image.
- Text. The information you send must be powerful and interesting in order to retain the reader, capture their attention and encourage them to visit your site. That’s why you need to take care of the writing style and, above all, the content you want to communicate and show.
- Audiovisual content. If, instead of words, you can convey your message through images, don’t hesitate to opt for this alternative. They are more useful for capturing attention and retaining the reader. It’s best to use photos, infographics, videos or GIFs.
- Design. Remember that the newsletter is part of the brand and should therefore follow the same design as your website and respect the color ranges, fonts and style.
- Call To Action. It is included very often, and it lets you check whether the goals you set at the start are being met.
- Social media. They help subscribers follow you outside their inbox too, so it’s a good idea to include them in your newsletters. You should also include buttons for every network the brand is on, paying special attention to the main ones, such as Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook or X. Besides social media, don’t forget a direct link to your own website. These are small details that can often go unnoticed.
- Other elements that should not be missing. Contact details (email, phone, address), an unsubscribe link (mandatory in commercial communications) and a link to view the web version of the newsletter.
Also pay attention to the preheader, the text that appears next to the subject line in the inbox. And if you want to see how other brands combine these elements, our blog has some newsletter examples.
You’ll find some newsletter examples at this link.
Newsletters usually include articles of interest about the company that sends them and related topics that may be useful to subscribers.
Sometimes they include incentives to close a sale, but a newsletter’s main goal is not selling (although it does help generate sales).
It is the foundation of an email marketing strategy and a resource used successfully by all kinds of companies: from small local businesses to publicly listed multinationals.
So what are the reasons why newsletters are so effective?
There are several reasons.
To begin with, newsletters are a customizable medium and can be designed based on the person who will receive them.
Not only are they segmented so that some contacts receive some messages and others don’t, but the content can also be created to follow the preferences of the person in question.
This advantage is even greater because newsletters are private, so what you send stays between you and the contact who receives it.
Private communications always feel more one-to-one and less like mass messaging.
Finally, although you need to look after deliverability when sending newsletters, whether or not contacts see the message doesn’t depend on algorithms.
And of course, the message you send doesn’t get lost among hundreds of messages from other people.
Your contacts are much more likely to see your newsletters, the message won’t disappear and they’ll be able to read it when they can or want to.
Sending newsletters has a number of advantages for anyone who takes the trouble to do so:
- It doesn’t require a large financial investment: any business or blog can do it (even at zero cost).
- Although it isn’t designed for direct sales, it can influence the purchase intentions of subscribers and generate sales indirectly.
- It helps you build customer loyalty with little effort and stay top of mind as a reference in your sector.
- It drives traffic to your website: the more subscribers you have, the more visits each send can generate.
- It is a direct communication channel with people who are genuinely interested in the content you send, since they have voluntarily chosen to receive it by email.
- It is a very useful tool for sharing the latest news and promoting offers easily.
- It is one of the best channels for selling; if you have a good strategy, you can get more conversions than on other channels.
- It keeps your lists of interested contacts fully up to date, since subscribers must be able to unsubscribe from the newsletter whenever they want.
- It provides data on subscribers’ behavior and interests, through the statistics available from services such as Mailrelay.
Newsletter software tools let you design, send and measure your newsletters without any technical knowledge.
Its main purpose is to create and maintain a close relationship with customers, promoting brand loyalty and encouraging recurring sales.
The most important thing is that every email adds value for the recipient and helps move them forward in their customer journey.
These strategies allow companies to create meaningful relationships with their customers, personalize their marketing messages and segment their audience effectively.
In addition, newsletters have an exceptionally high return on investment (ROI) compared to other digital marketing strategies.
According to Litmus’s State of Email 2025 report, 35% of companies get between $10 and $36 for every dollar invested in email marketing, and another 30% get between $36 and $50.
Sending a newsletter isn’t difficult, but to do it properly, here are the main steps you need to follow:
Set a goal first
Before you start thinking about the newsletter itself, stop and think about what you want to achieve with it.
It should always bring you some kind of advantage. Subscribe to your competitors’ newsletters to see first-hand what kind of content they send and to define your goal.
Build your contact list
It may sound obvious, but… if you want to send a newsletter, you need to have people interested in receiving it.
In this step you need to decide how you’ll get them. The most common approach is to use a subscription form or landing pages where, in exchange for a lead magnet, you ask potential customers for their email address to build your contact list.
Watch out for one legal detail. In Spain, the GDPR and the LSSI require subscribers to have given their consent before receiving your newsletter, and every send must include an easy way to unsubscribe. That’s why you should never buy databases or add contacts without permission. To make sure every address is real and its owner wants to hear from you, turn on double opt-in.
Define your strategy
This is the part that has the biggest impact on your newsletter’s success, so give it the importance it deserves.
At this point you need to define the type of content you’ll offer, how often you’ll send it and a design that makes your newsletters easy for your audience to recognize.
Time to send
With all of the above done, launch your newsletter and send it to your current subscribers, whose number will grow over time.
Check the results
Analyze your subscribers’ behavior and use that information to keep improving your newsletter. The metrics provided by your email marketing tool will help you do this: open rate, click-through rate, unsubscribes, etc.
Don’t forget to check
Before sending your newsletter, check these points:
- Catchy subject line: An eye-catching subject line helps increase your open rate.
- Relevant content: whether educational, informative or promotional, the content must offer value to the reader.
- Responsive design: as most users access their emails from a mobile device, the design must be adaptable.
- Clear calls to action (CTA): guide the reader to the action you want them to take, whether it’s reading an article, buying a product or signing up for an event.
A few years ago, sending mass emails for free was unthinkable.
No matter how big your list is, with free email marketing software you can send the same email to thousands of people at once.
That offers many advantages:
● It cuts costs. These email marketing platforms are especially affordable, not to mention the software that lets you send mass emails for free in Spanish. In addition, keep in mind that the time a person spends on this kind of task isn’t free; it has a cost. So the gentler the learning curve, the greater the cost savings.
● Save time. Can you imagine having to send emails to your list of subscribers one by one? It would certainly be a very tiring job. Any email marketing tool lets you send newsletters in very little time and, thanks to its automated actions, carry out complex tasks in just a couple of clicks.
● It offers great reach. Another advantage of using software to send mass emails is that you can reach thousands of people. As many as there are subscribers on your list!
All this, combined with the content and power of a newsletter, translates into a big impact on sales, as well as a stronger brand reputation and greater trust in the brand.
That said, let’s see what options the market offers us. Here are some of the best free newsletter software options.
This table sums up what each tool’s free plan includes, with data from September 2026:
| Software | Free contacts | Free sends | Tool branding in your emails |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mailrelay | 20.000 | 80,000 per month | No |
| Mailchimp | 250 | 500 per month (250 per day) | Yes |
| Brevo | 100.000 | 300 per day | Yes |
| SendPulse | 500 | 15,000 per month | Yes |
| Mailjet | 1.000 | 6,000 per month (200 per day) | Yes |
If you’re only looking for free options, you’ll find more details in our entry on how to create a free newsletter. And if you want a broader comparison, check out our selection of email marketing software.
Let’s start the list with one of the email marketing tools I have used (and still use) the most: Mailrelay.
It’s software with lots of premium features at zero cost (it lets you send up to 80,000 free emails a month to a list of up to 20,000 contacts).
Even its free version gives you access to advanced features.
Due to this and other advantages, it stands out from the rest of the tools on the market. Also, if you opt for its paid version, you will see that it is one of the cheapest.
That is probably one of the reasons why it has become such well-established newsletter software on the market.
The user experience is very satisfying. It more than meets the needs of its users and even exceeds their expectations!
Everything you need for your newsletter, all in one place
Manage your subscriber list, automate your sends and measure your results with Mailrelay.
On top of all this, working with Mailrelay is a great option for the following reasons:
● Free account. It allows you to send up to 80,000 emails per month and has a limit of 20,000 contacts. Of all the email marketing software out there, it has the most generous free version.
● Support at no extra cost. With the free account you get support through every channel (chat, ticket and phone). Most email marketing tools don’t offer support (let alone phone support) on their free accounts.
● No advertising in your emails. Even though it’s a free account, it doesn’t include any kind of advertising in your emails, nor platform logos or links.
● Advanced statistics. With this tool you can access advanced statistics to analyze the performance of your campaigns. And, if you need it, you can export them.
● Autoresponders. With Mailrelay you can create basic automations that save a lot of work and let you start communicating with new subscribers.
● Forms. Mailrelay lets you easily create subscription forms that you can then embed on your website.
● Simple newsletter editor. Mailrelay has one of the simplest and most powerful newsletter editors on the market.
● Teamwork. You can add as many users (within the same account) as your company needs.
● Dedicated IPs. You can get a dedicated IP if you send large volumes.
● Suitable for beginners and veterans. Its ease of use makes it a tool suitable for any type of user.
● A/B test. It lets you run tests such as A/B testing of subject lines and senders. This way, you can find out which version of the email converts better.
If you want to take a closer look at this email marketing tool’s features, check out this article.
In practice, Mailchimp is newsletter software similar to the previous one. Its use and purpose are the same; what changes are the advantages (and limitations) you’ll find in its free account.
It is another well-established tool on the market, having supported businesses and companies for many years. It is not difficult to use and is trusted by many people.
Those who choose this free newsletter software do so for reasons like the ones below:
● Integration with other tools. For example, this lets you easily embed forms in Elementor or analyze your email marketing statistics in Google Analytics. This is perhaps the main advantage of Mailchimp over other email marketing tools.
● Free account. This plan is much less generous than Mailrelay’s. Since February 17, 2026, Mailchimp has offered a free account that lets you manage 250 contacts and send 500 emails a month, with a limit of 250 per day. Free sends include the Mailchimp logo.
● Automation. With this mass email software you can create automations to build email sequences that help your business convert more.
● Forms. If you want to capture subscribers for your mass emails, you’ll need a form where they can leave their details. Mailchimp lets you create them easily.
● Marketing CRM. To keep all your audience information organized, Mailchimp offers a CRM in its free version.
● 30 days of support. Mailchimp’s free account only includes 30 days of support.
● Email templates. Finally, it’s worth mentioning that Mailchimp includes a large library of templates you can use to set up your newsletters.
3) Brevo (formerly Sendinblue)
Now let’s talk about another program for sending emails that hasn’t been on the market that long.
Although many companies already choose it, compared with Mailchimp or Mailrelay it could be considered relatively new.
This tool emerged within a digital marketing agency, where they detected certain shortcomings in the platforms that existed at the time and decided to create their own.
Today it is an option worth considering thanks to aspects like the ones we detail in the next paragraph.
Bear in mind, though, that the free version adds the Brevo logo to your emails and limits sending to 300 per day.
Among the advantages or reasons why Brevo is gaining users, we find:
● Prices. Although its free version is limited, if we compare the prices of its paid plans with other tools, it is (for very small volumes) one of the cheapest on the market. In 2026, Mailchimp’s paid plans start at $13 a month and Brevo’s at $9.
● Automations. It allows you to create email sequences and automate their delivery based on user behavior or interaction. Thus, your business can generate income uninterruptedly.
● SMS marketing. Most email marketing software doesn’t offer this option. Brevo allows you to send SMS virtually anywhere in the world and use another channel to gain the trust of your audience. That said, it isn’t a free feature.
● Share your newsletter on social media. If you wish, with just one click you can share your newsletter content on your social networks. With that, you gain an extra point of visibility. This feature is also available for Mailrelay users.
● Transactional emails. For ecommerce owners, this is one of its standout features: it lets you send, track and measure emails linked to store transactions.
● Support in Spanish (only available on paid accounts) . Finally, if you need it, you can use their support in Spanish.
Unlike the previous ones, SendPulse is free multichannel email marketing software: it uses more than one digital marketing channel to reach and connect with its audience. For example, you can use it to send messages through on-site web notifications, SMS or a chatbot.
When it comes to sending newsletters, it is an option used by both entrepreneurs and large companies. Although the price rises quickly with volume. Let’s see its advantages.
Those who choose to work with SendPulse do so for the following reasons:
● Free SMTP server. It’s something most email marketing software includes, but it’s worth mentioning. Mailrelay for example has this option.
● Push notifications on the web. This is an additional advantage, if we compare it with the rest of the tools. It also allows you to send SMS.
● Visual editor. Although the platform’s interface makes it somewhat complex to use, it has a visual email editor that lets you create professional emails by dragging and dropping elements.
● Free plan. The free account of this newsletter software allows up to 500 subscribers and 15,000 emails a month, with SendPulse branding in the footer of every email.
5) Mailjet
And what about Mailjet? If you work in digital marketing, the name of this tool probably rings a bell. It is newsletter software that also lets you send transactional emails.
Like the rest of the applications that I have included in this list, it offers a very interesting free option so you can start using it. Let’s see what advantages are worth mentioning.
Mailjet has earned a place on this list of email marketing tools for the following reasons:
● Free account. Its free plan lets you send 200 emails a day and 6,000 a month, for up to 1,000 contacts.
● Collaborative tools. This means that, just like with Google Docs, this newsletter software lets the whole team create, review and comment on an email together.
● Automation.
To wrap up, I have to say that the best free newsletter software for you will depend on your needs and the features you’re looking for in this kind of tool.
Even so, if we analyze all the advantages described in this article, for me, the podium would look like this:
● Bronze medal: Brevo. It’s a tool committed to innovation that strives to be competitive and offer advantages to its users. However, the limit of 300 emails a day and its logo on your sends make its free account less appealing.
● Silver medal: Mailchimp. It has very attractive features, especially in terms of integrations, but its free account is somewhat limited.
Gold medal: Mailrelay
It’s the only one that offers premium features at zero cost. The only one that offers advanced features on its free plan. No ads and with support included. Not to mention the number of messages and users included (80 thousand emails and 20 thousand contacts).
I invite you to try Mailrelay and see for yourself why it’s the best free newsletter software. Sign up here now!
What does newsletter mean in Spanish? It means “boletín”. Fundéu recommends using boletín, boletín informativo or boletín electrónico instead of the English word.
What is a newsletter for? It helps you stay in touch with your subscribers, share useful content, announce news and offers, and drive traffic to your website. It’s one of the channels that does the most to build customer loyalty.
What does subscribing to a newsletter mean? It means leaving your email address in a form to receive that newsletter in your inbox. You can unsubscribe at any time using the link at the bottom of every email.
How often is a newsletter sent? The most common is once a week or once a month. Choose a frequency you can keep up with quality content and state it on your subscription form.
Can you create a newsletter for free? Yes. Several email marketing tools have a free plan. With Mailrelay’s free account you can send up to 80,000 emails a month to 20,000 contacts, with no advertising in your emails.
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