In short
Yes, if you have something worth sending regularly and will keep sending it; a list of people who asked to hear from you is the one audience no platform can take away, and email consistently outperforms social media for reaching people who already know you. It is not worth it as a repository for company news, as a quarterly obligation, or as a channel started without a clear idea of what each issue contains. Most newsletters that fail do so because the sender ran out of things to say, not because readers stopped wanting them.
What a newsletter is for
Every other channel is rented. Search rankings shift with updates, social reach falls with algorithm changes, AI answers may or may not cite you, and any of them can disappear from one day to the next. An email list is different: people gave you permission, you hold the addresses, and a message reaches them when you send it. That permanence is why every marketer who has watched a channel collapse says the same thing: build the list.
The second reason is intimacy. A newsletter arrives in a space people check daily, in a format that allows a paragraph rather than a caption, from a sender they chose. It is the channel best suited to keeping a relationship warm between the moment someone finds you and the moment they need you, which for most service businesses is months or years.
The numbers, honestly
Industry benchmarks put average open rates in the 30–40% range since Apple's privacy changes inflated the metric, click rates around 2–3%, and unsubscribe rates well under 1% per send. A list of 1,000 engaged subscribers therefore produces a few hundred reads and a few dozen clicks per issue, which sounds small until compared with organic social reach, where a post typically reaches a low single-digit percentage of followers.
Revenue attribution varies enormously by business. E-commerce brands routinely attribute a large share of revenue to email; a consultancy may get one enquiry a quarter from it, and that enquiry may be worth the year's effort. The value is in the fit between what you send and what readers eventually buy.
The formats that survive
The curated digest. Links and short commentary on things worth reading in your field. Easiest to sustain, valued by busy readers, and it builds a reputation for judgement.
The essay. One idea, a few hundred words, in the sender's voice. Hardest to sustain, most likely to be forwarded, and the format that builds the strongest relationship.
The practical note. A tip, a checklist, a short how-to. Useful, quick, and directly connected to what you sell.
The update with substance. For product companies: what changed, why, and how to use it, written for the reader rather than the release notes.
What does not survive: the round-up of company news, the monthly obligation with nothing in it, the promotional blast disguised as content.
What it costs
Tools are cheap: free to a few tens of dollars a month for lists under a few thousand. The cost is time and attention. A short weekly essay is two to four hours a week from someone who can write; a fortnightly digest, an hour or two. Multiply by fifty and it is a real commitment, and the reason most newsletters end is that the commitment was not counted at the start.
There is also the deliverability work: authenticating the domain with SPF, DKIM and DMARC so messages do not land in spam, and keeping the list clean so that bounces and inactive addresses do not damage the sender's reputation.
Why newsletters die
The sender runs out of things to say, because the format was chosen before the content. The cadence was set too ambitious and the third missed issue becomes the last. The list was grown with incentives that attracted people who wanted the incentive, not the newsletter, and the open rate collapses. The content is promotion, and readers learn there is nothing in it for them. Nobody measures anything, so nobody knows whether it works, so it is cut when time gets short.
Each of these is preventable, and each is decided before the first issue.
Before you start
Write down what the next twelve issues would contain. If the list comes easily, there is a newsletter. If it does not, there is not yet. Choose a cadence you could keep during your busiest month; fortnightly or monthly beats a weekly that stops. Decide the format from the content, not the other way round. Set one measure that matters, replies, clicks to a specific page, or enquiries that mention it, and check it quarterly.
Grow the list from people who already like you: readers of the answer pages on your site, customers, contacts who asked to be kept informed. Offer the newsletter itself, described honestly, rather than a bribe; a smaller list of people who wanted it outperforms a larger one of people who wanted a discount. And keep the sign-up form where readers finish reading, not in a pop-up that interrupts them.
The decision
If you have a point of view, expertise your customers value, and the discipline to send something useful on a schedule you can hold, a newsletter is the most durable marketing asset a small business can build, and it compounds for years. If you are starting one because the marketing plan has a box for it, spend the time on the answer pages instead and start the list when there is something to send. If you would like help working out which situation you are in, book a call.
Common questions
Is email marketing still effective in 2026?
Yes, particularly for reaching people who already know you. Email reaches a far larger share of a list than organic social posts reach followers, is unaffected by platform algorithm changes, and remains the channel with the strongest reported return for businesses that send useful content consistently. Its effectiveness depends on relevance and deliverability, not on the channel's age.
How often should a business send a newsletter?
As often as it can send something worth reading, on a schedule it can keep during its busiest month. Fortnightly or monthly sustained for years beats weekly that stops after two months. Decide the cadence from a realistic count of the content available, and tell subscribers what to expect.
What is a good open rate for a newsletter?
Since Apple's Mail Privacy Protection began pre-loading emails, open rates are inflated and unreliable; benchmarks now sit around 30–40% and mean little. Click rate, typically 2–3%, and replies or enquiries that mention the newsletter are better measures of whether people are actually reading and acting.
How do I grow a newsletter list without buying subscribers?
Offer the newsletter itself, described honestly, to people who already read your site or buy from you: a sign-up at the end of useful pages, a mention in customer emails, a line in your signature. Avoid bought lists, which damage deliverability and are illegal in many jurisdictions, and be cautious with incentives, which attract people who wanted the incentive rather than the emails.
What should a small business newsletter contain?
Something useful to the reader every time: a practical tip, a short essay with a point of view, a curated set of links with commentary, or a substantive update on what has changed and why it matters. Company news and promotions belong in small doses at most; a newsletter that is mainly promotion is unsubscribed from.
