As a school, you spend a lot of time putting together a regular newsletter for parents, who, let’s be honest, can be demanding for information. But… are they actually reading it? 

Before giving you some tips on making this better, I have two questions for you to consider:  

1. Are you making it TOO hard for your readers? TOO much information (lots of text, lots of images, lots of pages), or TOO much repetitive information (school mission statement at the top every time, full term/year calendar every time), or being TOO crowded and cluttered can put the reader off, making your newsletter hard to read. 
   
   
2. Do you know how parents are consuming your newsletter? The average school newsletter is a static PDF document (or an image), with lots of blocks of text, scroll to navigate setup, and lots of pages. While PDFs are great for viewing on your desktop or printed out, they are not so good on a mobile device. Most of the parents I know receive their school information on their phones via email or school app. It’s a good idea to consider this with text size as well as amount of information. 
   
   

3 tips to make your newsletter more engaging: 

1. Short, punchy content. This helps your readers take in the information quicker and easier. This tactic effectively captures the attention of skim readers by not overwhelming them with content. Remember, you can always link out to your website or provide a link for readers to ‘learn more.’ 
   
   
2. Discuss relevant content. Remove repetitive information that readers can get elsewhere, like the school mission statement, term dates, contact details for all staff etc. The top of your newsletter is prime real-estate! What is the most important piece of information for this newsletter? Give that top place. For example, if you release your newsletter weekly only display new highlights from last week and upcoming calendar events/reminders.  
   
   
3. Keep it interesting. Consider using pull quotes, imagery, video, different sized fonts, colour, add a poll or quiz. Having said that, be careful not to go too crazy as this will make your newsletter cluttered and confusing. An image of your soccer team holding a trophy with a caption can often get the message across better than an article with a play-by-play of the game. 
   
   

Not sure where to start with your newsletter layout and design? Our team can help.

Get in touch to talk with one of our experts.