Just Monkeying Around: Newsletters So Easy ANY Monkey Can Do It!

Okay, here's the deal.

I love visualizing what my newsletter will look like.

I love having done a newsletter.

But mostly I don't like creating a newsletter. That's because it takes a lot of work to make it pretty and eye-catching. And deciding what to put in a newsletter is a pain. No wait...deciding what to leave OUT is the hard part.

Personally, a newsletter needs the following five things to catch my attention.

1) It needs to reflect the personal style or the brand of the sender
2) It needs to point people to the product (i.e. our books)
3) It needs to be short and simple
4) It needs to be visually appealing
5) It needs to be easy

The first three items on the list (personal style, product and short) are easy enough to achieve. And for some of us, if you like longer newsletters, that's okay. But people are busy, and I don't want to bore them with too much in a newsletter.

Way back before newsletter software like ConstantContact, MailChimp, and SendBlaster, I attempted to send newsletters via email. It was really hard to design something attractive quickly and easily and dump it into an email program and it would come out on the other end looking like a newsletter. It generally looked like what it was ... an email.

So, when I made the jump to MailChimp (newsletter software providor) last year, I thought all my problems were solved. I thought I'd have a gorgeous newsletter with great photos and content, and it would meet my most pressing needs: visually appealing and easy to create.

Even though MailChimp seemed to have all the bells and whistles I needed, the results felt bland...cookie cutter...and I felt like I was coloring within the lines. And it still took hours to create something that even when I was done, I just wasn't satisfied with how my newsletter looked.

After studying a couple of my favorite newsletters, I had an aha moment, and my latest newsletter was fairly quick and easy compared to previous ones. And I loved how it turned out.

The Key....

All the prep work was done BEFORE I opened my newsletter software. Yes, that's right. Instead of dumping a few pictures and book covers into MailChimp and writing content in the newsletter software around the pictures, I created my entire newsletter in PicMonkey in FOUR images (or sections), then uploaded the images to MailChimp. I linked the images to wherever I wanted each to go, and after checking things for accuracy, I was done with my newsletter.

Quickly, for those who might not know what it is, PicMonkey is a free online graphics design program. There are other more advanced programs, but PicMonkey does the job for me. I've blogged about PicMonkey before so for a quick tutorial on how to use PicMonkey to your advantage, check out Memes, Monkeys, and Me. The learning curve is not that steep and for me, I can visualize what I want a lot quicker than in MailChimp, and I have a lot more control over my layout, backgrounds, fonts, and style.

Now, here comes the fun part, some photos and instructions to explain all this. :)

I wanted the top of my newsletter to look like a 2:1 column, and I will probably stick with the same basic layout for a while. So, visualizing that, I started with my website header at the top and some cute borders and boxes for my content. Here's a template I created in PicMonkey. By saving the template, I'm already ahead of the game for the next newsletter. Or, I can create another template if I want to change things up. But I still need to stay on brand by using this color scheme, especially my header.

See the texture in the background templates in the empty text boxes? I worked up that parchment look in PicMonkey about a year ago and I've used it over and over again. That's not a background look I could get if I tried to design this directly in MailChimp.

Part A: Newsletter Template for Header Section
990x773 px

Now, this next part is what takes my newsletter from blah to wow. Or at least wow to me! :)

Think about any newsletter software you've ever worked with. Anything and everything in any given column or "block" is SEPARATE and contained, correct? In addition, the above layout isn't really even an option in MailChimp that I know of. You can do 1 column, 2 column, 2:1, 1:2, 3 column, etc, but not a combination like I've done above. That's because even though the layout above looks like three parts, it's not. It's one photo/jpg/image.

Below, you see the result of Part A of my December newsletter using the template above. Again, I wanted simple but gorgeous, with just a bit of content for the readers. I didn't want to bombard them with too much information, especially during Christmas. So, ignore the prettiness :) for a moment, and let's look at the content of this section...

Part A: Final Newsletter Header for December 2014 Newsletter
990x773 px

My newsletter header matches the header on my website, so that keeps my brand consistent. I incorporated a cute picture from my own Christmas decorations (didn't hurt that the colors were very complimentary!) and a short Christmas message. Then on the right, I gave thumbnail sketches of what I would be doing in December, January, and February.

Next, notice my name and the gold/tan swirls? Since this is all ONE image, I can "tie" what looks like three blocks of images/text together because I'm creating it all in my design software as one image. I originally planned to use a Christmas wreath, but ended up with the signature and the garnish. Finally, when I uploaded the above image to MailChimp, I linked it to my website. So, when subscribers received this newsletter, they could click anywhere on the above image to go directly to my website.

Again, remember I wanted to keep the newsletter simple, so now that I've wished my readers a Merry Christmas and told them what I'll be up to in the next couple of months, I wanted to tell them about my current release. Well, I could use the same 2:1 column layout, or I could use a square, but instead, I thought a banner style block would catch the eye more...

Part B: Announcement of Current Release
990x300 px

I used the same color scheme for this section to keep the flow, but as a long, narrow banner. I used the gold and tan background image, flipped it on its edge in PicMonkey, added The Evergreen Bride cover, and worked a bit of magic with the snow globe :) and this was the result. Notice how the cover bleeds out of the square just a bit, and the snow beneath the snow globe falls out of the image? Those were my attempts to give the newsletter more personality and less of a cookie-cutter feel. Since The Evergreen Bride was an ebook only, the link for this banner ad sent readers to Amazon. On various newsletter campaigns, I'll rotate links to CBD, B&N, Lifeway, etc. to spread the love just a bit.

Next, I wanted to give readers a sneak peak at what's coming up in 2015, but I wanted the visual to be different, so I chose a 2 column layout with two pictures side-by-side. But what else to put with the 2015 releases? I had blogged about my family's Burlap and Bows Country Christmas last year, so I decided that would be perfect for the Christmas newsletter. And I already had a postcard-sized image with the covers for 2015, all I had to do was resize it and pop it in.

Part C: December 2014 Newsletter
500x386 px

Part D: December 2014 Newsletter
300x332 px

Now, I could have combined Parts B, C, and D into one huge image, but I needed them to be separate so that I could add the links that I wanted. Because you can only add one link to an image/jpg.

So, to recap. I ended up with FOUR jpgs (images) in my newsletter. The entire newsletter was made up of images, not text. I linked each image to a specific spot on the web.

Part A linked to my home page on my website.

Part B linked to The Evergreen Bride on Amazon.

Part C linked to the Burlap and Bows Country Christmas. (the most clicked on link, btw)

Part D linked to my Books page on my website.

For those who are interested, I included the pixels in the captions above on each picture. You'll notice that the width across of both A & B are 990 px. That was about the right length to fit well with MailChimp.

As always, there are pros and cons to anything. Pros for doing a newsletter on this format is that you have more control of the visual appeal of your newsletter. Maybe that's not that important to my readers, but I personally like a pretty newsletter. I hope my readers do, too. And from the open and click-through rate, I think I'm on the right track. :)

One con is that you can only link ONCE to each image you upload. But, even though I didn't add any simple text in MailChimp, I could have, and I could have had links all over the text if needed. Another con would be that since you're typing your text directly onto your pictures and saving them, if you make a mistake, then you'll have to go back to your graphics design software to fix your jpg, then re-upload your graphics.

Here's a small screenshot of the finished product, but to see the REAL thing with the links, click here to see Pam Hillman's December 2014 newsletter. And, I'd love for you to Subscribe to Pam's Newsletter in order to receive future newsletters. Who knows what tricks I'll have up my monkey-sleeve next month? :)

Screenshot of Pam's December 2014 Newsletter

A couple of things I didn't mention before. I intentionally left a small white border around my graphics for extra eye-appeal, and then added the deep red background in MailChimp along with the narrow tool lines separating the sections.

So, there you have it. Newsletters so easy this monkey can do it! I hope today's post jumpstarts your creativity and ideas for a newsletter that reflects your personality and the image you want to present to your readers. Feel free to ask questions and I'll do my best to explain or clarify.

God bless and Merry Christmas!! :)

Memes, Monkeys, and Me: Photo Editing and Graphics Design for Amateurs

Background photo taken in Natchez, MS

What’s a meme, you ask?

Our current society considers a meme as an image or video that is passed electronically from one internet user to another. All those cute little pictures with captions that you see on facebook and Pinterest? They’re being dubbed as memes. We’ll get to the monkeys in a minute, but first, my graphics design credentials.

I became an amateur graphics designer many, many years ago. And I do mean amateur. My first foray into design was of the cut-and-paste nature. A co-worker’s son was having his 3^rd or 4^th birthday party and his mother found cute action figure plates, cups, and napkins for the party. We designed invitations, cut out the action figure from one of the plates, and taped it to the invitation and made copies on a black and white copy machine. Hey, this was the dark ages, but the invitations were still cute as a button and his son loved them, so that was what counted.

One thing led to another, and I started a cottage business called Celebrations, DTP (desktop publishing). I created logos, business cards, and letterheads for small businesses. Since the internet was unheard of (yes, there was such a time), I ordered font packages, clip art, and software to install on my computer. I also begged the local newspaper for all their old clipart books that they were going to throw away. HUGE books with tons of clip art that could be used in all manner of advertisements.

Okay, enough about that. Fast forward to today….

We’ve come a long way. Professional graphics designers wouldn’t be caught without the latest digital software, graphics, and fonts at their disposal. I’m not a professional, but I still need promotional pieces here and there, and usually too quickly to contact a professional designer. I don’t want to buy new software that has a huge learning curve when I’ll only use it half a dozen times a year. I want something easy, fun, and cheap!

So today isn’t about buying anything fancy. It’s just a few quick, easy examples that you can implement to promote your books, yourself, your brand, etc. I’m going to use the *free picture editing software called picMonkey to show you what you can do in a few minutes. You really can’t mess this up!

My interests lean toward cowboys, sepia-toned pictures, country, rural areas, horses, steeples, churches, rustic barns, cattle, etc. So we’re going to use a picture I took of my home church the other night. This particular picture was taken with my iPhone. I prefer my digital camera, but I worked with what I had at the moment. I took several shots at different angles, and at first glance, this one might not be the best choice to use, but it appealed to me. I could already visualize the type of design I wanted if the pictures turned out okay. See the Tahoe in the bottom left-hand corner of this picture?

Steeple In Shadow Original Photo - Taken with an iPhone at Dusk
White Plains Holiness Assembly
Pam Hillman 2013

After uploading my original picture Steeple in Shadow to picMonkey (just click “Edit a Photo” and follow the directions. It’s easy!), I started playing with it.

If you just want to add text, click on the “P”, pick a font and type your text. You can change fonts, sizes, colors. Just play with it until you're satisfied with the results. Obviously, since this picture was dark with a lot of shadow, I needed to use a contrasting white/cream-colored font.

Wait!! Stop the Monkey!! The sky is blue…ooohh, blue font… Be right back. I’m playing in picMonkey as I type this. What fun!!! And…more playing. Visually, this font needs to be right-adjusted because of the shape of the pink crepe myrtle bushes that are in shadow… Let’s see how this looks…

Steeple in Shadow - Blue Text Only Change

I haven’t done anything to the picture itself at this point. Just added the text, decided it needed to be pale blue, and right-adjusted. That’s it. Then I saved it. You could run with that. But let’s play just a bit more and see what we can come up with. I’d like to get rid of that Tahoe. lol

I could crop the picture, but I don’t want to. I like where the steeple is, just off center, so I’m not going to do that. Some kind of soft edging appeals to me for this pic. Let’s try that first...

Steeple in Shadow - Blue Text and Faded Edges. Nice!

Yep, that works! Simply select Dark Edges under the Effects tool BUT move to white (or a creamy color) on the color wheel. Again, with all these shadows, I don’t want to make it more dark. The Tahoe is almost completely gone. In some cases you can use the Clone tool to get rid of something, but in this case, I chose the soft edges option instead. Worked okay, and makes a nice enough meme.

One final picture of my Steeple In Shadow because I simply can’t resist, and the final result is exactly what I had in mind when I took this picture...

White Plains Holiness Assembly
In the Shadow of the Steeple

To achieve the meme above, I used Daguerreotype frame with Effects / Sunglow applied. Notice that since this version fits my personal style of old-fashioned photos with an antique flair, I’ve added my website in PicMonkey’s Bleeding Cowboys font. Small, understated, and unobtrusive.

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Here are some more before and after examples I’ve created with picMonkey. I wanted to show you these pictures side-by-side, but the blog feed is too narrow for that. 

ACFW is having a sale on all their conference CDs until the conference. So, I went into action. I grabbed my CDs, my pink iphone, pink earbuds, made a glass of raspberry tea and staged it all on my front porch. I took about 15 digital pictures, then uploaded them to my laptop. I jotted down 2-3 that I thought would be perfect to promote the sale. I needed a good sharp picture that showed the CD case, but also left room for text. I’ll try to point out all the options I used.

ACFW Original Photo
Taken mid-day with Kodak DX6490
Uh...My Front Porch

First, I decided where I wanted the text to be, placing it where it was visually the most appealing. I rotated the price just a bit clockwise. Then, thinking about the pink earbuds, I decided to use that to give some eye-popping color. Fun, flirty pink font at the bottom and at the top for the price. Next, I used the contrast and clarity tools to brighten the picture. I found the sunglasses in Overlays, made them pink and faded them out. The coup de grace was when I discovered the bright sunlight feature in Effects. I popped it over the top left-hand corner and added even more color with the yellow Summer Sale text. Use color and contrast to achieve the effect you want.

Final version of ACFW CD Sale Advertisement

I’m going to share a SECRET TIP with those of you who want something just a little more advanced. Sometimes you want a shadowed font, but oftentimes free software doesn’t give you that option. I haven’t found shadowed fonts in picMonkey, but you’ll see that I have some in the ACFW CD sale. The words “Summer Sale” and the “$89.95” have a dark gray shadow behind them. Here’s how I created that.

First add your text to your photo, formatting it as you would like it to appear.

Next, create a new text box and copy/paste the original font into the new text box. Make sure it’s the exact same size and shape as the original. The tool box will help you with this.

Reverse the font color so that it contrasts with the original, but also doesn’t blend into the background too much. If your reverse/shadow text box is in front of your primary color, right-click on your mouse, and select Send Backward.

And then shift your shadowed text box off-center just a little. Not much. You want the illusion of shadow, not something that jumps out at the viewer. That should give you a shadowed text. But don’t use shadows in long strings of text, only for emphasis and for contrast.

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I mentioned clarity earlier. 

Sharpen and clarity are your friends.

Just be aware of what happens when you use these features, so work to get the mix just right. In some cases, too much can be ...uh... too much. Check out this picture that I posted on July 4^th. I cropped out the date, of course. Used the Effects / Sharpen and Clarity tools to create eye-popping color.

Original Photo taken on perfectly windy
morning in June 2009
Hardy Manufacturing, Philadelphia, MS
Pam Hillman, Kodak DX6490

American Flag - God Bless America!

Can you see the difference?

You might have to click on the pictures to see. The white is brighter, the red deeper, and there is a slight glow all around the flag. This is a good example of what a difference sharpen and clarity can make. I ended up putting a basic picture “frame” around this.

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Sometimes it doesn’t take much to create a picMonkey masterpiece….

Black Angus Bull - iPhone
Broken Ended Farms
Pam Hillman

I took this shot with my iPhone while helping My Cowboy work cows. I was standing inches away, and the big guy was in the chute, so it wasn’t like he could get me. And he’s pretty gentle anyway...most of the time.

I used Daguerreotype / Shiro and the picture needed no other work. I popped my website in the spot at the top where that piece of treated lumber was, and the words “I’ve got My Eye on You, Cowboy!” along the side. Pink font just felt right for some reason. Again, contrast.

Black Angus Bull - Broken Ended Farms
Bull's Eye!

 426 people have viewed Bull's Eye

on my facebook author page!

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Final tips:

Make sure you RENAME your creation when you’re done. You don’t want to override your original picture, and then have nothing to work with if you goof up.

Take your own pictures, purchase them, or at least make sure they are in creative commons. Get creative with your own shots. If you can shoot it, do it, then you can add your own website or name without concern.

Make sure you use proper grammer, check your speling, and don’t leave word out. Nothing is more frustrating than seeing a meme on the internet with errors. No matter how cute or catchy, I will not share it.

Don’t just upload your masterpieces to facebook and Pinterest. Sometimes this is okay, but even better, upload them to your blog and then pin them to Pinterest from your webpage or blog. That way it’s linked back to you.

While picMonkey is a quick, free way to create a little buzz, once you edit your photo, then save it and close the picMonkey browser, you can’t go back and unedit your creation. If you discover at that point that you misspelled a word, or don’t like something you did, you’ll have to start over from scratch with your original picture. However, if you want to add something new to the picture you just edited and saved, you can upload it to picMonkey and make changes. I know that sounds confusing, but if you play with the software for any length of time, you’ll grasp what I mean.

*picMonkey has a free version, but there is also a $33 yearly paid membership that gives more options. Some of the tools that I've used in these pictures come with the paid membership. If you're unsure of how much you might use the site, then opt for the free version until you're sure.

Me? I knew I was going to enjoy it and signed up after about thirty minutes of playing. I hope you've enjoyed today's post as much as I enjoyed putting it together for you. Now, go out and have some fun with monkeys!

Pam Hillman