To get started with email marketing, decide what useful, relevant messages you can consistently send, invite people to subscribe with a clear explanation of what they will receive, and keep a record of their permission. Then choose an email marketing service, organize subscribers, send a recognizable first campaign with an easy unsubscribe option, and maintain the list over time.
1. Decide what subscribers will get
Before signing up for a service, define the audience you want to reach and the reason they would welcome your emails. A small business might send product news, practical advice, or occasional offers; a creator might share new work or subscriber-only updates. Be specific enough that a person can judge whether the emails are relevant to them.
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Set expectations you can keep. Tell subscribers what kinds of messages you plan to send and promise only a cadence your business can sustain. There is no universally established best sending frequency in the sources cited here; choose a realistic schedule and communicate it accurately.
2. Choose an email marketing service
An email marketing service, also called an email service provider, helps you collect signups, organize contacts, create campaigns, and manage unsubscribes. Compare services against the work you actually need to do rather than relying on an unsupported “best provider” ranking.
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- Signup forms: Can you create a form that explains the subscription clearly?
- Permission records: Can you retain useful information about when and how a person signed up?
- Audience organization: Does the service support tags or segments for relevant groups?
- Campaign tools: Can you create and preview emails and manage sender details and unsubscribe links?
- Reporting and integrations: Do the reporting and connections to your existing tools meet your needs?
- Practical fit: Check current pricing for your expected audience size, deliverability controls, and whether you can export your contacts.
Features, prices, and terms vary by provider and can change. Review the provider’s current documentation and policies before importing contacts or choosing a plan.
3. Collect permission transparently
Use a signup form that identifies who is collecting the address and describes the marketing the person will receive. Permission should be clear rather than inferred from a purchase, a business relationship, or access to an address. Mailchimp describes permission as express, verifiable consent; its example of a clear signup is a separate marketing checkbox. That is Mailchimp’s guidance and policy context, not a substitute for checking the rules that apply where you operate.
Keep a record of signups, including the information your service makes available about the signup and consent. Do not use purchased, scraped, or third-party lists as a shortcut: Mailchimp’s audience rules prohibit third-party lists. That is a provider-specific restriction, and other services may set their own requirements.
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4. Choose single or double opt-in
Opt-in describes what happens after someone submits a signup form. In a single opt-in flow, the person is added after submitting the form. In a double opt-in flow, the person must also confirm through an email. Mailchimp says that the confirmation step can help reduce spam signups and verify that an address is valid.
| Signup flow | What happens | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Single opt-in | The person is added after submitting the form. | Fewer steps can make signup quicker, but there is no email confirmation step to check the address. |
| Double opt-in | The person receives a confirmation email and must take an additional step. | The extra step can help filter fake or mistyped signups and confirm interest, but some people may not complete it. |
Choose based on your signup goals, audience, service rules, and applicable law. Neither flow should be presented as universally legally required or sufficient: legal requirements vary by country, and the Mailchimp opt-in guidance notes that variation.
5. Set up an audience you can manage
In your service, create the contact audience that will receive campaigns. Mailchimp recommends starting with one primary audience and using tags or segments to organize it. For example, a tag could identify people interested in a particular topic, while a segment could group contacts who meet criteria you choose. This is Mailchimp’s organizational recommendation, not a universal requirement for every provider.
Avoid making multiple overlapping audiences without a real organizational need. Duplicate records can make management harder and may complicate understanding which messages a person should receive. Use the provider’s available audience fields and signup-form settings to capture only the information that will help you send relevant messages.
6. Prepare and send your first campaign
A first campaign does not need to be elaborate. It should make clear who is writing, why the recipient is receiving the message, and what useful information or offer it contains. Use a recognizable sender identity, an accurate subject line, and content that matches the promise made on the signup form.
- Sender details: Use accurate sender and routing information so recipients can recognize the business or creator.
- Subject: Describe the message honestly; do not use a deceptive subject line.
- Message: Keep it relevant to the audience and consistent with the signup promise.
- Postal address and opt-out: Include the address and unsubscribe mechanism required for your jurisdiction and service, and make the route to leave clear.
- Final check: Preview the message and confirm that links, sender details, and the unsubscribe route work before sending.
For U.S. commercial email, the Federal Trade Commission’s CAN-SPAM guidance calls for accurate header information and subject lines, a valid physical postal address, and a clear opt-out mechanism. The opt-out must remain available for 30 days after the email is sent, and the sender must honor opt-out requests within 10 business days. The FTC states that CAN-SPAM covers commercial messages whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a product or service, including business-to-business messages.
The FTC guide, as accessed in 2026, states that penalties can reach $53,088 per separate email in violation. This is a maximum penalty figure in that guide, not a routine fine or marketing statistic; penalty amounts can change. Check the FTC’s current guidance before relying on the amount.
These are U.S. federal guidance points, not a global compliance checklist or legal advice for every jurisdiction. Requirements elsewhere vary. If you send to people in the EU, UK, Canada, or another market, check current regulator guidance for that jurisdiction. Hiring a service or vendor to send campaigns does not remove the sender’s responsibility under the FTC guidance: the FTC says a business cannot contract away its legal responsibility for compliance.
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Review list health as you continue: pay attention to bounces, complaints, unsubscribes, and contacts who have stopped engaging. Respect each person’s preferences and keep the list current. Mailchimp advises setting clear expectations, maintaining the audience, and providing an unsubscribe route; it also recommends re-engaging inactive contacts and unsubscribing people who do not respond.
If an audience has been inactive for a long time, some people may not remember signing up. A carefully worded re-engagement message can ask whether they still want to hear from you. Remove or unsubscribe people who do not renew their interest rather than continuing to send messages they no longer expect.
Sources and scope
The U.S. compliance points above are from the Federal Trade Commission’s CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business. Setup and list-management explanations draw on Mailchimp’s published guidance: About Compliance for Email Marketing, The Importance of Permission, Create a Mailchimp Audience, Single Opt-in vs. Double Opt-in, and Requirements and Best Practices for Audiences. Mailchimp’s recommendations and service policies are identified as such where relevant; they should not be treated as law that applies to every service or country.
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