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Monthly Newsletter Campaign

TL;DR: Stay top of mind with your book of business by sending a monthly PDF newsletter as a physical letter - every month.

Ready to put this play to work?

Who it's for​

Insurance agents, financial advisors, and real estate agents who want to consistently stay in front of their book of business with a genuine, personalized touch - not a generic email blast.

The play​

Every month, send a 1-page branded letter to your entire client list. Design your newsletter in Canva or any PDF tool, upload it in Send Mail, and thanks.io prints, addresses, envelopes, and mails it. No AI message or cover letter is added - your PDF is the complete letter.

Expected signals​

  • 1-2% call-back rate per send on a warm client book is typical and meaningful
  • After 3-6 months, clients start mentioning the letters - the consistency builds genuine presence
  • Works well as a renewal-timing anchor (send a newsletter 6 weeks before typical renewal dates)

Step-by-step​

1. Set up your client list​

Upload your current book of business as a CSV. Required: First Name, Last Name, Address, City, State, Zip. Optional but valuable: %CITY% as a custom field for hyper-local copy.

Save as a mailing list (e.g., "Monthly Newsletter").

2. Design and send your PDF newsletter​

  • Design your newsletter in Canva or your preferred tool at 8.5×11
  • Export as PDF
  • Click Send Mail in the sidebar and choose a windowless (or windowed) letter.
  • On the next screen ("How Would You Like To Send Your Letter?"), choose Upload Full PDF - not "Handwritten Cover Letter". Your uploaded PDF becomes the entire letter with no cover page.
  • Upload your PDF, add your client list, and place the order.
  • Your PDF is the complete letter - no front design or handwritten message is added on top of it.
  • See Send a PDF Letter for the full walkthrough.

3. Update your PDF each month​

Each month, design a new newsletter with current content, export it as a PDF, and upload it when placing your next Send Mail order.

Pitfalls​

  • Generic content. Insert real local context - a real town event, actual market data, something specific. Generic newsletters become wallpaper.
  • Not updating the PDF monthly. Sending identical content every month will start getting ignored. Rotate the content.
  • No call to action. Always end with how to reach you. Phone number, scan, or website.

Run this play​

  1. Upload your client list
  2. Send as a PDF letter via Send Mail

Real estate: AI-generated newsletter (no PDF required)​

If you're a real estate agent and want to skip designing a PDF every month, you can use thanks.io's AI message generation to write a fresh newsletter each time. Set a campaign to resend monthly, and the AI writes a new letter each time it fires - no PDF needed.

note

The videos on this page were recorded on an earlier layout of the dashboard, so some screens and names may differ from what you see today.

The prompt​

Paste this into the message editor on your letter creative's Message step (see Creating a creative), then add a campaign action that mails it Every month. The prompt runs again each time the action mails, so each letter is unique:

chatgpt: write me a monthly newsletter less than 300 words that starts with hi %FIRST_NAME% and include 1 fun fact that differs each month and include 1 home owning tip, 1 local event of the month, and 1 market update based on %CITY% using %CURRENT_DAY% + 10 days as reference so it's referencing the month that the letter gets delivered in. Remove subject line. Make sure the current month is used based on %CURRENT_DAY% + 10 days. Sign it %YOUR_FULL_NAME% %YOUR_PHONE%

The %CITY% and %CURRENT_DAY% replacement variables pull in each recipient's city and the current send date automatically, so the content stays locally relevant and timed to when the letter actually arrives.

There is also a %CURRENT_MONTH% variable that inserts the month name directly, but it uses the month the letter is generated in. A letter generated near the end of a month arrives in the next one, which is why this prompt works from %CURRENT_DAY% plus 10 days instead.