Our email marketing process, week by week.

Most guides to the email marketing process give the textbook version: set goals, build a list, write, send, measure. That is accurate, but it skips what keeps a program running, like who checks the unsubscribe link or what happens when an approval is late. Below is the working version we use for every client at EmailMarketingAgency.com: how an email marketing agency works inside your account, week by week, and the checks each email clears before it reaches a US inbox. For the wider list of jobs an agency can take on, read what an email marketing agency does.

What are the seven steps in our email marketing process?

1. Audit. We review list health, domain records and recent campaigns. This happens once, in week 1.
2. Calendar. We plan 8 campaigns for the month, roughly two a week, and you approve the plan.
3. Drafts. We write the copy, design each email and build it in your platform.
4. Approvals. You approve or comment, with up to 2 revision rounds per email.
5. QA. We test links, rendering, personalization, segments and spam score.
6. Send. We schedule each campaign for your customers' time zones and watch delivery afterward.
7. Report. You get one plain English report a month, with results and the next test.

Steps 2 through 7 repeat every month. The sections below show who owns each one and when.

How does an email marketing agency work with your team?

We do the work, you make the decisions. Here is each recurring task, who owns it and what it asks of you. The campaign types we plan are covered on our email campaign management page.

What happens in the first 30 days?

Month one does two jobs: it fixes anything that would hurt delivery, and it gets your first campaigns moving. The timing below is typical and moves faster when access and approvals come back quickly.

Week 1: access and the audit

You invite us as a user, so the account, the list and the templates stay in your name. Then we audit what is already there:

• Sending domain records. Are SPF, DKIM and DMARC published, and do they align with your From address?
• Spam complaint rate. Google tells senders to stay below 0.3% in Postmaster Tools and recommends keeping it under 0.10%.
• List hygiene. Hard bounces, contacts who have not engaged in a long time, and how people joined the list in the first place.
• Recent campaigns. What earned clicks, what was ignored, and which segments never hear from you.
• Footers. A physical postal address and a working unsubscribe link, both required under the CAN-SPAM Act.

If a record is missing, we tell you exactly what to add and where. Our email deliverability service explains the ongoing monitoring.

Week 2: the first campaign calendar

We plan 8 campaigns for the month ahead. Each line on the calendar names the goal, the segment, the send date, the offer and a subject line direction. Your launches and sales go on first, then we fill the gaps with dates your customers already care about, using the US holidays and shopping days in our 2027 email marketing calendar. You approve the calendar before we write a single draft. While you review the calendar, we set up a master template in your platform from your logo, colors and fonts, with your header, footer and content modules, so week three drafts are built on it.

Week 3: drafts and revisions

Drafts arrive in batches, built in your own platform, so you review the real email rather than a static mockup. Each email includes 2 revision rounds. Feedback can be as short as "softer discount wording," and we handle the rest.

Week 4: QA, scheduling and the first sends

Approved emails go through the QA checklist below, then get scheduled for the time zones where your customers live. By day 30, your first campaigns are live or scheduled, and next month's calendar is waiting for your approval.

What does the monthly email marketing workflow look like?

From month two on, the cycle repeats on a fixed rhythm, so you always know when we need a decision from you.

A note on the word workflow: inside many email platforms, it means an automation, a sequence that sends on its own when someone signs up, buys or leaves a cart. The workflow on this page is the campaign calendar we run by hand each month. Automated flows such as a welcome series are not part of the plan and can be quoted separately.

What gets checked before every email is sent?

Nothing is scheduled until it passes every item.

• Every link opens the right page and carries tracking tags.
• Images load and have alt text, and the key message is live text, not part of an image.
• The layout holds up in Gmail, Apple Mail and Outlook, on phone and desktop, in light and dark mode.
• Personalization has a fallback, so no subscriber ever sees a blank where a first name should be.
• The right segment is selected and suppression lists are applied.
• Subject line and preheader read well together, and any A/B test is split correctly.
• The spam score is checked before scheduling.
• The footer shows your physical postal address and a clear way to opt out. According to the FTC, opt out requests must be honored within 10 business days, and CAN-SPAM makes no exception for business to business email.
• One click unsubscribe works. Google requires it for marketing mail from senders who send more than 5,000 messages a day to Gmail accounts, and Yahoo asks bulk senders to honor unsubscribes within 2 days.
• The send time matches your customers' time zones.

For the full rules behind these checks, read our CAN-SPAM compliance checklist and the email deliverability checklist.

What do we need from you to start?

• A user invite to your email platform. We work inside Klaviyo, Mailchimp, HubSpot, ActiveCampaign, Brevo, Constant Contact and Shopify Email.
• Brand basics: logo, colors, fonts, product or location photos, and any words you never want in your emails.
• A 60 day heads up on launches, sales, events and stock changes.
• One approver. A single decision maker keeps feedback from contradicting itself.
• Offer limits, such as the deepest discount you are willing to run.

The most common delay is a late approval. Because nothing is sent without your sign off, a missed approval means the send date moves. It never means an unchecked email goes out.

What does the process look like on a real campaign?

ExpenseTracker is a WhatsApp app that logs spending to Google Sheets. While planning the calendar, we noticed November 1 landing on a Sunday, the same day the app sends its weekly summary. That became "New Month, Clean Ledger," an activation campaign that tied a fresh month to a fresh weekly report. The idea came out of the calendar step, not a template.

For Whapi, a Shopify app for WhatsApp automation, the calendar placed "Black Friday Prep" well ahead of the holiday, because Meta has to approve WhatsApp message templates before merchants can use them. For Moab RV Park, the seasonal "Red Rock Days" email opened with the park sitting 15 minutes from Arches. See the briefs behind more campaigns on our work page.

What is in the monthly report?

One short report in plain English: what was sent and to whom, what was delivered, what got clicked, and what drove sales where your platform tracks revenue. It also lists unsubscribes and complaints, plus the test we plan to run next. We weigh clicks more heavily than opens. Apple says Mail Privacy Protection downloads remote content in the background whether or not a reader engages with the email, so open counts from Apple Mail users are unreliable. Our guide to email marketing metrics explains every number in the report.

All of this sits inside one flat plan: 8 campaigns a month for $1,000, month to month. See what the $1,000 plan includes, or request a free email audit and we will send back a sample calendar built for your business.

Frequently asked questions