However you do it, make sure you offer them an easy way (usually down at the bottom) to opt out if they want out and honor that request ASAP.

The mindset you need to have is that you should think of e-mail marketing as a campaign. E-mail marketing is a networking marketing tool, so it’s not going to cut it to just show up in a customer’s inbox once. You need to do it multiple times. The problem is that if you start showing up multiple times you risk the recipient getting irritated and blocking your e-mails or relegating them to the spam bin.

So, think in terms of a campaign or newsletter series in which each and every e-mail offers the reader something new and different.

One way of doing this is to offer an autoresponder course, in which the recipient gets an e-mail a day for, say, 10 days. And each day’s e-mail contains a different tip or lesson that builds on the previous one. Where can you get these things written? Check out Elance.com or Google search “elance …”—they often offer these as a package.

Another thing you can do is e-mail newsletters. Newsletters are hard for people to resist reading when they are loaded with nice photos and are well laid-out. There are software programs you can use, along with templates, to make these e-mail newsletters. All you have to do is provide photos and text.

Again, any good copywriter and some Elance.com writers can provide copy for these newsletters.
Try to give your newsletters a theme, and number them, like “Issue #1,” and so on. And make sure the info in them is useful and not just silly filler. That way, your perceived value is higher.

A variation on this is the ezine (an electronic magazine), which also arrives through e-mail. With both ezines and newsletters, the trick is to drive them to your landing page. Thus, you’ll write your newsletters such that you give the reader a tidbit in the e-mail, and then to get the rest of the story they have to click on a link that takes them to the site.

So when you have a writer to write these things, ask for a clear distinction between what goes in the e-mail and what goes on the site.
As to length, try not to exceed 300-400 words or you’ll be testing people’s patience.