You want a newsletter that goes out every week or every month, but you don't have time to write each issue. Newsletter Autopilot writes them for you: on your schedule it takes a fresh idea from your brand's own content, writes the issue into your email template and turns it into an ordinary campaign. By default each issue waits for your approval before it is sent.
What you need first
- A verified sending domain and a sender address on it. Autopilot only offers addresses on a domain that is verified and not paused. See Verify your sending domain (SPF and DKIM).
- An email template with a Content area. The template is the frame every issue is written into. Templates without a Content area are not offered. See Email templates — save and reuse.
- Content to write from. Each issue starts from one idea taken from the brand's content: knowledge base, docs, products, website pages, blog sitemaps and feeds. You tick which of these each autopilot may use. See Choose what your autopilots write from.
- The Newsletter Autopilot add-on. It is included in the Growth plan; on other plans it is a $15-a-month add-on. Issues are written with AI, so your account also needs AI credits (a subscription or a wallet balance).
You'll find it under Marketing → Newsletter → Autopilot. The account owner always sees it; other teammates need the Newsletter Autopilot permission.
1. Start: brand and name
Click New autopilot. The Set up Newsletter Autopilot window opens and walks you through five steps.
- Brand — the brand this autopilot writes for. It can't be changed later. A brand can have up to 10 autopilots.
- Name — shown on the campaigns it creates, for example Weekly product news. Each campaign is named after the autopilot plus the date.
Underneath, Yaplet checks how much content the brand has to write from. If it says Nothing to write from yet, click Open Content sources and add some first. Otherwise click Start.
2. Choose when issues go out
The step asks When should issues go out? Pick one:
- Weekly — on the weekdays you pick (Tuesday by default). Pick all seven for a daily newsletter.
- Every 2 weeks — the same weekdays, every second week, counted from the day you turn the autopilot on.
- Monthly — on one day of the month (the 1st by default). 31 means the last day of the month.
- After the previous one — a set number of days (7 by default) after the previous issue has finished sending.
Then set the Send time (09:00 by default) and the Timezone (your browser's by default). Written ahead of the send by decides how early each issue is written: 1 day by default, anything from 1 hour to 3 days. While approval is on, this is how long you have to read the draft before it is due to go out. Click Continue.
3. Set up the campaign each issue becomes
Every issue becomes an ordinary campaign, so these settings will look familiar:
- Sender address — only addresses on a verified domain are listed. Sender name is filled in with the brand's name; change it if you like.
- Template — the frame each issue is written into.
- Audience — All active contacts (the default), or the Segments or Groups you pick. The line underneath shows how many contacts that is right now.
- Send priority (Normal by default) and Daily send limit (drip) (off by default) work the same way as for any campaign — see Schedule a campaign for later.
4. Choose what it writes from and how
- What may it write from? — tick the sources this autopilot may take ideas from. Nothing is ticked by default, and you need at least one before you can turn it on or generate a sample.
- About the readers — who gets this newsletter and what they care about.
- Standing instructions — rules for every issue: tone, things to always or never mention, a closing line.
- Language — The brand's language by default, or pick another one.
- Length — Short, Medium, Long, or Varied (the default), which alternates between short, medium and long issues.
- Generate images — on by default, with 1 image per issue (up to 3). You can choose the Image model (each one shows its price per image) and describe an Image style, for example "flat illustration, warm colors". Turn it off for text-only issues.
- Text model — leave it on Default unless you have a reason to change it.
Click Review.
5. Review and decide on approval
The Review step sums up the plan: the schedule, when each issue is written, the audience and its size, about how many issues a month, the cost per issue and how many content sources are ticked. On the free plan it also shows how many credits sending each issue costs. If a daily send limit would make one issue take longer to send than the gap between two issues, you get a warning here. It is only a warning.
Require my approval is on by default, and we recommend leaving it on at first. Each issue then waits as a draft until someone approves it, so nothing reaches your subscribers on its own. Once you trust the results you can turn it off: issues are then scheduled as soon as they are written and go out without anyone reading them first. Yaplet asks you to confirm that.
Generate a sample first
Not sure yet? Click Generate a sample. Yaplet saves the autopilot turned off and writes one real draft campaign. It takes about a minute (a bit more with images) and is billed like any issue, but a sample is never sent. When it's ready you see its subject line and three buttons:
- Open the draft — read the sample in the campaign editor.
- Turn on Autopilot — you're happy, start the schedule.
- Keep it off for now — close the window; the autopilot stays saved and off.
Turn it on
Click Turn on Autopilot, either on the Review step or after a sample. The first issue is written before its first send time, and you get a notification when it's ready. If you'd rather wait, Save, keep it off saves everything without writing anything; you can turn it on later from the autopilot's page.
Change the settings later
Every autopilot has its own page: go to Marketing → Newsletter → Autopilot and open it from the list. At the top you switch it On or Off. Below, five numbered cards hold the settings from the wizard: Schedule, Content, Images, Sending and Approval. Change what you need and click Save. Changes apply to issues written from now on; a draft that is already waiting keeps what it was written with. The brand can't be changed.
What the autopilot may write from is not ticked on this page. The ticks live on the brand's Content sources page, and the Open content sources button in the Content card takes you there with this autopilot already selected.
The page also has a Generate a sample button, which uses the saved settings, and the Issue history: every issue the autopilot has planned, written or sent, with its open and click numbers once it's out.
What's next
When the first draft is ready, see Approve or regenerate an autopilot issue.