Now that you have followed the preliminary steps necessary, you are ready to create your first newsletter.
You finished the basic settings, (at least) one mailing list is available and you created yourself as subscriber.
Switch to the menu Campaign - Management -> Create new Campaign. You will see an overview of the mailing lists you are allowed to access. If you do not see a mailing list, you either do not have the privilege necessary or there is no mailing list in your system. Please contact your system administrator in this case.
The following overview will be displayed:
Fig. 3.6 - Create a newsletter (1)
Choose the mailing you want to send a newsletter to. Click the "Edit"-Symbol at the end of the line. The entry mask for your content will open:
Fig. 3.6.1 - Create a newsletter (Example input)
Campaign description
Please enter a short description for your newsletter. It will be used to display the newsletter in the administrator interface. If you want to create more than one newsletter for this mailing list in advance, you are able to differentiate between the newsletters with the help of this description.
Fixed text width
You can define the maximum line width for text newsletters here (relevant for 'text-only' only). The newsletter will be reformatted according to your definitions.
Subject
Enter the subject of your newsletter here. All placeholders/variables you defined in your database designer can be used.
Insert or edit text/HTML
Choice of newsletter type: Before create a newsletter, you have to decide whether you want to send it as text or HTML.
It is possible to send both formats to your subscriber at the same time. This kind of E-Mail is called “Multipart”.
Possible choices are:
- HTML
- HTML and text (Multipart)
- text only
In our example we create an HTML newsletter. After choosing this type you will see an HTML editor as a possibility for input.
You can create your newsletter using this editor, we will explain it's features later on. It is possible to drag and drop HTML newsletters from Outlook and Outlook Express into this editor and edit these.
Choose template
When creating newsletters you can choose between different templates as well. You can create or edit these templates yourself. All these templates are managed in “Campaign Management -> Campaign Templates” menu selection. To edit a particular template, click the 
in the HTML editor. This will open a separate window, which will show you all the templates that you may work on.
You will see a preview if you click on the (
). You can open the template directly by clicking on the -Button. This will open the template in your HTML editor; it may then be used for the newsletter.
Personalization and Variables
As seen in the Figure this newsletter already contains replaceable characters for personalization. Every variable you defined in your database designer may be used here. Clicking on "variables" will open the following “Select” box:
Abb. 3.6.2 - Newsletter schreiben (Beispieleingaben)
Segmentation/number of segments
To send different contents to different subscribers of the campaign, you may replace parts of your newsletter by $$SEGMENTCONTENT-1$$ and define a content for these segments. The number of segments is not restricted by BACKCLICK. The entry mask can be found in the menu “Campaign-Management -> Segment Content”.
Abb. 3.6.2.1 - Segment-Content festlegen
You also must choose the number of segments into which your newsletter should be divided. For example: You want to send a newsletter to 100,000 subscribers, and choose “5” segments in your settings. BACKCLICK will now divide your subscriber list into five blocks, with 20,000 subscribers per block. You may now define a different content for each block. The following segments are selectable:
Priority
This is where you may choose the priority of your newsletter, which should be shown in the e-mail client of your subscriber. The following options are selectable:
Inline-Images
When writing an HTML newsletter, you may use this function to send pictures or figures within the body of your newsletter. The advantage here is that pictures may make it more likely that the subscriber will print out the newsletter and read it off line. The disadvantage is that your newsletter will grow in volume, so that the subscriber has to wait much longer for the e-mail client to download the newsletter. Also, the subscriber’s e-mail server may filter out your e-mails due to spam suspicion. As a result, you should only activate this function if you can somehow exclude these disadvantages.
Speed limit
Here you may set a speed limit for sending your newsletters. This will reduce the number of newsletters that BACKCLICK will send out every hour after sending has begun. If you do not want to reduce the number of newsletters sent per hour, BACKCLICK will try to use the maximum rate for sending. The following options may be selected:
Attachments
Here you may add as many attachments to your newsletter as you like. Mark the desired attachment listed in the box that says “Available attachments”, and click on the 
-Button. The chosen attachments are now shown in the box on the right, labeled “Attachments”. If there are no selectable attachments in the box, you may complete the settings for this newsletter, and provide BACKCLICK with the necessary data afterwards (see “Attachments & Images”).
Abb. 3.6.3 - Newsletter schreiben (Beispieleingaben)
Activate eRobinson-handling
You may activate this function to exclude particular subscribers from a newsletter mailing. Possible reasons to exclude these subscribers may be:
- E-mail addresses from an external database
- E-mail addresses that do not fit into target groups because of special criteria
- E-mail addresses that responded to special selections
- E-mail addresses of another mailing list in BACKCLICK
Activating this function will open eight selection boxes. To exclude the subscribers, select the entries in the left box, and confirm them by clicking on the -Button(now shown in the right box).
Abb. 3.6.4 - Newsletter schreiben (Beispieleingaben)
Charset/Language
You will need to select the charset/language that should be used to correctly display the letters of the newsletter in the e-mail client of the subscriber.
Status
After you have set all the information and contents of your newsletter, you may choose between two workflow statuses. If the status is set on “Draft,” no one can initiate sending the newsletter. If the status is set on “Ready for publishing,” you will find this newsletter in the “Campaign Overview”
Anyone who is authorized to access this newsletter may start sending it immediately, or define a date when it is to be sent. When all the necessary settings are complete, you may click on "save" to save your settings and contents. The newsletter will then be shown in either “Edit Existing Campaign” or “Publish Campaign.”