Newspack’s newsletter ad management tool offers an ad-server supplement for newsletters. You can quickly use the tool to create, preview, and track newsletter ads.

Managing Advertisers

Navigate to Newsletters > Advertising > Advertisers to manage your advertisers. The list shows each advertiser’s Name, Description, Slug, and Count (number of ads assigned to them).

Select Add new advertiser to create a new one, or click an existing advertiser’s name to edit it. Both open an inline modal with the following fields:

  • Name (required)
  • Description — Optional, for internal reference.
  • Slug — Leave blank to auto-generate from the name.
  • Parent advertiser — Optional. Useful if you want to group advertisers hierarchically (e.g., a parent brand with sub-brands).

Creating a Newsletter Ad

  1. Navigate to Newsletters > Advertising and select Add new newsletter ad.
  2. Give your ad a descriptive title. The ad title will not be displayed in the newsletter.
  3. Newsletter ads use the block editor, with the same blocks available as the newsletters. Image blocks are typically the standard for newsletter ads, linked to the advertiser, but a variety of blocks are available for use. Simple text is often quite popular for advertising in newsletters.
  4. Complete the “Ad settings” fields in the right sidebar.
    • Price: It’s a good practice to record the value of the ad sale for easy recordkeeping and historical reference when approaching that advertiser for a new campaign. The field is free-form, so the input can be the total value, CPM, CPD — whatever you prefer.
    • Insertion Strategy: This will be used to determine whether the ad can be automatically inserted or not (explained below). Choose between percentage (e.g., at the 50 percent point), block count (e.g., after the second block) of the newsletter, or placement for insertion via block.
    • Custom Start Date and Expiration Date: Optional. If this ad campaign has an absolute beginning and/or end for when it should appear in newsletters, toggle on these settings and set the start and/or end date. If you want the ad to always be available for use, leave the date settings toggled off.
    • Categories: If you have category-specific newsletters, you can limit a Newsletter ad to one or more categories by assigning categories to the ad. If an ad has no categories, it’s treated as run of site and can appear in any newsletter, regardless of the newsletter’s category.
      Example: A newsletter set to Arts will show ads categorized as Arts, plus any ads with no category (run of site).
    • Advertisers: After you add advertisers under Newsletters > Advertising > Advertisers, you can select an advertiser when setting up an ad. Setting an advertiser has two benefits:
      • The advertiser’s name appears in the ads list, so you can filter by advertiser.
      • If you select an advertiser on a newsletter, automatic insertion will only insert ads from that advertiser (useful for fully sponsored newsletters). If no advertisers are selected, automatic insertion includes ads from any advertiser.
  5. Publish your ad. Once published, ads will automatically appear in your newsletters, positioned according to the insertion strategy setting. You can also turn them off on each newsletter individually, under the newsletter’s Ads Settings. There, you can toggle off “Enable automatic insertion of ads.”

Managing Newsletter Ads

Navigate to Newsletters > Advertising to see all your ads in a filterable, sortable table. Visible columns include: Title, Status, Advertiser, Ad placement, Start date, Expiry date, Impressions, Clicks, and Price. You can filter the list by Status, Advertiser, and Ad placement.

Ads can have the following statuses:

  • Active — Published and currently within its date range (or with no date restrictions).
  • Scheduled — Published but with a start date in the future.
  • Expired — Published but past its expiration date.
  • Draft — Not yet published.
  • Trash — Moved to trash.

To quickly update an ad’s Advertiser, Ad placement, Categories, Start date, Expiry date, or Price without opening the full editor, select the ad row to open the Quick Edit panel on the right. Insertion strategy and position can only be changed in the full editor.

Ad Insertion Options

Two options are available for rendering ads in your newsletters.

Automatic insertion

Automatic insertion is controlled by each ad’s Insertion Strategy.

  • Ads set to Block Count or Percentage are automatically inserted into the newsletter.
  • Ads set to Placement are not automatically inserted. They’re intended for manual placement using the Newsletter Ad block. In other words, Placement ads only appear if you add a Newsletter Ad block.

Manual insertion

You can manually place ads within newsletters using the Newsletter Ad block. Manually placing a Newsletter Ad block in a newsletter turns off auto-placement. You can then either select which specific ad you want to appear in that block, use placements configurable when editing the newsletter ad, or let Newspack select ads on the basis of the most prioritized injection strategy of all existing and eligible newsletter ads.

Previewing Ads in Newsletters

To preview how ads look in your newsletter and see where exactly your automatic placement ads are falling while editing your draft newsletter, save your draft and select the “Preview email” button in the block editor.

Newsletter Ad Tracking

Within the Newsletter Ads list, you’ll see lifetime impressions and clicks for each ad as sortable columns. This is sometimes helpful to view the most successful campaigns.

Ad impressions and clicks are tracked through the same tracking pixel mechanism as the newsletters themselves. Note: Impressions are recorded as measurable impressions, not viewable impressions.

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Newsletter Ad Management