Newsletters and a rebuilt header for a German stage artist

The client is a German stage artist who announces her shows to fans, organisers and press by newsletter. Her site runs on WordPress, with a theme from an earlier developer and the Newsletter plugin. The work came to me through a German web agency in 2026.

It began in June with one question about the platform, newsletter templates and a rebuilt header. In September it came back with her autumn issue, built on the June template.

Projects

1. 2026

   Newsletter platform advice, reusable templates and a responsive header

   I assessed a move to a new mailing service, built two newsletter templates and rebuilt the header for phones and mid widths.

   First I looked at what she had: confirmed subscribers in three groups, double opt-in, past issues and a drag-and-drop editor. I recommended staying on the plugin, and noted its limit of about 100 emails an hour. In the plugin I built two responsive templates, a full event issue and a single promo, with real events in them. I also recorded a short video guide.

   The old header was built on floats. I rebuilt it with flexbox and fluid type on the dev site and checked it on phone, tablet and desktop. Before deploying I compared it with the live stylesheet and put only additions live, so subscribers and send history were not touched. The new header is live, and the June template became the base of her next issue.

   Stack: WordPress, Newsletter plugin, PHP, CSS

2. 2026

   Event newsletter production in WordPress

   Her autumn show announcement was a print flyer. I turned it into a newsletter built on the site, since the Newsletter plugin cannot import an issue.

   I cut the banners from the flyer and set every programme and date word for word, with links to each date and to tickets, checked against the site’s events. I compared a local copy of the site with the live one page by page, and every test went to a local mailbox first. The issue moved to the live site with a one-off script behind a secret key. Then I deleted the script and checked it was gone.

   Before sending I looked at the audience. Since 2021 every issue had gone to one list, while the site held four confirmed lists. The client chose to send to all of them.

   In the editor, about half the blocks still held June’s text in a hidden layer. So I wrote Python scripts that edit both the visible text and that hidden layer through the plugin’s own forms, and read every change back. I checked every link in a real test send and timed the start for a Saturday morning, at the plugin’s 100 mails an hour.

   Over 26 and 27 September every mail went out with no errors.

   Stack: WordPress, Newsletter plugin, Python, PHP