13 Steps to Effective Emails That Don't Suck Before you hit 'send,' check this list and make sure its a letter customers will want to open.

Three things that make an entrepreneur anxious: one, managing cash flow; two, finding the right partners/hiring the right team; and three, pressing the "send" button on an email campaign.

On the surface, email seems straightforward, not least because the people on your list have asked to receive your messages. (You are using an opt-in list, right? I hope so.) That's an advantage: You have the privilege of interacting with a person by invitation, in the relatively intimate setting of the recipient's inbox. All you need to do is create a compelling message, and boom—you're done.

But email is the Rube Goldberg machine of online marketing: There are multiple moving parts in what has become a complicated process. Get one wrong, and you might jam up the whole apparatus. Here's a checklist to follow to make sure your email machine performs flawlessly.