How to Build and Grow a Newsletter as a Business Model

[Cameraman]

View attachment 5094656 days in.

I think Sparkloop knows exactly what it’s doing. Creators understand that they can get subscribers for pennies on the dollar and that’s why they use it.

Personally I do not want any kind of subscriber just for the sake of numbers.

I didn’t want to start a newsletter. It kind of fell into my lap. I decided to stop aiming for the fastlane and thought it’s time for law school. Did what anybody would do: created a Linkedin account to follow in other people’s footsteps.

Turns out lots of lawyers like complicated words and cannot explain things to mere mortals.

So I pulled up Google translator, translated and posted a couple posts. I woke up the next day with 1 million impressions.

People wanted to download the post as a file (lead magnet?!)

At first I thought about uploading it online and sharing the link. Then it hit me:

This is temporary. I do not own any of this traffic. If LinkedIn decides to ban me tomorrow, all I’ll have is a nice story. These people have similar interests to me, so I’d like to stay in touch via email. I can always share files there.

Did that.

Almost 1000 downloads on the first day. Since then I started posted more regularly and yesterday I hit 10k followers on Linkedin and 5k email subscribers.

I’m not making any plans, I’m just letting it flow. I’m tired of planning for months and doing nothing. I’m still using the subdomain provided by beehiiv.

That's a pretty stellar result.
Nice one.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

View attachment 5094656 days in.

I think Sparkloop knows exactly what it’s doing. Creators understand that they can get subscribers for pennies on the dollar and that’s why they use it.

Personally I do not want any kind of subscriber just for the sake of numbers.

I didn’t want to start a newsletter. It kind of fell into my lap. I decided to stop aiming for the fastlane and thought it’s time for law school. Did what anybody would do: created a Linkedin account to follow in other people’s footsteps.

Turns out lots of lawyers like complicated words and cannot explain things to mere mortals.

So I pulled up Google translator, translated and posted a couple posts. I woke up the next day with 1 million impressions.

People wanted to download the post as a file (lead magnet?!)

At first I thought about uploading it online and sharing the link. Then it hit me:

This is temporary. I do not own any of this traffic. If LinkedIn decides to ban me tomorrow, all I’ll have is a nice story. These people have similar interests to me, so I’d like to stay in touch via email. I can always share files there.

Did that.

Almost 1000 downloads on the first day. Since then I started posted more regularly and yesterday I hit 10k followers on Linkedin and 5k email subscribers.

I’m not making any plans, I’m just letting it flow. I’m tired of planning for months and doing nothing. I’m still using the subdomain provided by beehiiv.

Great example of letting the market drive your actions.

The market is speaking...

Spiritually speaking from a Michael Singer POV, you can view it as a form of serendipitous surrender.

Good luck, hope to hear some great updates on this moving forward!

 

[Akaushra]

I noticed there’s a lack of newsletters in the formula one area, but I’m not sure how to monetize because I don’t know who’d sponsor/advertise on there and I don’t think people would pay… besides it would be really hard to fit in with school. Any advice?

 

[woken]

I noticed there’s a lack of newsletters in the formula one area, but I’m not sure how to monetize because I don’t know who’d sponsor/advertise on there and I don’t think people would pay… besides it would be really hard to fit in with school. Any advice?

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

Anyone use Substack? Comments?

 

[Akaushra]

View attachment 51121

well F*ck, I also realized Motorsport.com has a less obvious website and everyone with the free subscription to f1.com gets emails too if they allow...

 

[socaldude]

Anyone use Substack? Comments?

I use it as a reader. I did notice a lot of those I follow and subscribe to moved away from Patreon. Patreon is like PayPal. LOL

 

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[Andy Black]

Anyone use Substack? Comments?

I tested Substack years ago. It's nice to get started with and I liked the UI.

I didn’t like their fee being a flat % of your membership fee for a paid newsletter. At the start it's not much but as you scale it would make you think about migrating. But if you've no plans to run a paid newsletter then I think it's free forever?

I don't think it had automations other than a welcome email. If that's still the case then I think that's an issue.

Oh, and I was surprised at how little thought they'd put into helping their newsletters grow. It's like they want you to bring your audience to Substack.

Again, this was my experience years ago.

I also played with GetRevue (didn't like the interface on a mobile) and Beehiiv. I've heard good things about Beehiiv but didn't play with it enough.

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I tested Substack years ago

I asked because one of the newsletters I subscribe to posted this:



They recently went over 100k subs.

 

[MTF]

I've heard good things about Beehiiv but didn't play with it enough.

I'm testing it now. I'm using it both for a new project as well as will move my author newsletter there from AWeber.

The move by itself will save me about $3,000 a year plus I want to monetize through their boosts (recommending other newsletters).

Their calculator says I could make around $40k a year just through the boosts. Even if it's extra $10k, that will be a new income stream with zero work.

As for the new project, the built-in discovery tools are what makes it so interesting. I'll be testing them all and will report once I have some data. They're growing like crazy and many big players are using them so there must be a reason why.

 

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[Andy Black]

I asked because one of the newsletters I subscribe to posted this:

View attachment 51849

They recently went over 100k subs.

How is Substack bringing them more subscribers?

When I was looking at Substack (albeit a few years ago) I was struck by how little thought the platform appeared to have put into growing newsletters.

Is The Generalist outsourcing their marketing and growth to Substack? I wonder what they were doing to grow when they weren't on Substack.

 

[Andy Black]

Milk Road: From 0 to Acquisition in 10 months

How Milk Road scaled to over 250,000 subscribers and got acquired, in under a year.

blog.beehiiv.com

 

[MTF]

Milk Road: From 0 to Acquisition in 10 months

How Milk Road scaled to over 250,000 subscribers and got acquired, in under a year.

blog.beehiiv.com

The deal included equity but it was sold for at least $1 million and I imagine perhaps even more. You can't really be more Fastlane than that lol. Granted, they didn't start from zero. They had all the assets and experience to make it a success.

 

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[MitchC]

The deal included equity but it was sold for at least $1 million and I imagine perhaps even more. You can't really be more Fastlane than that lol. Granted, they didn't start from zero. They had all the assets and experience to make it a success.

I believe it was 8 figures, and they sold it early because they were bored, they could have made way more

Yeah the article fails to mention his cofounder has a podcast and massive following, and his cohost on that podcast is the founder of The Hustle, the newsletter that started this entire newsletter trend

Still incredible execution though

I liked one quote from him recently when he said they tried to post a newsletter about something one day because all the crypto news was talking about it, and he asked the guy who wrote it, do you care? Would you text your friend about this? And that became how they decide what to write about each day, would you text your friend about this?

Also I remember him talking about how good the Beehiiv founders are, they would ask for new features and the founders would ask a bunch of questions to understand what they wanted and why, then ship the updates almost straight away, and if they couldn't do it that fast they would come up with some kind of workaround for the meantime

They also focused on subscriber quality not quantity, they said the goal would be to eventually launch their own product and not rely on sponsorships, so there was no point in having a huge number of low quality subscribers

 

[Andy Black]

Would you text your friend about this?

Love this.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Well using newsletter monetization strategy via SparkLoop and Convert Kit has completely jumped the shark when the majority of "partners" have requirements like this and pretty much are thieves.



Let's be clear, you could have your ENTIRE FAMILY subscribed to your newsletter, and you won't get "engagement" like this. In other words, my wife or son as subscribers to my own newsletter wouldn't meet these requirements, much less the average subscriber who likely has a life.

These aren't "partners", they're thieves preying on ignorance.

This "opportunity" lasted barely a year before everyone learned how to game the system.

To give you some perspective, I could promote the above newsletter to 100,000+ subscribers and get them 2,000 clicks, 500 subscribers, and get paid absolutely not a F*cking dime.

 

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[MTF]

Well using newsletter monetization strategy via SparkLoop and Convert Kit has completely jumped the shark when the majority of "partners" have requirements like this and pretty much are thieves.

View attachment 52296

Let's be clear, you could have your ENTIRE FAMILY subscribed to your newsletter, and you won't get "engagement" like this. In other words, my wife or son as subscribers to my own newsletter wouldn't meet these requirements, much less the average subscriber who likely has a life.

These aren't "partners", they're thieves preying on ignorance.

This "opportunity" lasted barely a year before everyone learned how to game the system.

To give you some perspective, I could promote the above newsletter to 100,000+ subscribers and get them 2,000 clicks, 500 subscribers, and get paid absolutely not a F*cking dime.

As far as I know Beehiiv doesn't have such requirements (they have their own system to detect fake subscribers) but you'd need to switch your entire newsletter to their platform.

 

[Andy Black]

As far as I know Beehiiv doesn't have such requirements (they have their own system to detect fake subscribers) but you'd need to switch your entire newsletter to their platform.

Are you using Beehiiv at the moment @MTF? Does it allow us to ask for people's first names?

 

[MTF]

Are you using Beehiiv at the moment @MTF? Does it allow us to ask for people's first names?

I'm moving one of my newsletters to Beehiiv. I'm not actively sending emails yet.

I don't ask for first names but you can do that though in a different way than usual:

https://support.beehiiv.com/hc/en-us/articles/13943139624087-Can-I-ask-for-a-subscriber-s-first-name-on-my-subscribe-form-

 

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[Arjun Uphale]

Newsletters have been a stable online business model ever since the Internet became popular. For some time overlooked because of social media, they're now making a big comeback.

There are a few reasons why newsletters are now hot:

• Writers are looking for new ways to make money without being dependent on someone else (like a newspaper, website, or Amazon).
• With big social media platforms censoring writers, many shifted to Substack (a popular platform for newsletters) which is committed to minimal censorship. But even if you're not using Substack, newsletters in general are resistant to censorship because you control them and can always take your list elsewhere (unlike with social media).
• Smart content creators realized they're only renting space from social media. A newsletter list allows them to have direct access to their subscribers.
• Big players invest heavily in this industry. Twitter acquired newsletter tool Revue while Business Insider bought Morning Brew newsletter for $75 million.

And here are a few reasons why newsletters as a business model in general are interesting:

• Newsletters are in essence customer lists. So while you're building a newsletter, you're also building a valuable asset.
• Newsletters require very little capital and can be easily managed by one person.
• Once you figure out how to grow a newsletter, it's easy to start another one and scale to a few newsletters or more. The Agora is an example of a big publishing business mostly built through various newsletters.
• Newsletters on topics that appeal to many people can grow into lucrative businesses. Example: mentioned before Morning Brew or Subscribe to The Hustle Daily Newsletter recently acquired for $27 million.
• Newsletters have their own ecosystem. If you're in a popular niche, you can build and grow your newsletter by only interacting with other newsletters, similar to podcasting.

Newsletters can be monetized in many different ways:

• Directly, called premium or paid newsletters. This is most common for finance/industry newsletters where you're writing content that can make people money.
• Through sponsorships. Depending on the niche and your list size, you can make anywhere from a few dozen bucks to a few thousand dollars or more per one ad placement.
• Through affiliate marketing. You have a list and (hopefully) you have their trust so you can recommend products and make money from commissions.
• Through selling your own products and services. As above - you build trust with your audience so it's easier to sell.
• Through creating communities or organizing events - once you have enough subscribers, a newsletter can easily turn into a community. You can sell monthly or yearly access to it or organize events for your subscribers.

In this thread I'll post resources, news, tools, and other stuff related to newsletters. Feel free to contribute!

Note: this thread is ONLY about newsletters as a business model. If you use a newsletter as a traffic channel for your business that's cool but that's not the topic of this thread.

Thanks so much for making this @MTF! I was looking examples all around me and then I saw this thread.

I personally think it is a great model and I think it should get more attention as a business to have in the years to come!

Cheers

 

[Andy Black]

I'm moving one of my newsletters to Beehiiv. I'm not actively sending emails yet.

I don't ask for first names but you can do that though in a different way than usual:

https://support.beehiiv.com/hc/en-us/articles/13943139624087-Can-I-ask-for-a-subscriber-s-first-name-on-my-subscribe-form-

Thanks. It annoys me they make asking for a subscribers name something you do *after* people signup. I'd like their name so I can send a personal video. But instead the platform will decide for me that just asking for their email address is better and not allow me the choice. It's little things like that that put me off a whole platform.

 

[MTF]

Thanks. It annoys me they make asking for a subscribers name something you do *after* people signup. I'd like their name so I can send a personal video. But instead the platform will decide for me that just asking for their email address is better and not allow me the choice. It's little things like that that put me off a whole platform.

They do have some annoying aspects but the team behind it is the early team behind Morning Brew so I trust their judgment on the design of their features.

This particular feature is like that because it increases opt-ins. Asking for more info in the sign-up form reduces conversions. Of course, giving more freedom would be good but Beehiiv is not for every use. It's specifically for the fastest growth possible.

 

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[Andy Black]

Asking for more info in the sign-up form reduces conversions. Of course, giving more freedom would be good but Beehiiv is not for every use. It's specifically for the fastest growth possible.

That's their opinion though, and that's what annoys me. Personally, I think faster growth would come from getting into conversation with initial signups and getting their input as well as turning them into champions.

I had the same with Substack. They wanted me to have an annual as well as monthly subscription option. I had to email back and forth to ask them to remove the annual one as I didn't want it. They kept saying more people signup if you have an annual subscription option. I kept saying I was running a test and didn't know if I wanted to do this for a year.

 

[woken]

I’m on beehiiv too.

Been manually sending lead magnets on Linkedin to every single one of my subscribers.

Currently at ~8500 subs.

No sponsors yet, just sparkloop&boosts bringing in $1k/month.

Recently hit me that I should do something more scalable— currently exploring that.

Willing to sacrifice some quality if it means I can grow it exponentially

 

[Andy Black]

I’m on beehiiv too.

Been manually sending lead magnets on Linkedin to every single one of my subscribers.

Currently at ~8500 subs.

No sponsors yet, just sparkloop&boosts bringing in $1k/month.

Recently hit me that I should do something more scalable— currently exploring that.

Willing to sacrifice some quality if it means I can grow it exponentially

Is that because Beehiiv doesn't allow you to create an automated welcome email/series where you can send the lead magnet?

Good work at the $1k/mth revenue just from SparkLoop.

 

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[woken]

Is that because Beehiiv doesn't allow you to create an automated welcome email/series where you can send the lead magnet?

Good work at the $1k/mth revenue just from Sparkloop.

Currently working on writing more clearly too .

I meant that I’m using Linkedin as an acquisition channel. I post something, ask people to comment / message me and then send the link towards the lead magnet which requires their email.

Newsletter all time stats:
8881 subs; 59.8% open r, 8.5% click rate

 

[Andy Black]

Currently working on writing more clearly too .

I meant that I’m using Linkedin as an acquisition channel. I post something, ask people to comment / message me and then send the link towards the lead magnet which requires their email.

Newsletter all time stats:
8881 subs; 59.8% open r, 8.5% click rate

Smart. So you get into conversation with people who raise their hand (which can lead to all sorts of things), AND you get them onto your email list.

 

[woken]

Smart. So you get into conversation with people who raise their hand (which can lead to all sorts of things), AND you get them onto your email list.

Yes.

By the way @MJ DeMarco, why not add yours in there on Sparkloop?

The goal is to break even.

the rules of the game allow you to impose 2 opened emails / week as requirement yet you only send one / week.

I am building another newsletter where I create timelines of successful people’s lives. Will be doing exactly that on Sparkloop very soon.

 

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[Andy Black]

@woken ... this is what MJ wrote recently:

Well using newsletter monetization strategy via SparkLoop and Convert Kit has completely jumped the shark when the majority of "partners" have requirements like this and pretty much are thieves.

View attachment 52296

Let's be clear, you could have your ENTIRE FAMILY subscribed to your newsletter, and you won't get "engagement" like this. In other words, my wife or son as subscribers to my own newsletter wouldn't meet these requirements, much less the average subscriber who likely has a life.

These aren't "partners", they're thieves preying on ignorance.

This "opportunity" lasted barely a year before everyone learned how to game the system.

To give you some perspective, I could promote the above newsletter to 100,000+ subscribers and get them 2,000 clicks, 500 subscribers, and get paid absolutely not a F*cking dime.

 

[woken]

@woken ... this is what MJ wrote recently:

Yes, I read that.

I’m saying that there are some people that do not require 16 email opens, and he can use those. Whatever he makes out of that he can then reinvest on Sparkloop = free growth.