How to Build and Grow a Newsletter as a Business Model

[Andy Black]

25 Rules For Running a Great Newsletter

As the newsletter space evolves, so do the rules for creating a great newsletter. These are the 25 to follow.

inboxcollective.com

 

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[StrikingViper69]

I found this yesterday: Newsletter - Cheap Houses Japan

Neat idea. I wonder how many subscribers they have

EDIT: From the FAQ on the site, it's a passion project for the guy that runs it.

 

[MTF]

I found this yesterday: Newsletter - Cheap Houses Japan

Neat idea. I wonder how many subscribers they have

Similar to Cheap Property Europe

I do wonder how it's working for them. The European newsletter makes more sense as the market is free and you can buy houses easily and access them whenever you want (if you live in the EU). That's not the case with the Japanese market so I imagine there are much fewer people seriously considering to buy there.

I'm thinking of doing something similar for Poland but it's not a real business if you only have a newsletter. There's too little money in selling niche subscriptions for $10 a month.

 

[Andy Black]

I found this yesterday: Newsletter - Cheap Houses Japan

Neat idea. I wonder how many subscribers they have

Similar to Cheap Property Europe

I do wonder how it's working for them. The European newsletter makes more sense as the market is free and you can buy houses easily and access them whenever you want (if you live in the EU). That's not the case with the Japanese market so I imagine there are much fewer people seriously considering to buy there.

I'm thinking of doing something similar for Poland but it's not a real business if you only have a newsletter. There's too little money in selling niche subscriptions for $10 a month.

Spooky.

I'm just about to test running Google Ads for people looking for properties in the UK and seeing if they'll fill in a form that will help me connect them with local estate agents AND add them to a newsletter.

 

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[MTF]

Spooky.

I'm just about to test running Google Ads for people looking for properties in the UK and seeing if they'll fill in a form that will help me connect them with local estate agents AND add them to a newsletter.

I think it's a good starting point to get a newsletter going. People who want to buy such houses are probably a rather affluent audience and there's a LOT of products/services you can offer later.

My only worry is how to monetize it quickly if you don't want to run a paid newsletter (as I'm not sure there's enough value there to charge for it).

 

[Andy Black]

I think it's a good starting point to get a newsletter going. People who want to buy such houses are probably a rather affluent audience and there's a LOT of products/services you can offer later.

It's more a lead-gen play, with a potential newsletter attached. Yes, there's lots of products and services and money changing hands when people are looking for property.

My only worry is how to monetize it quickly if you don't want to run a paid newsletter (as I'm not sure there's enough value there to charge for it).

I just know it's a niche with lots of money changing hands, and lots of long-tail searches on Google. That's good enough for me to run a test.

 

[StrikingViper69]

Spooky.

I'm just about to test running Google Ads for people looking for properties in the UK and seeing if they'll fill in a form that will help me connect them with local estate agents AND add them to a newsletter.

If you can find a way to filter out bad estate agents you may have a winner - several of my friends who bought houses had a terrible experience due to awful estate agents. If there was a way to be sure to get a good one, it could be people would be more willing to sign up for your service…

 

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[Andy Black]

If you can find a way to filter out bad estate agents you may have a winner - several of my friends who bought houses had a terrible experience due to awful estate agents. If there was a way to be sure to get a good one, it could be people would be more willing to sign up for your service…

Interesting. Do you know what was awful about those estate agents?

 

[StrikingViper69]

Interesting. Do you know what was awful about those estate agents?

General incompetence and fecklessness. Not replying to calls, not following up on things they said they’d do, in some cases flat out lying; etc.

 

[Andy Black]

General incompetence and fecklessness. Not replying to calls, not following up on things they said they’d do, in some cases flat out lying; etc.

Ah, the same as many industries.

Do you know how they found them? Was it via Google, word-of-mouth, or ... ?

 

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[StrikingViper69]

Ah, the same as many industries.

Do you know how they found them? Was it via Google, word-of-mouth, or ... ?

I can't remember

 

[Andy Black]

Nathan Barry on LinkedIn: Today we're announcing a huge change at ConvertKit: our new Newsletter…

Today we're announcing a huge change at ConvertKit: our new Newsletter Plan which is free for up to 10,000 subscribers. ...and it includes access to Creator…

www.linkedin.com

 

[fmvpinho]

Hi everyone!
I have been reading this thread carefully to start me going with my own newsletter.
The newsletter will be about finance and I already came up with the concept. I am now looking into the newsletter providers and Substack was sounding obvious until I found this post To Substack or Not to Substack: A Comprehensive Guide for Authors — Jenn Hanson-dePaula. The author identifies the following as con from Substack: You’re driving traffic to Substack and not to your own website. Much like on social media, we don’t own our space on those outlets - we are on borrowed land. So if Substack were to go away, change its rules, increase its prices - you have no control of that and you’re at their mercy. And personally, if I’m going to be driving traffic someplace, I want it to be to my own website. If there is one lesson one takes away from MJ book's is that lack of control can jeopardize our entire venture so I will look into other options. In any case, it seems the best option would be to build a website first and then use a plugin. What do you think about this approach? What is the best option if I were to use Wordpress? Does anyone know of a plugin that can integrate with Wordpress with the main features from Substack? Let me just say that in terms of tech knowledge I think I am as good as a 5 year-old! Any feedback will be much appreciated!

 

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[MTF]

Hi everyone!
I have been reading this thread carefully to start me going with my own newsletter.
The newsletter will be about finance and I already came up with the concept. I am now looking into the newsletter providers and Substack was sounding obvious until I found this post To Substack or Not to Substack: A Comprehensive Guide for Authors — Jenn Hanson-dePaula. The author identifies the following as con from Substack: You’re driving traffic to Substack and not to your own website. Much like on social media, we don’t own our space on those outlets - we are on borrowed land. So if Substack were to go away, change its rules, increase its prices - you have no control of that and you’re at their mercy. And personally, if I’m going to be driving traffic someplace, I want it to be to my own website. If there is one lesson one takes away from MJ book's is that lack of control can jeopardize our entire venture so I will look into other options. In any case, it seems the best option would be to build a webiste first and then use a plugin. What do you think about this approach? What is the best option if I were to use Wordpress? Does anyone know of a plugin that can integrate with Wordpress with the main features from Substack? Let me just say that in terms of tech knowledge I think I am as good as a 5 year-old! Any feedback will be much appreciated!

You're starting from the wrong point.

How will you get subscribers? How will you monetize it?

You could just as well start by emailing people by hand with a free Gmail account. The technical part is easy. It's the business part that's hard (and arguably, very unlikely to work these days).

 

[Andy Black]

How will you get subscribers?

Aha. That's where I like to start.

I wrote this up this morning for a test where we're running ads and don't even have a website:

This week I'll buy a new .co.uk domain for a lead-gen (plus newsletter?) project that's showing potential from yesterday's Google Ads stats. I posted more details on LinkedIn here. We'll slap on a simple lead capture and see if we can start generating leads.

 

[fmvpinho]

You're starting from the wrong point.

How will you get subscribers? How will you monetize it?

You could just as well start by emailing people by hand with a free Gmail account. The technical part is easy. It's the business part that's hard (and arguably, very unlikely to work these days).

I know, I have nothing on my favour and I am conscious that it may not take off at all. I am choosing to be confident and take one step at a time. At least I have that and something to tell about whether it works or not. I am thinking to leverage on my existing Linkedin connections (a little above 200) while I also try to increase the people I am connected with. Some of them have their e-mails addresses displayed in there. With regards to monetization, I have decided it will be a paid newsletter from the start and see what happens. My idea is to have a simple website to (1) publish relevant news in the macroeconomic space and (2) display examples of older articles. Starting with a Gmail account already crossed my mind and one of the newsletters that I follow (due to work and that I receive for free) actually is shared that way. You can see and example here: https://www.research.unicredit.eu/DocsKey/economics_docs_2023_185234.ashx?M=D&R=104899740. My concept came from this idea but I would like to add other features to this type of reading and make it more of an entertaining experience for the readers. Using Gmail may make it harder to do as I think I would loose a significant amount of time in making it visually appealing and like I said... 5-year-old tech wise!

 

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[Andy Black]

I know, I have nothing on my favour and I am conscious that it may not take off at all. I am choosing to be confident and take one step at a time. At least I have that and something to tell about whether it works or not. I am thinking to leverage on my existing Linkedin connections (a little above 200) while I also try to increase the people I am connected with. Some of them have their e-mails addresses displayed in there. With regards to monetization, I have decided it will be a paid newsletter from the start and see what happens. My idea is to have a simple website to (1) publish relevant news in the macroeconomic space and (2) display examples of older articles. Starting with a Gmail account already crossed my mind and one of the newsletters that I follow (due to work and that I receive for free) actually is shared that way. You can see and example here: https://www.research.unicredit.eu/DocsKey/economics_docs_2023_185234.ashx?M=D&R=104899740. My concept came from this idea but I would like to add other features to this type of reading and make it more of an entertaining experience for the readers. Using Gmail may make it harder to do as I think I would loose a significant amount of time in making it visually appealing and like I said... 5-year-old tech wise!

Why not post your content to social media and other platforms and see if you can gain traction there? Or even join communities of people interested in your topic and observe or help them there?

 

[Cameraman]

I know, I have nothing on my favour and I am conscious that it may not take off at all. I am choosing to be confident and take one step at a time. At least I have that and something to tell about whether it works or not. I am thinking to leverage on my existing Linkedin connections (a little above 200) while I also try to increase the people I am connected with. Some of them have their e-mails addresses displayed in there. With regards to monetization, I have decided it will be a paid newsletter from the start and see what happens. My idea is to have a simple website to (1) publish relevant news in the macroeconomic space and (2) display examples of older articles. Starting with a Gmail account already crossed my mind and one of the newsletters that I follow (due to work and that I receive for free) actually is shared that way. You can see and example here: https://www.research.unicredit.eu/DocsKey/economics_docs_2023_185234.ashx?M=D&R=104899740. My concept came from this idea but I would like to add other features to this type of reading and make it more of an entertaining experience for the readers. Using Gmail may make it harder to do as I think I would loose a significant amount of time in making it visually appealing and like I said... 5-year-old tech wise!

Building the tech to add a newsletter function to something like a WordPress site is easy and probably takes about an hour, including installing and configuring the plugin and hooking it up to AWS.

My big question is, what are you offering in the Finance Space? Why should I subscribe to your newsletter? What benefit am I paying for, and why are you different from so many other investment newsletters?

You have a lot of competition you need to stand out from if you are going to be successful.

 

[fmvpinho]

Why not post your content to social media and other platforms and see if you can gain traction there? Or even join communities of people interested in your topic and observe or help them there?

Yes, but I could do that with the newsletter already set up, right? That's why I want to do it in the simplest way possible.

 

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[fmvpinho]

Building the tech to add a newsletter function to something like a WordPress site is easy and probably takes about an hour, including installing and configuring the plugin and hooking it up to AWS.

My big question is, what are you offering in the Finance Space? Why should I subscribe to your newsletter? What benefit am I paying for, and why are you different from so many other investment newsletters?

You have a lot of competition you need to stand out from if you are going to be successful.

I have worked in corporate finance mostly (treasury and debt capital markets). I have access to a lot of information (bank researches, bank meetings, commentaries, seminars, conferences...) that I can think will enable me to put up together something that could add value in respect of showing off the latest trends that could impact the economy and businesses. But I want the reading experience to be entertaining for the reader. I have attended a summit in the most beautiful place and I wanted the reading to feel like that. An experience of learning and delight at the same time. And because it is related with my 9-5 it kind of feels an extension of what I do so that I don't give up easily by not finding the time to pursue it.

 

[Andy Black]

Yes, but I could do that with the newsletter already set up, right? That's why I want to do it in the simplest way possible.

Just set it up on Substack, Beehiiv, or ConvertKit and start? They all have their pros and cons, but as James Schramko said: "You can't steer a parked car."

 

[Cameraman]

I agree with @Andy Black. Start with the simplest option to gain some momentum. Once you have some subscribers, you can easily migrate to your own domain and newsletter setup. I'm worried that you will get caught up with the technology and trying to manage it when your time could be better spent building your audience.

Get yourself 100 paid subscribers and then DM me. I'll explain how to build your own newsletter website.

 

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[fmvpinho]

Yeah, I think you are both right.

I agree with @Andy Black. Start with the simplest option to gain some momentum. Once you have some subscribers, you can easily migrate to your own domain and newsletter setup. I'm worried that you will get caught up with the technology and trying to manage it when your time could be better spent building your audience.

Get yourself 100 paid subscribers and then DM me. I'll explain how to build your own newsletter website.

That's awesome! Thank you so much!

 

[seraphine]

I also held myself back for a long time thinking that I should build my own website, until one day my boyfriend was like why don't you just START and then figure out the rest later? So I started my newsletter on Substack; most of my subscribers so far are people I know or people who know people I know, but I've been starting to build a following on Tumblr, where I post content related to what's in my newsletter. Trying to build my subscribers before offering paid content.

I noticed that several popular writers on Substack have bylines in old media publications. So I may try to pitch articles to magazines, etc.

 

[Andy Black]

START and then figure out the rest later

Sound advice!

 

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[Andy Black]

Wow. This is so interesting.

View: https://youtu.be/_gnQPV1MXjs?si=4whSq5QqeyveT49z

 

[Cameraman]

Wow. This is so interesting.

View: https://youtu.be/_gnQPV1MXjs?si=4whSq5QqeyveT49z

There's a similar feature in the Newsletter Plugin I use on my website.

It will automatically generate and mail newsletters using my website's existing or new content. It merges it with a dynamic template I can create and then takes care of everything. You just leave it running in the background.

I haven't explored it properly yet, but it looks like a viable option for sending relevant content to subscribers on a regular schedule.