Growing a newsletter to 3K subscribers and $10K in revenue as a side hustle

Hi Indie Hackers, my name is Jakub from Entrepreneur List. Here is new interview with Dylan, founder of Growth Currency. Newsletter that generated him over $10K as a side hustle.

Dylan shares his 5 lessons that he learned from growing the newsletter to 100 straight weekly editions, 3K subscribers and $10K in revenue:

I started publishing my Growth Currency newsletter 2 years ago this month. Since then, I've published over 100 straight weekly editions, grown my newsletter to nearly 3k subscribers, and earned over $10k via ads, affiliates, and services.

Here are 5 counter-intuitive lessons I've learned growing & monetizing my newsletter over 2 years:

Lesson #1: Consistency is important. But being resilient is critical

Being consistent was huge for me. And it wasn’t "hard" publishing a brief, weekly newsletter. What was hard was the slow growth at the beginning. Knowing that I needed to keep a long-term mindset for any chance of newsletter success. That’s why resilience to battle slow growth and feelings of “publishing into the void” is critical — otherwise, you'll give up. Keep publishing consistently, yes, but build a resilient long-term mindset.

Lesson #2: A website helps. But you don’t need one

I used Substack as my landing page + newsletter + blog site for 9 months. I grew nearly 1,000 subscribers with it. No purchasing domains or web hosting, or setting up some headache-of-a-WordPress site. I didn’t get distracted with the unnecessary and grew my list instead. Now I have a website. But it would have been a waste of time—and major distraction—at the start.

Lesson #3: Growth is not linear—but it is correlated

Subscriber growth is not linear. There are boom days, weeks, even months when that graph keeps going up and to the left. Then there are periods where getting 10 new subscribers feels like years. And it’s often due to a lack of promotion. Promotion is powerful & effective. Growth is highly correlated with how much you promote yourself. And it’s critical until you can get the promotional flywheel spinning.

Lesson #4: Switching platforms is scary until it isn’t

I began with Substack. Then switched to ConvertKit 9 months later. I was terrified to switch, even though I knew it was in my best interest. But in reality, it wasn't a big deal. I reached out to the ConvertKit team who looked at my account & email list. They reassured me it was going to be fine. And it was. More than fine. I increased my open rate by ~15% on my first send.

Lesson #5: Think about monetization from Day 1

I didn’t consider monetization much at the beginning. Like, I knew about affiliate sales. But I never considered newsletter ads & sponsors! Ultimately, your newsletter’s goal is to drive revenue—either directly or indirectly. And it’s SO much easier to actually make money with it when you’ve been strategic from the start.

Interview on Entrepreneur List