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I run a < 1000 subscribers newsletter that makes $200/month, AMA

Hi there, I see a lot of people starting newsletters and I thought I’d share my experience.

About 2 years ago I started mallorcatechnews.com a weekly digest with news, events and job opportunities from my city’s tech and startup scene. Hard to make it more niche than that.

Currently it’s read by about 900 people and sponsorships are booked almost every week for $50.

I’d be happy to share what I’ve learnt along the way! And if you have any ideas/suggestions please let me know.

PS: I’m also editor-in-chief at Starter Story👌

  1. 3

    How do you get your first subscribers? I'm at 4 😂 and this is my 2nd week

    1. 2

      What kind of people are you targeting? Who would be your die hard fans? Find them in your address book, LinkedIn, etc and send them a personal message about why you started this and why you’re passionate about it. To succeed you’re going to need to put yourself out there. Get personal, seek empathy.

      Once you got a message that works, go to reddit, Facebook groups, etc

      1. 2

        I'm targeting developers who want exclusive deals/content about BuildFaster.co's themes.

        My die hard fans would be ones who have already bought a theme from BuildFaster.

        Thanks for your feedback btw :)

  2. 3

    At what point (how many subscribers) should we start looking for sponsors? What's the average open rate?

    1. 2

      Open rate goes down as the list grows, but it's been around 50-60% for a long time.

      My newsletter belongs to the curation kind, which means I gather links from here and there. Once there were some people/companies feeding me links regularly to include them, I just casually offer them the possibility to sponsor the newsletter. Of course I was very doubtful, but it was obvious that they were getting value.

  3. 3

    oh exciting! what's your process for finding sponsors and how far in advance do your sponsors typically book a newsletter?

    1. 6

      I always try to find sponsors that agree to a 4-week deal (they get it for $150) to ease a bit the pain of having to look for one each week. I've tried to embed an Airtable form to make it self service, but that didn't work very well. People want to exchange a few emails usually.

      On average, I'd say I have the sponsorships closed 2 weeks in advance.

      One thing I recommend, if you don't have a sponsor for one week, is to give it away to a company that might benefit from it. You have an excuse to network and they might pay for it in the future if they see results.

      1. 1

        give it away to a company that might benefit from it. You have an excuse to network and they might pay for it in the future if they see results.

        This is really great advice, thanks!

  4. 2

    Did you find the audience first and then started newsletter OR vice-versa?

    I did the latter but it didn't work well for me.

    1. 2

      I started everything from scratch. I had a sense that people might be interested in it, but it was far from a sure thing. I didn't capitalise on a previous audience or anything.

      I'd say whatever you want to do, there most likely be an audience. What's your newsletter about? What have you tried? I'll be happy to help.

      1. 1

        My newsletter was basically my blog posts from my personal blog. I didn't know how to promote newsletter. I just had a email signup option in the bottom of blog posts. That brought me only a couple of sign ups.

        I figured that I wasn't writing, deep in niche. maybe that's why.

        1. 3

          Then you need to promote the blog, not the newsletter! Once you get visitors there, it's all about a good CTA and a good incentive to give out the email address.

          1. 1

            That's right. I decided that I will start the newsletter again once I am having a good amount of visitors per month.

  5. 1

    Have you run any paid ad or social campaigns? If so what did you find the most useful or useless?

    1. 1

      Tried different times, always with very little success.

      I gained a few followers, but not subscribers (I've found that is kinda hard to turn the former into the latter).

      Event with a very niche product, segmented by interest and location, I couldn't make it work, so it's probably my fault.

      As I said in a different comment, my best ads were little comments I started leaving saying "Cool! I'll share this in the next mallorcatechnews.com issue!", I think that really helped me reach a broader network.

  6. 1

    oh wow, I was just going to send you a tip in about a job opening and an article! I can vouch for the quality of the newsletter, it's one of my weekly must-reads :-)

    1. 2

      Hi there, Larissa! Thanks for your words, I'm glad you like it! Being such a small project, these support messages are really important <3

      By the way, I don't think we've met! So make sure to send me an email, I'd like to say Hi : )

      1. 1

        yay! I just wrote to you this minute, so I'm waiting in your inbox :D btw, have you promoted in any Slack groups? there seem to be so many now (marketing, entrepreneurial, remote working, etc). Curious to know if it actually works.

  7. 1

    Hey, congrats!

    What software do you use to track the signups etc?
    A better version of MailChimp?

    1. 1

      I use Mailchimp all around. From the sources they give (API, form, landing page) you can kinda guess where do people come from if you don't have many placements.

      For a while, I tried a Sumo popup on the web version, but I found it kind of annoying myself and it wasn't converting at all.

  8. 1

    Do you use any tools to help in curation?

    1. 2

      Very easy setup: I use a send to self app and browser extension. During the week I just send everything to my inbox (barely get other email there). When I have to make a new newsletter issue, I just need to open the email and Mailchimp, pretty basic but does the trick. There’s probably a better way to do it but this has worked for me.

  9. 1

    Can you describe the contest you ran to get subscribers? What worked and what didn't?

    1. 1

      The fault here was all mine. They were very poorly executed and it was more promoted inside the subscriber base (which was good for our relationship I guess) than focused on gaining subscribers. I just announced it in the actual newsletter and Twitter account.

      I should’ve done something like bring a new subscriber and you both enter or something like that.

      But still I’m happy that I was able to reach a company as cool as Doist and they agreed to partner!

  10. 1

    Uep @esquimal! Glad to see a fellow "mallorquí" here.

    I have seen your newsletter around twitter and I think you have found a very attractive niche. Some questions:

    -How did you find your first subscribers?
    -On what bases do you set the price x sponsorship?
    -Do you have any kind of expansion plans for the future?
    -Are you doing any growth tactic besides word of mouth and your twitter account? (paid media, etc)

    Moltes gràcies! :)

    1. 1

      Also a fellow "mallorquí" here!!
      I subscribed to the newsletter, looking forward to receiving the first one!

    2. 1

      UEP!

      First, I hope you're a subscriber : ) Just kidding.

      Second, if you're working on something send me an email whenever you have news, I'll be happy to include it.

      The first subscribers were from my personal network. I work with startups so it was easy to find some people interested. A couple were Meetup groups admins and were kind enough to send a message to their groups talking about the newsletter. That got me the first 70-80 subscribers in 5 weeks or so, which was enough.

      I heard Jaime Novoa, which runs an amazing newsletter dealflow.es, speaking about how much he charges. He also said how many subscribers he had in the interview. So I did some simple math if he has X subscribers and charges Y per week, and I have Z so I can charge W. That was really helpful, made me feel less of an impostor.

      I'd like to produce more content. I recorded a few podcast episodes but that was too much work. I'm thinking about writing detailed startup profiles, but I can't find a cool way to make a directory on WordPress.

      Tried some Twitter ads that worked terribly. What has really worked for me is leave my mark around the internet and I took a while to realise how useful this was. At the beginning if I saw a link to publish I'd just save it. But after some time I started leaving comments like "This is super cool! I'll include it in mallorcatechnews.com newsletter". This has been very useful to get the word out and reach people I don't know personally and be visible to their connections.

      I've also ran a couple of contests (one sponsored by Doist!) and that got me not as many subscribers as I would expect.

      1. 2

        Just subscribed!

        I am cooking some stuff so I will be sure to send it your way.

        Thanks for all the answers, makes sense on how you reached the pricing point.

        About the content, I am actually about to build a tool directory myself, but I will be using Notion(checking airtable too) and super.so (for publishing).

        If you want, I can send you some tutorials I found which I will use for building. Might not look like a million bucks but for a mvp-beta phase product might just do the work.

        Let me know!

        1. 1

          Wow, super.so looks dope!

          The thing is that I already have a Wordpress site, so I need to embed the thing there.

          Send me an email anytime please! You got my address in my profile : )

      2. 1

        I can relate to the first 5 weeks!

        It's been ~4 weeks since I first launched my newsletter and I've gotten about 60 subs mostly from personal contacts. What did you do next after this stage? Which channels did you find most helpful?

        I'm currently trying to supplement my weekly issue with bite-sized content in social media e.g., twitter and instagram posts between my weekly issue. Did you try something like this and is it worth continuing?

        For context, my this is my newsletter . It's a weekly issue for my notes and key takeaways on one curated business podcast episode. It's to help people know if an episode is relevant for them and worth their time.

        1. 2

          Dayum, very cool idea. I love it!

          In the beginning, it really helped to be connected to some people that were admins of several meetup groups of around 700 people each, they sent a message announcing my newsletter and that really helped me get from 10-20 to 70-80.

          I'm sure there are plenty of groups (Facebook, reddit) devoted to podcasts, entrepreneurship, hiring or whatever topic you cover, use them as a distribution channel. Sure, is cool to have a Twitter account but there's no audience there and you're putting a lot of effort from what I see.

          Take advantage of communities that already have a good amount of members.

          Also, you could become a medium to discover podcasts with less audience. The big shows probably won't RT you, but those starting will for sure. Because that's some sort of validation for them, use that vanity for your advantage.

          1. 1

            Great! Thanks that gives me direction on what to pour my energy on. I've been trying to do the social media route, but as you say it's hard to get traction.

            I've tested going to existing communities, but haven't focused as much on it. I'll try doing that moving forward!

            Good point on smaller podcasts! I'll try those out too.

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