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20 Comments

๐Ÿ’Œ Trends #0036 โ€” Paid Newsletters

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      ๐Ÿฅฐ

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    Regarding this point: "Own your domain and email list. Substack writers leave breadcrumbs around the web pointing to subdomains."

    So, there's a little trick I've been doing that more people should know about. It's a clever workaround that lets you keep using Substack and your own domain.

    1. Each time you post a newsletter on Substack, copy & paste it over to a blog post on your website.
    2. A week after publishing to Substack, erase the post, leaving a big fat link to your website. Say something like, "This issue has been archived and is available at mywebsite.com. Read now -->" (See an example of how I do this below)

    Now, every "web" visitor to your Substack will end up on your website, helping you gain traffic, trust, and rankings with Google.

    It also means there is no risk of content cannibalization/duplication, since there is only one "live" version of your content at any given time.

    I've been doing this for 3 months, and it's working like a charm. You could even use this in conjunction with Memberful for your paywalled content.

    https://alternativeassets.substack.com/p/12-publishing-with-amazon-kdp

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      This is an excellent idea I will be implementing.

      Do you wait for Google to de-index the substack post first before posting to your blog?

      Since substack is also indexed, your site's version could be seen as duplicate content.

      In the real world with a real site, the substack post could be tagged with a canonical URL or 301 redirect. That's not possible here

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        Nah, I don't wait for Google or anything else. Each post is live on Substack until the next one comes out, then it gets redirected to my website forever.

        Understood about the risk of not having a 301/canonical option like you do on Medium. I am willing to risk the substack indexing/duplicate issue since theirs only up for a week, and mine is up forever. It may be foolish, but I have enough confidence in Google to make sense of it all.

        Of course, all of this may be moot since Substack just announced they would be allowing custom domains. That solution will certainly work for many. But even so, I still think having a website you own is your best bet, as you have total and full control over not just content but design, structure, the whole nine yards.

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    quality content as always !

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    Really respect that you listed other players in the space, which shows you're not scared of driving your audience to them and causing newsletter fatigue or losing potential paid subscribers. Very much practicing what you preach.

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    Solid article. You just gained a subscriber.

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    This one is extra meta!

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    loved it, just discovered that I now work with Gonz who runs Seedtable. (listed in your report)

    Also, the haters sections delivers yet again! lol โ€œSponsors wonโ€™t change what or how I write.โ€ Meet Richard Feynman

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    Awesome report!

  8. 2

    Been wanting to read this one for a while. Digging in.

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    Got the paid version. This is fire.

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    Great breakdown! One of the biggest opportunities for paid newsletter for me is utility. Instead of just offering a curated list of articles, I get a lot more value from newsletters that have some sort of utility (like Trends.vc).

    Whether it's some type of data, sharing opportunties you've researched or anything else that provides some type of value outside of just links to articles, that makes it a lot more appealing for customers/subscribers.

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    Next issue - micro-monopolies (my guess) ;)

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    Nice. I run a service that helps newsletters find sponsors https://audiencehunts.com

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    @dru_riley. You an inspiration mate. Good Luck.

  14. 1

    Great article!

    I love newletters, but I have to admit that more than 50% of newsletter that are created recently (with the trend) are thin, bullshit or not interesting.

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    My first time reading. Wow and Thank you. Curious your thoughts on Social Impact trends.

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    I am very excited by this business model. It's not new really, but it has come into its own recently in a big way. We're working on an article that will talk about how to build a premium newsletter that you can sell as a business asset down the road actually

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