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Why won't you subscribe to my Newsletter?

In an attempt to understand what people want and don't want, I'm trying this little experiment.

Tell me why you wouldn't want to subscribe to my newsletter so that I at least know what goes on in people's mind when they see my Newsletter's landing page.

Subscribe here: The Curious Bunch
Newsletter Archive: Read past issues here

  1. 2

    You write well, and your newsletter is in a trendy content area—productivity and mental models get discovered by a new cohort of people every year—so your prospects for building a subscriber base are terrific.

    Some gentle feedback on the landing page: "Your inbox is filled with spam, emails from companies you’ve never heard of, and click-bait subject lines." Rather than leading with negativity, perhaps consider telling me what positive thing reading your newsletter will do for me.

    As some others suggested, you may want to narrow your focus. "Whatever is interesting to me" doesn't really work as a theme unless you're some Tim Ferriss-level famous person. You (and I!) aren't him, so we have to make sure our offer is ultra-honed and crystal-clear.

    Like Josh Spector says: "deliver content only a specific audience will appreciate." https://thinkgrowth.org/how-to-write-newsletters-that-people-want-to-read-caabba912bb9

  2. 2

    Agree with everything that has been posted there :

    • The topic seems way too broad and doesn't pique my interest
    • I received too much emails already, so if I'm going to subscribe to something, it has to be something I'm really interested in.
  3. 2

    I stopped subscribing to 'Newsletters' as there's only finite amount of time one could invest in reading one.

    Here are my inferences -

    1. Newsletter subscribers, like in several other information consumption medium do it out of FOMO. So if you create an atmosphere through your content, which suggests to the reader that they will loose out on something valuable if they don't subscribe to your future writing, they'll subscribe.

    2. Subscription != engagement, So FOMO subscribers already have at least dozen other emails waiting in their inbox which likely gets 'Marked as Read' one auspicious day.

    3. Dichotomy of email. I've had newsletter makers tell me, they're not an email person when I ask them to communicate via email instead of chat message. Email continues to serve its purpose, in fact I use only email as my primary communication medium(No phone calls, no chat, haven't downloaded zoom) yet I would be deluding myself if I believe email is where information transactions are happening right now 'for everyone'.

    That said, I would suggest you to keep writing for your own pleasure, don't stick to a regular schedule for sending your newsletter but send only when its absolutely ready.

  4. 2

    Sure, I'll bite.

    The description is broad enough that I'm not sure what it's about or what to expect. Looking at the archive, I'm not sure from the article titles what they're about either. After reading an article, it seems to be very general, high-level productivity tips.

    I may not be your intended audience because I'm interested in specific, concrete steps to solve problems that I have right now, rather than general advice on how to be productive. I wouldn't subscribe because I don't need generic advice, and don't need any more emails in my inbox.

    That said, there's probably a group of people who want exactly what you're providing. It might be a problem of figuring out who those people are and where they hang out.

    1. 1

      Hey @Overmind!
      Thanks for the honest feedback. All points noted. :)

  5. 1

    I usually suscribe to newsletters because they will help me to " get a job done ".

    The copy doesn't help me identify what what will I be gaining.

  6. 1

    Hey to everyone who gave honest feedback here!

    Thank you for your feedback! I read all the comments and I agree with few and disagree with few. But I love getting constructive criticism! So I really appreciate you taking time to write them.

    Ironically, yesterday was one of those days I got many subscribers, few of them directly from this post. So, I guess it boils down to finding the right audience in the right place.

    Thanks again for your time! Keep'em coming.

  7. 1

    Looking at the newsletter content, it seems like completely random tips... Covid vaccine with no-code in one email?

    I will not subscribe because I ultimately decided email newsletters are not really for me (and I was always subscribed to 2-4 maximum at a time).

  8. 1

    "The Curious Bunch helps you learn something new, increase your productivity, and be creative at what you do in under 5 minutes!"

    this is abstract explanation and it can be interpreted at least in two ways (yours and theirs).

    Imagine you invented an automatic transmission in the car industry and you're presenting it to the buyers. If all you say to them is "Totally new experience of driving cars" then that might not be enough. You do might have automatic transmission in mind, but the other side don't know what are you up to. They might think like - omg, more horsepower (with their existing manual transmission), but, nah, I'm pretty much satisfied with my car.

    And there's a mismatch, caused by abstraction. Losing interest, because it leaves to much for me to imagine what is "something new", how to "increase productivity" and "be creative in under 5 mins".

  9. 1

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