First MRR and $1K on launch day!
by Anne-Laure Le CunffSo far, Ness Labs and the Maker Mind newsletter have been funded through sponsorships and consulting — both time-consuming and unpredictable. Yesterday, I launched the Ness Labs membership to my newsletter audience.
This is a huge milestone as it's the first time ever Ness Labs is generating proper MRR—as in recurring revenue! The goal is to create a sustainable revenue stream so I can focus on creating great content and being helpful to the community.
I was initially planning on only offering an annual membership, but with everything that's going on, I thought it would be nice to give people more flexibility. So I ended up creating a $50 yearly plan and a $5 monthly plan.
I made exactly $1,105 in new memberships since launching 12 hours ago. After all the work I've put into writing free articles and the newsletter, this feels like a massive hug from my readers! 🤗
Both plans include:
- Mind Match: a service where I hand-match members for virtual coffees. I include a discussion guide to help them have interesting conversations.
- Partner deals: I negotiated some offers on mindful productivity and creativity apps, tools, and courses. It's a win-win add-on for members and partners and it's much easier to negotiate these compared to sponsorships, so I'll keep on adding to that directory.
- Events: obviously online only for now.
- Member newsletter: a monthly digest with exclusive content, new offers, community highlights, etc.
Next week, I'll launch a proper community where members can connect with each other.
In terms of growth, I'll keep on writing the free weekly newsletter, and hopefully in a few weeks I'll have a good idea of what percentage converts to the paid membership. Excited to grow this community!
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Already up to $1k/month, what a start! Congrats Anne-Laure!
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Thanks so much, Courtland! 🙏 I wish it was $1K a month, it's a mix of annual and monthly subscriptions. But the goal is to get there soon!
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Congrats Anne-Laure! You're absolutely killing it and it's a great privilege and big inspiration to watch you and Maker Mind, Ness Labs grow :)
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Many, many thanks, Preetam! 🙏
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Fantastic results, and they clearly show the power of creating and nurturing a great community. Congrats!
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Thanks so much, Fabrizio!
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Congrats Anne! Been following your progress and it's great to see you are making it. Cheers
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Thanks so much! 🙏
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Great job! What platform will you use to allow the community to connect with each other?
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Great achievement! How did you manage to have such a consistent output rate and do not struggle to find topics to write about? Gratulations Anne-Laure
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It's inspiring how you've built this community and keep moving forward with it. Congrats @anthilemoon
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Many thanks, Darshan!
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Looks interesting! I noted for future membership when getting more resources.
If you're need something like art, animations, or mobile app, just ask, and I maybe help with my unique fast prototyping project for free (experimental). http://animationcpu.herokuapp.com -
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How big was your audience before you got paying member?
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I have almost 9,000 email subscribers!
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Congrats! Super excited to be a part of this! :)
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Thank you so much for your support, Merott!
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Thank you for sharing! It's always inspiring to learn the backstory of how someone got started and 'made it'. Congratulations @anthilemoon! Look forward to following along your journey.
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Thanks so much, Bhumi!
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Congratulations! Your service seems really helpful, I just signed up and look forward to trying out the handbook! All the best for the future :)
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Thanks so much! :)
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Huge congrats! Your content is really inspiring!
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Thank you!! 🙏
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Congrats, amazing results!
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Thank you so much!
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Congratulations! I’d be curious to know what percentage opted for monthly vs annual and what channels are you using to grow your list?
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Thank you! 2/3 went for annual. Mostly using Twitter as a growth channel, and my existing newsletter :)
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I've been monitoring closely content creators for a while.
My feeling is that the best way to move from a free to a paid publication/community isn't selling additional premium services, but rather asking your current subscribers to support your work, and giving them a premium service as a complimentary benefit.
Have you ever considered this angle?
This is an extract from a Judd Legum interview on the Substack blog that seems to confirm my hypothesis:
“From what I’ve heard from my paid subscribers, it’s just that they really want to support this kind of journalism, and they feel good about it when I do that kind of work. They feel empowered and they feel more informed and so that’s what’s motivated them. And that’s something I didn’t anticipate either. I thought it was really just the paywall that motivates people and the fact that you were withholding content, but I think for most people that’s not it.”
https://on.substack.com/p/a-growth-masterclass-with-judd-legum
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Congrats Anne, Great fan of your articles 💯
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Many thanks, Abinaya! 🙏
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Wow. 1k Recurring? GOOD! Thanks for sharing! Keep us posted!
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Not really! It's a mix of monthly and annual memberships. So they are all recurring but not on the same timeline. Thank you so much!
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Contratulations Anne-Laure. You deserve it!
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Many thanks, Emeka!
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Congratulations Ness Labs! You deserve this.
This is so awesome you're building the community-
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Many thanks for all your support, Fajar! 🙏
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That’s amazing news Anne-Laure, congrats!
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Thank you, Matt! 🙏
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