7 of the Best Newsletter Growth Strategies of 2024 (#007)

Summary

Growth In Reverse Podcast Summary Episode: 7 of the Best Newsletter Growth Strategies of 2024 (#007)
Release Date: January 15, 2025
Hosts: Chenell Basilio and Dylan Redekop

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Introduction

In the inaugural episode of 2025, Growth In Reverse dives deep into the most effective newsletter growth strategies that shaped 2024. Hosts Chenell Basilio and Dylan Redekop leverage over two years of extensive research to unpack unique and impactful methods employed by top newsletter creators. This episode not only highlights successful tactics but also offers actionable insights for transforming newsletters into profitable ventures.

Highlighted Growth Strategies

1. Khee’s Innovative Use of Notion and Loom

Khee, the creator behind Rad Reads, employs a clever combination of Notion and Loom to serve as a "lead magnet in disguise." By tweeting informative threads about Notion's productivity features and linking to free Loom videos, Khee provides immediate value. At [06:26], Dylan explains:

“He's using Loom as the video capture platform. He'd walk you through them. They were free videos to access... and that would lead people to his newsletter where they could subscribe.”

Chenell adds how Khee’s approach fosters organic sharing without overtly pushing for subscriptions, making the content sharing seamless and value-driven.

2. Akash Gupta’s Internal Sharing Strategy at Meta

Akash Gupta, author of Product Growth, discovered a goldmine of subscribers by creating content tailored for internal sharing within large tech companies like Meta. As detailed around [09:10], Akash’s Ultimate Guide to Onboarding went viral internally, leading to a surge in both free and paid subscriptions. Dylan summarizes:

“He writes really good content that is geared towards someone sharing it in a Slack community or with their team at their large company.”

This strategy underscores the power of creating content that naturally fits into corporate learning and development initiatives.

3. Kyla Scanlon’s Mastery of Short-form Content

Kyla Scanlon combines engaging short-form content with educational value, dubbed "chocolate covered almond content." With a significant following across TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter, Kyla drives her audience to a minimalist website and her Substack newsletter. At [12:14], Dylan highlights:

“She provides really short-form edutainment... which has driven her a lot of subscribers, a lot of attention.”

Kyla’s method proves that delivering bite-sized, informative content can effectively convert followers into newsletter subscribers.

4. Yosi Levi’s Exclusive Insider Tips

Yosi Levi, known for The Car Dealership Guy newsletter, leverages anonymous insider tips to provide exclusive content. Highlighted at [18:08], Yosi’s ability to share groundbreaking information, such as impending layoffs at Stellantis before public announcements, positions his newsletter as a trusted insider source. Chenell emphasizes:

“Exclusives are so fascinating because you're the only person who has this content.”

This approach not only attracts subscribers but also enhances the newsletter's credibility and uniqueness.

5. Ben Tassel’s "Reply Guy" Strategy

Ben Tassel of Ben’s Bytes mastered the art of engaging directly on social media by replying to tweets with promises to feature mentions in his newsletter. At [25:04], Dylan notes:

“He would reply to all these people and then they're like, oh, I'm gonna get a shout out in the newsletter. Great.”

This technique, inspired by his time at Product Hunt, demonstrates the effectiveness of active social media engagement in driving newsletter growth.

6. Tom Alder’s LinkedIn Algorithm Mastery

Tom Alder, often hailed as the LinkedIn wizard, has grown his presence by meticulously optimizing his interactions with LinkedIn’s algorithm. Discussed around [27:04], Tom’s disciplined approach includes strategic post timing, engaging with comments, and consistent content delivery, enabling him to amass over 107,000 followers and 60,000 subscribers. Chenell credits:

“He was very strategic with this... executing it perfectly.”

Tom’s success highlights the importance of understanding and leveraging platform-specific algorithms to maximize reach and engagement.

Additional Insights on Exclusivity and Content Strategy

Throughout the episode, Chenell and Dylan underscore the significance of exclusivity in content creation. Exclusive content not only differentiates a newsletter but also fosters a sense of community and insider access among subscribers. At [19:56], Dylan reflects:

“Exclusives can be a really interesting way to do content.”

They also discuss the balance between providing free value and incentivizing subscriptions, ensuring that content remains both accessible and premium.

Reflections on Platform Transitioning and Engagement

The hosts explore the challenges and opportunities associated with transitioning between platforms. Referencing Dr. Julie Garner’s pivot from Quora to Twitch to Twitter, they highlight the necessity of adapting to platform dynamics to sustain growth. At [22:03], Chenell praises:

“Being an older woman and being on Twitch... that is really cool.”

Dylan further elaborates on the importance of not falling victim to the sunk cost fallacy, encouraging creators to remain flexible and experimental with their content strategies.

Conclusion: Key Takeaways

The episode culminates with actionable insights for newsletter creators:

• Leverage Platform-Specific Features: Utilize tools like Notion and Loom to create seamless lead generation funnels.
• Create Shareable, Exclusive Content: Focus on providing unique value that encourages organic sharing within targeted communities.
• Engage Actively on Social Media: Direct interactions can significantly boost subscriber numbers when done thoughtfully.
• Adapt and Pivot: Stay attuned to platform changes and be willing to explore new channels to maintain growth momentum.
• Balance Quality and Consistency: Deliver high-quality content consistently while avoiding burnout by pacing content creation strategies.

Chenell and Dylan wrap up by encouraging listeners to embrace a more authentic and less pressured approach to content creation, emphasizing genuine engagement over mere metrics.

“[Dylan] The engagement matters, but it doesn't matter as much as you think.” — [31:49]

This philosophy not only fosters a healthier content creation environment but also builds a more loyal and engaged subscriber base.

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Tune in next week as Chenell and Dylan continue to unravel the secrets behind successful newsletter growth, featuring expert interviews and proven strategies to elevate your newsletter game.

Transcript

[Chanel]

I'm always looking for people doing newsletter or just written content that is like, exclusive tips. Exclusives are so fascinating because you're the only person who has this content. When I was listening and doing the research, I was like, okay, wow, I am not on that level.

[Dylan]

How would somebody get to that point?

[Chanel]

And can we just give her some props for being an older woman and being on Twitch? I think that's freaking awesome.

[Dylan]

Oh, no, I don't want to perpetuate the reply guy. People on. On these platforms just like hijacking feeds. But it works, though. Like, so that' the thing.

[Chanel]

I feel like he probably had this full checklist and notion, like, okay, an hour before post, do this. After a while, you're just like, I cannot wake up and do this again. Unless your name is Justin Welsh and you just are a machine. The engagement, it matters, but it doesn't matter as much as you think.

[Dylan]

That's the stuff that keeps you coming back.

[Chanel]

Hello. Welcome back to the Growth in Reverse podcast. I'm Chanel.

[Dylan]

And I'm Dylan.

[Chanel]

This is our first recording of January of 2025, which is exciting. Whole new year.

[Dylan]

It is a whole new year. She's not saying, okay, yeah, I love it.

[Chanel]

Do you have any good plans for the. For the new year?

[Dylan]

Plans for the new year? Not. Nothing super specific. I'm. I'm looking forward to, you know, the cliche, what the. What the year will bring. Have some personal goals I'd. I'd like to achieve, and definitely some goals with, you know, this podcast and. And other things that we're working on that I'm really excited for. How about you?

[Chanel]

Yeah. Um, this year is gonna be a lot of travel. I think I'm going to, like, six or seven conferences, which is a lot, but it's exciting. Um, I always love getting to meet people in person and just hang out with fellow newsletter nerds.

[Dylan]

So which ones are you going to or most excited for?

[Chanel]

Well, the one coming up soonest is a newsletter marketing summit, the one Matt McGarry's conference I'm speaking at. Um, which should be fun. I'm excited to jump in and kind of meet some of those other people that I haven't met yet.

[Dylan]

So that was at the end of February, right?

[Chanel]

Yeah. In Austin.

[Dylan]

In Austin.

[Chanel]

That'll be a good one. But then other than that, cex, which is a Creator Entrepreneur Expo Economy.

[Dylan]

Oh, did they change the name of it?

[Chanel]

Oh, I think they changed the name of it, yeah.

[Dylan]

Oh, dang. Okay.

[Chanel]

Still cex, the same. Same acronym. Yeah, exactly. Acronym, but that one's in August. I was looking at my calendar and then yeah, Justin Moore is having a conference in March, the sponsor games, which should be fun. Sounds like it's going to be a different thing where he's kind of like actually getting people to pitch sponsors live, which a little nerve wracking, but that'll be fun.

[Dylan]

I think that'll be really cool. I love that he's taking, he just, he takes different approaches to content to, to everything he does, which is super refreshing.

[Chanel]

Yeah. So that'll be fun. Other than that, I'm just trying to get myself back on social media after we had that podcast a couple of weeks ago about what I wish I would would have done and the biggest one was stay on social. So in the growth and reverse pro community we're doing like a 30 day LinkedIn challenge which started today. Uh, so yeah, it's gonna be good. I'm excited to kind of get back on the, on the train of posting daily.

[Dylan]

So back back on the social horse as it were. Today being also January 2nd, so not the middle of the month as people will probably be hearing this. But yeah, we're, we're going strong into the new year.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I'm excited. Get back on the wagon.

[Dylan]

So what are we talking about in this podcast?

[Chanel]

Yeah, so the first podcast we did was the wildest growth strategies. And, and I thought that there was a lot left that we could have talked about. And so with it being the new year, I figured why don't we just do something of like the best growth strategies I saw with the deep dives I wrote in 2024. So kind of like a yearly recap, but pulling out the most interesting ones or some of the most interesting ones.

[Dylan]

Yeah, I love it. And, and I think with some of these too, just the unique nature of them, you don't see a lot of people doing. That's what drove me to chose the ones I chose. At least they, they were, they were good in terms of like helping the, the newsletter grow. But I also thought like, you know, the most successful growth strategies might be like paid growth with Facebook ads. But I mean that's, that's tried, tested and true. That's boring to some degree. It's been talked about. I thought these were a little bit more interesting. They had more of a unique angle and didn't necessarily need a whole bunch of spend in them either.

[Chanel]

These are going to be good. I'm excited to, it's always fun to like go back to something. I spent like 40 hours researching. And, like, it was like a whirlwind at the time. And then, like, honestly, after I hit publish, I, like, completely forget about all these things until something like this, where I'm, like, going back through and I'm like, oh, that was so cool. I forgot about that. So I'm excited to kind of relive those.

[Dylan]

That's amazing. When you're done publishing these, is it kind of like, you know, they say the waiter, the waitress at a restaurant remembers everybody's order. They submit the order, and then as soon as that order is submitted, it just, like, vanishes from their memory. Are you kind of like that with these deep dives? Like, do you have to really?

[Chanel]

Yeah, somebody will come back and be like, oh, remember that thing? And I'm like, kind of. And then I like, yeah, go look at what I wrote. And.

[Dylan]

Oh, yeah, that's awesome. Well, we're going to. We're going to go look at what you wrote. So do you want to start or should I?

[Chanel]

Why don't you take that first one that you were looking at?

[Dylan]

Okay, cool. So some of you may be familiar with Khee. He writes rad reads, which he's been writing for, geez, I think close to 10 years or so. And so if you haven't, go check it out. But Khi, he did something that you wrote about in your deep dive that I thought was really cool. It was kind of like a lead magnet in disguise. So one of Kehi's things, one thing that he monetized quite well was he got really good at using Notion and using Notion for Productivity. So he had a course called Supercharger Productivity. And so what he was doing was tweeting threads about how you can use certain Notion features. And in those threads, he would link out to Loom videos. So he's using Loom as the video capture platform. And he would have these Loom videos on how to do them. He'd walk you through them. They were free videos to access. And then he would throw a little badge in the corner of that Loom video saying, subscribe, which is, I believe, a paid feature for Loom. And then I. I didn't look closely, but I assume he probably had somewhere also in, like, the comments or in the caption for that video or the description for that video, a link probably as well. And that would lead people to his newsletter where they could subscribe. And I just thought, that's really cool, because it's like I'm helping people accomplish this goal of, you know, or at least teaching Them something where they're gonna be able to go from, you know, have this transformation of not knowing how to do something to knowing how to do something. And they're be like, hey, this guy's awesome. He helped me. And now I'm going to subscribe to his newsletter where it's full of this content as well.

[Chanel]

Yeah, this was so fun when I saw this because, you know, like, he's actually just shared. Like, typically people, when they teach you something, quote unquote, they'll be like, hey, go sign up for my newsletter and get the full video. He's like, no, no, here's the loom video. Go watch it. It's free. I don't even need you to sign up. But then at the end, he would be like, if you want this actual template, go subscribe. So I mean, it's still kind of like something similar to that, where you're asking people to sign up for their newsletter. But he did it in such a different way. And honestly, when I saw these, I was like, I didn't even know that you could do that with loom. Like, I did not know that you could add a custom button and even on the free plan, I think you can do this.

[Dylan]

Oh, really?

[Chanel]

Wow, this is. Yeah, I think so. I was like, this is fascinating. Um, and one of like, the side things of this is, like, these tweets, people would just reshare them because he's giving it away for free right there. Like, he's not. They're not re posting him asking for someone to sign up for his email list. They're reposting, like, a full loom video, which was interesting. Um, I have a feeling this wouldn't work as well these days because Twitter links, not really one in the same. They don't do as well.

[Dylan]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

But I wonder if there's some way to kind of rehash this.

[Dylan]

I think it goes back to, even if you have a link in your. In your content, if it's good enough and people. You get the right people seeing it and sharing it, it's still going to, you know, quote unquote, blow up. The algorithm can only bury it so much. So I think what he did was just provided such great value that people were just like, sharing it. And that's what. That's what help it spread by, like, wildfire. So I love what he was doing. I love how it was kind of like a lead magnet in disguise, where he's giving you that basically free content and then preempting you with like, oh, you can get that template where this is all done for you as well. Um, just sign up for, for the newsletter and you'll get it.

[Chanel]

Yeah, this was a, A very interesting growth strategy when I stumbled into it. And I think even he was on like a YouTube video with Ali Abdaal, like during the pandemic. They were just like, creating videos because everybody was at home anyway. And I think in one of those videos, like Ali Abdaal linked to one of these loom videos and I was like, oh, so good. It's almost like he's linking them to K's, like, landing page for someone to sign up for his email.

[Dylan]

So basically. Yeah, yeah, yeah, really smart.

[Chanel]

I thought that was cool. So this next one is from Akash Gupta, and He has over 150,000 email subscribers on Substack at this point. But he actually stumbled into this strategy. Um, he wrote a piece, uh, he writes a newsletter called Product Growth. It's about growing with product. Uh, kind of like a Lenny Rachitzki, but different. And so he wrote this piece called the Ultimate Guide to Onboarding. And he kind of went viral with it in terms of, like, the new subscribers, the new paid subscribers he was seeing. And on the back end, he realized that all of these subscribers were coming from Meta. So someone on the product team must have found this article and shared it internally. And then he got a bunch of other paid subscribers through that.

[Dylan]

So. From the company Meta. Not from Meta, the.

[Chanel]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, yeah, from the company. Yep. So these people in the product development team at Meta were actually signing up and paying because they have an R and D budget. Right. You can have. Or an L and D, I should say, learning and development budget. So $150 a year subscription for them is probably nothing. So they were just like, yep, I'll read this, signed up. And so he discovered this, like, after going through and looking at the data and he has this quote, he said, writing more pieces like that that can potentially go viral within these big tech companies and learning with learning and development budgets is my number one goal. And so he had this whole product growth flywheel of like, you know, the input is just him writing really good content that is geared towards someone sharing it in a Slack community or with their team at their large company. And then they would sign up, people would share it, and it just kept like building this flywheel. So I thought that was super interesting. Um, especially for a B2B newsletter, it's like, yeah, how can you optimize for the internal share?

[Dylan]

Yeah. And that's what that's. I don't know if he called it that or if you called it that, but like optimizing for the internal share is like just like. I love that.

[Chanel]

Yeah, he called it that. I cannot take credit for that.

[Dylan]

Okay.

[Chanel]

But I just thought that was smart.

[Dylan]

And I, it's, it's challenging if you're writing more of a broad, broad appeal newsletter or something that isn't necessarily a B2B experience like his is. But that being said, if you're writing in to a niche community or really kind of passionate community, you could gear content that that community will share with other people in their community. Right. And I don't necessarily mean physical community but even online communities and that sort of thing. So it doesn't necessarily have to be something that people are going to be sharing in their companies, but company is, in a way it's, it's a community. Right. And so just that mindset of creating content that somebody would want to share in their community. Oh, check out what I found. Right. I think we've done that in the growth reverse pro community. We found great content online or great tools and we've shared them there because we know it's, it's helping everybody else because we're all, you know, striving to reach a similar cause.

[Chanel]

Yeah, 100%. That's a great, great call out there.

[Dylan]

Nice. We don't talk a lot about, at least I don't think we do talk a lot about short form or video content. And somebody who you wrote about who's really done this many masterfully in my opinion is Kyla Scanlon. So she writes the, well, she writes Kyla's newsletter, it is called and it's on substack, it's got 69,000 subscribers and she also has a number of paid subscribers as well. And Kyla writes about basically the economy, mostly US based economy and she does really awesome short form content and has gotten her, I would assume a large amount of her subscribers and her followers, TikTok, she's blown up. She has over 217,000 followers on TikTok. She's got I think 270,000 followers on Instagram where she can't be sure, but she's probably mostly posting the exact same content, short form reels, TikTok type of content there and she even has a pretty significant Twitter following. Over a hundred, over a hundred thousand. And she's driving all these people to her website that is really, really minimalist and it's really interesting that her content that is Quite creative. Drives people to a very minimalist website that you can't even scroll on. But what she's done with this content is basically provided really short form edutainment. I guess on that's. It's both fun and you learn something with it, which I love. I think we've quoted this as, or I've heard this quoted as like chocolate covered almond content. I think Caitlin Burgoyne shout out to her for that sort of reference where it's like, it's fun and you don't realize you're learning something, but you are. And I think that's really driven her. A lot of subscribers, a lot of attention, a lot of followers and it's been really successful and I love it. I just, I can't get enough of the short form. Like, I don't. I'm not an economic nerd. But she does such a great job with it.

[Chanel]

Yeah, well, she'll take like, like very newsworthy topics at the time and be like, here's why that's happening. And it's like, how do you know that? Like, she's very, very smart. I, When I was listening and doing the research, I was like, okay, wow, I am not on that level.

[Dylan]

You're not like a macroeconomic expert or guru?

[Chanel]

No, no, no, not at all. But I think it just like it gets people to share the content too. Because I mean, if, if someone's explaining something I was just talking about with my best friend and I'm like, hey, here, like, look at this video. This kind of like explains why this is happening. It just like it's not optimizing for the internal share, but you're optimizing for some kind of a share for sure.

[Dylan]

Yep.

[Chanel]

Yeah.

[Dylan]

And it does a, it does a few other things too. It it. One, she proves that you can convert people from video to written. Because a lot of the arguments is, oh, publish on. If you're writing a newsletter, publish and promote on Twitter, on LinkedIn, on these written platforms, um. Cause you're gonna have a better conversion rate, which might still be true, but she's proof that people will see your video content and still wanna subscribe to read your words potentially. So I think, I love that she's kind of proven that, that you can do that and have success with it. And she's also doing something that I think a lot of us could take a cue from, which is basically like having this short form content inform her longer form content. Because if she's putting out say a reel or a TikTok every day. Yeah. Not of them all going to hit, but the ones that do, she'll know. Okay, people are interested in this. I can actually write a good newsletter piece around this. I could gate it, I could charge. It could be like a, almost a lead magnet for paid subscribers. So I love how she's basically using this, like short form, low production. She's not investing probably a ton, ton of time and effort into it. It helps that she's very smart and knowledgeable on the topic, but she's really letting that also inform what she writes. Writes about too.

[Chanel]

It's a good one. She definitely has the knowledge there. It kind of looks like she slowed down quite a bit with her growth. I'm wondering if she's like. Because she wrote the book and everything.

[Dylan]

I was going to say she kind.

[Chanel]

Of like pivoted a little bit into, you know, focusing on more, longer evergreen type of stuff versus trying to grow the number of followers on Instagram and that kind of thing.

[Dylan]

Yeah, it is possible. I did notice she did, I think as recently as mid December, put out a TikTok. But I don't think she's being quite as prolific lately. But we did. I didn't even mention that she published a book called in this Economy, which I love the title because it's so, it's so, it's, it's a meme. Right? Like it's, it's so on point with her content and it's just. Yeah, it's great. I haven't read the book, but I think she spent the first probably half of the year finishing it and promoting it. And then now it's published and she's probably doing more promotions for it too.

[Chanel]

Moving on to Yosi Levi, which is. We've talked about him a little bit before. I think we talked about his like, content planning strategy before, but this, this was actually interesting to me because. So Yossi runs the car dealership guy newsletter, Twitter account, et cetera. He essentially finds all this interesting information around the car dealership space and shares that before most other people know about it. So he's almost like the go to news platform for the car space at this point. In the beginning, he started off anonymously and now he's grown. Uh, he's actually come out and told people who he is. So this is still very interesting though because he gets these like anonymous submissions and tips from like higher ups and like different car dealerships, car companies. Yeah, and the one that really stuck out to me was this was March of 2024. So he essentially Got a picture in his inbox of someone, I guess an email was sent out to the entire corporation at Stellantis, which is like the company behind Jeep, Dodge, Ram, like Chrysler, it's like the parent company. And so they sent this notice to all their employees saying, like, hey, everybody's working from home tomorrow. And Yossi posted this, and he's like, smells kind of like some layoffs are coming, Right? But this is before any of this happened. But somebody felt comfortable enough to send this to him anonymously, and he posted it, and sure enough, within 24 hours, he was like, layoffs confirmed, 400 positions gone. Um, and it was just fascinating. He got comments on that post like, you are on the inside of the inside with this info. And so I am. I'm always looking for people doing newsletter or just written content that is like exclusive tips. So one of the other ones that comes to mind was Gerge Oroz, probably saying his name wrong. He writes the Pragmatic Engineer, but he would also get anonymous tips from, like, startups, different kinds of companies, and he would share that. He called it the scoop. And so he would share those tips in his newsletter, and people trusted him not to like out them for sharing it. So he had, like, this insider information. But I think exclusives are so fascinating because you're the only person who has this content. So, like, if you go ahead and publish that, it's going to get shared. Like, no one else has this information. Even if someone else republishes it, they're likely or probably going to, you know, say, like, hey, I found this through Yossi Levi or whatever. So exclusives can be, like, a really interesting way to do content.

[Dylan]

How would somebody get to that point? I just. I guess, like, that would be. It would be awesome. But how would you, like, I don't know, start day one and do something like that? You probably don't fall into it. It's probably something you're. You're like. Yoshi had grown up in the car dealership. Right. Industry. And.

[Chanel]

Well, yeah, so this side of exclusives is kind of like the anonymous tips type of thing. But even like us having Eddie Schlanger on the podcast, like that content with us, three lives, nowhere else. So if someone quotes that piece of content, it's still an exclusive piece of content. Like, you're still creating something that nobody else has, essentially. This is just like taking it to a whole nother level. It's like advanced exclusives, if you will.

[Dylan]

Yeah, you're kind of like the. You're kind of like In a way, like a gossip magazine, but not because you're. It's not gossip. It's actually, you know, insider info. But, um, and I don't want to conflate. Go like gossip usually has a negative stereotype. I don't mean that in a negative way, but you're like, you're kind of like the person everybody's going to. To like share information or get information from. So. Yeah, really interesting.

[Chanel]

Yeah. I mean, you could even say growth in reverse in the early days is doing exclusive content. Like, you could still find it elsewhere, but because it was published first in my newsletter, like hypothetically it was the first one. Um, like, sure, you can come along and do the same thing.

[Dylan]

But yeah, like a fully assembled backlog history of this person kind of thing was right there. No one else had been doing that for at least the people you were writing about.

[Chanel]

Yeah. So maybe we can talk more about exclusives in the future episode. It's kind of an interesting topic.

[Dylan]

Yeah, I really think it. It has a lot of legs, especially. Again, the newsletter space is only getting more and more competitive, so you're going to need to probably stand out to really see some, some growth in the coming years. So having being exclusive, having kind of the insider track on things is going to help.

[Chanel]

Agreed. Do you have another one you want to jump into?

[Dylan]

I do, I do. I'm going to. Let's see. I've got two here. I think we've got time for both. Why don't I start with Dr. Julie Gner? So the thing that, that I thought was really interesting with Dr. Dr. Garner's deep dive that you wrote was she had been trying basically, uh, she'd been popular and gotten found a lot of success with growth on a bunch of different channels. Um, but the interesting thing is she kind of knew when to pivot and switch from those channels. And I think this is really apt for the time we're in, and I'll get to that in a second. But she basically started posting on Quora back in kind of the mid 2010s, like 2014, 2016 kind of timeframe. She was posting a lot on Quora. She got the three time, like Top Writer Award on Quora and then she pivoted and she was doing Twitch for a while. She was doing Twitch Streams. Then she pivoted again in 2020 and she went to Twitter and really grew Twitter from like 7,000 followers to now. She has over 135 followers there. And so she seems to be really in tune with basically going Hard on a platform, getting as much out of it as you can, and then pivoting to a new one when it's not really providing you the same returns. And so it almost makes you wonder. She's been now but four years on. On Twitter. I wonder if there's going to be a change coming there, if she's kind of tapped that out. And the timing is interesting, just talking about this, because we see, like, this kind of mass migration of people going from one platform to the other. There's been a lot of talk about reach on Twitter and that sort of thing, and people are trying things like blue sky or threads, and I'm curious to see if. If she goes from one to the other now that she's potentially kind of tapped out an audience or maybe not seeing the same reach and. And success that she was originally on Twitter.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And can we just give her some props for being an older woman and being on Twitch? I think that's freaking awesome.

[Dylan]

Yeah, like, absolutely.

[Chanel]

Over 30 and on Twitch, like, okay. And you're not gaming. Like, I think that's really cool that she was like, I'm going to try this out, because that is. I think that's the first time from any deep dive I've done that someone was on Twitch.

[Dylan]

Yep.

[Chanel]

I was not expecting that from her, but I thought that was awesome.

[Dylan]

No, when you. When you hear the word Twitch, you definitely think a certain stereotype of a person, and not necessarily in a bad way, but just, like, you don't think of somebody who is maybe like her. So I think that's really cool.

[Chanel]

It was really cool. Um, but, yeah, definitely being willing to almost kill your darlings in a different sense. Like, sure, you're not, like, killing your writing, but you spent so much time and hours and energy, like, learning a platform and then to just be like, all right, I'm gonna move my energy elsewhere and just, like, let that sit. Props, like. And I think that comes back to, like, all of the research she's done on, like, high performance and, like, just being able to, like, cut the cord if you need to and that kind of thing.

[Dylan]

So, yeah, the sunk cost fallacy. Like, don't let that just keep you mired in this, like, algorithm that is no longer serving you, like, which a lot of people have, you know, mentioned. Twitter is not kind of serving them the impressions and the views and the reach that they used to. So I could see that changing, if not for her, for a lot of people. I'm not saying that, you know, Blue sky or another Platform is going to be the answer. But I think the whole point is realizing when you've kind of tapped one out and experimenting with others, so could be a really interesting opportunity even. You know, I was thinking about this going from a written platform to, like, we talked about Kyla Scanlon with video or going to Instagram. There could be a whole other audience who's consuming content just in a different way that prefers more of the more visual or the video type of content. And you could, you know, start really tapping into that audience as well. They still will love your content. They're just consuming it in a different way. So I think that could be an opportunity for a lot of people.

[Chanel]

I like that. All right, I'm going to move on to Ben Tassel from Ben's Bites. This one was fun to see, see, because I actually saw it real time. But, like, going back and, like, rehashing, it was exciting to watch. So Ben writes a newsletter called Ben's Bytes. And he started this went, like, right before ChatGPT. And everything came out, like, when AI was starting to get big. And he was like, I don't know enough about this. I'm going to teach myself about AI and all these tools that are coming out. Because honestly, like, 700 new AI tools probably hit the market every single day. And so he was like, let me just try and figure this out. So he started a newsletter called Ben's Bytes. And he did something called Being the reply Guy. And so he would go under if someone was mentioning any of these tools on Twitter, he would go under that tweet and be like, hey, shouting this out in the newsletter tomorrow. And just like, super simple. But he would reply to all these people and then they're like, oh, I'm gonna get a shout out in the newsletter. Great. So he was already going to be publishing about these different. Either the news for AI or the different tools. And so he would just, like, comment underneath, like, going to cover it tomorrow, my AI newsletter. And so he was just active in the space and telling people, like, hey, just saw this. I'm gonna actually write about this tomorrow too. And so the big one that stood out to me, he replied to the CEO of Google at the time, Sundar, and he got the reply alone by itself. Got like 26,000 views.

[Dylan]

Wow.

[Chanel]

And I think he got, like, probably hundreds of subscribers from that, just from replying with a link. Fascinating. So he did this over and over again to the point where I would see it on Twitter, people being like, yep, there's the reply guy. And so it just became like a joke. Um, but he used to work for Ryan Hoover and Product Hunt. And so him and Ryan grew Product Hunt in the same way. And I thought this was fascinating because I didn't know this before, before I was doing this research. Um, so Ryan tweeted, for those that run a newsletter, what tactic had the biggest impact on subscriber growth? And Ben replied, having a tweet thread go viral or replying to tweets, saying, I'll add this to my newsletter. The link. And he said, tactic taken from the Product Hunt days. Wink, wink. And I was like, yes, this is so good. Like, why reinvent the wheel? You've already done this and it worked.

[Dylan]

Totally. You know, it's funny that you mentioned this because I was looking at talking about this one as well when doing some research for this episode, and I was like, in. Part of me was like, this is really cool, really awesome. We should talk about it. But then the other part of me was like, oh, no, I don't want to perpetuate the reply guy. People on. On these platforms just like hijacking feeds. But it works, though. Like, so that's the thing. Or at least it can work and it works for Ben. And I just would, like, caution people, like, if you're going to be the reply guy, like, be strategic and not annoying, I guess, and don't use AI. Like, those are like my main three things because we. We have enough of that out there.

[Chanel]

Yes. Make sure you're actually going to put it in your newsletter and not just like saying something about that. Yeah, yeah.

[Dylan]

So this would work really well if you're doing a industry niche focus. Roundup type of email. Doesn't have to be just a roundup type of email, but at least you have it in, like your curated links section. Yeah, this would be. This would be a really great strategy. I use this a little bit to some degree. When I was growing my newsletter, I mean, I saw other people doing something similar. They very well may have gotten it from Brent too, because it really did work for him.

[Chanel]

Good stuff. Yes.

[Dylan]

Well, let's do. Speaking of reply guys and comments and sort of gaming algorithms a bit. Let's talk about Tom Alder, because I. I don't know, he's kind of like the LinkedIn wizard in my mind. We've discussed him a little bit on other podcasts, so I won't go too deep into this, but I'm, you know, some. Some details that maybe are helpful is he's got over 107,000 LinkedIn followers and he's got 60,000 plus subscribers to his strategy breakdowns newsletter. And he's really figured out how to get the most out of the LinkedIn algorithm. And it all started with a challenge, a 30 day challenge, which I don't know if we got inspiration from, from Tom to do our 30 day LinkedIn challenge, but I thought.

[Chanel]

Thanks, Tom.

[Dylan]

Yeah, I thought the timing of this would, would be interesting talking about this, what we're doing, but it's where his growth really started. Right. And he grew his newsletter to 5,000 subscribers before he had even published it. We've talked about that, but really he has basically laid out this formula, if you will, on how he writes his LinkedIn posts, how he engages with the algorithm beforehand before he actually publishes his post, how he adds comments into his own post when the time serves, and um, and then how he engages after. And Chanel's written, she's like got this mapped out really nicely in her deep dive. So I will point your attention to the deep dive to get this all listed out, but it's definitely something that I know I'm looking to for this month as we're doing this LinkedIn growth challenge and something that I think more people probably could benefit from. A few of those, a few of his strategies as well. It's worked very well for him, clearly.

[Chanel]

Yeah, he was almost like he was very strategic with this. Like there was, I feel like he probably had this full checklist and notion like, okay, five minutes before post or an hour before post, do this, you know, and like all of this stuff to make sure, like as soon as, I don't know, just that he executed it perfectly. Um, and it really helped him in the early days. It's, it's funny though, he actually slowed down posting a little bit. I'm sure it was just cuz of the end of the year, but launched his course too. Yes. Wondering if he's taking a little break here to regroup and catch his breath after launching.

[Dylan]

Yeah, yeah, it definitely could be. It definitely could be. I mean there's, there's only so much stamina one can have for this kind of thing. Unless you're starting to hire it out, of course. But I'm not saying that's what Tom did either or is going to do, but that, that definitely will help with the, the burnout factor.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And I speak from experience, which is why I'm doing this LinkedIn challenge, because I burnt myself out going too hard for about nine months after launching the newsletter. Uh, it works, but After a while, you're just like, I cannot wake up and do this again day after day after day. Yeah, yeah. Unless your name is Justin Welsh and you just are a machine.

[Dylan]

He is. He's a machine. It's 6ish years, 7 years maybe of him just, like crushing it every day. Yeah, yeah. Hat tip to him, because I don't think I have that in me.

[Chanel]

Yeah, that's a lot.

[Dylan]

Do you have any last ones you wanted to talk about? Chanel?

[Chanel]

I feel like there are so many more, but, yeah, I feel like that's probably a good, good place to end it. Um, just everybody get back on LinkedIn here and see if we can't grow this.

[Dylan]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's. I. I think one of. Not that we plan to talk about this, but one of my goals with LinkedIn is just to come at it with, like, a fresher, more fun sort of attitude and not always, like, trying to optimize every post for. Still be strategic about it, but not optimize every post for, like, the best hook ever and the. The absolute best formatting, because that's where I just push it off and then I don't eventually do it because I, you know, perfection is the enemy to some degree. So I just want to come at. Come at this next month with a little bit more of a. Just kind of a. Not a who cares Attitude at all, but more of a open to not having, you know, a post. Absolutely. Take off or anything like that. Just less pressure and more fun.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I think it's actually pretty telling. A lot of the people that we've seen grow super fast on LinkedIn or Twitter or any of these platforms, this stuff stops working the same after a while. And so I think if you can come at it with a fresh perspective, kind of like you're talking about, just like, have fun, see what's going on. Like, enjoy yourself, be social on social media. Like.

[Dylan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chanel]

Instead of just trying to make it a place where you market your newsletter, there is a lot of new stuff that we could all learn. It's good to have these new, like, reset periods where you're just like, let's try something different and see what happens. Like, even if I don't get a single newsletter subscriber, like, even this morning I posted, and this guy Niall, who I had talked to probably a year and a half ago through LinkedIn, was like, hey, it's so great to see you back on here. We should catch up. And so I DM'd him a link to my schedule. And I was like, let's do it. And we already have a call booked for next week. So, like, awesome. It's just fun. I love that stuff. Like the engagement, it matters, but it doesn't matter as much as you think.

[Dylan]

The numbers are this like fading feeling of like goodness. Whereas something like what Niall reached out and said, hey, great to see you, and then you're chatting, like, that's the stuff that keeps you coming back. Right. Like you get some momentum from seeing all the charts kind of going up into the right in the beginning. But I mean, there's only so much that's gonna happen and for so long and then that can start. If you, if you keep expecting that to motivate you, I don't think you're looking at the right thing. I think it's true engagement. Building these kind of connections just with people and getting to know people. I think that's, that's where it's gonna carry you forward and you're not less likely at least to burn out.

[Chanel]

Yeah. I think the other thing people don't realize is like, once your follower count gets like over 50k or like over a hundred k or you're email subscriber list goes up, people stop being as willing to like DM you because they're scared and they think like, you're this big person where. So you probably hear less of those people as you grow. But people don't think that. They think like, oh, I'm gonna get more opportunities and all this stuff. And that's true. But also there's like this level of like, I don't know, humanness that you lose as you like become this mini celebrity online. So I think it's almost interesting in the beginning just like lean into having a small following and like, do like be social, like enjoy yourself, engage with others and meet friends.

[Dylan]

I think some of my favorite posts that I've seen in the last few months have just been people like posting about more of their lives than their business or like business advice or anything like that. So I'm trying to lean into that a little bit more as well. And if I don't have a great idea for a post that day, I'm just going to post about a story or, you know, some sort of anecdote experience that I've had and I'll be curious to see if that resonates with people, if they're interested in it. If that, um, just falls flat. Either way, it's, it'll be fun to see what happens.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I'm Excited to kind of see where this 30 days goes.

[Dylan]

Maybe it'll turn into 60.

[Chanel]

Maybe. Or maybe, like Tom, it'll turn into. What was his, like, 900 or something?

[Dylan]

Oh, yeah, yeah, it was crazy. He had. He had posted pretty consecutively for a long time. And like, mad props because don't know if. I don't know if I have that in me. I also, I don't know what if I want to be sitting on my, you know, computer on the weekends and not tending to my family and. And other things. So, yeah, I'm not saying that Tom didn't do that. Just. I know I would probably have to sacrifice that time. And it's not. It's not. The trade off is not one I'm willing to make.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I published the newsletter on Monday this week, and it was kind of insightful and nice to not have to worry about doing it on Sunday morning because even if I, like, finish a deep dive or finish the post beforehand, like, Sunday morning is always inevitably tied up with writing the sponsor ad or, like, filling out the rest of the email and, like, making sure the subject lines, like, it's just all that stuff that you're like, oh, I'll just do it Sunday morning. And then it's like three hours in and you're like, oh, my God, why did I do this again?

[Dylan]

Why did I do this to myself again? Yes. Yeah, I feel that. I feel that. Well, did you. I'm curious. The sun, the Monday Morning Post, did it change anything in terms of open rates and engagement? Or was it pretty much all, um, same. Same.

[Chanel]

Um, it was similar. I got some replies of people being like, I didn't even realize that you sent it on Sundays, so keep doing whatever you want to do. It's like, okay, cool. Um, yeah, the open rates were about the same, so didn't impact it at all, which is interesting. Um, good to know. Good to know.

[Dylan]

Yeah, that's cool. I think the. Unless your email or your newsletter's name is like, Friday Finds or Saturday Solopreneur or, you know, a day of the week is attached to the name. I think we as publishers hold so much more, like, clout. Not clout, but just like, really cling on to, like, no, I publish on Wednesday, so I have, like, if I deviate from that, everyone's going to be like, oh, what happened? Why aren't you publishing today? When the truth is nobody's paying attention to it that much? So, yeah, you can stray.

[Chanel]

You can definitely stray. I did not get a single email of someone saying where. Like, why didn't you send this yesterday?

[Dylan]

Did you think you would?

[Chanel]

I don't know. I mean, I feel like there's always this feeling of, like, I'm gonna. I'm doing it wrong. I'm, like, letting people down. But it doesn't matter. Like, as long as you're showing up and you still send something, I think it's fine.

[Dylan]

Yeah. Showing up, sending good, quality content and helping people. That's what it. That's what it's all about.

[Chanel]

Yeah, for sure. Cool. Well, I guess we'll wrap this one here as we've gone after our 10 minute rant.

[Dylan]

Yes, Tim and rant. Well, thanks for chatting about this. I hope everybody has a epic start to 2025. And thanks for hanging out with us.

[Chanel]

Yeah. See you in the next episode.