Grow Your Newsletter WITHOUT Social Media (#005)

Summary

Growth In Reverse Podcast Summary

Episode: Grow Your Newsletter WITHOUT Social Media (#005)
Release Date: December 30, 2024
Hosts: Chenell Basilio and Dylan Redekop

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Introduction

In Episode #005 of the Growth In Reverse podcast, hosts Chenell Basilio and Dylan Redekop delve into alternative strategies for growing a newsletter without relying on social media. Drawing from over two years of research and thousands of hours reverse engineering successful newsletters, they explore various methods that bypass traditional social media platforms to build substantial subscriber bases.

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The Importance of Quality Content

Before diving into growth strategies, both hosts emphasize the foundational role of quality content. Chenell underscores that without compelling content, growth hacks and alternative strategies would be futile. As Dylan notes, "It's important to think about content-led growth," highlighting that exceptional content naturally encourages sharing and organic growth.

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1. Leveraging SEO for Organic Growth

SEO emerges as a cornerstone strategy for growing newsletters without social media. The hosts profile several experts who have successfully utilized SEO to amplify their reach.

a. Ben Collins: Mastering Google Sheets SEO

Ben Collins, known for his newsletter on Google Sheets tips, exemplifies effective SEO usage. He meticulously researches relevant keywords and crafts content that directly answers common queries related to Google Sheets. Collins strategically ensures his content is discoverable via Google searches, leading to a substantial increase in subscribers. Chenell remarks at [03:20]03:20:

"He didn't just write content and hope it got discovered; he actually leveraged Google searches to find keywords and answer questions people were asking."

b. Pat Walls: Pioneering Lean SEO

Pat Walls, behind the Starter Story newsletter, showcases an unconventional approach to SEO. Initially not focused on SEO, Walls adopted a "Lean SEO" framework years into his newsletter journey. This approach involves creating "minimum viable content" to test what ranks and then expanding on successful pieces. Dylan reflects at [05:12]05:12:

"He created a shortened version of a post, saw which ones started ranking, and then doubled down on those, making them more robust."

Walls' strategy not only streamlined his content creation process but also sustained his newsletter's growth, attracting over 1.6 million visitors.

c. Anilore: The Master Interlinker

Anilore of NIST Labs employs strategic interlinking across her articles, enhancing both user experience and SEO performance. By ensuring each piece of content links to relevant others, she keeps readers engaged within her ecosystem, thereby improving search rankings and driving consistent traffic. As Chenell observes at [08:29]08:29:

"Interlinking not only improves user experience but also serves as a crucial SEO tactic to help articles rank higher."

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2. Cross Promotions: Building Relationships and Expanding Reach

Cross promotions involve collaborating with other newsletter creators to mutually expand subscriber bases. This strategy emphasizes relationship-building over direct subscriber acquisition.

a. Building Relationships with Other Creators

Chenell shares her experience at [11:22]11:22:

"Cross promotions were a big part of me building relationships with other newsletter creators."

These relationships may or may not immediately result in subscriber gains but lay the groundwork for future collaborations and sustained growth.

b. Utilizing Newsletter Directories

Platforms like Lettergrowth.com, Inbox Reads, and Beehive serve as directories where newsletter creators can find and collaborate with each other. These directories facilitate connections without the need for social media engagement.

c. Lead Magnet Swaps

Brian Harris exemplifies effective lead magnet swaps, where creators exchange valuable resources (e.g., e-books, toolkits) to entice subscribers. At [15:24]15:24, Chenell explains:

"Lead magnet swaps are a form of cross promotion where both parties offer something of immediate value to attract new subscribers."

d. Recommendations Widgets

Dylan introduces the concept of recommendations widgets, where newsletters promote each other’s content within signup forms. This mutual promotion can drive quality subscribers who are already inclined to engage with newsletter content. Chenell highlights at [16:57]16:57:

"Using recommendation widgets can drive subscribers who are more likely to engage because they already enjoy reading newsletters."

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3. Guest Posting and Leveraging Other Audiences

Guest posting allows newsletter creators to tap into established audiences by contributing content to other platforms.

a. Lenny Rachitsky: The Guest Post Success

Lenny Rachitsky's growth to nearly a million subscribers began with strategic guest posts on platforms like Medium and Andrew Chen’s First Round. These guest posts not only increased his visibility but also drove consistent subscriber growth through search traffic.

Chenell notes at [19:04]19:04:

"Lenny wrote guest posts that continued to attract subscribers over time through consistent search visibility."

b. Cody Sanchez: Podcast Proliferation Strategy

Cody Sanchez’s strategy involved appearing on numerous podcasts to maximize exposure. By guesting on various shows, Sanchez built her brand presence without relying on social media. As Dylan states at [21:54]21:54:

"Going on every possible podcast was integral to launching her newsletter, eventually growing her audience to over 800,000 subscribers."

c. Josh Spector’s Outreach Tactics

Josh Spector emphasizes the importance of leveraging other people’s audiences through guest posts or content sharing. At [25:12]25:12:

"You can create great content and reach out to larger audiences by having others share your content, effectively promoting your newsletter without social media."

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4. Referral Programs and Giveaways

Referral programs incentivize existing subscribers to bring in new ones through rewards, while giveaways attract attention through valuable prizes.

a. Thomas Shields: The Pickleball Newsletter

Thomas Shields of The Dink utilizes partnerships with pickleball brands to offer tangible rewards, such as free paddles or balls, for referrals. This strategy not only encourages signups but also aligns the newsletter with relevant brands. Chenell shares at [26:07]26:07:

"Offering free gear through partnerships made the referral program highly attractive to subscribers."

b. Al Solis: Tiered Referral Incentives

Al Solis of SEO Fomo crafted a referral program with easily attainable rewards, such as Twitter shoutouts for three referrals and newsletter mentions for five. This approach ensures that rewards are desirable and achievable, driving consistent participation. Dylan comments at [28:03]28:03:

"Making initial referral rewards attainable and valuable encourages more subscribers to participate actively."

c. Justin Moore’s Exclusive Content Unlocks

Justin Moore integrated referral incentives by unlocking exclusive content upon achieving referral milestones. At [30:58]30:58:

"Subscribers receive targeted brand sponsorship insights once they refer just one person to the newsletter, increasing engagement and motivation."

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5. Paid Growth: Scaling Without Social Platforms

While primarily discussing organic strategies, the hosts acknowledge the role of paid growth in supplementing newsletter expansion without relying solely on social media.

a. Meta Ads and Strategic Investment

Paid advertisements, particularly Meta ads, offer a scalable way to grow newsletters, especially when organic growth plateaus. However, it requires careful budgeting to ensure return on investment. Chenell advises at [31:58]31:58:

"Paid growth is a way to scale your newsletter, but it's crucial to monitor subscriber acquisition costs to maintain profitability."

b. Tom Alder’s Growth-as-a-Startup Approach

Tom Alder treats his newsletter like a startup, reinvesting revenue from sponsorships directly into growth efforts like paid ads and partnership programs. This reinvestment creates a sustainable growth loop. As Dylan mentions at [35:02]35:02:

"Reinvesting sponsorship revenue into growth activities like ads can create a continuous expansion cycle for your newsletter."

c. Sponsoring Other Newsletters

Sponsoring spots in established newsletters is an effective way to reach targeted audiences. While potentially costlier upfront compared to other methods, the quality of subscribers acquired through this channel tends to be higher. Chenell elaborates at [36:03]36:03:

"Sponsoring other newsletters can drive highly engaged subscribers who are already inclined to appreciate newsletter content."

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6. In-Person Strategies and Events

Despite the digital focus, in-person tactics remain powerful for building newsletter subscriptions.

a. The Gist’s Launch Party

The Gist hosted a local launch party requiring only an email address as entry. This grassroots approach resulted in acquiring a thousand subscribers overnight, leveraging community engagement without digital platforms. Chenell recounts at [38:03]38:03:

"Hosting a free event and simply asking attendees to subscribe can lead to significant subscriber boosts in a short time."

b. Payload’s Conference Outreach

Ari Lewis of Payload, a space industry newsletter, personally attends industry conferences armed with a clipboard to collect email signups. This direct approach, although challenging, effectively targets a niche audience. At [40:25]40:25:

"Taking a hands-on approach at industry events can yield high-quality subscribers who are genuinely interested in your newsletter’s focus."

c. Morning Brew’s Collegiate Beginnings

Morning Brew founders Alex Lieberman and Austin Reiff started by gathering email addresses on their college campus, using physical interactions to build their initial subscriber base. This method laid the foundation for their eventual sale to Business Insider for millions. As Chenell highlights at [41:12]41:12:

"Engaging directly with potential subscribers in person can create a strong initial foundation for your newsletter's growth."

d. Local Newsletters: Nap Scoop Example

Ryan from Nap Scoop, a local Annapolis newsletter, became a community staple by attending local events and prominently displaying his newsletter's branding. His consistent presence transformed him into a local celebrity, significantly increasing his subscriber base. Dylan observes at [42:13]42:13:

"For local newsletters, integrating into community events and being a recognizable figure can drive substantial subscriber growth."

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Conclusion

Chenell and Dylan wrap up the episode by reinforcing that growing a newsletter without social media is not only possible but can be highly effective through strategic SEO, cross promotions, guest postings, referral programs, paid growth, and in-person engagements. They encourage listeners to focus on creating exceptional content and leveraging diverse growth strategies to build a thriving, profitable newsletter.

As Dylan aptly puts it:

"It's a numbers game and you just got to kind of get out there and get your feet wet."
[22:49]

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This episode serves as a comprehensive guide for newsletter creators seeking to expand their reach beyond the confines of social media, offering actionable insights and real-world examples to inspire and inform.

Transcript

[A]

He actually goes to the industry conferences with like a clipboard and just like gets people to sign up for the email list. He definitely figured out the SEO game and was able to quietly, I will say, drive lots of revenue and lots of subscribers off the back of it.

[B]

His subject line was, your newsletter just made me mad. And I was kind of like, oh man, did I like piss somebody off. What did I do?

[A]

This is also like a little sneaky way to get on some bigger creators radars. They just started inviting all these local people to their event. Your ticket to get in was your email address. A thousand subscribers in one night is what they got. This is kind of an overlooked one, but honestly, I feel like it's something that just makes sense. Like, hey, I'm Chanel.

[B]

And I'm Jillian.

[A]

And welcome back to the Growth and Reverse podcast. If you're new here, I write a newsletter of the same name where I do deep dives on the biggest creators and how they grew their newsletters to 50,000 or more subscribers. And this is the podcast version of that. And I'm excited for this episode in particular because it's a topic I get asked about all the time.

[B]

Yeah, I'm excited too, because my initial gut reaction for this topic is kind of like, no way, this is not.

[A]

Going to work totally. But we're going to discuss how you can grow a newsletter without using social media. And a lot of us spend so much time on social to grow our newsletters, but we kind of don't love it and kind of sometimes feel like we almost don't have a choice.

[B]

But apparently we do have a choice.

[A]

We do have a choice. There are actually a lot of ways to grow your newsletter without using social media and focusing on the algorithms and what times to post and all that stuff. So we're going to share some ideas on how to do that and like.

[B]

Some really interesting examples of people who have done it what we think quite well and successfully. So I'm really excited to get in, get into this. So before we start though, we should maybe acknowledge the elephant in the room of your content actually needs to also be good as opposed to, um, you know, just doing all the growth hacks that are outside of social media and driving subscribers. Um, it's really important to think about content led growth and I think you should all are a great example of that. Where you started publishing your newsletter almost two years ago now, you were, you were active on social media to a degree at least, but really your newsletter spread like wildfire, I think because people were just talking about it and sharing it and, you know, sharing in their newsletters and on social media as well. So by virtue of it just being a really good and new, unique lens for the content you're sharing. So I think that's a caveat. It's important we get out of the way.

[A]

Yeah, I. I would agree with that one. I think it was almost like the one, two punch, because I was on social media and the content was unique, and so I think it got shared a lot and then people saw it on social too. So it is definitely like one of the ways that I grew so fast early on. So that was a good, good thing to call out, Dylan.

[B]

Yes. Okay, cool. So I think we're gonna touch on, let's see, about five or six different kind of general buckets, if you will, of ways people can grow their newsletters without using social media. And so the first one that kind of comes to mind, that might not be the most obvious1, is SEO. You've profiled a few newsletter operators who have kind of leveraged SEO and found quite a bit of success with it. And one of the first ones that comes to mind is Ben Collins, who writes a newsletter about Google Sheets tips.

[A]

Yes. Yes. Ben goes very in depth with his Google Sheets tips. Yes.

[B]

Yeah. And so he's strategic about it. Right. He didn't just write content and just hope it got discovered. He actually, like, leveraged Google searches to look for keywords all around Google Sheets and basically found the questions that people were asking, created content to kind of answer those questions, and really drove a decent amount of subscribers. I think he's got, you know, over 50,000 subscribers now. He's. He's made multiple six figures from courses and other product sales that he has now. But it's something that you would maybe look at his newsletter, not assume that that's how he got a lot of his subscribers.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. And he's definitely one of the ones that was more under the radar, I would say. I think I had seen his name around the space just for years and years, because I just kept finding every time I had a Google Sheets question, I'd like Google something, and I'd see Ben's blog pop up, and I'm like, oh, there he is again. And it's like, it worked. Yeah, he's not a very, like, outspoken person in his niche per se, but he definitely figured out the SEO game and was able to quietly, I will say, drive lots of revenue and lots of subscribers off the back of it. So that's a good example.

[B]

Yeah, he's done great. Another one that comes to mind is Pat Walls. He's almost like a even larger example of the success you can have with SEO. And I think he gets over 1.6 million visitors to Starter Story. He writes a Starter Story, website, newsletter, et cetera, via SEO. I would need to confirm if that's 1.6 million monthly or annually. I mean, who doesn't want 1.6 million visitors? Either way.

[A]

Either way, I'd take it.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he also did SEO a little bit more unconventionally, and he wasn't even doing it at first when he started. I think you wrote about this where he didn't start paying attention to SEO till a few years almost into doing Starter Story. And then. Do you want to talk about his Lean SEO framework or should I? Because I thought that was interesting too.

[A]

Yeah, he, he created a course around this too, which is really fascinating. But yeah, he was not focused on SEO at all. And he did admit that in one of his posts. And his framework was essentially to. To do research. So he'd find the opportunities through quick Google searching and maybe some tools on the other side. And then he would create like this shortened version of a post that he was thinking about creating. He'd call it like his minimum viable content. He'd create a bunch and then he would see which one actually started ranking and then he would double down on that content and go and like, really make that post more robust. So instead of spending like hours and hours on each article, he would spend a little bit of time on each one and then figure out what was actually working and yeah, run with it. Essentially, he said he didn't touch them for 30 days afterwards and he would just keep an eye on the traffic and the rankings and then just scale that from there.

[B]

I think that's really smart for a few reasons, but the main one being like, when I think about creating content, you know, that I want to rank in SEO, I just feel like overwhelmed with all the stuff that has to be done and to really go through that properly and do all the best practices and all that sort of thing. And so where you can create content, that is what he calls minimum viable content, which is a really, a really great term. You should probably trademark that. But yeah, I think that's really smart because, like, you don't have to spend hours and hours and hours and hours and days trying to figure this all out. Just write, you know, a half decent. I'd be curious how minimum this content is like, is it 250 words, or is it like, maybe a thousand? Either way, I'd be curious to find out how much time he spends on these. And then it seems like it's not much time. Like, this whole process probably only takes, you know, a day or so for each piece. So I think it's really smart the way he's done it.

[A]

Yeah, I'd agree with that. And knowing Pat, he's like a very smart guy and he'll figure out ways to build small tools that help his process along. So I'm sure there was something on the back end that, like, helped him. Not. I don't think AI was doing any of the writing back then, but maybe tools to help him find keywords or different, like, pull in the top 10 results on that page or that kind of thing. So I'm sure it wasn't a huge lift on his side.

[B]

No, probably not. And then yes or. Or yes. And he then, like you mentioned, created the Lean SEO, our framework for SEO traction. And he's created a course around that, which is like, like you said, we mentioned selling sawdust in another episode. This is like, prime example of like, hey, here's what I did to do this, and it worked for me. Do you want to learn how, you know, sign up for my course? Really smart. It obviously works if. If he's been able to make it work for him and then sell it to other people too.

[A]

So I think that was a really interesting one to come across.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. Very, very different. The last one that, that jumps to mind for, for SEO is Anilore, who owns, operates, runs the NIST Labs website. You call her a master interlinker, I believe is the word you called. She's just really leveraged all of her articles and she creates a lot of content. So yes, there is a lot of work behind the scenes to write this content, but it's really the backbone of her website, the backbone of her newsletter. And so she does a lot of interlinking between all these articles. And so you're going through her website and her content and one thing links to another, all really nicely.

[A]

Yeah. So when I found this, I was just laughing to myself because one of the core tenants of SEO, or used to be, because now Google's changed everything. Who knows? But one of the core tenants used to be if you link to, like, interlinking to your own articles, actually help those other ones rank if it was relevant to the topic. So just seeing her, like, link to all these things, a. It's good for user experience. Like if someone's reading and they're like interested in that one sentence and then you have a link to another article of yours, like you're keeping them in your ecosystem, they're going to be more likely to trust you and learn from you in the future. So I think it's super smart in that respect. But also for SEO, just like the technicality of it was just so smart because that is a main way that you were able to grow with SEO in the past. Yeah.

[B]

And she was getting from this strategy. This is back in, you know, caveat. This is September to November of 2022, so two years plus ago. But she was getting about 200,000 visits per month from Google. So what she's doing is obviously, or was at that time working really well. I'd be curious to see how she's doing now. But yeah, pretty impressive stuff for sure.

[A]

I just looked using Ahrefs, but Pat's traffic has gone up since I wrote that. Deep dive.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So he's continually getting more and more. But he's also on YouTube and stuff now too, which helps with search traffic, so. And Laura's, I feel like she kind of dropped a little bit, but I also know she just got her doctorate, so like, she's got other bigger, better things going on right now, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

Geez. Dr. Yeah. That's doesn't lend tons of time to publishing content on your website and your newsletter, so that makes sense for sure.

[A]

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[B]

All right, well, let's move on to our next category, which is one that I think we've both used in the past to sometimes to success, sometimes not. But you don't have to use social media for it, and that's cross promotions.

[A]

Cross promotions were definitely a big part of my growth in the beginning. I wouldn't say a big part. I would say they were a big part in me building relationships with other newsletter creators. I wouldn't say they drove like oodles of subscribers. Some did, some definitely did not. But the relationship side of this is a big piece to it.

[B]

It really is. And I think, you know, when you think about not again, not using social media to grow, this could be a really good strategy too, even with just by driving subscribers. Because instead of trying to create content, post game the algorithms all the time like people are doing on social media, you just need to basically find newsletters that you can pitch to, do cross promotions with or maybe people you're already, you already have some relationships with and do that. And an example of that is somebody who just fell into my inbox a few weeks ago. They responded to a newsletter that I had published and it was a really, a really unique subject line that caught my attention. So I opened it and then they basically said, love this article. Here's why I loved it. Definitely going to use this strategy. And then so they flatter me, buttered me up, caught my attention. And then, and then they're like, hey, would you want to do a cross promotion? And so, yes, it takes a little bit of work, especially if you're doing that, you know, that kind of unique cold outreach to people. If that's your cup of tea and social media is not, then this could be a lot of fun going through people's content and doing these cold pitches and stuff too. So there are ways to find other newsletters as well. When you not on social media. You and I have probably used a few of these.

[A]

Yes. Lettergrowth.com started by Paul Metcalf. He no longer runs it, but that was a really good one in the beginning, I think now I get a lot of spam pitches from that. Yep. People have decided that AI is the best method to reach out to every single person that's on there.

[B]

No. So no, do like the person who, if you're going to do cold outreach, be like the Guy who landed in my inbox saying, you're. I think that his, his subject line was your newsletter just made me mad. And I was kind of like, oh man, did I like piss somebody off? What did I do? But he got my attention, right? He was just. It was a clever way he got in my inbox. And so that can be a way to do it and not use AI and be like a real person.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. And then there's other newsletter directories I think you had called out inbox reads. I know there's a couple other ones too. One of the other ways is just like finding communities that you're already in. Like when I was in. Well, I'm still in Jay's J class's lab. I have found people in there to do cross promotions with. I mean, Growth in Reverse Pro growth. We'll just talk about that. People in there have done cross promotions, which has been awesome to see me.

[B]

Putting my hand up.

[A]

That was cool to see some in. In real time without me actually incentivizing that. That was cool. And then you can also look at like the creator network recommendations and Sparkloop as like, they're not necessarily cross promotion directories, but those people have newsletters and they're looking for other people to cross promote or just share their content with.

[B]

Beehive has the same thing. They'll have a directory that you can basically search through to. So there's. There's all these different platforms that are. Are basically sharing newsletter operators who want to grow. So that's another way to reach out. Um, one other really neat way that I believe we've talked about in another episode, but it's doing lead magnet swaps. So it's kind of a form of cross promotion. But what you're doing is you're cross promoting with lead magnets. And I guess the, the idea behind that is it's actually something that somebody can get value of right away as opposed to this standard, hey, here's a great newsletter. I'm loving subscribe it. This is like more of a. Here's something tactical or that you can use right away, depending of course on what the lead magnet is. But doing those swaps can work really well. And Brian Harris, who came into the Growth Reverse Pro community to talk all about that, I mean he's built a huge business based on that.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. He said he does like two of those a week now of just like swapping with other creators. I saw him do a workshop with Justin Moore recently. He's. I think he did something with Beehive this past week. Um, so he's just super, super good at that. He has a team around him now too, to help.

[B]

But I was gonna say.

[A]

Yeah, but even just if you can find one of these every other week or one a month or something to do, I think that's a really powerful way to grow your newsletter.

[B]

It really is. Um, one other way that you can benefit from kind of these. This type of cross promotion is doing like, free recommendation, free recommendations, I should say. So most people are familiar with the recommendations widgets that pop up. Whether you subscribe to a ConvertKit newsletter or a Beehive newsletter or a substack newsletter or the list goes on when you sign up. These days, almost everybody has a recommendation. Oh, also check out these newsletters. So oftentimes those are paid, so there is obviously money being exchanged on the back end there. But there's also free recommendations. So if you find somebody who has a similar audience to you or maybe a complimentary audience, somebody that would benefit from your newsletter and vice versa, then. Or your newsletter audience, I should say, then you could put them into your recommendations widget and promote them for free and they can do the same for you. The challenge there is like, how much traffic is everybody driving to their signup page? Um, that's something you. You'd have to determine, but it is just another way that you can drive some signups in a. Maybe a lower lift way. That could scale a little bit easier too.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. This is also like a little sneaky way to get on some bigger creators radars. Um, I've had people recommend like, lots of subscribers, like over a hundred subscribers to me, and I'm like, I had no clue who this person was. And now I'm like, I subscribe to their newsletter, I'm following their content just to like, see how they're doing things. Um, so I think that's an interesting way to kind of, you know, get on someone's radar too.

[B]

Wait, you mean they recommended hundreds of subscribers to you in the widget?

[A]

In the widget?

[B]

Yeah, like you were scrolling and scrolling and scrolling.

[A]

Like they signed up for creator network recommendations and they. Yeah, added me to their widget.

[B]

Oh, okay. Okay, okay, okay.

[A]

Yeah, got it. Sorry. I thought when you.

[B]

I thought when you sign up to their newsletter, like, you know how the window pops up. It just was like hundreds of recommendations. Okay.

[A]

No, they sent me like free subscribers through their recommendations widget. And so when I got through your attention. Yeah, because sometimes I go through and I look at who's recommending me and stuff. And I saw that and I was like, whoa, this is awesome. So it was Jason from PMM Files was actually the guy I did not know. He was not on my radar at all. Shout out to Jason.

[B]

And he is now because he was recommending me driving traffic. Yep, that's a new strategy. I haven't heard that one. I like that. That's what we do here. That's what we do here. Might have to read about that. Okay, let's. Anything else you want to cover on the cross promotions or should we move on to our next.

[A]

Yeah, no, I think that's. That's a good one.

[B]

I think this next topic is kind of in the same vein as a cross promotion because you are getting in front of other people's audiences with a cross promotion. In this case, you're doing the same thing, but it's not just through newsletters. So this topic is other people's audience and. Or, you know, guest starring as I guess starred on the Growth in Reverse blog a few months ago writing about this topic. Very meta like. So, yeah, we've got a list of a few people who've done this really well. Do you want to. Do you want to grab one of these and. And share how they did it?

[A]

Yeah, sure. So the first one that comes to mind that every time I hear the word guest post, I think of is Lenny Rachitsky. And everyone like his newsletter now is like, I think it's over a million subscribers. And so people. Oh, it's 870,000. Sorry, not there yet.

[B]

Basically a million.

[A]

But people are always like, oh, I'll never be like Lenny, whatever. Like, you know, they just get. So. It just seems so far out of reach. He was writing on medium and he wrote like one post, I think, and then he wrote on first round, which is. Was his friend Andrew Chen, his website. And so he actually wrote a guest post there and that's how he got his first. Like, I can't remember the exact number right now, but that's how he got his first few subscribers on his email list. And because some of these compound. Right. So that article also showed up in search for a while. So he was getting search traffic from that first round article. And so it just like over time he was continuing to get these subscribers. So I thought that was an interesting one that most people don't think of. It looks like he got. Yeah, he did two guest posts and they got him to a thousand subscribers.

[B]

There you go. Two guest posts, thousand subscribers. It's yeah, it's easy. It's not that easy. But like. But it is that. It's that simple though, right? Like, yeah, we don't have to overcomplicate things. And he wasn't using social media. It was, it was. Again, it's something that you can do. You don't have to be a slave to the algorithm. I mean, slave to maybe an SEO algorithm to some degree. You know, I'm sure you know somebody who, in your network who you could reach out to, ask if you can at least do guest posts. And you can also, you know, do the cold pitch thing too, to certain people, just like that guy cold pitched me recently. And it worked. So it's one way to do it. Um, another one that comes to mind that I love is the Cody Sanchez strategy. And that's basically going on any and every podcast you possibly can imagine. Because, like, to bring some context to this, I was on Twitter quite a bit through the pandemic, and, you know, Cody's face and name just started appearing everywhere. It wasn't, you know, just by happy accident. She was like going on all the podcasts I was listening to. She was getting retweeted by people I was following. She was just everywhere. And it was a byproduct of her basically going on all of these podcasts all of the time.

[A]

Yeah, she did a lot. When I was doing the research, I think my Spotify playlist was like 70 plus hours long. Maybe like a hundred hours. It was ridiculous. Like, there was no way I was gonna be able to listen to em all. But I actually tried to put together a, like a visual and we can share that with her growth timeline. I tried to map out all of the podcasts she was on at the time. And so some months she had seven plus published that she was on, which is like insane. And. Yeah, but most months it was at least two or three. So it's just wild. And you think like, not every podcast gets published in the same month that was recorded. But, you know, I feel like there's some consistency here to what her strategy was of just like in the beginning. And she even said that she would go back to some of the people that she knew from her finance background and that kind of thing, and they had podcasts and she'd go on. So it was just a very interesting strategy.

[B]

It really is like. And she did it strategically too, where she was like launching a newsletter and so she was going on. It was kind of like how when you have a book launch going, you're Getting as much media as you possibly can. Right. So she was doing that but for her newsletter. And her newsletter now has like 800,000 plus subscribers and she's doing all right. So it was a really good strategy to really launch the Contrarian thinking brand and it's worked out really well for her.

[A]

Yeah. And even just doing the recent Justin Moore deep dive, he also has been on lots of podcasts and I think I saw a tweet of his that was like, even if you get two people to listen to that episode, like, even if that person has no subscribers, they only have a few listeners, it's worth it because A, you're getting the experience, especially in the beginning, you're probably not going to be great on podcasts and B, those two people could eventually hire you for something. So it's like it's a numbers game and like math is math. You just got to kind of get out there and get your feet wet.

[B]

It is. And I think, I think about the podcast I've been on and those are like, those are established relationships that are definitely, that can be, I don't want to say leverage, because it sounds like I'm. There's like an ulterior motive. But like, if you go on someone's podcast, they're going to remember you. They're going to, you know, appreciate what you did. You built some kind of relational equity or relationship equity there. And if there ever comes a time where you're, you might want some support with promoting something or whatever it is, maybe coming on your podcast, then they're just gonna be that much more likely to do so. So it's a real strong relationship builder too. So there's multiple reasons why I think it's a, it's a good strategy. There's one last one I want to quickly talk about and I, I tweeted out, kind of in prep for this episode, I sent a tweet out saying, is it possible to grow a newsletter without using social media? And I got a few replies and one of them was from Josh Spector, who some of you might be familiar with. He's at J. Spector on Twitter. And, and he wrote basically a hundred percent yes. And he kind of gave this a lot more in depth response than a lot of people did. And he shared kind of the idea of, let's say you have like zero social media audience to really leverage to grow your newsletter. You can still create really great content and you probably are anyway, that you maybe are even publishing in your newsletter that you're not. You're struggling to promote cause you don't have a social media, social media audience. And he's basically like suggests, similar to what we've talked about about doing this outreach. So you create great content. You reach out to people who have much larger audiences and ask if you can basically kind of have them guest posted on your behalf or share it for you and have those people kind of promote your content on their own. Of course, there's got to be something in it for them. Really what you're doing there is you're kind of using other people's audiences again to get people to your content. So an example he gives is if he was starting from scratch, he says he'd write some amazingly valuable piece of content and then instead of posting it on his own account where he has no followers, he would give it to someone else to publish to their thousands of followers in exchange for them promoting his newsletter. So they get free content, he gets free promotion. So of course you'd have to find the right people to align with that would have the content, I guess the audience who'd be interested in the content. But it could be a way that you could, you could definitely get some content promoted without having to do the algorithmic slave audience building thing.

[A]

Yeah. And this is almost just like the same thing that Brian Harris does, but via social, it sounds like.

[B]

So you're just going, you're leveraging for algorithms rather than inboxes.

[A]

Awesome. Well, I think the next. If we move on to referral programs, slash giveaways, I'm excited to see what you have to say about this one. I know there are a number of good referral programs that I've seen just in the research I've done. The first one that comes to mind is definitely Thomas Shields from the Dink, which is a pickleball newsletter. So not business related at all. And he has a referral program where he's partnered with these well known brands. So if you're playing pickleball, you need a paddle, you need balls, you need, you know, all this stuff. And so he's partnered with some of these brands and if you refer enough people to his newsletter, a free pickleball paddle or a free set of pickleballs. Ah. When I saw this, I was just like, what? This is so good.

[B]

And didn't you. Were you kind of wondering how he was like justifying the cost of all this?

[A]

Yes, I was. And I, I think it was just he did it through partnerships. And so I think he was. And this is a little questionable, but I Think the brands also get the people's email lists? I'm not sure. Like, they also get their email address.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So there's gotta be some legalese in there somewhere.

[B]

But yeah, some terms and conditions kind of thing that he probably has. But I think one thing that you wrote about here that other people probably don't think about with a referral program is it can be like potential advertising. Right. Basically, like these brands are all getting in front of their ideal audiences just in, in the form of a referral program. So whether or not they even get to the referral point of winning that free paddle now, they'll be like, oh, wait, I need a pickleball paddle. I'm going to check out X brand that, that Tom from the Dink is promoting. Like, it's just a, a way to get your, your brand in front of people. So really interesting strategy that he used.

[A]

And I actually, because I had published. So I used my referral link in the deep dive because I knew some people would sign up. I just wanted to see how the back end worked of it. And I actually ended up getting a free set of pickleballs, which is cool. I don't even play pickleball yet, but dang. Yeah, so that was fun. Never got the paddle, but that's okay.

[B]

You need to refer a few more people. I think.

[A]

I do. I do.

[B]

Well, that kind of. This kind of goes in line with Al Solis from SEO fomo, who did something sort of similar. Similar, but different. So she has a strong referral program in that, like her first few referral tiers, if you will, are really easy to achieve. And not only are they easy to achieve, then you. It's like a pretty decent incentive. Three referrals and you get a shout out on Twitter from her. And she's got a decent sized following on Twitter. If you send five, she includes you in a supporter section in the newsletter. Now some people aren't going to care about that. And so that's fair. Back in the day, especially when, you know, Twitter shoutouts were probably a little bit more valuable than they might be now, that was, that was something that was really driving a lot of referrals for her. And I think this probably isn't a hot take, but maybe it's a hot take. The most important rewards are the ones that people are going to get right away in your referral program. Yes. People will see like a new backpack or a trip for 500, like nobody's going to get there. Or most. 99.9% of people aren't going to get there and you're almost never going to give those away. What really matters is making those first one or two reward tiers, like attainable and desirable. And so I think she did a really good job with that. The other thing she did was she leveraged giveaways really well. And when I was working at Sparkloop, I wrote about this, but essentially she writes about SEO. So she reached out to all these different SEO tools and courses and essentially said, I will feature you in my giveaways, because she did milestone giveaway. So when she was about to hit, like 10,000 subscribers, she did this big giveaway and the reward was she awarded X amount of winners, like basically free year of, like, Ahrefs or 50% off this great SEO course. Or she really, like, basically cost her nothing to get these rewards. And it was really sought after by her readers, so they're more incentivized to share it because, like, who doesn't want a year of free SEO tools or courses and stuff like that? So I thought it was really interesting way that she used giveaways to grow her audience.

[A]

A really interesting one. I think the theme here is like, finding brands that your readers are going to want something from and go partner with them.

[B]

It sounds so obvious, but it's sometimes. Sometimes it's not.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. I think the other one was from the recent deep dive I wrote on Justin Moore. I don't want to bring him up again, but it's fresh in my mind. So he did. This one was really cool. He did secret sponsorship research. So essentially his team would go out and find recent partnerships they found with other creators that were doing them, and they would try and figure out, like, who the actual person is that you should contact at that brand. So Justin writes all about sponsorships, how to get more of your ideal sponsorships, and so he shares how to do it, but he doesn't always give away the details. So in this, all you had to do was refer one person to his newsletter and you unlock this extra content content in his weekly email. So he uses like some code on the back end to essentially say, if this person gets one referral, unlock this box every week. And it's like, here's the brand, here's the person you should contact, and here's either their email address, their LinkedIn profile, or some easy way to get in touch with them, which is like, how much more could he give you to go get brand sponsorships? It's like the last piece of the puzzle and it's it was so good. And it's only one referral.

[B]

Exactly, one referral.

[A]

Love that.

[B]

It's genius. And he puts it, at least he used to. I don't know if he still does, but when I was looking this up, he put it behind like this like lock image, like a padlock sort of image as well in his newsletter. So like just teases you that much more. Like just make one referral and you'll unlock, you know, this content that's all blurred out that you can't see.

[A]

So good.

[B]

Cool. Let's move on to paid growth. Let's talk about maybe briefly. I don't know if we need to go too in depth. A lot of people are pretty familiar with paid growth, but still it is something that you don't have to rely on social media in terms of like posting content, getting followers, growing an audience that way. Yes, paid growth. Often you will have to rely on social media to pay them to send you subscribers. So I just want to make that clear that when we say this is how you can grow your newsletter without using social media, we're talking more about the organic, audience growing way. Because obviously with paid growth you're probably going to use, you know, meta ads. Facebook, Instagram, potentially Twitter X LinkedIn.

[A]

Yep, exactly. So it's definitely a couple of ways. Like with meta ads, I feel like this is some of the most straightforward. Especially after you're hitting like 15, 20,000 subscribers, it gets a little harder to grow organically. So by adding a little extra oomph with paid ad spend, you can definitely continue to grow your newsletter that way.

[B]

And there's a, I mean we could list out tons and tons of newsletters who have done this and outwardly, you know, share how they're doing it too. There's agencies that do it for you, but really like it is, it is a way to, if you have the capital to invest, really to kind of scale your growth. And actually that brings me to Michael Hauk from Houck's newsletter because you've written about him, you've done a deep dive on him. We interviewed him back when I was working at Sparkloop as well and I did a write up on his strategy and he really likes thinking of newsletters basically like a startup or the way he thinks about his newsletters, like a startup. So essentially any revenue it brings in he just reinvests right into growing it. He was getting a bit of sponsorship revenue, so all that revenue went straight back into growth and he was just growing and growing via meta ads. He was using Sparkloop Partner program at the time and really just basically creating this flywheel of the more he grows, the more he'll earn, which means the more he'll grow.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. He's definitely a good example of someone who's used that to grow pretty well.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I think the funny thing here is like the meta ads, I guess in my head there are like two types of newsletters, right. There's like the media forward newsletters, like the next one, the Pour Over With Jason, which is like a, I think it's like three times a week now. So it's like these more media focused ones versus like the personal brand type newsletters. And I feel like the media focused ones are really, you almost have to use paid growth at a certain point with your personal brand type newsletters. You can after a certain point, but you want to make sure, you know, like how much you're bringing in per subscriber and what the payback period is so that you're not, you know, putting out $10,000 in paid ads and only getting back $1,000. Like that's not a great, great method either. So.

[B]

Yeah, well, I think it really depends on how you're. You're monetizing too, right? With, yeah, with these media brands, it's all about impressions. And so if they're a large bulk of them are selling sponsorships based on, you know, CPM and they need, they need the bigger audience to really justify the spend, then that's what it is. It's just a numbers game. And when we're talking about maybe some of these smaller ones who are more personal brands, maybe like this next one, you're. I see you're about to talk about. That's where it's like, no, you've got to, you've got to kind of get established, figure out what. You're got to be a little bit more careful, I think. I mean the media brands do this as well. But I think you, you definitely need to pay a lot of attention to how much it costs to get a subscriber, how much they're worth. Really be careful that you're not spending way too much money to acquire subscribers when you're not figuring out how to monetize them properly and how much you're actually getting per subscriber too.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. I think it's, it's a, definitely a dicey road if you don't figure out the numbers ahead of time.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But yeah, so I think called out Tom Alder. Do you actually want to take this one.

[B]

Sure. Yeah. So Tom Alder writes strategy breakdowns and he was very, very smart in growing his newsletter with social media in the beginning. But he also was not shy to spend on paid growth too. So he outwardly has discussed and shared, even in some kind of like year in review articles that he's published that he leveraged Sparkloop, refined Beehive boosts. I believe he's even started doing meta ads. Chanel, I know you did a write up on him recently, so you might be able to speak to that.

[A]

Yeah, I'm not sure if he's doing meta ads.

[B]

Okay. He's, he has definitely used those other three to some extent and they've driven about 21ish percent of his subscribers to this point at least last, last we checked. So there's, there's a way to even combine, you know, paid growth with social media. And Tom, I mean, he was really is really good at LinkedIn and drove, I think 5,000 subscribers before he had ever even published one edition of his newsletter. But he also wanted to invest some money into paid growth, and that's just another way to do it.

[A]

I think the other one that I want to touch on real quick before we move on from paid growth is ads and other newsletters. So I think this is kind of an overlooked one. But honestly, I feel like it's something that just makes sense. Like if you're looking to get newsletter subscribers, where better to go find subscribers than other newsletters, right? So if you're able and willing to sponsor other people's newsletters, uh, this can be a really interesting and good way to grow. And I think the caveat here is like, with all of this stuff, the quality is really the key piece. So, you know, if a meta ad is driving, you know, a quality bar of like five, maybe a newsletter ad is driving someone who's actually more of like a 7 out of 10, they're actually going to open more emails. They are native to newsletters, if you will. So they've already shown that they enjoy reading newsletters. So I feel like while they might come off a little expensive on the front end, it might actually pay off better on the back end. So this is something I want to test out more in the future, just trying to see if we can't grow the newsletter with sponsoring other newsletters.

[B]

I love it. Have you, have you done any of that before in the past?

[A]

I recently bought sponsor spots in Adriana's newsletter because she just started doing sponsorships and she has great content. So I know her readers are really. They. They love reading her content. She does a great job with it. So I was willing to take that chance and see what happens.

[B]

The. The rating system too, that you just like a 5 versus a 7 out of 10. I've been thinking about this idea of subscriber, the saturation level of your subscribers. And I guess I think of, like, how saturated are your subscribers with, like, really good, engaged, interested subscribers versus, you know, you know, 2 out of 10 or actually. Actually care about your content versus the other eight who maybe subscribed through a meta ad and have never opened a single edition or it's gone to their spam folder and they've never found it. So, Yeah, I think that's a really good way to think about it too. So newsletters would probably have a higher saturation rate than some of their methods, for sure.

[A]

Yeah. I think the last one that I wanted to kind of bring up was, like, in person stuff and events. I remember doing a deep dive on the gist. It's a newsletter that's focused on spreading sports for essentially the other half of the population. Because they initially went out there saying it was sports for women, and now it's like, sports for people who aren't, like, sporty, I guess, if you will.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[A]

Yeah, I don't. Yeah. So they actually ran an event in the beginning, and they did, like, a launch party for their newsletter. So they got together, they went out to some local businesses in their area, and they got the food and the drinks all, like, paid for by these businesses because they were getting free promotion, essentially. And they just started inviting all these local people to their event. And your ticket to get in was your email address. So you didn't have to buy a ticket, you didn't have to do anything. And they just asked everyone, they did like, a little speech at the beginning, like, hey, we're the gist. Go sign up. And they said, if you. We would love it if you would just share this with one friend. And most people at the event did because they just got a free party, essentially. Yeah. And so overnight, they actually ended up with, like, a lot of subscribers. A thousand subscribers in one night is what they got.

[B]

Not too shabby.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And they also had fun. So it was like.

[A]

And they had fun. And they're like, associating their brand with a fun event.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like, showcasing that. Like, this isn't, I don't know, just some random newsletter that you're signing up for.

[B]

No, I think there's a lot of opportunity to Be different and dive into. Go deeper into experiences with newsletters than, you know, what we've been accustomed to over the last four or five years. So this is a really cool example of how.

[A]

Yeah. And the other one that I recently learned about, Payload is a newsletter about space, the space industry. So it's really just for people in that industry. And the founder, Ari Lewis, he actually goes to the industry conferences with, like, a clipboard and just, like, gets people to sign up for the email list. He said it was super, like, hard to get them to because they're. They're like old school. Right. They're a little bit. They're not really, like, sitting in front of their email all day. And so that was the only way to do it was just like, hey, sign up with the clipboard. And. Yeah, so he just goes to industry events, and that's how he really got that newsletter off the ground. I think now he's probably growing in different ways, but they probably still have a presence at those. That. Those conferences.

[B]

I love these grassroots strategies. Like, just, like, so old school, just get your clipboard, go out and ask people for email addresses. That's amazing. I mean, it's kind of a hybrid of that between what the Gist did and what Palo did is what Morning Brew did, right?

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. So Alex Lieberman and Austin Reiff, they started Morning Brew out of their college campus, and they essentially went through college classes also I think, with a clipboard and just, like, write down your email address. And I think Austin used to say that, like, they did. They couldn't read all of the email addresses, so they would add, like, every permutation of what they thought that, like, if it was, you know, Chanel, but they thought it might be spelled a different way, they'd, like, add the other one, too.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Just to make sure they got them. And that's how they kind of started that. And now it's. I mean, they sold for multiple. Multiple millions. So.

[B]

Yes. Yes to Business Insider.

[A]

Yeah, all from a clipboard.

[B]

The other aspect, too, that really helped them grow once they got that initial traction, was I think they were kind of the pioneers of the refer a few friends get a free Morning Brew mug. And it just. The tie in there was like, you know, the Morning Brew, literally called Morning Brew. You've got a mug where you hold your Morning Brew of coffee. Like, it just. It was brilliant. It worked. It worked, like, wonders for them. So there's a few different strategies they used here that basically altogether avoid social media. So really a really great example of how you can do it.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. And um, and then I guess with the other in person stuff is just like going to conferences, holding your own events. Um, I think the Dink does this pretty well. They actually go to like pickleball competitions. Pickleball? Yeah, Tournaments, Yeah. Um, and they have like a truck that has like the logo on the side and like, so it's just getting your brand out there in different ways is, is very interesting.

[B]

And I think if you're running a local newsletter, that's even more important too. And it's like such. I don't say easy because of course nothing is easy. But it's a simple. You don't have to overthink it. It's like go out to events. If you're running a local newsletter, show up there. I know his name escapes me, but the guy that runs the Scoop, the Naptown Scoop, Ryan from Nap Scoop, he, he goes to events and he, especially in the beginning when he was really trying to grow his newsletter, he would be wearing his jacket with his logo on it. And he basically got to the point where he went to so many of these things that he has basically half of the town subscribed to his newsletter of Annapolis, Maryland. And, and he, he's kind of a local celebrity and it's not, that's not the reason why he, you know, started the newsletter. But people know his face and you know, there's pros and cons to all that sort of stuff, depending how public in the public eye you want to be. But just like getting out there and into the real world is, is definitely gonna help you, especially if you're running a more local, locally focused newsletter.

[A]

Yeah. And if you read the stories of any like, major entrepreneur or like marketing book, one of the big things you'll read is like, do the things that don't scale. And I think this is like a clear example of doing the things that don't scale. Like in the beginning it might seem like, oh, well, it's only four subscribers here, four subscribers there. But over time that can add up quick. So yeah, do the things that don't scale in the beginning.

[B]

Especially if your content is so good that people are sharing it, those four subscribers turn into eight, turn into 20 and compounds. Right. So exactly like how I tied that back into the very beginning.

[A]

We're just going to keep hammering people with. Right. Better content.

[B]

That's right. That's right. Oh man. Well, this has been. I don't know, I really enjoy the conversation. So thanks for chatting about this.

[A]

Likewise. Yeah, we'll have all the links and everything in the show, notes to those newsletters if you want to check them out. Until next time, take care.

[B]

It.