3 ways to start & scale your newsletter
If you’re about to jump into your first newsletter, or looking for ways to boost subscribers, here are three ways to get it right…
1. Think about your why
Why start a newsletter?
Duh Rachael…to get more sales, obvs.
A newsletter is a great ‘shop window’, but before you start blasting your peeps with too many salesy messages, think a little bit more about the human behind the email address.
Why? It’s easy to sell low-price commodities from a few emails, but for those of us offering coaching support or 121 services, it’s unlikely our subscribers are going to go from reading our newsletters to jumping straight into a coaching tete-a-tete with us.
So think about…
- Who’s gonna buy from me?
- And why?
- And what are they most likely to buy?
What’s the next easy step your subscribers can take, is it
- Buy a low-cost online course or resource?
- Sign up for a free webinar?
- Reply to your email?
- Book a free call with you?
Newsletter growth is a long game, and IMO the funnest way you to grow a biz.
But it does take some commitment, SO before you sign up for MailChimp and start riffing on stuff, think about WHY you wanna start.
My why: to have more conversations with my ideal clients.
The more I get to know my audience, the more value I can deliver — and the more value I give, the greater the return, for them and me.
So, I want my readers to hit reply and ask questions, or comment.
I want them to share my work with others.
So, I’ll make sure there’s a conversation starter at the end of the newsletter and a big bloody share button!
Y’know there are other reasons to start a newsletter, aside from sales
Build a network. The people who sign up for your newsletter have more than money to offer — they have connections, advice, support, and ideas. Leverage this community of fans to test out ideas, get feedback, build partnerships, or come together around a common cause. FemStreet is a great example of this
Generate revenue via ad space — Business guru Josh Spector earns $48k per year from his relatively small email list. His list is so well curated and niched down that advertisers pay him $200 per day for this wee line….
2. Think about the value you provide
Heads up: your newsletter’s success depends on your ability to provide value to an audience, not your ability to extract it from them.
So, do you know what they’ll value?
In most cases, value is rooted in transformation.
If your newsletter topic helps your audience get from Point A to Point B, it will transform them and that’s valuable.
Try to fill in the blanks on this sentence:
My newsletter will help [Target Audience]
solve [Problem/Challenge]
by sharing [Content/Solution]
Here’s my newsletter value statement:
My newsletter helps purpose-minded entrepreneurs
get over ‘growing a biz’ overwhelm
by sharing ways to market their biz that feel good and create powerful connections
TL:DR: What’s the value you add? Think of your newsletter like a paid offer and get clear on why your reader needs your thoughts in their inbox.
If you need a hand working out why people should sign up to your newsletter, book in a free call with me x
3. Boost them sign-ups!
If you have a clear why and an even clearer sense of the value you provide, then getting (the right) people to sign up is soooo much easier.
If you’re struggling to get interest in your newsletter, pick 2 quick wins and 1 ‘rainy afternoon’ task from the following list…
- Get your shop window sorted; create a separate landing page on your website (include your value statement above), add an (obvious link) onto your homepage and add a link on your email signature
- Before you send out your newsletter, preview it on your fave social channel
- After you’ve sent your newsletter, post snippets on social with a link to a sign up page
- Update your social bios with newsletter sign-up
- Encourage shares by adding a share button on the bottom of your newsletter
- Include testimonials that attest to how darn useful your newsletter is — sprinkle them on social and add them to your sign-up page.
- Pick one of your most valued/opened newsletters & promote the topic to leaders in your community. Create a pitch around the topic and offer to be a guest on a podcast or at a speaking event.
- Consider a newsletter swap; ask one of your fave business buddy’s to write to your list about something they’ll value, and do the same for your biz chum.
- Interview other people in your field and include in your newsletter; they get exposure to your list and in return you can ask to share it with their list and on social.
- Add links to other wonderful content that you know your audience will dig. It could be links to articles or other people’s offers, even those in the same field as you! If you think it’s of value to your audience, include it. (And watch as the law of influence does it thing!)
Did you notice one thing missing from the above list?
Create a high-value lead magnet and promote it everywhere.
This is standard marketing advice, has been forever, and maybe it works.
BUT, in my experience (after downloading 000s of freebies and then promptly unsubscribing from the emails) I’m not so sure anymore.
Are we now more discerning about what gets past our virtual velvet ropes and into our in-box?
I’m curious: how often do you subscribe just to get a free resource, then ignore the emails or quickly unsubscribe?
I’d love you to hit reply and let me know x
