The non-scientific, non-scammy way to grow your newsletter

There’s nothing quite like the thrill of getting your first newsletter subscriber—especially the first subscriber you don’t know (sorry, Mom!). Someone else out there thinks like you, wants to read more of what you’re writing. Grandiose visions of newsletter success dance before your eyes.

Until the signups slow down, the unsubscribes creep up, and the devil on your shoulder says maybe you’re not cut out for it after all.

Neither extreme is correct, of course. No single subscriber validates all of your hard work, any more than one detractor invalidates it.

What each offers is a lesson to learn, a chance to refine your newsletter’s focus into something you want to write a million words about over the next decade. Your newsletter has a purpose, has people who want to read it. It’s time to refine that—and turn it into a community.

You’ve got a good thing going on

Your first few subscribers prove you’re doing something right. You might not know exactly what, though.

Did someone influential share your writing, or did something you wrote strike a chord in a particular community? Did your friends ask their friends to subscribe? Did they stumble across your website, subscribe to your newsletter, and read every issue?

Check your stats, especially your referrer data, to glean which website sent subscribers your way. Search for your newsletter’s domain on social networks and communities, to see if others shared it.

Then ask your readers. The real people behind those email addresses are your best sounding board. Email them, as a group or individually, to say hi (they’ll like that personal touch, at any rate). Ask how they discovered your newsletter, and what they’ve liked about it so far. Survey them about their likes and desires, hopes and fears (at least as they relate to your newsletter’s theme).

You’ll likely get some nice replies. With luck, you’ll get some honest ones that share what they truly found interesting about your newsletter—a positive reply loop. You’ll discover the real reason people read your writing.

That’s where you can start to narrow your email newsletter’s audience.

Imagine only some of the people

Because before your list can grow, you have to accept that your newsletter is not for everyone. No newsletter is.

Your newsletter, instead, should be for someone very specific. Define why people like this need newsletters like yours. Give your newsletter a North Star.

Why do people read The Economist? To be generally informed of world affairs, to get a broader perspective on the news a bit after the fact, and—perhaps—to be seen in public reading the publication of movers and shakers.

Why do people read The Lancet? Presumably not because they collect surgical knives or are concerned about their health. No, people are inclined to pay $253 for 52 issues of medical research only if they’re a medical professional.

Each publication has a job to be done, “what the customer hopes to accomplish” with the product as Clayton Christensen describes it. If The Economist helps a business traveler generally know what’s going on in the world when they walk into a boardroom, or The Lancet gives a doctor a heads-up on a new treatment, those publications accomplished their job.

Same for your email-powered publication, regardless of audience size.

Dig deep. “Pick a niche, then go 2 levels deeper,” recommends Matt McGarry. Anyone can write; only you can write your newsletter. Make it so uniquely yours that it won’t be for everyone. Make it only for the few, the crazy ones, the ones who will want to read every issue you send.

Matt Levine did that for people who obsess about finance news—and that everything, apparently, can be securities fraud—with his Money Stuff newsletter. Ben Thompson’s Stratechery for the intersection of tech and strategy. Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters From an American for the history behind today’s news. It doesn’t have to be so serious, either. Mandy Brown’s A working library centers around her reading; Laura and Ethan’s Occasional Puzzles delivers exactly what the name promises.

Every bit as important is knowing who your newsletter is not for. It’s for people who make pour over third-wave coffee, not for decaf coffee producers. It’s for trail runners prepping for marathons, not for sprinters or couch-to-5k beginners. It’s for these people, not those. That’s your niche.

As you hone in, ensure this increasingly niche topic is one that you love enough to write about, week in and week out. “What topics give you energy to think about, write about, and talk about? What saps you of energy? Spend more on the former and less on the latter,” advises Lenny Rachitsky. That’s how to keep consistently publishing, year in, year out. It’s how, presumably, Levine has published Money Stuff and Thompson Stratechery for over a decade.

“All that matters is do people want what you're selling,” says Not Boring developer Andy Allen. Selling, and sending in the case of newsletters. By virtue of making something that some people really want, you’ll make something that other people don’t want as much. That’s good. It means the people who are on your wavelength know that yours is the newsletter for them.

Go where the people are

Then, find where those folks hang out. At parks and trails, perhaps, for a running newsletter. Meetups for startups, expos for industry, parks and playgrounds for moms, roasters for coffee enthusiasts.

Email newsletters live in the ether, but your readers live in the real world. They hang out with other people who would also likely be ideal readers for your publication. You need to go where they are.

“The newsletter writing process is really about finding your people,” says Ellen Donnelly. And as Minted Story found, a number of influential newsletters used real-life communities to kickstart their subscriber base. The Gist threw a party. Morning Brew pitched their newsletter directly to economics students after lectures. Check Meetup, join local clubs, visit expos, become a regular at local businesses. Hang out with folks in your niche.

Online communities can work as well (they’re just less fun). Most of my early newsletter subscribers came from Hacker News, from articles written with an eye to that audience. Your audience might hang out in LinkedIn or Subreddits or forums or Facebook groups. Go there. Participate. You’ll glean ideas for newsletter issues, and earn a chance to share your newsletter with each new connection.

Or, start a new community around your newsletter, like the Gist team throwing a party. Community builder Rosie Sherry, when asked how she’d grow a new newsletter to 100 subscribers, said: “I would start a weekly roundup newsletter and focus on sharing people’s work.” Each time you reach out and ask someone if you could interview them, or let them know that you featured their work in your newsletter, you get a new chance to share your newsletter with new folks. It’s the one-on-one interactions that, over time, snowball into a sizable audience (and, if you’re lucky, new friends).

The specifics vary for your tribe, but you should be having open-ended, two-way conversations with new people—ideally in person—at least a couple times a month. It’s good for your soul, equally good for your newsletter.

Go the distance, now you’re not gonna stop

With focus, real-life ideas, and new followers in hand, it’s time to go back to your main newsletter job: Writing. It’s not that you have to write every day, but it is that you have to write consistently.

Once a day, once a week, even once a month: Any schedule can work for your publication. Pick one and stick to it as much as possible. Don’t publish so frequently that you run out of things to say, nor so infrequently that readers forget who you are. 

You’ll lose some readers whenever you send an email; that’s normal. Perhaps your niche isn’t exactly their niche. Perhaps they’re just on a quest to Inbox Zero and want fewer distractions. Regardless, don’t let the fear of losing subscribers keep you from clicking Send. You’ll lose more readers the longer you wait, as folks will forget they’d subscribed to your list.

With each new issue, you’ll build anticipation for your next newsletter, earn the trust of readers who are increasingly less likely to churn. You’ll become one of the leading voices in your field, as weeks of dedication to the topic turn into years. “Sure, followers are cool,” says Benjamin Watkins, but “what's cooler is finding your voice and not losing it to the academy of arrogant and dry writing."

The only way to do that is by putting in the work of writing, refining, and sending your newsletter. Again, and again.

And another one, and another one

Email lists, relationships, communities: They’re built one person, one relationship at a time.

Sure, that breaks down at scale. The millionth subscriber to the New York Times’ newsletters isn’t really part of a community, any more than you’re a New Yorker when you transit through JFK.

But you’re not building mass media, today. “You don’t need 1000 subscribers,” says Josh Spector. “You need 1 subscriber x 1000.”

That’s where the little wins add up. One reply to a reader earns their loyalty, makes them less likely to churn, more likely to recommend your list to others. One real-life meetup leads to a new subscriber or two—or an idea for your next email that you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise. One upvote on Hacker News or Reddit leads someone to share your newsletter with their audience. The journey begins when you launch, and continues every time you hit send, again.

Don’t be afraid to advertise your newsletter and ask for signups. But also, don’t ignore the core work of refining your niche, building community, and writing stuff you’d want to read.

You started your newsletter for the love of your topic, for the craft of writing about it. What got you here will get you there, one issue and subscriber at a time.

Header image by Jeremy Bishop via Unsplash