How to Grow Your Newsletter

Growing a premium newsletter in today's saturated market requires a strategic approach, leveraging the right tools and platforms to attract, engage, and retain subscribers. Informed, data-driven decisions also play a pivotal role in the growth of any successful newsletter. This article covers how to engineer a successful newsletter using best-in-class tools and strategy. We’ll go over many general best practices and specifically touch on how to grow a newsletter using Webflow, Memberstack, and Mailchimp.

Examples of Newsletters

From industry insights to community-focused content, premium newsletters span various niches and content types. This suggests that the ability to attract an interested audience dictates success more than subject matter. If you’re not convinced, check out how different some of our examples of successful premium newsletters are.

The Rundown AI – The Latest in Artificial Intelligence

“The Rundown AI” is a leading source for the latest developments in artificial intelligence, catering to over 500,000 readers with a keen interest in AI advancements and trends. Curated by Rowan Cheung, it offers in-depth articles on a wide array of AI topics, from technological breakthroughs to ethical considerations. This platform distinguishes itself by making complex AI subjects accessible and providing timely, expert analyses on how AI is influencing various sectors and shaping the future.

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Parent Data – Research-based Parenting Data

ParentData, created by Emily Oster, is a website that helps parents make smart choices by using facts and research. It offers both free and paid subscriptions, where parents can get weekly newsletters with tips and discussions on parenting. Emily uses her skills as an economist and mom to dig into data and provide clear answers to common parenting questions, making ParentData a go-to resource for data-driven parenting advice.

Letters from an American – Politics Meets History

"Letters from an American" is a newsletter by Heather Cox Richardson, a history teacher. She writes about how history helps us understand today's politics. The newsletter looks at America's rules, economy, and traditions to explain current events, showing how the past and present are connected.

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Dinner: A Love Story – An Ode to Food

"Dinner: A Love Story" is a project by Jenny Rosenstrach that focuses on the importance of family meals, offering a wide range of dinner ideas and more. It's known for its practical approach to cooking, with recipes that cater to real families and discussions that extend beyond the dinner table. Jenny's work, including her newsletter and the "The Weekday Vegetarians" book, emphasizes the joy and community found in sharing meals, making every dinner special.

Marketing Your Premium Newsletter

Marketing your newsletter is about connecting with your audience and sharing the value you bring to their inbox. It's about crafting a message that resonates, stands out in a crowded space, and turns casual readers into loyal subscribers. By leveraging the right channels and strategies, you can grow your newsletter's reach and impact, one subscriber at a time.

Designing Your Landing Page

Your landing page is the gateway to your newsletter. Ensure it's visually appealing, clearly communicates the value of your subscription, and makes signing up effortless. Webflow’s design capabilities allow for stunning, conversion-optimized pages. To get a head start on your design, check out our premium newsletter template which provides a responsive default landing page created using Client-First.

SEO

The better your SEO, the more likely people are to discover your newsletter organically through their favourite search engine. Most SEO plans focus heavily on Google since they receive over 90% of all search traffic. Google publishes its own SEO guidelines that you can follow to get started. Common SEO best practices include using relevant keywords, meta descriptions, and authoritative content to improve visibility and attract organic traffic. 

Socials

Social media is another path to reaching potential readers through search, advertising, and direct outreach. 

Organic social media: Expand your organic reach by sharing snippets of your premium content, engaging with your audience, and driving traffic to your landing page. Consistent, engaging posts can significantly increase your subscriber base. Social media's sharability also adds a virality factor that can boost your subscriber growth rate.

Advertising: Most social platforms offer targeted advertising using the data they collect about their users. Once you define your target audience, you can reach them directly using information such as location, age, and interests.

Direct marketing: Social platforms give you a direct line to their users’ inboxes. You can use this to launch efficient, scalable direct marketing campaigns less expensively than traditional marketing methods such as cold calling or door-to-door sales.

Make sure to link to your socials on your landing page! Since socials are commonly found in site footers, our template includes them by default.

Sending Email Updates

Regular email updates keep your audience engaged and remind them of the value your newsletter brings. Highlight recent topics, upcoming exclusives, and special offers to maintain interest and loyalty.

There are also technical reasons to send regular email updates. Boosting your open rate and sending mail consistently boosts your deliverability to Gmail addresses, which make up nearly half of all existing email addresses.

Posting Blog Posts Tailored to SEO

Create blog content that complements your newsletter topics and is optimized for search engines. This boosts your site’s SEO performance, serves as a valuable resource for your readers, and can be used to build trust with your audience.

Growing a Community

Foster a sense of community by enabling comments on your blog posts and other content. This interaction encourages engagement, builds a loyal subscriber base, and provides unique insight into your readers’ thoughts. 

Growing Your Subscribers

Utilize lead magnets, referral programs, and strategic partnerships to continuously grow your subscriber list. Offer something of immediate value in exchange for their subscription, such as a free ebook or an exclusive webinar.

Engaging Readers

Keep your content fresh, relevant, and engaging. If you make a promise to deliver specific value when selling your newsletter, keep that promise! Your readers signed up because they’re interested in what you have to say about your niche. Use analytics and direct feedback to understand what resonates with your audience and tailor your content accordingly.

Pricing Models; Free and Paid

Offering a free version of your newsletter for a subset of your content defines a valuable stage in your funnel. Readers can gain value and build trust before they’re ready to purchase your premium subscription. There are also opportunities to generate revenue from free tiers, such as through advertising.

Your premium subscription can be reserved for your exclusive, highest-value content. Here, you can drive revenue directly through subscription fees and convert qualified, paying readers to your other products and services. Feel free to experiment with multiple subscription pricing for different levels of value.

Analytics; Track and Measure Performance

Analytics show you how your readers behave in each stage of your funnel and track their transitions between funnel stages. You can optimize your newsletter through experiments informed by your analytics. 

Measuring Your Landing Page Performance

Google Analytics and Google Search Console are both popular tools for gathering data about website visitors. Google Search Console is more specific to traffic flowing through Google Search, but Google Analytics gathers a much broader range of data. It can tell you how many people visit your landing page, where they came from, and which of them convert.

There are also much more advanced analytics tools such as Hotjar for user session data and SEMrush or Ahrefs for SEO data. These tools are helpful once you’ve done everything you can using the broader data available in Google Analytics.

Tracking Newsletter Metrics

Once a reader subscribes to your newsletter, your analytics should continue to follow them throughout their customer journey. Data on your readership can help diagnose unacceptably high churn, low read rates, or negative feedback. Most email marketing and automation tools have some built-in analytics. For example, you can set up custom report metrics on Mailchimp.

Some great email metrics to get started with include click-through rate, churn, and delivery rate. Note that this list doesn’t include open rate, which has become less reliable since Apple’s security update blocked invisible pixels in the Mail app.

With Webflow and Memberstack (Embed Template)

Webflow and Memberstack are well-suited to building premium newsletters. Webflow provides an easy-to-use website builder and content management system. Memberstack streamlines account and payment management. It also integrates with your email tool of choice through Zapier. All that’s left for you to do is start writing your newsletter!

Tips on Growing Your Premium Newsletter with Webflow and Memberstack

To get an even bigger head start on your premium newsletter, give the Memberstack premium newsletter template for Webflow a try. This template comes with a landing page, two newsletters, CMS collections for newsletter and testimonial content, four different pricing options, and social auth for your members. You also get tutorials and private support to show you exactly how to get the most out of the template.

Landing Page Customization: You can use Webflow’s designer to quickly customize your landing page. Our template automatically populates some of the content for you based on your CMS collections. 

SEO: Webflow’s built-in SEO tools encourage you to follow on-page SEO best practices. Technical SEO best practices are covered by the way Webflow sites are hosted and delivered by default

Additional Analytics: Memberstack comes with Member Metrics, which tracks subscription data, such as the total number of subscribers and signups over time. 

Sending Emails: Integrate with your email marketing tool of choice through Zapier. Some email marketing tools, like Mailchimp, have predefined workflows that streamline the integration.

Cost Management: A natural concern is how your newsletter's costs will grow as you grow your subscriber base. With Memberstack, you can keep up to 96% of your earnings, compared to 88% with Patreon or 87% with Substack.

Be Aware of the Challenges of Creating a Premium Newsletter

Creating a premium newsletter presents unique challenges, including establishing a value proposition compelling enough to convince readers to pay. Building and maintaining an engaged subscriber base requires consistent delivery of high-quality, exclusive content that meets the evolving needs and interests of your audience. You’re also competing for your readers’ limited attention with other newsletters.

Know Your Competitors and What They’re Doing to Promote

Understanding your competition is crucial. Analyze their strategies, content quality, and promotional tactics to identify opportunities for differentiation and improvement. Dive deep into how they engage with their audience, the platforms they use for promotion, and any partnerships or collaborations that boost their visibility. Pay attention to their pricing models and subscriber benefits, as these insights can guide you in refining your own offerings. This comprehensive analysis not only highlights areas where you can stand out but also helps you anticipate market trends and align your newsletter with subscriber expectations, ensuring your content remains relevant and valuable.

Memberstack + Premium Newsletter Template Showcase Study

Explore case studies of successful premium newsletters powered by Webflow and Memberstack. These showcase studies highlight effective strategies, design choices, and marketing tactics that led to their growth.

Get Growing!

Growing a premium newsletter is challenging – it combines strategic content creation, effective marketing, and the right technological tools. Webflow and Memberstack provide a robust platform for building, managing, and scaling your premium newsletter. Templates allow you to save time and effort getting started. By leveraging SEO, engaging with your community, and understanding your audience, you can significantly increase your subscriber base and revenue. Remember, the journey involves continuous learning and adaptation, but with the right approach, your premium newsletter can thrive in the competitive digital landscape.