There’s no shortage of advice out there about how to start a newsletter.
But the truth is, if you get the following 5 things right, it’s almost impossible to fail.
1. Set The Right Goal
Let’s start with a crucial, but counterintuitive point:
The goal of your newsletter is NOT to grow your newsletter.
It’s not to get as many subscribers, opens, or clicks as possible.
Will getting those help you?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
If you’re starting a newsletter to get clients, then the “success” of your newsletter is entirely dependent on whether or not it actually gets you clients.
If your goal is to get 20 clients, then you’d rather have a newsletter with 200 subscribers that gets you 20 clients than one with 20,000 subscribers that gets you 2 clients.
Before you do anything else, ingrain this concept in your head because it will influence every other decision you make about your newsletter.
You will optimize your newsletter to get you clients because that’s the reason you’re starting a newsletter.
Now…
You don’t have to write a newsletter simply to get clients – you can do it because it’s fun, because you want to share what you know, because you want to sell sponsorships, because you want to learn something, or for any of a million other reasons.
But if your main goal is to get clients, then never forget to keep the main thing the main thing.
One More Thing About Setting Your Goal:
Almost all the advice you will read online or hear from experts about starting a newsletter isn’t aimed at people like you who want to get clients from a newsletter.
They’re telling you how to get subscribers, not clients.
That’s not the same thing.
2. Define Your Ideal Client
In order to get clients from your newsletter, you need to attract likely clients to your newsletter.
To do that, you need to know who is a likely client.
This goes beyond your newsletter.
Hopefully you already have an idea of who’s most likely to value your product/service and who you most want to serve.
Describe them and be as specific as possible.
Don’t use words like “people” when you can use phrases like B2B CEOs, moms who are small business owners, or suburban Chicago real estate agents.
That’s who the amazing newsletter you’re about to write is for – your ideal client.
One More Thing About Defining Your Ideal Client:
Ideal doesn’t mean “only.”
You’ll be scared to narrow down the description of your ideal client because you know you can help lots of other people and worry you’ll turn away people who may have hired you.
Don’t worry about that.
You want to aim for the client you most want to attract so that they know you’re the perfect fit for them, but they won’t wind up being the only people who are attracted to your newsletter.
Aiming for what you most want is the most likely way to get it.
Be perfect for someone, not OK for everyone.
3. Choose A Platform
You may be the kind of people who agonizes over what email service provider to use and how to build the “tech stack” that powers your newsletter.
Don’t be.
The platform you choose is the least important decision you’ll make when starting a newsletter.
You can be just as successful on Convertkit, or Substack, or Beehiiv, or Mailchimp, or any of a hundred other options that are out there.
They each have some unique strengths, but the truth is 99% of what they offer is the same and they’ll all have everything you need to be successful.
Plus, if you choose one and don’t like it you can always switch down the road so just pick one and move on.
One More Thing About Choosing A Platform:
You still want a recommendation – I get it.
I use ConvertKit and highly recommend it.
(Yes, that’s an affiliate link and it’s the only one you’ll see because it’s the only product I recommend.)
4. Choose A Frequency
There’s no magic number of how often you should publish your newsletter.
But I do have a few recommendations for you.
Every issue you publish represents an opportunity to turn a potential client into an actual client AND an opportunity to attract new potential clients.
(Assuming what you publish is valuable to your ideal clients – more on how to do that soon.)
This means if you only publish on a monthly basis, you’re only taking 12 shots a year at getting clients from your newsletter.
In most cases, that’s not enough.
I recommend you publish at least twice a month and ideally at least once a week.
But don’t be intimidated by that frequency – an issue of your newsletter doesn’t have to be as complicated as you likely assume.
(Most newsletters are overwritten and longer than they need to be.)
For example, I publish a daily newsletter that’s a single paragraph and readers LOVE it in part because of it’s brevity.
There’s no magic frequency when it comes to newsletters, but just know that if you don’t publish consistently, you’ll be fighting an uphill battle.
One More Thing About Publishing Frequency:
Whatever frequency you choose, consistently publish at that time.
You want to become a habit for readers and if you publish randomly at different days/times, it’s impossible for readers to expect to hear from you.
It’s impossible to be “missed” if no one knows when to expect to hear from you.
5. Choose A Name
The name of your newsletter represents an incredible opportunity that too many publishers overlook.
You want to pick a name that would make it immediately clear to your ideal clients that it’s a newsletter for them.
Don’t fall into the trap of trying to be clever – aim for clear instead.
For example, if your ideal clients are social media community managers you might think it would be clever to name your newsletter “The Double Tap.”
That may be clever, but it’s not clear – if I showed that name to 100 people most of them would have no idea what the newsletter was about from name only.
But if the newsletter was named “Community Manager Mastery?”
Every community manager would at least be curious to check it out.
The more your name makes it clear who the newsletter is for and how it will help them, the easier it will be for you to attract and convert subscribers (and more importantly, your ideal clients).
One More Thing About Newsletter Names:
If you subscribe to my For The Interested newsletter, you might be thinking I didn’t listen to my own advice…and you’d be right!
I launched my newsletter almost a decade ago when I was much less clear on my own niche and how to name a newsletter.
I’ve stuck with the name because it’s built up some brand awareness at this point, but if I was starting my newsletter from scratch today I definitely would choose a different name that reflected what I help my clients do – get clients from their content.
So this is a classic example of “Do as I say, not as I do.”