Uncommon Advice
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Uncommon Advice
Mastering Audience Monetization with Newsletters
What if you could unlock the secrets to turning your newsletter into a revenue-generating powerhouse? Join us as we uncover the multifaceted strategies for monetizing your audience through newsletters. We'll guide you through diverse revenue streams, from social and website income to the crucial newsletter revenue, revealing how to leverage both other people's products and your own. Whether you're targeting B2C or B2B audiences, discover how to align your newsletter style with your business goals, drawing from our own experiences in building a successful media company.
Next, we dive into specific monetization models like CPM, PPL, and PPS, each offering unique advantages, especially in B2B spaces with high CPM rates. Learn the importance of understanding conversion metrics and optimizing them based on advertiser goals and ad styles. We also highlight the benefits of continuity programs like affiliate marketing for sustainable recurring income. Finally, get a sneak peek into our robust system designed to help you gain a thousand subscribers per day, ensuring rapid and sustainable audience growth. Thank you for joining us, and don't forget to reach out with your questions or for further assistance using the provided link!
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I have to do some training here in regards to the newsletter space. So if you're jumping in, we're trying something new. We'll see how it goes. Trying something new getting live streaming this across different platforms. Got the old iPad, I'm going to get some drawings going on and demonstrations moving here and really the goal here is to get you some details on how to monetize your audience with a newsletter, leveraging email and whatnot. So there's a lot of different ways to leverage your audience and you're going to see some of those ways, but I'm going to really focus on the newsletter side here today for you. So I'm excited. If you're on IG, you won't be able to see my screen If you're, but here, if you're on some of the other platforms that we're going live here On Facebook and YouTube and LinkedIn and X, formerly known as Twitter You'll be able to see some of this other stuff I'm going to do, but I'm going to give you some details here as we dive in. So with that, let's roll. I'm going to go ahead and pull this up and see. Here I'm going to dive into how to monetize your audience with a newsletter.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of different ways to do it, but I think what's important is really understanding that there's different ways and revenue opportunities when trying to monetize your audience. You can do that with a, let's say, social revenue right? So there's that's one way you can drive social revenue through some of these. You know a lot of people running TikTok stores these days. You can have different offers and stores inside of Instagram, depending on how you're doing that you can also use. There's also another thing on the social revenue is people paying you for shout outs and you've got some sponsorship avenues. A big thing that people talk about is the NIL, so that stuff's going on right. So that's one way. The next way is website revenue. So if you actually have your website and you drive a lot of your traffic and stuff to your actual website, that actually gives you an opportunity to generate revenue as well that through banner advertising and through some other different pieces that you can leverage. So then that's one. The other one is through your newsletter revenue. This is another way to generate revenue with your audience. These are three of the core ways that you can do it, and the one way that I'm going to focus on today here is the newsletter revenue. All right, I think this here is very timely with what's going on in the marketplace. You probably see more people talking about newsletters. There's some very specific things that you can do with it and some very specific things you can do wrong to screw it all up. So I want to make sure that, as I get into this today, we're talking about some of the ways that you can do it right, so you have the business operating and flowing. So, with that, let me, let's go here and let's get into it and let's get into it. So, newsletter revenue in itself right. So there's audience revenue that you can drive in social website newsletter and, specifically, in newsletter. There's different ways to do it. You have other people's products and services that you can sell, and then you have your own products and services that you can sell, and then you have your own products and services that you can sell. So I've talked a lot about the, the newsletter, the space of selling other people's products.
Speaker 1:When we launched our media company in 2020, a lot of what we did with that was the whole goal was to sell other people's products and services and generate revenue in that manner, and I'll talk about how we did that, but that's one way. So if you're coming on real quick hello, welcome. I'm Scotcher here, so we're diving into how to monetize your audience with the newsletter. So with that, appreciate you all jumping in. So the other way is through your own products and services. So you are most likely, if you got an email from me, you're on a newsletter that I have and I use it in two different manners, one of them being the how to. One is the uncommon advice newsletter, where we give value content and stuff as well and have some different sponsorships in it. Another one and I have my, you know I have an email where I send more content as well, more kind of focused. So I send two different types of emails. We'll talk about those two differences here coming up. But you can sell your own products and services. So this does work for many different people and businesses and industries and whatnot.
Speaker 1:The key for you with newsletter revenue is to decide with your audience how do you actually want to monetize it, what works best for your business? If you already have products and services, then right now a good opportunity for you is to use the newsletter to strengthen that relationship and turn more leads into sales, more leads into customers and more customers into repeat buyers for yourself, right. So that's very important to do that. You can leverage it to do that. Then you can also have. If you don't want to do that and you want to go the route of building out a newsletter that is for a specific audience and other people, you want to sell products and services. There's two different ways. You got B2C and B2B and we'll get into that, but the key is kind of decide how you want to leverage it right. So we currently do both of these. But when I launched my media company, the media company focused a lot on newsletters and website revenue and we were selling other people's products and services, and we still do that to this day. So there's that.
Speaker 1:So let's get into some different newsletter styles. So now that once you pick kind of what you want to do in regards to the actual newsletter revenue side, we also now want to talk about what styles do you want to leverage? And so for me, there's long form values, sponsorships. For me, we have the Uncommon Advice. We have a couple other different newsletters that we run too, where they're more long form. You've also probably seen some others if you've been on newsletters and obviously you know the big names that are out there. Morning Brew is a big one and the Hustle is a big one. Right, that have grown over time. They've kind of like mainstreamed the newsletter business and email marketing business you know a while back. But they're also long form Right. They're providing a lot of different content. So the cool with long form is value driven, so it's lots of content. So you're dealing with more, more, more. There we go Get this working here. So tech's not perfect, but lots of different content.
Speaker 1:Usually in there tends to be a little harder to write and not a big deal, because there's ways to leverage AI to do that, to write it but it is a process and a way for you to do that. I actually like it. Deliverability wise, it tends to be better than some of the quick headline based stuff, but it is. If you curate it as well, you can still get a lot of good content, value and hyper focus for people, depending on who your niche is and who you're working with. Now you're going to get multiple ad placements, usually in a long form style newsletters. You're going to usually spots throughout the newsletter, so it provides value in that manner.
Speaker 1:Now, one thing that you're going to find a lot of times, though, in the sponsorship newsletters is, in the long form sponsorship newsletters you're at, you're going to drive less clicks to your advertisers and driving those less clicks, they should ideally milk road. Yeah, drew, absolutely. Milk road is another great one. Less clicks that we have seen. This is from our experience from running this style, and the next style I'm going to talk about is we tend to drive less clicks. They tend to be a little bit more qualified, uh, in regards to a little bit more engaged click, which is good, but it is less click.
Speaker 1:So it depends what your advertisers if you're selling other people's products and services or selling on a cpm basis depends what sort of advertising they're trying to, what kind of. What's their goal? What's is it a performance goal? Is a brand awareness goal? What is that that they're trying to accomplish from there? So the next thing here let's get into another newsletter style, which are dedicated promotional emails. So you got a quick and easy one from me this week, if you're on my email newsletter, because I included in my uncommon advice this, which is our long form content driven. And then I also had a dedicated promo saying hey look, I'm hosting this live stream this week, dropping knowledge and value for anyone interested in the newsletter space. So that's what we did there, right? So there's that as well.
Speaker 1:So, advertisers you can generate sales in both ways. If you own your own products and services, a dedicated email is actually a great way for you. Let's say you want to drive more applications to your sales team. If you set up a email that goes out and drives directly to a application, you're going to drive more sales calls to your sales team and turn more opportunities to close the deals that you've got. So there's that as well. And it it tends to be very focused offer. It's usually here's the nest. The message is very linear in regards to what it is that's being offered to the individual themselves. Uh, it's usually one email, one offer. So I guess I should come back up to the other newsletter long form.
Speaker 1:Sometimes you can have multiple different sponsors in that newsletter. You might have your main sponsor and then you might have a secondary sponsor. That is a little bit different. So there's that as well. So a dedicated promotional emails tend to be one offer, one email, one offer. Hyper focused drives many more clicks to the actual advertisers or your offers and landing pages, and it also tends to be something that produces more sales.
Speaker 1:So for us, when we advertisers come to us and we actually will do a dedicated promotional email for them we'll include them in a sponsorship and then we'll include them in a dedicated promotional email with the main goal of driving them sales, usually for their business. So we do. Some of our advertisers want leads, some of them want sales. At the end of the day, they all want performance, right. So the key is making sure they get that. But depending on how you want to structure this business, those are some different ways that you can do. Those are the two core different newsletter styles that you can send, email styles that you can roll with. So, hey, susie, great question. By the way, if you've got questions and you're on the live, you can drop them in here. I will happily answer them as we go along.
Speaker 1:So, can a dedicated promo email strategy work within the long form with sponsorship framework? So it's a unique question. If I'm understanding it properly, yes, you can. So, for example, we will stick the dedicated email promo at the top of the newsletter, at the very top, so it's the first thing that gets seen, but then we will also stick some newsletter content underneath it. So it's more long form in regards to the newsletter, so we do do that, and also inboxes like it more. You know all the different internet service providers that want our email to be quality, so they will do that. Now, what we do as well is we will send a newsletter with sponsorships and then we will send a dedicated email that exact same day. So one in the morning, one in the evening, to drive the best performance we can for our advertisers. So, if you're selling advertising space, this isn't specific to advertising space. What's happening is they want performance, so you want to be able to drive it, obviously, in any way that you can, and there's different ways that you can send those emails. But, yes, you can do that within that structure.
Speaker 1:Now let's get into getting paid by others. So you're selling other people's products and services. There's a handful of things here, right, we've got CPM. Now this, this, if you're selling advertising space, tends to be kind of that holy grail that people look for in regards to advertising, and it is something that they agree. Basically, they agree to a specific price. We sell, we sell a lot of this in our media company, right, they want to buy a specific amount of impressions and they also, obviously they want it. They want those impressions to back out into clicks and those clicks to back out into sales or leads and revenue at the at the end of the day, revenue. So it is for us. What they do is they agree to a specific price per thousand. So if you have a hundred thousand subscribers, maybe they're going to pay you. B2c might pay you $15 per 1,000 subscribers, so you might maybe sell a $1,500 sale If you're in B2B and have 100,000 subscribers. So that in itself is a little bit different. The B2B is going to be much larger. In regards to a CPM price, you might find 50 to 100 to up to 250 CPM in some of these deals in the B2B space. So that's one way.
Speaker 1:Now the next way here is PPL. So PPL is pay per lead. This is another great way to drive leads. We work with advertisers that pay us on a per lead basis as well. You get paid for every, every active lead you send. You know if you're using Beehive or ConvertKit or SparkPost or SparkLoop and let's say you're connected in those services. You're, and with that, if you were connected to those services, they have this stuff built right into their platform. So the advertiser comes to beehive and says hey look, we want to generate x amount of leads, we're willing to pay. You know, we're willing to pay this per lead.
Speaker 1:But what you'll find in there is they also make a. They set parameters saying, hey, lead must open three emails in 14 days, or lead must open and open one email and click on another Right? So they set these parameters and they basically pay you per engaged lead. So you want to make, you want to be very cautious to see what actual how many leads you send versus how many actually engage, because that's the number you get paid on. Now you could also go to people directly and say hey look, I'll pay, I will send you leads direct, but I don't really want the five dollars for engage lead, I just want a dollar for every lead, right? So now it's two dollars for every lead. So now it's on them to engage that lead, right? As opposed to, it's required for them to get engagement. You're taking a little less money, but they're also involved too and are required to get an. They are going to work a little harder to engage that lead.
Speaker 1:So PPL can work both ways. So just know one kind of how you're structured and how you're doing it. It's also a great way to grow your newsletter, by the way. So we actually are part of our media company, brokers out those deals as well. So, like, if you have a newsletter and you're looking for lead flow, that's something that we do is we come in and we're able to get PPL deals for people. So we've got some in some different spaces that we that we do now. That is a great way to grow really, really fast on your newsletter. Now, not every niche has it, but it is a great way to grow.
Speaker 1:Now, drew, great question what percentage conversion are sponsors looking for? I mean, that is a great question, but it's a very loaded question because there's so many different metrics that go into them, right. So some leads, if you're, let's say, we have an advertiser and their goal is they're looking for like a cost per lead hey, I'm paying X, but I want my lead cost to be around $50. And then my qualified lead cost to be at like 120. And so there's a difference. A lead is an opt-in, a qualified lead is someone they get on the phone and have a conversation with, right. So how they determine a qualified lead, so those conversion metrics change.
Speaker 1:So I think some advertisers are going to drive a very branded not direct response style ad that drives less clicks, less clicks. And then some are going to do stuff that drives a lot of clicks and they try to do they. They let the ad copy convert really high to get the click and then they let the sales page do the conversion. And then there's other people who let the email copy do the sale and they let the sales page do the collection. Right, so there there is that.
Speaker 1:As for replay, my first time going live in this manner. So they might be back on, they might stay online for a little bit, so let's go over to the next thing is PPS. This is pay per sale and you get paid a commission for a set price for every sale, or CPA networks, and CPA networks and affiliates operate in this manner. Right, they say, hey, look, for every sale you send me, I'm going to pay you a hundred dollars, I'm going to pay you a thousand dollars Pay-per-sell stuff. One thing I do like, depending on what space you're in, one thing I'm a big fan of is continuity stuff. So if you have a software that your industry loves, that people on your newsletter love, and if you can set up an affiliate with them and then they sign up and they use that software and then you get paid every month that that software rebuilds and the customer uses it. That's a great way to build continuity and reoccurring revenue monthly reoccurring revenue without having to be the one that manages the software, builds the software right. So that is the other model of It'll get paid by others.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about if you're growing your business, right, so coaching and let's see so growing your business coach is a consultant. So if you're a coach or a consultant, you're listening to this. This is a phenomenal way. Putting in a newsletter, not just an email, not just sending emails to sell more stuff, but putting in a newsletter to help solidify your expertise to your subscribers, is going to be a huge value to you. So it comes with being a thought leader, right? If you're trying to be a thought leader and drive more, build value with your subscribers, you can do that through a newsletter through a very, very simple way. So write this one down.
Speaker 1:If you're a coach, consultant, a very simple way of doing that is to curate. If you're producing a lot of content that gets pushed out on social, you can curate a newsletter on Friday or Tuesday, whenever it is once a week that kind of links to your best performing content that you pushed out on social and just make it a digital roundup. And that just reminds me. I need to get back on doing that because we have more content going out. I need to get my team back on pushing that one out. But that's a very, very great way to get credibility. Absolutely, drew, it's a very, very valuable way. I like the word cheap, but yeah, it is a very cost-effective way to get there. But also it allows you, if you're a coach consultant, you can now advertise that newsletter on your social handles, right, they're in your profiles and a person a lot of times will be more apt to subscribe from social to your newsletter. Then go right into a big sales flow and everything else and now you can follow up with them consistently to build that rapport and eventually turn those social leads into uh, into sales calls or sales, right. Yeah, that's better, inexpensive, but, uh, absolutely so. Coach consults great way now.
Speaker 1:Agency owners. So, as a little bit, maybe some of you read my story or heard my story, but I used to own an agency a long time ago. I did a I at the time I was just an awful leader is really what it came down to. My clients called me, everyone called me. I was always constantly dealing with you know, putting out fires or having issues and this, and that I was. I was loved when revenue was up. I was hated when revenue was down. I was an asset when it was up. I was an expense when it was down, and marketing is a cyclical thing, Right. Sometimes months are different. Prime example in our media company July, july and December the two worst months of the year. It's just the way it is. We know year after year it's happening, so that stuff does happen, and we know what months are great for us as well too. So I had that and I got kind of stressed out. That's why I started the media company, because I wanted to control the audience, I wanted to own it, I wanted to manage it, do all that and then drive sales for people in that manner, and that's what we built.
Speaker 1:I'm now back into the agency side because we've launched our newsletter side of the agency. We're actually done for you service and helping people build out their newsletters and manage them on a monthly basis. But the difference is I've got an amazing team of people that run that daily, and so I'm very, very fortunate to have them a part of the crew and we're very focused Right to have them a part of the crew and we're very focused right, so we're excited. So, granted, I was burnt out before, but I fixed all those things I did wrong and now we're relaunching back out, so we're excited about that. We've been doing that for about six months now.
Speaker 1:Uh, product creators. So if you have, let's say, you've got your own product and you want to sell more of it, or that's a great way of doing it. If you have digital products, if you have books, if you have, uh, courses, all that stuff a newsletter is a way for you to give value to your subscribers, drive more sales and not always be selling. I know people say, oh, you know you should always be be selling and doing this and that, and I and I've been and, look, I'm at fault for this I used to have a, a setup where I basically every email was a sales email. The problem is, eventually people stop listening because you're not giving value and you're just constantly selling. So you got to do both. Yes, you don't in a newsletter and you, owning your audience, you're going to sell, right? I mean, that's part of business. There's sales. It gives you a digital form to talk one to many so you can sell. And if you're a product creator, it's a great way to do it without having to do that every single day.
Speaker 1:But also provide value going forward. I think the common theme you probably heard through this live is value, value, value, right. Give value. You value, value, right. Give value e-com stores. So another phenomenal way is to for e-com stores is to leverage email marketing, leverage a consistent newsletter with some of your product offerings in it, your promotions in it as well, to drive more sales for your business. A lot of companies don't do this. It's a very easy way for us to help you make more money and it's it is a for you to make money and find someone to help you with it if you're not doing it.
Speaker 1:And once again, software companies. And another great service to grow your business is blue collar businesses, home services style companies, right, they got all this database of people from over the years that have contacted them, but they never reach out with an email to promote to them again and say hey, look, it's that time of year again. Do you want us to come check your HVAC units? Do you have any plumbing issues? All these different companies window washing, garage door maintenance you've got power washing all these different blue collar style businesses that you can leverage email effectively to grow your business. You can get turned more leads into sales and more past customers into repeat buyers. The best customer, the easiest customer and the fastest way to generate more revenue is to work with a customer that you've already worked with. So you know email newsletters help you accomplish that. So, wrapping up here, so if you have customers your audience right, that's your audience then a newsletter will help you convert more leads and more sales on a monthly basis. So you know whether you want to build an audience where you can sell other people's products and services or whether you want to use your audience to sell more of your products and services. This is a strategy that will have a positive impact your bottom line and your business going forward. So with that, if you got questions, drop them on in kind of answered a couple that did come in when they were being asked. So I do appreciate y'all coming up.
Speaker 1:One last thing, too I do have real quick. We do have a newsletter fast track. If you want to jump on a call and figure out how to leverage this inside your business, we'll help you design a plan for your business and leveraging a newsletter to do that. If you like the plan and you want us to execute it, awesome, we're happy to do it. That's what we can do really, really well for you. If you want to execute it yourself, that's cool too. Either way, if you just go to that site, natekennedycom, forward slash NFT not crypto NFT newsletter fast track. So if you do that, we'll hook it up. Jump on a call, see how we can help you leverage this as well in your business. Hope you build a plan. If you want us to execute it, once again, we'll do it. If not, you can execute it either way. So looking forward to kind of connecting Uh, if you like this live, hit me back up an email Looking to do more of these on a weekly basis to drive more value and an opportunity for you.
Speaker 1:So next week I think we're getting into next week's live is going to get into how to generate a thousand subscribers per day sales system thousand subscriber per day sales system that we leverage. So I'm going to get in deep into that. So if you've got your stuff up and running, you want to get more subscribers. Definitely want to tune into that. So all right, thank you all. Appreciate you. Uh, coming out to this live stream, got questions, hit us up. If you want help, hit up that link later.