DEEP DIVE

How to get your newsletter subscribers to pay for your growth

About a year ago, I talked with Austin Rief, the CEO of MorningBrew.

I learned a ton, but one thing he said stuck with me:

“Newsletters should be trying to 10X LTV, not trying to make CAC 10X lower.”

For those not familiar with those terms:

• LTV = Lifetime value (how much revenue a newsletter subscriber will generate over their time as a reader)

• CAC = Customer acquisition cost (In this context, we’re talking about subscriber acquisition cost)

For some, this advice might seem obvious.

But most media founders and creators are doing the opposite!

Most founders I talk with obsess over lowering CAC and finding more sources of cheap subscriber growth without working to improve their subscriber LTV.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with lowering subscriber acquisition costs.

But that’s not how you win in the competitive world of newsletters and media.

Dan Kennedy says, “Whoever can spend the most money to acquire a customer wins.”

It’s true.

If you make your subscribers and customers more valuable, you can:

• Spend more to acquire them

• Improve your customer experience

• Beat the competition because they can't afford to do this

And, if you can speed up the process of generating revenue from your subscribers, you can grow even faster.

That’s the topic of this post…

How to make money immediately after subscribers sign up for your newsletter.

This post won’t cover all the ways to increase subscriber lifetime value.

Today, you’ll learn how to make $0.50 to $5.00 for every new subscriber you get IN your sign-up flow.

By making money in your sign-up flow (as people sign up for your newsletter), you can reduce your payback period, increase LTV, and grow faster.

Here’s how…

There are 4 ways to make money in your sign-up flow:

1. Paid recommendations / co-registration

2. Front-end product offers

3. Affiliate marketing

4. Lead generation

Let’s break these down:

Paid recommendations / co-registration

This means recommending other newsletters or products after people sign up for your newsletter, which you get paid for.

The most popular paid recommendation tools are:

SparkLoop Upscribe

SparkLoop is essentially an affiliate network for newsletters.

You can use their Upscribe tool to recommend other newsletters and get paid per qualified subscriber you send to those newsletters.

Newsletters on SparkLoop’s platform pay ~$2.00-$3.00 per qualified subscriber.

You can recommend up to 5 other newsletters after a user signs up for your newsletter.

By doing this, you’ll make approximately $0.50 to $1.00 for every new subscriber you get.

Like with any tactic, SparkLoop Upscribe has pros and cons:

Pros

• ~$0.50 to ~$1.00 ESP (earning per subscriber)

• Easy to set up (It takes about 20 minutes to add to your forms)

• It’s automated. You can set it up and mostly forget about it

• There’s a network of 300+ other newsletters to recommend

Cons

• It’s opt-out, not opt-in. By clicking “Subscribe” your users are automatically subscribed to 5 other newsletters

• You need to recommend 5 other newsletters to maximize your earnings

• This may crowd your subscriber’s inboxes with up to 5 other newsletters that are not yours

• By recommending other newsletters after users join yours, you may lower your subscriber engagement and long-term LTV

• More bounces. Fewer users will see your thank you page because they left after seeing the Upscribe widget.

If you want to use SparkLoop, sign up using this affiliate link to get a $100 cash bonus if you make $100 or more in paid recommendations in 60 days.

Beehiiv Boosts

Boosts is a paid recommendations tool similar to SparkLoop.

The main difference is that Boosts is limited to newsletters on the beehiiv platform.

Here are the pros and cons:

Pros

• Easy to set up

• ~$0.50 to ~$1.00 ESP (earning per subscriber)

• It’s automated. You can set it up and mostly forget about it

• Opt-in, not opt-out (Users must toggle on a switch to sign up for another newsletter)

Cons

• Boosts may have lower ESP than SparkLoop

• Must apply and be accepted by each newsletter

• Limited to beehiiv. There are fewer newsletters to recommend

• You need to recommend 5 other newsletters to maximize your earnings

• This may crowd your subscriber’s inboxes with up to 5 other newsletters that are not yours

• By recommending other newsletters after users join yours, you may lower your subscriber engagement and long-term LTV

• More bounces. Fewer users will see your thank you page because they left the page after seeing the Upscribe widget.

If you want to use beehiiv boosts, sign up using this affiliate link for a 30-day free trial (no credit card required) and get 20% off for 3 months.

The next recommendation tool is…

AfterOffers

I have not tested AfterOffers personally or with my clients, so I know less about this platform.

AfterOffers is popular with financial newsletters and publishers.

Typically, advertisers pay ~$3-$6 per email lead with AfterOffers, so your earnings per subscriber may be higher.

The same pros and cons from SparkLoop and beehiiv boosts likely apply to this platform.

My thoughts on paid recommendations / co-registration

Paid recommendations are the easiest way to make money in your sign-up flow, but they’re not the best.

Everything has tradeoffs.

Recommendations are easy to set up and mostly automated.

However, you will sacrifice your subscriber’s experience, reader engagement, and possibly lower your subscriber LTV in the long run.

I recommend using paid recommendations as a means to an end. Or not at all.

The other ways to make money in your sign-up flow are much harder. But if you execute them well, they’re worth your time.

Let me explain…

Front-end offers

This is when you sell a low-priced product on your newsletter thank you page and welcome email designed to drive impulse purchases.

Sometimes, these are called tripwire offers or self-liquidating offers.

Front-end offers should be lower in price to convert subscribers who don’t know you yet into customers.

The product price must be low enough for impulse buying.

Usually, that means $7 to $97.

Companies often provide a special offer or discount exclusively to new subscribers to sweeten the deal.

Why front-end offers work

If you sell a $49 product on your thank you page and:

• 2% of subscribers buy on that page

• You’ll make $0.98 per subscriber ($0.98 EPS)

Then, if you can upsell customers after they buy your front-end offer, your EPS will be even higher.

Here are a few examples…

Matt Gray — $29 course bundle

After you join Matt Gray’s newsletter he sells a discounted bundle of courses and bonuses exclusively available for new subscribers.

Here’s the thank you page offer.

Scalable — Free plus shipping book offer

After signing up for Scalable’s lead magnets, you’ll be offered a free copy of Get Scalable (just pay $8.70 for shipping and handling).

Here’s the thank you page offer.

The Motley Fool — Stock Advisor

After signing up for Motley Fool’s newsletter via an advertorial, you’ll be offered 50% off Stock Advisor (a paid newsletter) and a bonus report.

My thoughts on front-end offers

If you can pull it off, this is the best way to make money in your sign-up flow.

Every other tactic in this post is about driving your subscribers to other products or newsletters. That can work great, but…

It’s best to focus on capturing subscriber value with your products.

If you can get someone to buy from you, they’re more likely to trust you, read your content, and buy from you again.

Even if they buy a product for as little as $5! Buyers are buyers.

Affiliate marketing

This is simple:

Promote affiliate offers on your thank you page or in your sign-up flow.

In this context, the best affiliate offers pay you on a CPL (cost-per-lead) or CPC (cost-per-click) basis.

Don’t promote affiliate offers that pay a percentage of a sale. It’s hard to get someone to buy on your thank you page. Especially if it's not from you.

Here are a few newsletters that do this well…

The Assist

The Assist offers free tools and templates on its thank you page. When you sign up for those free offers, they receive a commission.

MarketBeat

After joining MarketBeat’s newsletter, you’ll reach an offer wall with up to 6 offers from which they can earn an affiliate commission.

MarketBeat also uses paid recommendations to generate revenue from two different sources in their sign-up flow.

Lead generation

The final method is lead generation.

Here’s how it works:

• After sign up, collect data on your subscribers via a survey

• Sell that email address and data to an advertiser as a lead (with consent)

This is commonly used by B2B media companies like IndustryDive.

After you join an IndustryDive newsletter, you’ll be prompted to complete a survey like this:

At the end of the survey, you can check a box to access a free report or lead magnet. If you do, your email and data will be shared with the advertiser who created that report as a “lead.”

Then, you’ll get access to that report via email and on the thank you page.

Advertisers pay companies like IndustryDive $50 to $250 per lead.

That’s a big range because CPLs vary based on what the advertiser sells and who the lead is.

To sell a lead, you need:

• Consent — A check box where users agree to share their information

• Lead magnet — Something valuable subscribers are opting in to get

• A qualified subscriber — The subscriber must match the advertiser’s target industry, job title or function, seniority, company size, etc

Advertisers won’t pay for any email sign-ups that check a box. They need to be qualified leads.

And, of course, you’ll need to work out these lead-generation deals with your advertisers. Agree on a CPL, lead qualification terms, payment terms, etc.