Yesterday we published a guest post by Sarah Noeckel about how she grew her Femstreet newsletter to 5,000 subscribers and built a thriving community for women in tech. Now, you can ask her how she did it. Jump in!
What does your research and writing process look like? How do you do your own research to find the news you're going to tell your audience about this week?
I've heard some people say the newsletters don't necessarily convert that well. Obviously, you've built an entire company around yours. Could you give more insight into how subscribers have turned into paid customers (subscribers, attendees...etc)? Is it necessarily more difficult/easier compared to other mediums?
Biggest pieces of advice for someone starting their own newsletter? What would you differently if you had to start all over again? I've been thinking about starting one in the ecommerce space.
Hi Sarah — I'd be interested to hear more about how you launched the slack group. Sounds like the idea came from surveying/talking with subscribers… Can you share some more detail on how you went about introducing the slack community to readers? Any recommendations or mistakes you learned from along the way? Also, how do you handle onboarding from Substack to Slack? Are you manually sending invites as new people sign up?
Hi Sarah, so when you say that you "started talking to our subscribers" to improve the newsletter, are you referring to the meetups at the conferences and events? The Slack channel? I'm wondering what would be a good way to do this - was thinking of an online survey... Thanks!
As you scale your community - what are your thoughts on making sure you are staying true to the early followers while starting to think about broadening your audience?
Thread for publishers: Ask Sarah Noeckel anything
What was more difficult - getting your first 50 subscribers or your first 500?
What does your research and writing process look like? How do you do your own research to find the news you're going to tell your audience about this week?
What is one bad habit you haven’t been able to kick which you feel could hold you back from achieving your goals?
I've heard some people say the newsletters don't necessarily convert that well. Obviously, you've built an entire company around yours. Could you give more insight into how subscribers have turned into paid customers (subscribers, attendees...etc)? Is it necessarily more difficult/easier compared to other mediums?
What advice would you have for other newsletter writers considering starting a Slack community? has there been anything about that that surprised you?
Biggest pieces of advice for someone starting their own newsletter? What would you differently if you had to start all over again? I've been thinking about starting one in the ecommerce space.
Hi Sarah — I'd be interested to hear more about how you launched the slack group. Sounds like the idea came from surveying/talking with subscribers… Can you share some more detail on how you went about introducing the slack community to readers? Any recommendations or mistakes you learned from along the way? Also, how do you handle onboarding from Substack to Slack? Are you manually sending invites as new people sign up?
Hi Sarah, so when you say that you "started talking to our subscribers" to improve the newsletter, are you referring to the meetups at the conferences and events? The Slack channel? I'm wondering what would be a good way to do this - was thinking of an online survey... Thanks!
What inspired you to write and at what time in the do you decide what you use?
As you scale your community - what are your thoughts on making sure you are staying true to the early followers while starting to think about broadening your audience?
"The future is niche, but niche doesn't mean small." The most salient point for me in your guest post. Thank you Sarah.
Thanks. Congrats.