Matt McGarry 's Linkedin Analytics

UPDATE on our retreat for media founders and creators! We've surpassed 50% in ticket sales and the event is 94 days away. This means we've reached the planned milestone of increasing ticket prices by $500. The current pricing is live until Thursday, June 5th at 11:59 PM ET. After that, it goes up. If you're interested, check it out and save your spot (link in comments). We've got an amazing group of speakers and attendees like: Daniel Bustamante 🥷🏻 Chenell Basilio Ricci Wolman Ferol Vernon 📕 Erika Burghardt Justin Moore Tarzan Kay Kalryzian Katelyn Bourgoin 🧠 And many more! There's a great mix of creators & writers, paid ads wizards, sponsorship experts, email marketing nerds, info/coaching, self-serve advertising, the list goes on... We have founders, creators, and operators with audiences of 4,000 all the way to 4,500,000. (Yes, 4.5 million) The event is called Audience Camp -- but it's not exactly a “camp”. It’s an all-inclusive retreat. You won’t need a tent or camping gear. Instead, we’ll provide you with a private room, bathroom, food and drinks, and transportation to the venue. What you will get to do is: - Roast marshmallows with some of today’s most successful media founders, marketers, and newsletter operators. - Meet and connect with other attendees through outdoor activities (hiking, mini golf, paddleboarding, pickleball, and more). - Attend 7 interactive workshops on newsletter content, audience growth, sponsorships, email marketing, and digital product sales. Last thing: We’ve deliberately capped this event at 40 people to keep the conversations high-signal and the caliber of attendees high.

I just hit 55,000 subscribers after publishing my newsletter for 119 weeks straight. Here’s the #1 newsletter growth tactic you’re probably not using: 1) Pre-Newsletter Call To Action (Pre-CTA) 2) Post-Newsletter Call To Action (Post-CTA) Here’s how they work: 1) Pre-Newsletter Call To Action (Pre-CTA) A pre-CTA is when you post about your newsletter ⁓24 hours BEFORE you send it. By doing so, you pique their curiosity, drive fear of missing out (FOMO), and create urgency to sign up and get access to the content. If people are interested in that content, they’ll subscribe. 2) Post-Newsletter Call To Action (Post-CTA) A post-CTA, on the other hand, is when you post about your newsletter AFTER you send it — either immediately or the day after. Post-CTAs are less effective than pre-CTAs at driving sign-ups, but they can still work. Here are 3 ways to do it: - Ask people to sign up to get access to the content. - Send people to an email-gated article, so they have to enter their email address to get access to the content. - Direct people to your blog where they can read the content, then have email capture forms in place within and/or next to it. — Use a pre- and post-CTA the next time you send your newsletter and watch your subscriber count take off.

2 spots left before prices go up by $500!

You don’t need a custom website and professional design to scale your business to 6-7 figures/year. Here’s what you DO need: - A primary brand color. - An easy-to-use website. - A legible newsletter template. - A simple Canva logo (or even just your photo). This should take you a few hours tops. WordPress websites and professional brand assets will waste your time, eat up budget, and create technical debt. They may look pretty, but that’s about it. Just do everything on beehiiv: newsletter, website, blog, landing pages, surveys, etc. What you need to focus on instead is: (a) more content, (b) better content, and (c) genuine relationships. I’ve talked about the first two before, so I’ll focus on the third one here. You need to make friends with other founders and creators in your niche. Just like entrepreneurs and investors use other people’s money (OPM) to grow their wealth, you need to learn how to use other people’s audiences (OPA) to grow yours. This is “earned” media. And the best way to build it is to be kind and helpful — which brings us back to good content. Your friends and readers frankly don’t care what your site looks like if you’re good to them and your content is good. Any investment beyond the basics is just a waste for that reason.

There are 4,351,852 emails sent every second. Trust me, good content isn’t good enough. Profitable newsletters are built on *insanely valuable* content. Publishing insanely valuable (IV) content is the only way for you to stand out and grow your newsletter into a large and profitable business. To reference Chenell Basilio (Growth in Reverse), IV content helps people do any of the following: - Make money - Save money - Save time - Laugh - Learn You’ll know your content is IV when you start getting comments like: - “I’d pay for this.” - “This is incredible.” - “I can’t believe this is free.” - “This helped me [achieve outcome].” - “How do you put out content like this every week?” - “How do you only have [a small number of] followers?” And at that point, your content will be a growth multiplier for everything else in your business. But the only way to get to that point is to create and publish lots of bad content first. With time, that content will turn mediocre, then good, then great... then, with enough reps and feedback from your readers, you’ll get to insanely valuable content. If you’re not there yet, don’t worry. As I said, it takes time. Just keep at it by publishing: - Your newsletter (1×/week) - Your social posts (5×/week+) Building a business is a marathon. Not a sprint.

What are some under the radar media brands and creators doing 7 figures in revenue (or more) with small teams? I'm looking for companies that started in the past 5 to 10 years. They don't need to be email focused. I'm putting together a list in my newsletter.

Save 10+ hours writing your weekly newsletter by creating a template. Here’s the 6-step template used by the likes of Morning Brew, 1440, and Axios: 1) Intro This is where you grab attention and tease the content in your newsletter with a table of contents or bullet points. What you want to do here is create an open loop to keep people reading. 2) Curated This is where you share the best content, news, or resources you found that week. You could summarize, share takeaways, add your own POV... When you have a curated section with multiple links like this, you’re going to see a drastic CTR increase, which will improve your deliverability and engagement. It’ll also give your readers more content to enjoy. 3) Promo This is where you promote a sponsor, affiliate offer, or your own product. 4) Main This is where you share original content that informs, educates, entertains, or tells a story. If you can, keep the reading time under 5 mins (500-1,000 words) — but I wouldn’t worry about it too much. It’s not really the length that matters, it’s the amount of value per minute. So as long as the content’s good, you’re good. And then because most people read newsletters on mobile, try to keep your paragraphs under 3 lines, so you don’t end up with big blocks of text. 5) Outro This is where you sign off and share how you can help (more resources and/or calls to action). 6) Poll This is where you collect feedback on your newsletter and see how people enjoyed it. You could literally ask “How did you like today’s newsletter?” and then give them 3-5 possible answers (words, stars, emojis…). — You need a repeatable template like this because you don’t want to be writing your newsletter from scratch every single week. All you want to do is fill in the blanks. Now, I actually encourage you not to copy this template and create your own instead. To do that, think about what sections in your newsletter are going to keep your readers engaged and help them solve a problem. But still, don’t try to reinvent the wheel. Go subscribe to 20-30 great newsletters within or adjacent to your niche, then cherry-pick the sections you like best. Kind of like building blocks. Then, once you have your newsletter template, it’s time to fill in the blanks with content. But that’s a story for another post.

People won’t subscribe to your newsletter unless it helps them solve a problem. And the easiest way to do that is to use the ‘Job to Be Done’ framework: Each successful newsletter ‘does a job’ for its readers. - ‘Going’ helps readers save money on flights. - ‘Daily Dad’ helps readers become better dads. - ‘1440’ helps readers stay informed without bias. - James Clear’s ‘3-2-1’ helps readers build better habits. Each of these solves a painful (!) problem. And each has millions of subscribers. Other painful problems include losing one’s job, failing in business, losing money in the market, losing sleep after having a baby... All of these are topics you could build a newsletter around. Now, how do you find your ‘job to be done’? By answering two questions: 1) Who is your market of one? Think of one person within your niche. What would they find extremely interesting or useful? 2) What is the concrete job you’re doing for them? How exactly will you help them solve their problem and reach their goals through your newsletter content? If you can answer these two questions, you’re golden. All that’s left is to create the right content. It all boils down to this: your newsletter’s value proposition needs to be so good that people within your niche would be stupid not to subscribe to it.

Flash sales are a stupid simple way to get money in the door. Here’s how Jon Morrow, founder of Smart Blogger and creator of 7-figure courses, runs them: - Pair a low-priced product with an upsell. Take a product that normally costs ⁓$100 and drop the price to $29-$49, then use a 1-click upsell after to sell a product for $299-$1,000. - Send 3 broadcast emails about the initial product, mentioning the percentage off discount (which will be huge) but not the price. That’ll create curiosity and increase CTR. - Create a follow-up campaign of ⁓12 emails for everyone who clicked through the broadcast emails and landed on your sales page. - Put a 48- to 72-hour deadline on the special offer. Some people will say a dozen emails in 3 days is burning out your audience — but you’re not emailing the whole list, just the segment that showed interest. Jon says he’s consistently gotten half of the sales on the last day this way. It really is that simple. I talk to a lot of people who are afraid to send to their list more often because of unsubscribes or negative feedback. But Jon doesn’t mind. He mentions having a schedule to promote a different product each week, amounting to 12 weeks of promotions, each with its own funnel. If people don’t click the link in the broadcast email, they don’t go down the rest of the funnel. This is just one of many tips Jon shared on the episode. The rest is well worth checking out on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts!

I was NOT hacked! 😅 Today, I tested sending an old-fashioned sales letter to my email list via a PDF. I got 2 types of responses: 1) This is a cool / different way of marketing 2) Were you hacked? No, I wasn't. I'm simply tired of sending people to landing pages, webinars, stuff like that. I wanted to try something different. And for the most part, it worked. We got dozens of qualified leads and calls. But it's probably something I won't try again because of the concern. I get it. The reasoning behind sending a sales letter PDF is: - It's novel, different, and feels more personal - People could be more likely to read a PDF vs a long web page. So far, it's worked for me. But not something I would recommend.

This might sound strange coming from ‘the newsletter guy’ but, you need to spend more time on social content than you do on newsletter content. Here’s what I mean: Your newsletter should be short and simple to complete each week. One or two primary sections are all you need. I often see beginners with long and complicated newsletters that they struggle to write each week. It’s a recipe for disaster. If you don't have a large email audience yet, you need to spend more time creating content for the people you want to get onto your email list than for the people already on it. And that means creating for your discovery platform of choice — LinkedIn (text-first), Instagram (image-first), or YouTube (video-first). How often are we talking? - LinkedIn: 3-5 posts per week - Instagram: 3-5 posts per week - YouTube: 1-3 videos per week Don’t do every social platform at once. Pick one and master it. The fact that the content should be high-quality goes without saying. But you also need to be consistent and post for months or even years for your newsletter to see serious growth. Take Alex Hormozi. His newsletter is literally a 60-second read. But then he publishes hundreds of social posts that would take hours to consume. Then there’s repurposing. A single newsletter can easily be repurposed into 3-5 LinkedIn or Twitter/X posts — which is what our team does every week. And if you do *just* that? You’ll publish 156-260 posts a year.

Prediction: Every serious email player is going to be using multiple ESPs in the next 12 months. - beehiiv + substack - kit + substack - beehiiv + high level - beehiiv + kajabi - Etc, etc Deliverability and inbox placement is getting harder. But still worth pursuing. Every one with a professional or B2B audience will also be targeting "registrations" not just email subscribers. Registrations mean after a user submits their email you collect 1st party data: Name Phone number Company Job title Survey responses Yes, this might be an obvious prediction. Many of our clients are already doing it. But most still are not aware.

Our agency has driven $100M+ in sales with newsletters. Here are 11 newsletter questions I get all the time — answered: (1) “Can anyone start a newsletter?” Anyone can start it, not everyone can scale it. To do that, you need to know what you’re talking about, build a reputation, and be consistent. (2) “How do I pick a newsletter niche?” Think about the category (word, phrase, idea) you can own. To quote Naval Ravikant: “Become the best in the world at what you do. Keep redefining what you do until that is true.” (3) “How often should I be sending my newsletter?” If you’re just starting out, weekly. No more, no less. Weekly is the minimum cadence readers need to build a habit of opening. Increase your cadence only after you get to 25k-100k subs and there's a clear financial ROI. (4) “Which email service provider should I go with?” I’ve tested dozens of ESPs. The only ones I would consider are beehiiv and Kit. For most people starting out, beehiiv is the best choice. It’s free to start, easy-to-use, and has all the tools you need for growth and monetization. (5) “Can email be my only channel?” No, because email has no discoverability. You need to publish content elsewhere. For starters, pick one social platform — YouTube, LinkedIn, or Instagram — and spend all of your content creation time (outside of email) on it. After you hit 25k-100k followers, you can start another. (6) “How long should my newsletter be?” Make it short and simple to complete each week. One or two primary sections max. I often see beginners with long and complicated newsletters that they struggle to write each week. It’s a recipe for disaster. Alex Hormozi’s newsletter is literally a 60-second read. (7) “What about repurposing?” Always repurpose your newsletter into 1 blog post (web version of your newsletter) and 3-5 posts on your discovery platform of choice. Do so, and you’ll publish 52 blog posts and 156-260 social posts every year. (8) “Do I need a custom website?” No. It’ll only slow you down and create technical debt. It may look better, sure, but it won’t help you grow. (9) “What *do* I need?” A simple logo (made in Canva), a primary brand color, and beehiiv (newsletter, website, blog, landing pages, surveys...). Plus good content, of course. (10) “What data should I collect after I capture an email?” Here are a few ideas: interests, job title, company name, job level, location, industry, phone number. Don’t go crazy asking 10+ questions; 4-6 are all you need. (11) “How do I stand out and hedge against AI?” Deliver what no one else can. Do what no one else can do. Be different. Add personality to your content. Have a POV. Share stories. Host events. Do the hard things others won’t. If your content and products solve a problem, you’ll win.

I’ve helped hundreds of creators make a living off of email. Here’s how I expect the email inbox to change over the next 6-18 months, as AI continues to evolve: - It will get easier to unsubscribe. Most email services already have 1-click unsubscribe. That’s the new standard. Gmail prompts you to unsubscribe from email lists if you haven’t opened. Eventually, all email services will do this. - Email services may automatically unsubscribe you from newsletters or lists you haven’t opened in 2-3 months. - Email services will create a ‘list management’ feature where you can see all your subscriptions and unsubscribe from any in one click. - Email services will have AI summarize every email you receive. You’ll be able to read the summary at the top — or scroll down to read the full email. This is already happening with transactional emails. - There will be more tabs in the inbox. Instead of 4 main tabs (“primary”, “promotions”, “social”, “updates”), there may be a separate “newsletters” tab too. - Not all emails will be in chronological order. At the top of each tab, there may be 2-4 emails labeled as “important” or “opened often” — emails identified as urgent based on the text inside or emails from senders you engage with often. Of course, we don’t know what the future of Gmail, Apple Mail, Outlook, etc. will look like. Will it involve more AI? Probably. But if the past 25 years are any indication, email will change slower than other platforms.

How I got to 10,000 newsletter subs in 2023 couldn’t be more different than how I got to 50,000 in 2025. Here are 3 things that changed: 1) Twitter is dead for email list growth Between 2020 and 2023, Twitter (now X) was a reliable source of organic growth. Not anymore. Now, most people see a fraction of the reach they used to have. But I’m glad I was able to get ⁓10k subscribers before it fell off a cliff. 2) Everyone moved to LinkedIn — including me I have about 12,000 LinkedIn followers. It’s been a good channel for acquiring agency clients. But it’s not as good as Twitter was for list growth, because the dynamics of the platform make it hard to get people to click a link. My analytics say ⁓300 subscribers have come from LinkedIn. But I expect the number to be closer to 2000, because people discover me on LinkedIn, then go to my website or google me. I’m bullish on LinkedIn. It’s the last text-focused social platform you can use to grow. That said, I could do a better job with it: spend more time on it, promote lead magnets, test ‘comment to get’ posts... It’s simply not a priority for me at the moment. 3) More paid advertising I rely on paid ads way more than I used to. That’s because organic list growth has slowed and I found reliable ways to turn advertising into profit. Depending on how I run the numbers, 30-60% of my customers come from paid ads. Yes, on average, subscribers from paid ads are less engaged than organic sources. But it’s faster, more consistent growth. Not to mention, I still convert them into customers by nurturing them and getting them to join a live webinar where I introduce our flagship product, ‘Write, Grow, Sell’. If you have a product in the $1k-$20k range, doing some type of live training is a must. I’ve found that subscribers who join my list through webinar registrations not only buy more but have nearly double the email CTR. — My goal for this year? 100,000+ email subscribers. And I plan to reach it by focusing entirely on two acquisition sources: Meta ads and YouTube. I’ll dive into the how in a separate post — or you can check out my newsletter, Newsletter Operator, where I’ve already covered it.

Update: We're hosting a retreat for media founders, newsletter publishers, and content entrepreneurs this fall. The full event agenda is now live! (Website link in comments). We've got an amazing group of speakers and attendees: Justin Moore Erika Burghardt Daniel Bustamante 🥷🏻 Chenell Basilio Ricci Wolman Ferol Vernon 📕 Katelyn Bourgoin 🧠 And more! It's limited to 40 people and there are 24 spots left. Check out the site below if you want to join us in Asheville, NC at a beautiful lakeside venue:

Getting to 1000 newsletter subscribers organically is a big accomplishment. Not many people realize that. If you can get to 1000 subscribers with a 50-60%+ open and 5%+ CTR without paid ads... You have massive potential. The first 1000 is the hardest. After that, growth snowballs.

This is how a PRO finds content-market fit: Ted Williams started Tiny Money 10 months ago. It's a local media company focused on personal finance for professionals in Charlotte, NC.  - Goes hyper niche: Personal finance + Charlotte, NC. - Solves a problem: Ted says, "People spend most of their money locally, there should be more useful content about that." (I'm paraphrasing) - Publishes one newsletter per week for 30 weeks - Posts 5-7 per week on one social platform (LinkedIn) and replies to almost all comments - Talks with and interviews his readers - Shares actionable and entertaining content, like: Curated $100k+ jobs Stories of local entrepreneurs Ways to make more and save more money Anonymous deep dives into locals' personal finances (income, spending, investing, net worth, goals) That's how you get to 9,000+ readers with 78%+ open rate and 25%+ CTR. Ted's a pro. He's done it before with Charlotte Agenda, which sold to Axios. Then he built Axios local to 10+ cities and millions of readers. Everyone should learn from Ted, regardless of whether you're in local media or not. We did a great podcast together, which I'll link in the comments below:

I just passed 50,000 newsletter subscribers after 3 years. Here’s how I plan to double that number by the end of the year: 1) Meta ads About 80% of my ad spend will be used to drive webinar registrations for ‘Write, Grow, Sell’, our flagship product that helps founders build profitable newsletters. The other 20% will be used to drive sign ups to my newsletter and/or a lead magnet. Then immediately after signing up and completing a survey, they’ll be invited to register for a webinar. Those percentages could change depending on performance. We’ll see what happens. 2) YouTube This will be the only organic source I focus on. My plan: - Publish 2-3 videos a week. - Focus on insightful content. - Work on the editing (remove the fluff). - Always include a CTA (e.g., webinar sign up). - Improve the packaging (ideas, titles, thumbnails). Compared to my paid ads experience, I’m a YouTube beginner. My channel only has 5,000 subscribers and 100,000 views. But I see a path to growth if I publish consistently. I’m excited about YouTube because: - It’s more stable than social platforms like Twitter/X. - It’s the only discovery platform (outside of search) where your content can be discovered for months or even years after publishing. - As with email (or a community), you can build a deep connection with your audience. - It’s a search engine that allows prospects to ‘research’ you. Meaning people may discover me from a Meta ad, then look me up on YouTube, then buy from me. Still, my goal with YouTube is *not* to build a massive following. It’s to build a following I can convert into email subscribers and customers. That’s the thing: Audience goals should always come second to client goals. Acquiring clients and giving them an incredible experience continues to be a priority for our team. It’s nice to have a subscriber/follower goal. It helps you move in the right direction. But it should never be the primary business goal.

I continue to be amazed by the amount of people who work hard to publish a great newsletter everyday or week... Then never publish that content anywhere else. Repurpose!