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Yeah, I know. We have Moishka Marsh just launched Mastering Facebook Marketing, a weekly video series about Mastering Facebook marketing. Kurt Elster has his e-commerce hacks weekly, a weekly video series that’s really, really good about E-commerce hacks for store owners and Shopify store owners. And Alan Weiss has Common Sense Consulting, which is a weekly video series he releases about consulting best. Practices. And this is an old, old, old idea. If we jump back 30, 40, 50 years, we could see paid mailing lists in the direct marketing and direct response world where you’d sign up and get, you know, a physical letter in the mail from some. Some marketer or some business somewhere writing to you about X, Y, or Z. And what I really love about this as a concept or a potential product that a consultant can add to their product ladder is that It’s A, highly leveraged. You’re doing the same amount of work, Nick, if you’re writing revised weekly for one person or for 5,000 people. But you make a lot more money every time somebody signs up. Well, like your effective hourly rate right now, writing it, eh, probably not as good as other things. But a year down the line, when maybe you have 100 or 200 people subscribing to it, that’s a really nice, effective hourly rate for writing four letters a week or four letters a month. It provides a lot of value in that sense. Beyond that, there’s opportunities to take the best content there, like you mentioned, and Remix it into other things. If you notice that one of your letters is like the most widely read, the most opened, the most responded to, well, That’s an idea for a book. That’s an idea for a webinar or a podcast or another series of articles because you’re able to take that information and say, well, how can I take the topic here and turn it into more additional pieces of content?

So, one fear I always had around this idea was the concept that somebody’s paying $50 a month for this. Oh, God. Or let’s say I have 50 people paying me $50 a month. So, I’m making $2,500 a month off of it. And oh gosh, each letter, I had this terrible, terrible thought in my head: like each letter has to be worth $2,500. And if it’s not, I have failed my audience. But Just in the last year, I was able to flip around my mental perspective on this and be like, okay, from the audience side, they’re paying $50 a month for four letters. So each letter on average should be worth about $12. What level of information would somebody pay $12 for? One tip that helps them improve their business? One idea that they’re able to think about and bring to their boss? One concept they’re able to implement and test? The barrier to $12 of value? It’s not that high of a ledge to get over. It’s actually really, really small. And I think when you view it from The audience’s side, where, like, oh wow, in the first month of you know, this paid newsletter, I got three ideas I was able to implement for my business. That person probably isn’t going to unsubscribe for a while. That person is probably going to recommend your letter for other people out there because it’s going to. Provide value for them in an ongoing fashion. Even if four or five letters are a miss in a row, or don’t give them something they in particular can implement. It’s still going to provide value, and they’re going to look back and be like, hey, you know what? I’m $150 into this and I got three ideas that helped improve my business. Cool. Let’s keep on going.

Yeah, I think there’s a ton of value in that feedback process because any question that Somebody asks of you in the paid list. Well, that’s an opportunity to better engage with somebody there. And it’s also an opportunity to create future content, future Issues. So many of the blog posts and articles I’ve written on my site are directly from questions people ask me in my newsletter onboarding process. My system, like when somebody signs up for Kai’s free newsletter, The first thing you get is the thank you page where it’s like, I want to know more about you. Please, like, tell me about you. Here’s the three-question questionnaire. And it’s like, what do you do? Tell me about your business. What’s the number one problem you’ve run into over the last few weeks? What else should I know about you? And like 25% of people sign up for that or answer that. And it’s been incredibly valuable because I’m able to start that dialogue. But also, when I ask the question, what’s the number one thing that’s been giving you trouble in your business? People type. People type either a single question that I could answer or they type a lot which I could answer. And that frequently turns into feature blog posts or mailing lists that I send out or other pieces of content. Somebody just wrote in and said, Hey, you know what? I love your content. I’ve been following you around for a while. I would love to see you write a book about how to do joint ventures well. How do I set up joint venture partnerships? How do I do webinars? And I’m like, that’s been on my list for a while, but you writing in just made it move a little higher because I’m able to get that feedback loop of people. And now I know, okay, people, some at least one person out there has raised their hand to ask for. Content on this topic, which means there’s probably a number of people who haven’t had the courage to raise their hand and ask that question on that topic. So, why don’t I Smoke test it by writing an article about, like, hey, here’s how to do joint venture outreach and see what the response is. And if the response is good, well, great. That validates that this is something I should talk about more. So Having that conversation, having that open loop and dialogue is so valuable. And what I love about Revised Weekly, and in fact, any of the paid newsletters we’ve talked about so far, is If somebody writes in with a question that you’ve already answered, it becomes super simple to link back to it and be like, oh, hey, you asked a great question. I answered that in issue four of, you know, Master Facebook Marketing or e-commerce hacks weekly. Here’s that link, enjoy. And it takes you or your assistant 60 seconds to do that versus, okay, I have to write a response and da da da, and 30 minutes later, you could send it off. It’s so easy to link and reshare that content.

Yeah, with my book Podcast Outreach, I have an accountability course in the back end, which just every week takes somebody through. It’s like, okay, cool. Chapter one is about this. Like, let me give you a brief TLDR over chapter one. And here’s a little accountability quiz, not quiz, but like questionnaire you could answer about the main questions chapter one posed. And I frequently had people write me in with a question relating to. Some topic in podcast outreach. And I’m like, cool, I have an answer for you. Here’s a link to the, you know, the accountability course email that talks about this topic. Enjoy. And it’s the same thing. I get a response back that’s like, whoa, this is awesome. This exactly answered my question. This helped me so much. Thank you. And It’s reusing that content. It’s saying, okay, I created this in one spot, but it’s going to apply over here, and it still provides as much value. They don’t need something new from the ground up, they need an answer to their question. And if you’ve already answered their question, Great link to it. This is why I love blogging so much.

I will go on record and say I do not understand Snapchat. I am old and it confuses me.

Just across the board.

No. Jumping back to paid newsletters, I think one question that people in our audience might have, or the listeners might have, is. Okay, so I’m a consultant and I’m doing client work. When and how should I add something like this? And I think if you are in the position of knowing a decent amount about a topic, and you frequently get questions from clients or potential customers or people in the industry. Those are both good signs. And if you frequently get people contacting you who are like, I really want your advice on this, but I can’t afford you, well, great. That’s a perfect signal that you could add a lower price, more leveraged offering like a paid newsletter. And say, well, great. I understand. Like, you want my advice on A-B testing, but you could only afford $100 a month. I’m a bit more expensive than that. I’m so sorry. But what I can do is offer you, you know, my weekly. A newsletter on A-B testing, and it’s $50 a month. So you’re going to save money compared to your budget, and it will give you actionable advice that you could implement. It gives the buyer that choice of, well, do I invest in this thing or do I not? Where before, for the abstract consultant we’re discussing here, a prospect who comes to you only has the option of engaging with you at your higher priced service offering levels. And you’re leaving money on the table in that sense, where somebody might have $50 or $100 to spend, but not $1,000 or $10,000. And well, that money’s going to walk away. This is exactly why I created my book, Podcast Outreach, because. People would come to me and say, I want you to do podcast outreach for me. And I’d say, wonderful, it’s X thousand dollars a month. And they’re like, I can’t afford that. And I’m like, I’m so sorry. And The conversation ended there. Now I’m able to say, Well, great. I’d love to help you. What’s your budget? Ah, we really don’t have a lot of money. Excellent. I have a do-it-yourself book that will teach you. Absolutely everything I know. Here’s the link. Please enjoy. And it’s able to capture some of that surplus. People who were showing up but couldn’t afford a full engagement, but we’re saying, I value your insight, I value your opinion, I want to learn more from you. How do we do this? Now, with my book, I’m able to offer it. With a weekly newsletter, you’re able to offer it. So, I always think of this as being: if we think of like the consultant’s product ladder of an initial service offering and larger service offerings after that. These sort of highly leveraged one-to-many writing a book, writing a paid newsletter, doing a paid video course, sort of fill out the bottom half of the product ladder where it’s a lower-priced service offering, but If you have one person subscribing or 10,000 people subscribing, it’s the same amount of work for you to deliver it, and you’re able to provide a lot of value to those subscribers in the process.

Entirely. And. I think, I mean, echoing what we’ve said in probably half of these episodes, it really connects to having strong positioning. Because if you’re positioned as a general marketing person, People aren’t going to be sure what problem you could help them solve. But we’ve talked about this on previous episodes, Nick, how you intentionally or unintentionally positioned yourself as the A-B testing guy, and people come to you for A-B testing advice and for help with A-B testing. By doubling down, by having that strong positioning and then doubling down and saying, Well, hey, I have a paid newsletter on A-B testing. People show up saying, You’re the A-B testing person. And you’re like, Yes, I am. And they’re like, I want to work with you. And you’re like, I got a paid mailing list. Subscribe here. And there’s a resonance and a common thread through that all. Where if you were like, oh, I do design-related things, and I’ve got this, and this, and this, and this other thing, and I got this paid list over here, you’re going to be attracting a really wide range of people. And not everyone will convert to that paid list. But by having a narrow focused positioning, like Moishka and Facebook Marketing or Kurt and e-commerce and Shopify marketing. Well, the people who show up are already in the mindset of, you’re an expert in this area. And when you offer them that paid list or that paid service, they’re going to say, perfect, this is exactly what I need. Here’s my money. Thank you so much.

No, I completely agree. And launching a paid newsletter is something that’s on my list. I’m focusing on other areas right now, but I think it’s a valuable activity for a consultant who, I mean, like if we wanted to put hard metrics to it, I’d say like, let’s say you have a free newsletter and you’re comfortable sending out a letter every week, every two weeks, so you’re actively engaging with it. You have somewhere between a thousand and five thousand or more subscribers on it, and you frequently get your audience writing in with questions about your discipline. I think if you’re able to say yes or tick those three boxes, you’re in a good position to launch a paid mailing list. And it might start out with just, you know, Five to ten folks subscribing to it. But if you’re charging $25 or $50, that’s a couple hundred bucks a month. And that’s decent compensation for, hey, answer four questions a month, a thousand words per email, or you know, a five-minute video. And it’ll provide value to them and level up from there. And just like publishing a book provides an authority level up, I think having a paid mailing list Provides two benefits. It provides that similar authority level up, but it also provides an evergreen asset that you could offer to people. If you meet somebody at an event, What’s his name? Michael Port from Book Yourself Solid recommends this. Always having some free or some ongoing way for a prospect to engage with you. If you meet somebody at an event and they’re like, well, great, I’m interested in your stuff. How do I better engage with your content? You’re able to say, well, great. You know, I have a free newsletter and I also have a paid newsletter where I send out the good stuff. And you can sign up here. And Anybody’s able to onboard themselves at that point. Anybody could show up and hand over the money and suddenly be a customer, not just a prospect on the list. And it provides It provides this intake that you wouldn’t have had otherwise. And suddenly, suddenly, you could be like, okay, cool. I’ve enjoyed the weekly letters or the weekly videos. I’m going to buy the book. Oh, I really enjoyed the book. I’m going to schedule a call. Oh, that call was great. I’m going to schedule a consulting engagement. And you’re providing new rungs on the ladder. So, prospects can move themselves up to the tier that makes the most sense for them. It’s so possible for somebody that comes in the door today for Revised Weekly or Moishka’s Master Facebook Marketing. To in a month, three months, or 12 months, level up to a multi-thousand dollar engagement. And all you, as the consultant or product creator, need to do is make the clackety noise. Write your newsletters, record those videos, provide value and answer questions, and the magic is going to happen.

Well, Alan Weiss does this. Alan Weiss, with his Common Sense Consulting Weekly video, packages up the previous year’s videos and sells them as a bundle. And it’s like, great, do you want to buy the 2014 series of Common Sense Consulting? It’s, you know, maybe 200 bucks. And you get 52 videos from Finn. And cool, that makes sense. And if you’re doing just a say pure email newsletter where it’s just the content, well, once you have 20 or so issues written, you could be like, okay, cool, 10 of these suck. 10 of these are great. I’m going to make the first 10 somebody receives once they sign up the 10 great ones. And so you know, any new people that come through the door, they’re going to get an orderly progression of The 10 that you like the best, or got the best response from your audience, and then they get the new stuff. But to that new subscriber, there’s no difference, it doesn’t matter that you wrote the first letter they received nine months ago. If it provides value to them in the moment, if it’s interesting and relevant to them.

I think it makes a lot of sense as an easy level up for consultants or product creators or anybody if you’re comfortable writing. One thing I advise people is Pick the content publication medium that you are most comfortable with, be it text, a newsletter, be it audio, a podcast, or be it Video, a weekly video series, and double down on that. I have a friend who was able to bust out 3,000-word essays in 45 minutes, and they’re wonderful and amazing and get incredible, incredible reviews. But he’s not that comfortable podcasting. And he’s like, I feel like I should be podcasting. I’m like, no, you have a superpower here. Double down on the superpower. So For somebody who’s like, I want to do a weekly paid thing. Does it make sense to do video? Do I do a paid podcast? Do I do a paid newsletter? Well, whatever form of content is easiest for you to create on the regular, do that. Just focus on that. Don’t feel like you have to play in these other arenas where you aren’t as comfortable, like podcasting. If you don’t feel comfortable, you know, recording audio or video, if you don’t feel comfortable recording video, do whatever makes the most sense for you. What’s the easiest for you to ship? And focus on doing that regularly because you’ll get the best results from it, you’ll enjoy it the most, and your audience will appreciate it the most.

And I’d also say focusing on the small wins is incredibly helpful. If you’re able to get it to $500 a monthly recurring revenue, well, you might be like, oh, the product only makes $500 a month. This sucks. But you flip it around and say, well, I’m getting paid $500 a month to write four essays. That’s not bad. That’s fun. That can be enjoyable. And focus on the small ones like that. It doesn’t need to be a $50,000 a month product. It could be a $500 a month thing to start off, and you grow from there to somewhere larger.