8 Things I'd Do *Today* to Build a Bingeworthy Newsletter Even Tina Fey Would Want to Read
11/13/2024
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hi, i'm ash!
Creator of the New Travel & Design Series, 'OTHER PEOPLE'S HOUSES.'
Travel writer & host, cultural explorer, and architecture & interiors freak.
Meet ash >
The Newsletter
Every week, we're exploring global culture through the lens of the home. From floorplans to fixtures, we examine how houses are built, designed, and decorated around the world (with a side of sass, of course!)
The Podcast
The only podcast where we pass on the pyramids and poke around in the plumbing. Iโm Ash, and I'm, exploring the strange, smart, and wonderful ways houses are built, designed, and decorated around the world.
The Books
A new series of OTHER PEOPLE'S HOUSES books designed to help you try on a new life in different places around the worldโby getting to "go behind closed doors" inside local homes to discover what it's really like to live there.
I moved my email list to Substack in Sept (from Aweber), and I’m loooooooving it!! But — I have not yet explored Substack Notes (overwhelm ๐) or Threads because I was afraid it would be too much like Twitter. Thanks for the rec’s, I’ll make time to check them out.
(And, speaking of ice cream, if you have time you may want to see me most recent post ๐).
OMG, if only I had had those customers when I worked at the ice cream stand! (8 year high school + college veteran over here, lol.) I remember it used to drive me hilariously nutty when people wouldn’t specify what size they wanted. I was always like, “but it’s directly correlated with the price! How could they never mention this, and ultimately force me to have to ask them?!” Until I went to order ice cream literally this past summer. And realized I started with the freakin’ category first: mint chocolate chip, in a cup, with rainbow sprinkles. AND THEN I WAITED TO BE ASKED WHAT SIZE. I almost fell over.
I so fโn love you ash. Here I was deep in Amy Porterfield 700+ manual hell about newsletters and this email arrived. Perfect!
LOL I’m sure there are plenty of incredible gems inside of whatever you were looking at from Amy, but if the goal is to keep it simple and JUST GET STARTED, highly recommend this approach! YAY
Just wanted to flag that you *can* just email your audience without also posting it publicly. It’s a great feature to make use of when you want to do something like send a survey to your subscribers.
Didn’t know that and immediately googled. Very handy to know!!
OH MY GOOD FREAKING OVARIES – I CANNOT BELIEVE I DIDN’T KNOW THAT!!!!! I just Googled it and then saw you have to go into ‘Subscribers’ and then add a filter and then magically an email button comes up – what!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LIFE-CHANGING. I am so glad you left this comment, Cassandra! Thank you!!!!! ๐ฅ
Woohoo! Happy to help! ๐ช
๐จ๐ฆ VAs for the win!
(Raises hand) “Ash made me do it”. I discovered Substack through you Ash and I love it. I am finally getting paid for writing emails, and I love this platform. I have kept my old email/newsletter platform for automations that lead to my online courses, but I do love Substack for connecting with other writers. And for sheer writing pleasure.
For sheer writing pleasure, indeed! Oh, Jorunn, this makes me SO happy to hear. You deserve every darn paid subscriber there is! I love reading your emails. ๐ You are kicking some major Nordic ass, my friend!!!
Started a Substack a few weeks ago, so many great tips in this post, that I’m excited to start to explore and implement.
By the end of the week, I’m going to create a logo, and need to work on the title and clear punchy line that explains what it’s about.
Excellent, excited to check out your tips. ๐
YES PLS. Been having so much fun walking people through setting it up from A-Z on some of my Farmhouse Sessions – did not expect that to be so popular, but omg, what a blast! It is SO COOL to see people’s eyes light up when they realize they actually have a place they can write, where they feel like they belong.
I haven’t mastered it yet, but part of what lead me here is that I HATE setting up and maintaining Shopify to sell my art, and decided to come here to do some experiments. While I haven’t sold work yet, I’m having so much more fun curating mini drops each week and am ACTUALLY staying on top of photographing, creating videos, titles, and sharing work.
Dude, but THANK YOU FOR SAYING THIS! I couldn’t believe it when I saw Cassandra’s post and went and Googled it – I CANNOT BELIEVE I DID NOT KNOW THIS ALL ALONG. It’s weird they don’t have that UX a little more streamlined, for as good as they are at all the things! LOL. Seriously, game changer. I kept sending things out (when doing launch-style anything) and then going to the pub and deleting. Which probably wasn’t that awesome for blowing everybody up in the app, either….hahahahahaha. SO GLAD I LEARNED THIS TODAY
Ok I was so overwhelmed by starting an Aweber account and associated webpages with lead magnets and all the things! I am definitely starting a Substack (did hear that Flodesk was good too). How would you even start to get your first subscribers when starting this from scratch?
I mean, those definitely have their purposes and can be great, too – it’s how I got started with email marketing myself in 2009! (I actually worked at Aweber at one point, true story!)
Seriously though. Get on Substack Notes. You’ll see what I mean.
how often do you recommend publishing at a minimum? weekly
Yes no less than weekly or you won’t exist hahaha
I feel like I should be your pet project, Ash. I want to launch a new branch of my service based business next year under a new brand. Yes, online! I listen. Most of the time. And I’m caught in the Substack debate. Sounds good on paper, but I’ve read over and over that it can be *nearly* impossible to get found and established here with the leader board people being shown as priority publications. Plus, I can sling words, but am not an ‘author’ or ‘writer’ strictly speaking. The debate continues.
I think you should just dive in and try something and get started! No more overthinking – just play with it, and see how it feels, and most importantly: HAVE FUN. There are no Substack police! ๐ฎ ๐
In order to get paying subscribers, do you recommend selling the newsletter first before you invest time and $$ into creating the newsletter? Or does Substack as a platform build in marketing in order to acquire free or paid subscribers?
Hey! I’m not sure what you mean by selling the newsletter first before you create it? But my policy in general is simply: just start. Start, and figure it out as you go!
ok, Iโm starting my first paid e-newsletter. Iโll put my doubt and fear aside and figure out how to market it and get subscriber sales later. Iโm starting it!
THIS IS THE BEST POST! Seriously, you answer all the questions I didn’t even know I had. One thing that is very small, but keeps stopping me – how do you combine your CK and Substack lists (or maybe you don’t)? Like if someone signs up over on CK do you manually put them into Substack or just leave them be once they’ve gone through your automation?
Your posts truly are the best and so flippin’ informative!
Hey Ash, thank you for mentioning “What to Cook When You Don’t Feel Like Cooking.” I’ve been looking for an example of a thriving cooking newsletter that *didn’t* grow out of an already-successful YouTube channel, because I had my doubts if this format can work (most cooking content seems to emphasize video for obvious reasons).
Might just inspire me to do something in this niche finally ๐ค
This is the Post I needed but didn’t know I needed. I’ve been toying with the idea of a Substack for awhile but I know that there is so much I don’t know, but now I’ve been enlightened! I don’t feel like I’m entering a deep dark cave trying to figure things out. Yay! Also, ridiculously excited to find out about the release of the revised Creative Writing School! ๐ฅณ
Play with it and HAVE FUN!
ASH! Love this strategy. Writing? Done! Affiliate links? Done! But where I get my panties in a wad is where to sell my digital products? Substack โก๏ธ Checkout page for that product with Flodesk? Same but with Kit? Substackโก๏ธBeacons and โsell from thereโ? Tell me what to do and Iโll do it๐. I can mass email from all of those but get stuck on which to use to SELL. I swirl around selling one product (flodesk/kit sales page) vs list of all my products ala beacons/Stan store etc. knowing I can direct link to specific product when I want. Damn I got in the weeds quickly! Help a girl out