6 Months of the Newsletter: A Behind the Scenes Look
How many people are reading? Where are they coming from? And can I afford to go out to dinner from this?
Hello, everyone!
If you’ve been on the Modern Hiker Email List for years or if you just joined last week, first off let me thank you. Thank you for being interested in the outdoors, thank you for being interested in my take on the outdoors, and thank you for supporting this project.
I started putting more energy into this newsletter project at the beginning of the year to see if I could keep up with it, and now that it’s been a little over six months I figured now was a good time to let you all take a peek behind the scenes to see what goes into this—and where it stands today.
WHAT GOES INTO THIS
Every morning, I scan news sites, blogs, and (begrudgingly) some social media for outdoor stories that I think are interesting, important for my fellow outdoor enthusiasts to know about, or just plain fun. In addition to several major newspapers, I subscribe to Apple News+, which lets me add certain sites like those good ol’ RSS days and have access to other outlets I’d have to pay for individually.
I’ve used many systems to keep track of these stories over the years, but right now I’m using simple Apple Notes. I have stories grouped by month, and when they’re included in a newsletter I move them into a separate subfolder. Stories left over are potential fodder for the Island of Misfit Stories series—or they may just eventually get deleted when they get too old.
I read each story, come up with an entertaining synopsis for the newsletter, and track down an image to include. Some of these stories are pretty long or complicated, so this can take a decent amount of time.
I try to balance the content of each newsletter, too—not to have too many stories of a specific type, or too much from one region for balance. I’m still figuring this out a bit, but I at least think I’m heading in the right direction!
Throughout this process, I’m also brainstorming longer, more personal essays to open each newsletter. Sometimes these are thoughts from a hike I’ve been on or an outdoor experience, and other times they’re inspired from one of the stories I’ve read for the newsletter that week. Sometimes it’s a mix of both. I like to write rough drafts and give at least a night before I go back and edit, so I’m usually working on some of these over the weekends.
One thing that I do really like about this email newsletter format is the way it’s bringing old-school, 2006-era blogging back to the internet. This is the kind of writing that got me excited to add stuff to the web way back when, and it’s honestly really refreshing to be able to do that and not have to worry if the headline is optimized for Google search or contains enough high-drama buzzwords or hot-takes to get people angry enough to give it traction on social media.
READER TRENDS
Since I imported my existing newsletter list from Mailchimp, I don’t have a steady, slow increase of readers like a lot of other Substack newsletters—it’s more like a big ol’ mesa.
Looking at the 90 day view, there are more peaks and valleys, but I’ve kind of been hovering around the 8,500 mark for the entirety of this newsletter’s existence on Substack.
According to a 2022 email marketing benchmark report, the average email open rate for all newsletters is just 21.5%. Travel newsletters are a bit lower at 20.2%, while categories like “Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing, and Hunting” (which maybe this falls into, too?) are a bit higher at 27.3%.
Overall, the Modern Hiker Newsletter is much higher—ranging from 47% to 54%. So that’s great! One thing I do miss about Mailchimp is that it allowed me to parse out subscribers who hadn’t opened a newsletter in a little while to send them a targeted “hey, do you still want to read this?” message and find out what was going on … but then again, they also wanted to charge me $100 a month, so I’ll live with it.
A thing that Substack seems very good at it is driving both traffic and subscriptions. In terms of views, the emails you get in your inbox are by far the largest source (no surprise there). But after that it’s direct links and the Substack app. The Substack app is also the biggest driver of both paid and unpaid subscriptions.
… which leads to the big question everyone asks about Substack:
CAN YOU MAKE MONEY DOING THIS?
Of the 8,500+ people who subscribe to the Modern Hiker Newsletter, 37 are paid subscribers (including comps and gifts). That’s less than 1% of all readers.
In terms of actual income, before Substack and credit card processing fees, the gross annual revenue right now is hovering around $2,200. Pro: with Substack, I’m not paying for things like website hosting and tech support. Con: Even with the royalties on my three books (which usually come once or twice a year), this is definitely not enough to live off of.
Now, I didn’t start this project with the goal of quitting my other jobs (though that would be great!), but in the long-run I would at least like to get these numbers to a place where I feel like I’m getting fairly compensated for the time I spend putting the newsletters together.
WHERE WE GO FROM HERE
Based off the numbers at this half-year check-in, it seems like y’all are enjoying the newsletters enough to open them up, read them, and click on a few links. I would love to foster more discussion and feedback (and get a few more paid subscribers? Honestly even getting to 3% would be a huge win).
I will say, the comments and direct emails I have received so far have been AMAZING. People are engaged, have thoughtful things to add and critique, and in six months I have only had to block a SINGLE trolly comment. I would absolutely, positively love hearing from more of you. Let me know what you’re enjoying, what you wish you saw more of, or anything else!
I’d also love to hear what I might be able to do to help nudge you over into the paid subscriber territory. More subscriber-only emails? A Q&A session or Zoom? More chat stuff? Photo-essays from my favorite hikes? Lower monthly costs? It would be helpful to hear some of your favorite extras or perks you’ve enjoyed from other writers and creators, too.
If you want to continue supporting this project, like my posts, comment on stories (I will respond to almost everything!), and most importantly, share this newsletter with friends who you think may like it.
And finally, to every single person reading this newsletter in any way—thank you from the bottom of my heart for supporting outdoor writing, whether it’s here, on the Modern Hiker site proper, or by buying my books from me or other bookstores or just telling your friends about them. It is truly a privilege to do this, but it is absolutely a joy to get to do it with such a wonderful community.
Y’all are the best.
