Your Subscriber Count Is Lying to You. (Sort Of.)

BUILD

Hey Operators! 👋

Quick question.

Would you rather have 10,000 newsletter subscribers scattered across the country...

Or 2,000 readers who live within 15 minutes of the businesses you're trying to help?

Before you answer, remember we're talking about a LOCAL newsletter.

Not launching the next New York Times.

Although if somebody wants to buy us for a few billion dollars, we're willing to discuss it.

Here's the thing.

A subscriber count tells you how many people signed up. It doesn't tell you how valuable your audience is.

And it's certainly not the only number that matters.

For a local newsletter, geographic relevance can make a substantial difference.

A restaurant in Pottstown probably doesn't care much about reaching readers in Portland.

Unless they're planning to ship cheesesteaks across the country.

Which, frankly, we'd support.

But there's more to the equation.

Are your readers engaged?

Do they click on local events?

Do they respond to your emails?

Are they recommending your publication to neighbors?

And when you feature a local business, does that campaign generate meaningful attention or action?

Your most valuable metric isn't necessarily your biggest number. It's the evidence that you're reaching and helping the right people.

That's also why you should collect information beyond subscriber totals.

Understand where readers live, what they care about, and how they interact with your publication.

You can learn a surprising amount from a simple reader survey.

Your next move: Ask your subscribers two questions:

"What town do you live in?"

"What's the most useful thing we include in this newsletter?"

Those answers might be worth more than another thousand random email addresses.

We’d love to invite you to join us in Local Newsletter Launchpad👇