📧 Everybody is starting to publish newsletters

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👋 Hey!

This week's packed with major moves: a legendary hedge fund manager just launched his newsletter, Beehiiv's confident newsletters are going to win, and legacy media corporations are doubling down on newsletters. Plus, we've got automation gold that'll save you hours and proven growth tactics you can swipe today.

Let's dive in! 👇

Beehiiv rejects 'newsletter saturation' claim. CEO and co-founder Denk says that “quality content always rises at the top” and claims that newsletters present a lot of opportunities for creators.

Michael Burry launches newsletter to lay out his AI bubble views. The "Big Short" investor is using newsletters to reach 1.6M+ followers directly, proving newsletters work for everyone from indie creators to Wall Street legends. Premium pricing ($379/yr) signals a high-value content opportunity.

The Financial Times launches FT Alphaville on Substack. It now reaches younger readers on a creator-friendly platform; enables audience growth experiments, referral funnels, and a lower-friction entry point for future subscriptions.

Buttondown adds gift subscriptions on the subscribe page. Tapping gift purchases boosts discoverability and revenue, buyers gift friends or teams, subscriptions activate instantly, and purchase metadata helps segmentation and promos.

Guardian US eyes $50M+, expanding newsletters. Legacy media’s commitment to newsletters shows that newsletters indeed scale revenue and build communities.

How:

Why: DMs feel personal and low-friction, so they convert higher than cold CTAs. Rapid replies + social proof build trust fast and turn conversations into subscribers.

Expected Result: Convert ~10–30% of qualified DMs into subscribers within 24–72 hours; running 1–2 DM CTAs/week can add 100–1,000 subs/month depending on audience size; templates + simple automations, while saving 2–4 hours/week.

Spotlight: Cassandra Unchained by Michael Burry (Substack, $379/yr)

What Works:

Creator Quote:

"I doubted if I ever should come back. I'm back. Please join me."

Your Takeaway:

If you have a good subscriber base and if you’re confident that your content is valuable, use his playbook: package a strong, distinct thesis, promote it on your biggest social channel, and test a premium tier. Aim for a conservative 1% conversion from an engaged audience: 10k engaged followers = ~100 paid subs (about $37,900 at $379/yr), then iterate on pricing and content cadence.

Paved Ad Network

Why You'll Love It: Earn steady, always-on revenue with a one-time placement setup. Paved auto-populates relevant ads (Motley Fool, HubSpot, Amazon, Simon & Schuster, T-Mobile) for every send while you keep control over brands and placements. The downside is that you need at least 50,000 subscribers to join.

Best For: Newsletter publishers who want low-maintenance ad income, an easy onboarding flow, and a way to fill gaps between direct sponsorships.

Test: Daily subject line A/B test measuring click-through rate (not just opens).

Method: Send two subject line variations to 30% of the audience, measure CTR, and send the winner to the remaining 40%.

Result: Additional 43,876 clicks per newsletter from optimized subject lines.

Takeaway: Most newsletters optimize for open rate, but The Hustle discovered that optimizing subject lines for click-through rate delivers better business results. The winning subject line isn't always the one that gets opened most, it's the one that promises content readers actually want to engage with. Their rigorous daily testing adds nearly 44K clicks per send.

Before:

You either manually welcome new subscribers or send them the same email, chase conversions, and hand off paid members, eating up hours each week and missing timely, personal touches.

After:

A drag‑and‑drop beehiiv automation sends a personalized welcome series, tracks engagement (e.g., opened 5+ emails), nudges high‑engagers toward a paid tier, and triggers instant Discord invites or Slack pings when they convert. Setup takes minutes and requires no code.

Result:

Welcome flows drive 35–50% higher retention in the first 30 days; reactivation flows can recover up to 20% of inactive readers, and you cut manual ops from hours/week to minutes.

Your Takeaway: Clone a Welcome→Upgrade template in beehiiv, connect your Slack/Discord channels, then A/B test message timing and CTAs using the automation dashboard to optimize conversion and retention.

When you finally hit that 50% open rate... then remember bots count for more than 50% of opens. 🤦‍♂️

Thanks for reading,

Eren Daskesen

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