This is Why I’m Unsubbing From Your Newsletter (and why I don’t write one anymore)
I’ve unsubbed from several newsletters lately. Yours might be one of them.
Repetitive message, generic format
Reason being, too many are jumping on the “weekly bite-sized tips” formula and can’t keep their content useful/interesting/valuable for longer than a month.
Forced consistency
This is one of the reasons I don’t write a Substack anymore.
The challenge of:
- forced consistency (keeping up the weekly or biweekly publishing cadence)
- writing things I don’t want to write about
is a burden I don’t want to carry. And it’s usually for nothing.
Few were sitting and wondering “hm I wonder where his newsletter is?”
Stale material, limited niche
I feel especially bad for those newsletters that cram themselves into a single niche/perspective.
The result = after a month or so, you’ve seen their whole act. The rest are just upsells or pleas to engage in (probably) non-existent community.
I don’t know how to write one that’s me and is something people will pay for
I like the idea of communicating with people at a regular cadence. But I like the idea of communicating AND forming real connections more.
That’s hard to do when I’m chasing a self-imposed deadline every week.
But I also realize as a writer, a newsletter is one of the easiest ways to monetize my writing.
I probably think “I should start a newsletter again” at least once a day.
But then I think about how, much like visakanv, my writing topics tend to be unlimited. It’s hard for me to know what I’m gonna write about next (didn’t expect to write this essay).
So it’s hard for me to justify charging money for access to a scattershot of topics.
Combine that with my loathing of the subscription based pricing model and I’ve got a seemingly impassable roadblock to creating a newsletter.
I’m open to suggestions of ways to monetize w/o:
- stuffing myself into a niche
- forcing myself to write things I don’t want to write about
- ripping readers off (time and money)
DMs open
Read this post and more on my Typeshare Social Blog
