Spot the Low-Hanging Fruit: 12 Simple Growth Tactics for Newsrooms and Publishers

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I’ve been working with a group of small publishers lately, and one topic repeatedly comes up on our calls: Low-hanging fruit.

These teams want to grow their newsletters, but they’re also all limited in what they can do. They don’t have huge teams, they don’t have a ton of time, and they don’t have much money to spend to help them grow. Which is why they ask, “Dan, what’s the low-hanging fruit we can go after first?”

The good news is that there’s a lot of it out there — simple tactics that cost virtually nothing and are incredibly easy to set up. The more you promote your newsletter, the more growth you’ll see, so don’t stop after implementing one or two tactics. You could work through every tactic on this list in just a few hours, and these strategies might drive thousands of sign-ups for your newsletter in the long run.

But first, you need to work on two things.

Craft your pitch + create a landing page

You’ll note in every example I share below that there’s a clear pitch for why someone should sign up for your newsletter. 

Your potential reader already gets way too many emails, so you’ve got to give them a reason why your newsletter is absolutely essential. A call-to-action, or CTA, that says “Sign up for my newsletter!” isn’t enough.

Why might someone sign up? A few reasons:

• Your newsletter creates value for them — Your newsletter saves them time, makes them money, or helps them do better work.
• Your newsletter impacts a reader’s life in a positive way — Your newsletter makes them smarter, helps them make decisions, solves a problem they have, connects them with a larger community, or gives them resources to improve their life.
• Your newsletter strikes an emotional chord — Your newsletter makes them happier or helps them better understand themselves.
• Your newsletter is a way for readers to engage with you and your work — Your readers like you and choose to sign up because they want to hear directly from you.

If you still want to figure out what your newsletter does for a reader, review this Newsletter Strategy Positioning Brief. It might help you figure out your why.

Once you’ve got that nailed down, make sure you have a landing page where readers can sign up for your newsletter. You’ll link to that page over and over again, and many of these tactics rely on a landing page. It doesn’t have to be perfect or particularly fancy — a page with a clear CTA and a sign-up box will do. Here are a few suggestions for how to build a good landing page.

19 Great Newsletter Landing Pages You Can Learn From

You can always make the page better later on — I’ve also got some suggestions for how to improve your current landing page.

With your pitch and your landing page in place, let’s talk through these tactics. Everything here can be done in less than 90 minutes, and in some cases, may take as few as two or three minutes to implement!

Add your newsletter to your email signature

Estimated time to implement: 2 minutes

Your email signature is included in every single personal or work email you send. Why not use that as an opportunity to grow your list?

Add a sentence at the bottom of your emails with your CTA, and then include a link. It’s a small task, but you’ll be surprised how many friends or colleagues sign up after seeing it.

Here’s how I do this with my email signature — a sentence that says, “Sign up to get weekly tips for sending better email.” It’s not fancy, but it actually works!

Paste a CTA into every story you publish

Estimated time to implement: 2 minutes per story

For many publishers, the most effective driver of newsletter growth is sign-ups collected on article pages. If a reader comes to your site and reads something they like, you’ve got a good chance to convert them into a newsletter subscriber. In an ideal world, you’d run pop-ups, toasters, registration walls, or other aggressive tactics on your article pages, but those take a bit more time to set up and run correctly. There is one tactic that any team can implement that costs absolutely nothing and requires just a bit of copy and paste.

Take the CTA from your landing page, and then find a story relevant to the newsletter. At the top or bottom of the story, paste in the CTA, add the link to your landing page, and add bolding or italics to make it stand out from the rest of the story. I like this example from MSNBC. They’ve got a weekly newsletter about the U.S. legal system, so they add these CTAs at the end of stories about big legal cases. The reader who just finished a story about the Supreme Court is likely to want to read more stories like that, and what better way to feed them those stories than through their newsletter?

If you want to improve the conversion rate, try a tool like Gravity Forms or OptinMonster to embed a sign-up box below the CTA. Setting up the forms takes a bit more time, and you will have to pay to use those tools, but reducing the amount of friction in the sign-up process will lead to more subscribers in the long run.

Promote the newsletter in your website’s header

Estimated time to implement: 5 minutes

The header of your website — where you put your logo and links to key sections of your site — is seen on every single page of your website. Shouldn’t there be a newsletter link prominently displayed there, too?

Don’t bury this in a menu that requires a few clicks to reach. Put a link in the header that links back to your newsletter landing page.

And if you want to go a step further, make the link stand out by turning it into a button with a background color or an email icon alongside it — something eye-catching that will drive more clicks back to your landing page. A site like TownLift uses a button like that — just with a paper airplane icon and the words “Join Free” — to get readers back to their landing page.

Promote the newsletter in your footer

Estimated time to implement: 5 minutes

Footer units aren’t seen quite as much as the ones in a header (not as many readers make it to the bottom of a website!), but what I see with my clients is that readers who do make it there tend to sign up for the newsletter. Those readers are usually looking to take a next step, which often includes signing up for a newsletter.

Including a link or a button in the footer is a good start. But if you can take it a step further and embed a sign-up box, that’s even better. (I mentioned two tools earlier: Gravity Forms and OptinMonster. Both are good for creating sign-up boxes to embed on your site.) If you have multiple newsletters, pick your flagship newsletter — the one you think every reader should sign up for — and promote that within the footer. Just like with the other tactics in this guide, make sure you give readers a clear CTA to subscribe — “Sign up for our weekly newsletter” won’t cut it!

If you have multiple newsletters, you can always add a link below the embedded form to point readers back to the newsletter sign-up page. (Or you can include the link in a confirmation message after someone successfully signs up for your flagship product.) That way, a reader can choose to get more newsletters from you.

Include a newsletter icon among your social profiles

Estimated time to implement: 5 minutes

When I audit a publisher’s newsletter growth strategy, one of the first things I look at is how they promote their social media platforms. Just about every site has a list of icons promoting the social media platforms they’re active on: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Bluesky, etc.

But I rarely see a newsletter icon listed among them.

Will adding an envelope icon (like this: ✉️) make a massive difference in growth? No, probably not. But here’s what I tell clients: Let’s assume that it’ll drive 1,000 clicks back to your landing page every year and that 50% of those readers will sign up for your newsletter. It’s a tactic that takes five minutes to implement. Wouldn’t you spend five minutes on something that will drive 500 sign-ups every year?

Take the easy wins whenever you can.

Add a link to all of your social bios

Estimated time to implement: 10 minutes

While you think about promoting your newsletter alongside those social media accounts, you should also think about promoting your newsletter on your social media accounts.

Platforms like Instagram or LinkedIn make promoting your newsletter easy. In LinkedIn’s case, you only get 30 characters to describe your newsletter, so you’ll probably need to trim down your CTA to just the basics.

If you want to promote lots of stuff in addition to your newsletter — like stories from your website or a subscription, membership, or donation offer — then you should use a tool like Linktree or even Canva to create a page where you can create a single link that then promotes multiple things.

Promote your newsletters in your next survey

Estimated time to implement: 10 minutes

If you’re a publisher who isn’t asking readers to sign up for a newsletter in a survey, you’re missing out on easy growth.

You might be thinking: Aren’t those survey takers already on our newsletter list? Why ask again?

So let me explain.

Let’s say you’re a newsroom with multiple newsletters. Someone takes a survey in response to one of your newsletters. You already:

A) Have their email address

B) Know they’re interested in newsletters

So at the end of a survey, ask them if they want to sign up for more newsletters from you. (Many email platforms can auto-add them to your lists, or you could use a tool like Zapier to connect the form to your email platform.) 

Here’s a real example from a client. They’ve got 10+ newsletters, and they did a big survey of their newsletter audience.

5,000 people took the survey.

3,500 chose to sign up for at least one additional newsletter.

And those 3,500 people signed up, in total, to more than 11,000 newsletters. (Each person signed up for, on average, about three additional newsletters.)

11,000 email sign-ups — all by adding one question to the end of a survey. Try it for yourself and see if it works for your org, too. (I can’t guarantee 11,000 sign-ups, but you’re likely to see a small percentage of survey-takers convert!)

Set up a “Forward to a friend” link in your newsletter

Estimated time to implement: 10 minutes

Readers will share your newsletter with a friend or colleague — you just need to make it easy for them.

I like to include a link to a pre-built email with the subject line and body copy written. All the reader needs to do is insert their friend’s email address and hit send.

Here’s a basic template you can use:

Subject line: I think you’d like this newsletter about [your topic]

Body copy: I’ve been reading this newsletter about [your topic], called [name of your newsletter]. Every [day/week/month], they send me [one sentence about what you get in your newsletter]. I think you’d really like it. You can sign up for free at [your landing page].

So for the Inbox Collective newsletter, that might turn into something like this:

Subject line: I think you’d like this newsletter about newsletters!

Body copy: I’ve been reading this newsletter about how to build a great newsletter from Dan Oshinsky, the former director of newsletters at the New Yorker and BuzzFeed. Every week, he sends me tips around newsletter growth, strategy, and monetization that I can implement into the newsletters I’m building. I think you’d really like it, too! You can sign up for free at inboxcollective.com/newsletter.

You’d take that copy and generate the link with a free tool like this. They’ll give you a URL you can paste into your newsletter. Then add a sentence in your newsletter — “Have a friend who might like our newsletter? Share it with them.” — and include the link in that second sentence.

I’d add one more CTA to your newsletter: “Did a friend forward this newsletter to you? Sign up now to get this in your inbox.” Include a link back to your landing page. That way, you’re covered if a reader forwards the full newsletter instead of using the “forward to a friend” link.

(One more thing: Some email platforms offer a “forward to a friend” option, but it takes readers to a webpage instead of keeping them in the inbox. On that page, the reader will have to manually insert their friend’s email. I never recommend this route — it adds too much friction to the process.)

Add a CTA in your left or right rail

Estimated time to implement: 15 minutes

In a perfect world, you’d go to the left or right rail of your website — sometimes called the sidebar — and embed a CTA and a sign-up box. On desktop, that would mean a reader could sign up for the newsletter without leaving the page, and that box wouldn’t interrupt the reading experience.

But I also know that for many publishers, that may require developer help, and my goal here is to give you quick wins. So let’s start by creating a simple ad that you can embed on your rail. You don’t even need to be a designer — you can make in a free tool like Canva. All you need is:

• A square (500px by 500px) or rectangular (500px by 1,000px) ad unit.
• A solid color background. (Make it something that will stand out on your website.)
• A sentence or two about why your newsletter is worth signing up for.
• A button, built into the ad itself. (Canva, for instance, has lots of buttons you can easily paste into a design.)

Save the ad as a .png file, upload it to the rail, and then link back to the landing page, like KPCW does on their site with this black, green, and orange ad. It’s not fancy, but it’s enough to start driving some sign-ups.

Direct message your colleagues and friends 

Estimated time to implement: 45 minutes

When an independent writer asks for growth advice, my first tip is to take time to reach out to your network and ask them to sign up for your newsletter. Newsrooms and publishers often skip this step, maybe because it seems too time-consuming or low-fi. 

You shouldn’t, though! This is one of those tactics that takes a little time but leads to lots of new sign-ups. (And understandably so: Your colleagues and friends like you and want to follow your work!)

You can do this in one of two ways:

1. Write an email to people in your network and ask them to sign up for your newsletter — Make sure to BCC everyone (nobody wants to be part of a never-ending reply-all thread), tell them what you’re working on, and give them a link to sign up.
2. Direct message, or DM, people you know on social media and tell them about your newsletter — You don’t have to customize the message for everyone, though that certainly won’t hurt. Just tell them about the newsletter and give them a link to sign up.

(There are some tools that will automate the process of sending a DM for you, though I haven’t found one that I like enough to endorse here on Inbox Collective.)

If you can offer a hook to sign up — something that gives them a reason to check out the newsletter — that’s even better. Some clients of mine have had success with a message like this:

Hope all is well! I recently launched a newsletter, and I’d love your feedback on it — I think you might have an idea or two for how I could make it better! Here’s the link to sign up —> http://mywebsite.com/newsletter I’d love to hear what you think!

In this case, the hook is a bit of flattery. This person is asking their friend or colleague for feedback because they think they’re the kind of smart, insightful person who could help. (And who doesn’t like hearing how brilliant they are!) If you launched your newsletter a while ago, just change the first sentence: “I’ve been working on this newsletter for a while, but I think there’s room for improvement!”

You could try your own hook, too — anything that piques a reader’s interest and gets them to take the next step. 

Try a one-off poll

Estimated time to implement: 60 minutes

So many local newsrooms have success with an annual Best Of competition, where readers vote on the best local restaurants or businesses. As part of the competition, readers need to enter their email address in order to vote. But those sorts of Best Ofs take lots of time to properly plan.

What if there was a simpler option that only took a few minutes to deploy?

There is.

Instead of a giant Best Of, with dozens of categories, pick one simple thing that readers can vote on, like the best hamburger in your community. Create a post on your website with a simple headline: “Poll: Who makes the best burger in our city?” Write a short intro explaining that you want readers to cast their vote, and that you’ll share a post with the winners once voting closes. Then embed a Google Form below that.

On the form, list a few options for the best burger for readers to choose from. Add an open-ended field so readers can share why they love that burger. Then add a CTA for your newsletter. The more you can customize the CTA for the poll they just took, the better. For instance: “We love digging into more than just burgers in our daily newsletter. Every weekday, we share five stories locals like you absolutely need to know about. Can we sign you up for it?” Then give them a field to enter their email address — and import the emails into your email platform.

The form should look like this:

But don’t stop there. Write a post afterwards announcing the winners. (“Who makes the best burger in our city? Here’s what readers like you said.”) On the post, include some of those quotes from readers, and then copy-and-paste the CTA for your newsletter into the post, too. It’s a double-dip — you’ll get email addresses from the poll and from the follow-up post!

Test out IRL promotion

Estimated time to implement: 90+ minutes

Don’t underestimate the power of promoting your newsletter in person. If you can get in front of your ideal audience, you’ve got a chance to convert them to your newsletter.

The most obvious examples are for local newsrooms. Create an ad in Canva, even if it’s just an 8×11 version of the left/right rail ad you made. Add in a QR code that readers can scan to go directly to your landing page, and print out copies that you can spread around town. You’ll find that there are plenty of spots — from bulletin boards to telephone poles, like Madison Minutes did in the example below — where you can staple your ad.

But this tactic doesn’t just work for local newsletters. For instance, plenty of co-working spaces have a bulletin board where local businesses can promote their services. If you’ve got a B2B newsletter, you could print out a business card-sized ad to promote your newsletter to a group of professionals.

Want something more sophisticated? Scroll through a platform like FedEx Office or VistaPrint, and you’ll find that there are lots of customizable options that are affordable. For less than $100, you can print:

• 5 yard signs
• 10 window clings
• 150 napkins
• 200 bookmarks
• 250 door hangers
• 300 stickers
• 1,500 postcards
• 2,500 business cards

The local coffee shop you solicit might happily place your napkins in their store in exchange for some free ads in your newsletter. The same is true for the local bookstore or library with your bookmarks. You’ll find neighbors who will put a yard sign in their yard, or friends who might help you leave those door hangers or postcards around town.

Plus: You can use unique QR codes or landing pages to see how effective each tactic is. (Looking for design inspiration? Bitly has a guide with lots of QR code examples.) If those door hangers convert at a high rate, spend a little more to distribute even more of them around your community. These offline tactics probably won’t drive growth the way some on-site tactics will, but they can be cheap and quick tactics that are part of your overall growth strategy. You never know whose eye they might grab. 

There’s a lot more to try — I’ve got 50+ growth ideas to consider. But start with the 12 in this guide. The low-hanging fruit is there for you if you’re ready.