Today I deleted 239 subscribers from my newsletter.
They hadn’t opened a single email in more than six months.
A big list can lie to you.
It looks impressive on the outside.
But inside, it’s quiet.
Cold.
Unresponsive.
For a long time, I held on.
Because the number felt good.
Because it made growth look real.
Because everyone says, “Build your list.”
But here’s what I’ve learned:
A small, clean list is far more powerful than a large, stale one.
If only 20% of people open your emails,
you’re not writing to your audience.
You’re writing to ghosts.
So I made a decision.
I will keep cleaning my list
until every person on it has opened and read my emails
in the last six months.
Those are my people.
The ones who care.
The ones who respond.
The ones who will eventually buy, join, and stay.
Vanity metrics build ego.
Clean data builds a business.
If your list feels heavy…
Maybe it’s time to let some people go.
Category: Newsletter
How I Turned a Small Newsletter Into a Paying Client Engine
Most people think you need a big newsletter to make money.
You don’t.
You need the right strategy.
I have been writing my newsletter for five years, and I hardly made any money from it.
It is small. No viral posts. No massive launch. No sophisticated funnel.
Then everything changed in January this year. I used a strategy to turn my small number of subscribers into clients.
Today, that “small” newsletter has become a consistent client engine for my Book -To-Business coaching business.
Here’s exactly how it happened.
I Stopped Chasing Subscribers and Started Attracting Buyers
In the beginning, like many creators, I thought growth was the goal.
More subscribers = more success.
Wrong.
What matters isn’t how many people read your newsletter. What matters is whether the right people read it.
When I shifted my focus from:
- “How do I grow fast?”
to
- “How do I attract people who want to write a book and build a business?”
Everything changed.
Your newsletter is not a popularity contest. It’s a positioning tool.
I Wrote With a Clear Outcome in Mind
Most newsletters are informative.
Few are strategic.
Every issue I write answers one of these questions:
- How do I write a book that builds authority?
- How do I turn my expertise into a structured method?
- How do I monetise my knowledge without feeling salesy?
When someone reads my content consistently, they begin to think:
“She understands exactly what I’m trying to build.”
That’s when readers turn into prospects.
Clarity converts.
I Built Authority Through Depth, Not Noise
Short content builds visibility.
Long-form content builds trust.
In my newsletter, I don’t just share opinions. I share frameworks, processes, behind-the-scenes breakdowns, and real lessons from my own journey of publishing multiple books and building programs around them.
Authority isn’t built by posting daily.
It’s built by thinking deeply and teaching clearly.
When readers see structure in your thinking, they assume structure in your services.
And they’re right.
I Made the Bridge to Paid Offers Obvious
This is where most creators hesitate. They write valuable content… But never connect it to their paid work.
I do the opposite.
If I teach about:
- Choosing the right book topic
- Structuring a business around a book
- Positioning yourself as an authority
I clearly mention:
“This is exactly what we implement inside my program.”
Your newsletter should naturally lead to your offer.
If it doesn’t, you’ve built a hobby—not a business.
I Treated My Newsletter Like an Asset, Not a Side Project
A newsletter is not “content.”
It is:
- A trust-building machine
- A positioning platform
- A sales conversation in slow motion
- A business ecosystem anchor
One well-written email can do more for your authority than 30 scattered posts.
One thoughtful issue can spark a DM that becomes a client.
One clear framework can position you as the go-to expert.
Small audience. Big intention. Clear pathway.
That’s the formula.
The Real Shift
The turning point wasn’t when my subscriber count grew. It was when I stopped asking: “How do I grow this newsletter?”
And started asking: “How do I use this newsletter to build authority and attract the right clients?”
Your newsletter doesn’t need 10,000 subscribers.
It needs:
- Clear positioning
- Consistent value
- Strategic alignment with your offer
- The courage to invite people to work with you
That’s how a small newsletter becomes a paying client engine.
If you’re building a business and thinking about writing a book as your authority anchor…
Or you already have a newsletter, but it’s not converting…
Because when done right, your words don’t just attract readers.
They build a business.
Why I created ‘Author Circle’
Early in my writing journey, I joined a writers’ group.
It was an off-shoot from a writing course I did.
We met once a month for 15 years.
We wrote stories about our life.
But more than that, we supported each other through life’s ups and downs.
The group only ended when two of our members passed away and another moved away.
A decade later, in 2015, I joined another writing group.
This time, formed from a fiction writing course called A Year of the Novel.
Five of us bonded over our novels, critiquing each other’s work and offering unwavering support.
We called ourselves Gutsy Gals.
It was more than just writing. It was a safe space to share ideas, struggles, and dreams—knowing we had each other’s backs.
When this group eventually dissolved, I found myself longing for that connection again.
So I created one.
Author Circle, a writing community on Substack.
We meet online every week to support each other’s writing journeys.
Rather than facing the challenges of writing and business-building alone, join us.
Let’s grow together.
How to grow your newsletter from scratch?
That’s the most common question I hear when someone
wants to start a newsletter.
When I started mine 4.5 years ago on Substack, I had no audience.
No email list.
No viral posts.
Just a deep desire to help writers.
Here’s what I did instead of chasing followers:
– I picked one clear problem my newsletter would solve
– I created a simple lead magnet (not perfect—just useful)
– I told everyone I knew personally, one by one
– I showed up every week, even when no one was watching
It was slow.
But it was solid.
No advertising.
No hacks.
Just trust.
I built it one reader at a time.
Today, my content gets read by more people than ever,
and it all started with a handful of audience.
So if you’re starting from scratch, here’s my reminder:
You don’t need huge following. You need a reason to be read.
If you’ve got that, you’ve already begun.
Subscribe to join a wave of creators building bold, brilliant, and wildly successful businesses.
How I’ve added 612 subscribers to my newsletter in 34 days
Have you ever heard of the term ‘Radical Incrementalism?’
It’s a concept first introduced by legal scholar Cass Sunstein in his 1999 book ‘One Case at a Time: Judicial Minimalism on the Supreme Court’
He advocates for a judicial approach that emphasises making narrow, case-specific decisions rather than broad, sweeping rulings.
He argues that such incremental steps allow the law to evolve thoughtfully, accommodating new information and societal changes without causing abrupt disruptions.
But ‘Radical Incrementalism’ is not limited to the legal system.
It applies perfectly to building a solo business.
At its core, it means this:
– Start with a big, transformative vision
– Move toward it in small, deliberate steps
– Learn, adapt, and improve along the way
The idea is a quiet rebellion against two extremes:
– The overwhelm of total reinvention
– The slow drift of aimless tweaks
Instead, Radical Incrementalism says:
“Make small bets, work smartly, toward a bold goal.”
And it works beautifully for building my newsletter business.
Here’s how I’ve applied it (and how you can too):
Big vision: Build a writing-based business from my expertise on Substack
Tiny actions:
– Write 2 Notes a day
– Test a paid offer with 10 readers
– Create a simple lead magnet
– Build one automation, not five
In the past 34 days, I gained 612 subscribers, including 20 paid using this exact approach.
No hacks, no funnels, just small strategic actions stacked daily.
You don’t need perfect timing or a 6-month plan.
You need one courageous step today
and another one tomorrow.
That’s Radical Incrementalism in action.
Subscribe to my newsletter and learn the system.
There will always be too much to do (the trick is to figure out what not to do)
We are reaching the end of yet another year. Each year, around this time, I review the current year and make plans for the next.
This year has been a weird one. Not just for me but everyone in the whole world. On the one hand, it was calamitous, restrictive, and depressing, while on the other hand, it was uninterrupted, quiet, content time perfect for learning and doing things that get put on the back burner.
I enjoyed these undisturbed months a lot and used them to learn and grow. I got a lot done, but the feeling of not accomplishing much wouldn’t go away. It is as if I haven’t even made a dent in what I wanted to do.
I am not the only one who feels like that. Oliver Burkeman wrote in The Guardian:
Today more than ever, there’s just no reason to assume any fit between the demands on your time – all the things you would like to do, or feel you ought to do – and the amount of time available. Thanks to capitalism, technology and human ambition, these demands keep increasing, while your capacities remain largely fixed. It follows that the attempt to “get on top of everything” is doomed. (Indeed, it’s worse than that – the more tasks you get done, the more you’ll generate.)
The upside is that you needn’t berate yourself for failing to do it all, since doing it all is structurally impossible. The only viable solution is to make a shift: from a life spent trying not to neglect anything, to one spent proactively and consciously choosing what to neglect, in favour of what matters most.
The Guardian
I used to be fixated on productivity. When I was able to strike-off all the items from my To-Do list are a good day. The same used to be the measure for the year. It would be a good year if I achieved all the goals I had set up for myself. But the problem was I would keep adding more goals all through the year.
I have finally started to see that I am staking my self-worth on my productivity levels. I don’t need to accomplish more. I need to figure out what are the things I need to stop doing.
The point Oliver Burkeman is trying to make is that we need to continue to align ourselves to our core, which is not easy. We go off tangent all the time. And the way to avoid that is to take a pause and think.
The end of the year is a good time for that. Although notional, this annual cycle of time is a good measure to re-evaluate priorities.
What pleases me to report is that the number of things that I want to “stop doing” is growing with every passing year.
Lately, I have been asking myself three questions every day.
- What excited me today?
- What drained me off energy today?
- What did I learn today?
They are good pointers to know what things I need to pursue and what I need to stop.
This was the last week of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). As reported in my previous newsletter, I couldn’t finish the novel I started with. It stalled after day nine. I happily let it rest and started writing the non-fiction book. I am happy to report that the first draft is near completion. It flowed much more effortlessly. Better than any project I undertook recently. Which tells me practice does make things easier.
I will be spending next month planning my author business. Laying out steps for 2021 and making sure that they do become another massive “To Do” list.
That’s it from me this week.
Take care.