Generalist World's newsletter achieves a 45% open rate by focusing on consistent utility. Every Tuesday subscribers get curated jobs, and every Friday a podcast. This reliability ensures subscribers see value in every email, rather than relying on unpredictable content.
The concept of a single best day and time to send an email is misleading. Instead, marketers should vary send times throughout the week to reach different segments of their audience. The key metric is the aggregate number of unique individuals engaged weekly, not the performance of a single blast.
Amy Porterfield found her newsletters with the highest open rates and clicks were those sharing personal stories, not just promoting content. This human connection, she argues, is the most powerful business strategy available to a creator.
Email providers prioritize senders with high engagement. Sending at least five emails per month generates more opens and clicks, signaling credibility. This counterintuitively leads to higher average open rates and better inbox placement, contrary to the common fear of over-sending.
Contrary to the fear of over-sending, emailing at least five times per month improves deliverability. Email providers view consistent recipient engagement (opens, clicks) as a sign of a credible sender, leading to better inbox placement and significantly higher open rates.
Social media algorithms are fickle and AI summaries are reducing referral traffic from search. Email newsletters are thriving because they provide a direct, reliable communication channel where creators truly own their audience and distribution, hedging against unpredictable platforms.
A B2B marketing newsletter saw a massive spike in replies when it shifted from tactical advice to a personal story about managing mornings and avoiding burnout. This shows that content resonating on a human, empathetic level can outperform purely professional topics, even for a specialized audience.
The Kapo Chronicle bundles all content—four main stories, news briefs, and a calendar—into a single weekly Sunday edition. This "packaged product" approach, unlike a constant stream of individual articles, creates a predictable ritual for readers, increasing anticipation and solidifying the reading habit.
By shifting from a structured, podcast-focused newsletter to a personal, 'unhinged' format discussing everything from reality TV to eye patches, Amy Porterfield dramatically increased engagement. This personality-driven approach created a stronger connection with her audience, who now genuinely look forward to her emails.
The Kapo Chronicle uses simple, numbered issue titles like "Kapo Chronicle Volume X, Issue Y" as its main email headline. This works because the highly engaged, niche audience has developed an appointment-reading habit, eagerly awaiting the content regardless of a clickbait-style headline.
Explicitly telling recipients to 'Open this' or 'Open this email' in the subject line can lead to a significant lift in open rates. This direct command, while seemingly simple, taps into our subconscious tendency to follow instructions and stands out in a crowded inbox.