What's up, GrowGetters? I hope you had a great weekend!

This newsletter is about finding the best growth hacks for your newsletter; I explore the wins and the fails. So, in all honesty, this week's experiment failed miserably because... Facebook hates me. What happened?

After a successful Product Hunt launch (till now, 341 new sign-ups in total - thank you very much), I decided to set up Facebook Ads. The Hustle founder Sam Parr mentioned Facebook Ads for newsletter growth in this (fascinating) interview, so I decided to give it a try.

So, I designed these beautiful ads, set everything up, and was ready to see new subscribers rolling in...

Maybe a little too dramatic...

But, Facebook had other plans for me, and to this day, I don't know If I will ever be able to run Ads again. Facebook didn't approve the ads and blocked me from any future activity (till now). If you have any idea or can set this straight- please reply to this email. Facebook support is not really helping.

German for: you're out

So, instead of Facebook, I will spend my big bucks ($300) on another growth strategy that will take some more time, but:

1. might be more interesting.
2. seems highly effective after the first test run.
3. will earn newsletter creators some money.

So, what am I talking about?

ADVERTISE IN SMALL NEWSLETTERS

This is a thing - it's still early days, but it's definitely worth a try. There are two (credible) options if you want to find newsletters to advertise in (or vice versa): Swapstack or Letterwell. I prefer Swapstack, but I don't think there is a big difference.

I went on a search and found these newsletters that are in my niche and willing to take my $$. First surprise: the prices vary wildly. Second surprise: the subscriber numbers are not that high. For my $300, I can advertise in approx. 6 newsletters. So, let's see which ads run best and which flop.

MarketerCrew was kind enough to give me a spot in the latest newsletter, and the results were pretty promising: After the send out, I quickly got 58 new subscribers, the next day, I approx. 70 more. So that's 118 new subscribers for $15 - not too bad. Of course, once the other ads run, I can tell you more about this growth strategy and if you should give it a try.

That's it for this week, not that much to report if you are denied access and try to get it back for several days...

How to monetize your newsletter

Also, I have something new to share. As it is probably the most often asked question, I will conduct all my interviews around one topic: How do I monetize a newsletter? So far, I spoke to:

• Jonas from Duuce (Selling newsletters)
• Parthi from Letterdrop (Newsletter subscription)

and this week:

• Scott Ellis from local newsletter Lifestyle Frisco (local newsletters)

I have some pretty exciting interviewees coming up, and I will always share the current conversation in the weekly email and the Facebook group.

Have a great week, and let's keep growing (or, in my case: don't stop trying?!)

Alex