198: Growing Your Newsletter in a Unique Way (With 45% Conversion Rates)

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Welcome to the Creators MBA Podcast, your go to resource for mastering the art and science of digital product entrepreneurship. My name is Dr. Destiny Kopp and I help business owners generate consistent revenue from their digital product business without the need to be glued to their desks constantly live launching or worrying about the social media algorithms. I hope you enjoy our episode today.

And my special guest today is Brie Noble. Bri quit her corporate job as a director of finance to pursue music and after a successful run as a touring singer songwriter, she founded Women of Substance Radio to promote quality female artists in all genres. Now, Bri, I am super excited to chat with you today and for all of you listening. Bri is one of our newsletter profit club members and as I was going back and forth with her on a few things, I learned that she was doing something a little bit unique. And I know that a lot of you are going to be interested in hearing what she's doing here, what she's doing that's different, different and how it's working for her. So I wanted to bring her on and just let her walk us through what she's doing to grow her email newsletter. So Bri, before I get into all the questions I have for you, do you want to tell the audience a little bit more about you and how you help people?

Yeah, absolutely. Because I think it would based upon that bio intro, I think it will help help you know how I got to where I am now from there. So I'm a musician. I currently work as a director of worship at a church as well as running my business. I was a performing artist. I started finding all these amazing female artists that I really loved. I wanted more people to know about them. So I started a platform to promote them called Women of Substance. And then as tends to happen, they started asking me a ton of questions about marketing and how I was promoting this, the station, and myself as an artist. And so I and I'm like, my gosh, your music is so good. Like, how come I'm the only one that's playing their music? And they're saying I don't know how to market myself. So I started helping them. I started with helping female musicians specifically create an academy just for them that still is running today, the Female Musician Academy. But over the years I expanded because of my finance background. I wanted to help musicians make more money because that's where musicians especially struggle. And a lot of artists in general, you know, they have this mentality that like artists can't make money from their art and it is hard but there are ways to do it. And so I transitioned into this profitable musician brand because I'm like, well, I've got the finance background. I've got. I. I can think like a musician as well. And so I did some summits and started a podcast called Profitable Musician. And I've been doing all that for several years and been like, a regular marketer. Right? Like, I'm emailing my list several times a week with different things, helpful things, podcasts and, you know, things I'm selling and courses and things. And I just think that the industry has changed a bit. And I know Destiny talks about this a lot. Like, I started to realize I really wanted to. I love writing. I love creating emails and helping people. And I felt like I wasn't effective as I had been, and I was blending in a little bit. And so I decided to transition to a newsletter this year, really only this past summer. So the profitable musician newsletter was born. And I tried a lot of different iterations, a lot of testing how many days per week and what days and what sections to put in and all that. But what I really came around to is that, like, this newsletter itself needs to be so valuable that people want to go back to it. They don't want it. And I have newsletters in my email where I'm like, I really want to read this whole thing, but I don't have time. And I leave it in my inbox, and I notice, like, my inbox gets super crowded with these things, but I'm like, I don't want to put them away because I want to make sure I get all the value out of this. And that's what I want my newsletter to be. And I know Destiny has mentioned, like, you know, people tell her, oh, I. You know, it's so valuable, I save it in, like, a special folder and I go back to it and stuff. And that's what I wanted to be, because I just love being a resource to help musicians. I've always had this lead magnet called the 39 Streams of Income for Musicians, and it's done really well. I mean, I've literally had the same lead magnet for many years, and I've just changed it up. It used to be, like, you know, tw. I forget there was like, 19 streams, and then it was 15 streams, and then I was like, oh, let's go 39. And it still does really well. But I wanted to attract people that specifically were interested in my newsletter because they might get this 39 streams of income and love it, but then they don't see the tie in of like how the newsletter is going to help them in the same way. And I hope that they will. I try to bridge that gap. But what I thought is I really want to get people who want this newsletter specifically. So I decided to start running Facebook ads specifically to the newsletter. And that's what Destiny was referring to as far as something that I'm doing that a lot of newsletters aren't doing yet. And so I don't know how far you wanted me to go with this, so go ahead and give me some questions.

Well, you did a really good job kind of setting the stage for folks. And I want, for anybody who is kind of just coming into our world and our newsletter world and some of the changes that have happened this year as it relates to newsletter. One of the things that we talk about and teach in the newsletter Profit Club is that, yes, you still need your remote, which you do, but we want people on our email list who absolutely want to be getting our emails. And that's why I always teach and preach that we need a newsletter landing page for people to go to, sign up. And that's how you and I started kind of talking about this. We had, I did the training on it, you sent for review. And then I learned, okay, Bree's not only like sending organic traffic to this, she's sending hate traffic to this, which was unique. So it definitely caught my eye. And I will tell you, Bree, that when I did that six month research study, you know, partly last year, partly this year, kind of led into this year, a lot of those newsletter operators are growing their email list from paid ads. And there's different ways that they're monetizing it on the back end to kind of recoup some of those paid ads. And I'm going to be delving into that a little bit more in 2025 in the newsletter Profit Club. But what I wanted to do was just chat with you a little bit more about how the paid ads, you know, driving, you know, we could talk about what you're doing, Facebook, Instagram, whatever you're doing there, how that's working for you, what kind of conversion rates are you seeing? So walk us through the funnel a little bit more.

Absolutely. So just for the newsletter itself, I do have a specific landing page for it. The ad itself, like the actual text of the ad, is very similar to the what's on the landing page. And my specific promise that I think people really like is become a more profitable musician in just three minutes a week. Because I feel like, who wouldn't want that? You know? And then I. I also call out, okay, there are 16,000 readers. So they're not like, oh, am I the only one? You know, it. Somehow it feels good to, like, jump on a bandwagon or. It's kind of like that thing where you're looking for a restaurant to go to and you're walking down the street and you're like, well, there's that restaurant. It looks good, but there's like two people in there. Or this. This restaurant down the street is so full, it's like coming out the door. Well, I'm willing to wait for that one because there's a lot of people there. So, you know, you have that social proof of saying, join 16,000 people who are becoming more profitable musicians. So that's as far as, like, the text on the landing page. That is mostly what it is. And I don't have a ton of text on there other than that. I kind of tell them, like, what they're going to get a little bit, like, you know, resources, tools and. And, you know, strategies to build their fan base and their income, which is what they want, and their fan base kind of leads them to the income and becoming profitable. As far as, like, the ad itself, I've tried a bunch of different things. I've tried, like, static images, and then I've tried those short videos, but they're basically an image, and those tend to do the best. The static images do fine, but the cost per lead is much lower. For the video, I tried a few different styles, so I've tried kind of like a testimonial one, and it didn't have as good of a cost per lead, but I got some great comments from it. So, like, this one testimonial was something like, I've been on your email list for years, and every time I think about selling my equipment and giving up, I read one of your emails and I don't do it. And so I would get these comments that are like, you know, keep going, Allison, or whatever her name was. And I'm like, okay, so that's really resonating with certain kinds of people. But the cost per lead wasn't as good, so I might want to test more of those. But because I only had so much time to devote to it, I was basically like, here are a few different kinds, and let's see which one does well. And then I would stick with that one kind, and then I'll change the audience up and try them all again. See if another kind does better for that audience. But the other kinds that I have are kind of like the. If you want this, then do this. So it's like, if you want to become a more profitable musician or if you want to build a successful music career, join the newsletter. Or, you know, learn the strategies to become a more profitable musician by joining 16,000 people. That kind of a structure on that ad. And then there's another one that I use that's kind of like, here's a hack. If you want to be more profitable in your music career, join this newsletter for free or whatever. So those are some different kinds of ads that I was running. But basically the actual text on the ad is almost exactly what's on the landing page.

I love that. And if I remember correctly, and I'm testing my memory here a little bit, you have like a 4, 45% conversion rate on that landing page, which I thought was amazing for a landing page where you're just inviting people to join your email list. I thought that would great. I mean, a really, really high conversion rate on that. Plus, you're sending cold traffic to her, so. Yeah, cold traffic. And then you're just inviting them to be on your email list. I'm like, well, she's definitely doing something right here. And let me ask you this. Are you doing the paid ad on Facebook and Instagram or just Facebook?

Yeah, Facebook and Instagram. So I basically allow it to choose the placements because it knows best. So I. It. It's probably doing stories and, you know, all the places that it makes sense for that ad to work. Another thing that I do on the page is I actually have a photo of myself so they know it's a real person instead of a brand. Because my ad is coming from profitable musician, and it's just a logo, right? So it doesn't see a real person. But when they get to the landing page, they can see that I'm a real person. I also do mention the lead magnet, but it's not the focus. Like, I have a very small little thing that says, you'll also get access to our 39 streams of income. So they may see that or they may not. I don't want them to be surprised when the email says, here's this, you know, free gift. Cause I kind of use the same email for both the lead magnet and the newsletter just because I want the lead magnet. People that are coming in that way to understand the value of what they're getting in the newsletter and vice versa. With the newsletter people on the lead magnet. So I actually use the same sequence for both, but the focus is different on how. On the landing page, on how I'm getting them in there. So, you know, maybe they see that or maybe they don't. It's kind of like right by where they sign up. So they might see it, but it's definitely not the headline is not the focus.

So, Bri, let me ask you this. If somebody is interested in growing their email list with this strategy, which is, you know, like I said, unique, and a lot of people aren't doing this, but we want these type of people on our email, people who want to be there, not people who just signed up from a free gift that we did in a bundle or participated in a summit. We want these engaged readers, and I think that's exactly what you're getting. So if somebody is hesitant to get started, Facebook and Instagram ads are very intimidating for some. What would you say to them?

I mean, I have done them for years, so it does help to have. Having done them before, but when I learned them, they were so much more complicated. It's so much easier to get started with those ads now. It. Their system basically walks you through everything. So, I mean, I would maybe listen to a few podcasts to just understand the basics of Facebook ads, like what's a campaign, what's an ad set and what's an ad, and how are they different and that kind of thing. But, you know, if I'm in a very small niche, like, there's only a few things that I can target nowadays, and I can still get plenty of people to respond to my ad. So I'm not concerned about you not being able to find the right people. And I'm really not concerned about you figuring it out, because it really isn't. It's so much easier than it used to be. And also, you don't have to do all this detailed targeting anymore. Facebook knows who the right people are for you, as long as you give it just a little bit of information. You know, find a few interests that are related to the people that you're trying to target, and that's going to be enough. I literally use sometimes just musician interest. It's a very broad category, but it. Sometimes it. It's better than other things that I might target. Like sometimes I'll target software that musicians use and things, but sometimes the musician. Broad interest actually does better because Facebook has so much data now that it knows how to find the right people. So you don't have to have the knowledge to figure out how to detail target people anymore. It's really just. And they walk you through everything. They make sure that your thing is going to look good. You can crop it. Basically all the steps that you need to know to make sure your ad is going to be okay. And you know, I recently did a local ad for something that I'm doing for the church. I've never done a local ad before. All these years of ads, I've never done a local ad. It was so easy because all you really need to know is the basics. So just, you know, go out there and listen to a couple of podcasts about how Facebook ads work and you'll be good. You don't need to be intimidated.

And Bri, I want to let everybody know where they can find you. And also sign up for your email list and go to your Laney page and just check it out. So can you give us those details?

Absolutely. So our brand is profitable musicians. So profitablemusician.com we bought a got a podcast. You can see that 39 streams of income lead magnet on there. But if you want to sign up directly for the newsletter, it is profitablemusician.com join. Yeah, so thank you.

And I will make sure that all of those links are in the podcast show notes. And Bri, thank you so much for sharing this with us and letting us know kind of this unique thing that you've been doing and how it's been working for you.

You're welcome.

Thanks for listening all the way to the end. I hope you enjoyed this episode today. If you love the show, I'd appreciate a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast platform. Have a great rest of your day and bye for now.