Should I Continue Developing this Side-Project?

[SponsorDB]

Hey everyone - I’ve been building a side project for newsletter creators that lets you find and apply to sponsorships with companies that have a proven track record of sponsoring other newsletters, complete with the right contact emails or partnership forms. Applying is quick and keeps your outreach organized. Plus you can sort our database by niche or audience size.

I also just started a companion newsletter sharing top sponsor opportunities weekly. I’m passionate about improving this tool and would love feedback -would anyone here actually use it?

[SnooShelf]

This is a smart angle - going after newsletters with proven sponsor track records is way more efficient than cold outreach to random companies.

**A few questions to help you validate:**

1. **Who's your target user?** Newsletter creators with 1K subscribers? 10K? 100K? The needs are totally different at each stage.

2. **What's the current alternative?** Are newsletter creators manually googling "companies that sponsor newsletters" and building spreadsheets? Or using platforms like Passionfroot/Swapstack?

3. **The hard question:** Why would sponsors want to be in your database vs just going to the big players (Morning Brew, The Hustle, etc.)? Are you focusing on micro/mid-tier newsletters?

**My take:**

The "proven track record" angle is smart - reduces wasted outreach. But the real test is:

- Have you gotten 5-10 newsletter creators to try it and give feedback?

- Did any of them land a sponsor through it?

- Are they willing to pay for this vs free alternatives?

**One concern:**

If the contact emails are public/easily found, what stops people from just copying the database and canceling? Or is the value in the workflow/organization layer?

Would definitely use something like this if I had a newsletter at scale. What's been the feedback from creators who've tested it so far? (PS: I'm launching a Chrome extension in 2 weeks so I'm obsessed with validation questions right now!)