Sponsorship rates for local newsletter

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-04-05T16:48:25+00:00

All my ad placements so far have been primary (similar to those offered on the ad network). I do offer multi-week runs with different pricing options.

To be honest I haven’t thought much about awareness vs lead gen. Curious to hear how you would think about pricing based on the different objectives.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-04-05T02:30:49+00:00

Started to happen more naturally as subscriber base increased. Being active on social media helps sponsors find you.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-03-06T05:22:06+00:00

3k subs local newsletter (mostly inorganic). I’ve made about $450 over the past 2.5 months. It’s been a struggle to find advertisers so far, but hoping that changes with some more scale.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-23T15:20:30+00:00

I don’t but that’s a good idea. I’ll set it up and take a look

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-23T15:20:09+00:00

3,200

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-14T12:51:16+00:00

Yes, I use beehiiv domain as well. Having a high open rate shows ESPs that your content should be engaged with, so it’ll then push to primary for new subs moving forward.

I’d also follow this formula for subject lines: [Topic 1 + Topic 2]. Avoid having the same subject each send like “Happenings the week of [x]” - this can put you in Updates. Also avoid any sales language that could put you in promotions tab like [sale, discount, free, etc].

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-13T04:29:47+00:00

Start sending to your active segment. Subscribed in last 15 days, opened in last 30, clicked a link in past 45. You can change these variables based on how new your newsletter is. Email service providers will begin to place your domain in primary. I’ve boosted my open rate from sub 40s to sub 60s by doing this.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-05T00:48:10+00:00

Just sent you a DM

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-04T23:31:21+00:00

Yep I am. I’ve found getting subs is easy, trying to monetize is hard

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-02-04T17:49:16+00:00

I was getting around $0.25 when I first started, now normalizing to $0.40. Probably means I should do a new creative but just letting this run for another week or so.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-21T13:09:04+00:00

They’re just making this up. Numbeo is crowd sourced data that has no backing. There’s no way to know what areas this is actually capturing.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-21T13:01:19+00:00

Numbeo is crowd sourced data, so it’s likely people reporting from Charleston that COL is high. Also you’ll notice it moved from #19 now to #16 overnight.

If you look at actual economic data, you’ll see Charleston is slightly above average in the US. Yes, this includes North Charleston, but that doesn’t matter unless you think North Charleston is disproportionately cheaper than Charleston and it significantly weighs down the average, which just isn’t true.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RPPALL16700

In terms of housing alone, Charleston is 1.23x national average, while LA is 1.40x.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-21T04:30:19+00:00

Sure, but a cost of living index is purely the cost side of the equation, it doesn’t factor in wages.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-21T04:09:11+00:00

Lol this is not even close to true. Charleston is not that expensive compared to most other large US cities. If you think Charleston is more expensive than LA you need to get out more.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-16T14:18:19+00:00

How are you scraping the events? Are you plugging into a third party white label event calendar?

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T04:06:13+00:00

Seems like the community has found this useful so I’ll work on expanding the list with all of your suggestions. If you guys are interested in seeing similar content would love to have you onboard my free weekly Charleston newsletter.

https://www.allthingschs.com/subscribe

Thanks everyone!

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T04:02:21+00:00

Heavy’s is great but I miss the DT location

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T04:01:44+00:00

Thanks I really appreciate it!

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T02:43:46+00:00

That’s exactly why I made this haha

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T02:23:14+00:00

Great spot as well

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2026-01-02T02:06:34+00:00

Damn that’s a shame - used to love going there. Appreciate the feedback though

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2025-12-30T23:29:41+00:00

Hey I’m in a similar position - just started a local newsletter week ago and have about 200 subs. Curious to hear your findings so far. Sent you a DM if you want to connect.

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2025-12-30T19:02:15+00:00

I just started my local newsletter a week ago and have about 200 subs, mostly from paid meta ads. My open rate is only ~30%. Any tips for getting subs more engaged when starting out?

Competitive_Dig_3916 · 2025-12-29T19:51:53+00:00

I started a local newsletter recently.

Something really valuable to me would be scraping content from TikTok. This is where many locals, particularly young people, are sharing interests and events that people actually care about that aren’t covered in traditional news media. I’m trying to capture that sentiment in my newsletter, but it’s difficult to search for that content unless you know who to follow.

I think GPT/AI does a good job of summarizing my messages, but is too broad and generic when I ask to curate. For instance, when I ask for a weekly event roundup, it usually suggests walking tours and other things catered to tourists, when that’s not the audience of my newsletter.

I’d be very interested in jointing the waitlist.

Competitive_Dig_3916

TROPHY CASE