The Ultimate Guide & List of Newsletter Directories

30 Dec 2020

Growing a newsletter is the hardest part about running a successful newsletter. No matter if you're just starting out or if your newsletter has 10k+ subscribers. It doesn't get easier, but there are many ways to that can facilitate growth.

Growth by organic ways like word of mouth is possible but only works if you already people talking about your newsletter. It isn't the most viable solution in the beginning.

To reach a wider audience you'll have to go where your audience dwells, you can start with Twitter, Reddit, Quora, IndieHackers, or communties on Slack and Discord. These channels have a diversified audience but is only one of the many tools a newsletter creator has in their tool chest of growth. One of the best solutions is to list your newsletter in newsletter directories. It's very similar to the classifieds we see on newspapers but focused towards newsletters.

Benefits

Submitting your newsletter to directories have multi-fold benefits. Below are all of the benefits you'll receive when you submit your newsletter to a directory.

SEO

SEO is one of the most sought after growth avenues for newsletters. When you submit your newsletter to a directory you'll receive SEO in the form of a backlink to your newsletter.

What does that mean? When someone searches for anything on Google or any search engine, they usually place sites with the most backlinks at the top. It takes months and years to build up sufficient backlinks to rank for popular search phrases that your newsletter wants to compete for.

SEO is the long game and submitting your newsletter to all 21+ newsletter directories gives your newsletter a backlink boost.

The main goal of a newsletter directory is to help others discover amazing newsletters to read. This usually means that they want to spread the word as far as possible. Most newsletter directories have multiple social media accounts and will usually share to their audience any new newsletter that's submitted. It's nothing crazy in terms of growth, but it does give a little boost.

Most newsletter directories provide ways for visitors to share your newsletter to their audience as well, adding to the compounding effect.

Discoverability

Newsletter directories sole purpose is to help people find the best newsletters to read in any category they're interested in. Capitalize on the interest of those visitors by submitting your newsletter. The more eyes your newsletter is in front of the more you'll grow.

Passive Growth

One of the most interesting benefits of submitting your newsletter to a directory is the passive growth you'll receive. Do the work of submitting your newsletter once, get passive subscribe growth forever. Every weekly you'll slowly grow from this channel without needing to think twice.

Nick Frost from Newsletters.co and InboxStash says to expect about 10-20 new subscribers the first week you submit to a newsletter directory. Also a newsletter directories authority grows, growth picks up for all newsletters. For more information on the benefits of newsletter directories checkout our interview with Nick Frost, the expert in them.

Apart from these, there are some newsletter directories which focus on different parts of growth other than subscribers. Here are few newsletter directories which will help you get sponsors for your newsletter.

Here is also a list of a few of newsletter aggregators where readers can discover and read your newsletter along with many others.

Final Thoughts

We recommend everyone submit their newsletter to every newsletter directory listed in this guide. It'll take at most a few hours but you'll receive massive benefits. Nick Frost from Newsletters.co and InboxStash strongly agrees as well.

We've also started our own newsletter directory using Twitter! Everyday it's growing with more and more newsletters. Submit your newsletter here as well and reach even more potential subscribers. Tag anyone you know who runs a newsletter to submit theirs too.

Let’s start a Twitter newsletter directory! Drop your newsletter below with a name, description, category, and frequency.

Tag two people you know who run newsletters!
— Newsletter Crew (@newslettercrew) December 30, 2020

Our part is done, now you have all the resource you will need. Take the next hour or so and submit your newsletter in all these directories. Also share this article with any other newsletter creators you know. Let's help them grow too!

Growth

Yaro Bagriy

Podcast host & community manager

The Ultimate Guide & List of Newsletter Directories

Benefits