You Can Have Loyal Readers Just Like Morning Brew

Morning Brew has gained a large and loyal following for their daily newsletter. While their formula is quite simple, it’s not easy to execute. They have a clear and consistent brand voice and they cover content their readers find interesting. Morning Brew presents the information in a way that is easy to digest in a few minutes. They also provide convenient links to dive deeper into the material they are curating from. 

By sticking to this simple formula, they have gained nearly two million daily readers and have an impressive open rate in excess of 40%. Wouldn’t it be great if you could have engagement like this with an audience of interested readers for your own company newsletter?

One thing to note is that Morning Brew is a media company. They are not a brand that sells products or services to their readers. You are probably not in the same category but you can still learn from the success of Morning Brew.

Be authentic

Stick to your brand voice. Morning Brew doesn’t try to be The Wall Street Journal or The Economist. They are who they are and they appeal to a segment of the population who like their style. When you write original content or pieces that pull from other sources, keep the style aligned with your brand. Don’t jump all over the place. 

Be relevant

Morning Brew focuses on the topics their readers want to read. This is a tough one for brands as opposed to media companies. Brands want to talk about their products, their services, or at least their content, but consumers may not be that interested. They have some level of interest in the brand or they wouldn’t be a subscriber to begin with; however, that doesn’t mean they want to repeatedly hear just about that brand.

Be fun

Morning Brew has a tone that makes it easy to read, fun and engaging. A consumer facing brand doing this well and mixing their own content with outside resources is Huckberry. As a regular reader you know that you’ll always find some interesting content that isn’t about them. However, it aligns with the ideas the brand stands for in every issue. By reading their content and links to outside content, they deliver value to the reader and ultimately builds trust in the relationship, and that’s pretty darn cool. 

Be regular

Morning Brew sends their flagship newsletter six days a week. Most brands that attempt to publish a newsletter struggle to get one out every month or even every quarter. If you’re going to have a newsletter of any type, it is important to be with your readers frequently, otherwise you’re quickly out of sight and out of mind. In my experience, weekly is usually a good default. Depending on your industry you can get away with bi-weekly in some cases. All that said, many newsletters that perform the best go out multiple times per week. One key for brands - your newsletters don’t have to be super long. Most readers don't thoroughly read each issue. And remember, when you start curating great content from external sources, you don't need to write nearly as much original content of your own, and your readers will like you more for sharing great stuff regardless of authorship!

Tip: instead of one newsletter per month with 6-10 pieces of content, you could have a weekly newsletter with 2 to 3 pieces or bi-weekly with 3 to 5. 

Amith Nagarajan is the founder of rasa.io - a software company that helps businesses send better newsletters through AI. rasa.io makes it easy and fun to send a regular newsletter for any company.