The Top 5 Spots To Sell In Your Newsletter

Newsletters are about value.

With that value you're able to drive massive sales...without constantly "selling".

I talk a lot about passive selling, and in this deep dive we're going to be discussing the top 5 places to do it within your newsletter.

As you guys know, I recently launched my signature course: The 6-Figure Creator Newsletter Blueprint.

And while a launch comes with lots of hype, launch emails, and psychological marketing tactics like scarcity, FOMO and more - it's important to keep sales coming in AFTER a launch.

While some email marketers, plain text/daily emailers, and other digital marketers might make the mistake of thinking you need to constantly sell in every email; we, as newsletter creators, lead with value and let it work it's magic.

In a previous deep dive I discussed a quote from Katelyn Bourgoin (Why We Buy newsletter):

I had been subscribed to, over the years, probably hundreds. And they all follow the same playbook. They were often these long meandering stories from whoever the author was…I wouldn’t be reading newsletters, I’d get stuck in email funnels. You sign up for X freebie and suddenly for the next 2 weeks you’re going to get this drip sequence that’s pushing you towards buying a thing. And I was like I don’t want to buy your thing, I just wanted that cheat sheet, or I just wanted that PDF. So I was subscribed to many, and I was reading almost none."

And in that same deep dive I talked about how Dan Koe tweeted that when he changed his approach to his newsletter and stopped "hardcore marketing", his revenue 2-4Xed.

In a longer Tweet Koe wrote:

"Because that's what happened when I switched from hardcore marketing where I didn't feel like a used car salesman."

If you can stick to providing tons of value, then you won't have to worry about any of this.

Instead, you'll slowly build trust, authority and expertise with your list, and the spots in this deep dive will do the rest.

We'll be covering a couple sections we have seen in some other deep dives (for good reason), but I'll go into a bit more depth and give you some new visual examples.

Here are the 5 sections we'll be covering:

1. The PS Section CTA
2. The PS Section Outro
3. The Main Intro Section
4. The Sponsorship Section
5. Passive Recommended Selling

It'll be your call whether you want to use all or just some of these sections - but they can technically ALL be used in unison (sometimes at different times) to passively sell to your audience.

 The PS Section CTA

First on our list is what I'm referring to as our "PS Section CTA".

You actually have two separate PS Sections to take advantage of (as shown in the image on the right above of my own newsletter); so I want to start with these two sections specifically.

Before I break it down, you can also pair this deep dive with these two:

1. How To Use Your PS Section To Sell In Your Newsletter
2. The 5 Must Have Sections Of Every Creator Newsletter

In the image on the right I'm using a PS Section CTA (Call To Action) directly after my branded signature, and then below that I also have a PS Section Outro, which we'll talk about below.

Important Note: You do NOT need to use both of these sections, and sometimes a PS Section CTA acts as your outro.

I personally recommend using ONE of these in every single newsletter, and then doubling up if you have a specific call to action you want to add into your newsletter.

Which is why I personally opt for my PS Section to be built like the Outro Sections we see below.

BUT, you also have the option to do a PS Section similar to the one I show on the left from Jade Bonacolta.

She uses a basic PS Section CTA and when she has something extra to add she simply adds an extra line.

BONUS: I also included an extra picture of Katelyn Bourgoin and Justin Moore's PS Section above the final section of this deep dive below for some extra inspiration.

 The PS Section Outro

This is my preferred PS Section for multiple reasons.

1. It adds a gentle nudge to as many pieces of my value ladder as I'd like.
2. It's super easy to make variable based on tags/segments of my list.
3. It allows me to add a secondary PS Section CTA in certain newsletters (as I explained above).

As we broke down in our original deep dive on the PS Section, it almost always leads with copy similar to this:

"Whenever you're ready, there are 4 ways I can help you."

Here are some exact lines used by the top creators:

• Jay Clouse [Creator Science]: "When you're ready, here's how I can help:"
• Katelyn Bourgoin [Why We Buy]: "Wanna really get inside your buyer's head? When you're ready, there are a few ways I can help:"
• Justin Moore [Creator Wizard]: "When you're ready, here's how I can help you:"
• Justin Welsh [Saturday Solopreneur]: "Whenever you're ready, there are 4 ways I can help you:"

See a trend?

Newsletter creators are using it...because it works.

If you want the full in depth guide on this section then you'll want to hop over to the deep dive I mentioned above: How To Use Your PS Section To Sell In Your Newsletter.

 The Main Intro Section

Next up on our list we have a section that probably should be obvious - but I want to make a special note of it anyway.

This is the main intro section of your newsletter.

You should be using this section to do a few things: 

1. Engage your audience with an immediate hook.
2. Catch up, share stories and connect with your audience.
3. Make mention to products and updates relevant to your newsletter.

Among many other topics and uses for this section; these are some of the most powerful.

I won't go into too much depth on HOW to weave in product mentions, though.

We'll be talking about this more in the final section of this deep dive: Passive Recommended Selling.

(Which is the Justin Welsh and Dan Koe specialty.)

 The Sponsorship Section

This is one of my favorite additions that most people don't make enough use of.

In our deep dive on The Ultimate Guide To Newsletter Business Models I break down the difference between Media Brand Newsletters, Hybrid Newsletters and Creator Newsletters.

If you're not building a Media Brand Newsletter that sends out 5+ times a week, it's often not recommended (because it's not lucrative enough to warrant it) to start taking sponsors for your newsletter until you have 10-20K+ subscribers (often times even more, depending on your niche).

So, many creators [with less than 20K+] don't end up adding in a sponsorship section at all....

BUT, I actually recommend adding in a sponsorship section early for a couple different reasons:

1. You start familiarizing your audience with that section, so when it comes time to actually promote sponsors, it's not a random big block addition out of no where.
2. You can use it to do A LOT of different things for YOURSELF, without actually taking on sponsors.

This isn't absolutely necessary, but it's something I recommend for most people.

The versatility of it makes it an easy addition (and usually a no-brainer).

Here are some of the different ways you can use it:

1. Sell your own products.
2. Build a wait list and build hype.
3. Ask questions and learn from your audience.
4. Add affiliate products as sponsors (earn money).

And as you can see in the image above, even larger creators choose to lose out on some money by cutting their sponsorship section, but in turn reap the rewards of promoting their own products as a larger and more focused CTA.

In the image above you can see:

1. Jay Clouse [Creator Science]: Promoting his community "The Lab" in a large sponsorship section in his newsletter.
2. Codie Sanchez [Contrarian Thinking]: Promoting her new course "The Seller Financing Navigator" in her sponsorship section of her newsletter.

Keep this in mind as you start implementing a sponsorship section in your newsletter.

 Passive Recommended Selling

I recently did a write up on LinkedIn about Justin Welsh's newsletter article titled "The Newsletter Tactic That Boosts Sales (Without Feeling Sleazy)".

He talks about two common problems he sees among newsletters:

1. "Some of them bombard their subscribers with constant sales pitches."
2. "They avoid mentioning their products altogether."

To avoid this, he shares the approach of recommended selling, which he agrees seems counterintuitive at first.

And guess what that entails...

Justin says: "Bottom line: Always lead with problem-solving value."

Once you do that, you can take advantage of his "counterintuitive (but effective) approach".

Here's what you do next:

1. "Use a Combo Approach to Weave Your Products in Naturally"
2. "Use a ‘Recommendation Selling’ Approach"

In the images above you can see both Justin Welsh and Dan Koe doing this naturally within their newsletters.

Justin shares his LinkedIn Operating System and Creator MBA, and Dan shares his 2-Hour Writer course.

This brings us full circle to what I discussed about Dan Koe above (not feeling like a used car salesman).

(Here's that full write up on LinkedIn if you're interested.)

Dan said: "I had people (mainly marketers) laugh in my face when I mention my monetization strategy."

His strategy is as simple as this:

• Promote in his newsletter.
• Promote in his newsletter blog post
• Read his newsletter to a camera and post it onto YouTube

And he goes on to say: "So I ask what their numbers are with all of the spamming and hard selling they are doing...and I can confidently say they would make 2-4X more if they ditched what they are doing."

Main point: Lead with value -> Sell passively.

Dan Koe uses recommended/passive selling in his newsletter, blog posts, and even within his YouTube videos.

 Final Thoughts On Passive Selling

Product launches are going to give you a massive spike in income when you do them properly.

I made $5000 launching to a small 500 person segment of my list (to prove the power of small lists) when I launched The 6-Figure Creator Newsletter Blueprint - and that's not including bumps, upsells and backend offers - which make it closer to $15-20K.

But you're not launching things weekly...

Realistically, you can launch something new every quarter (every 3 months or so).

That would give you 4 launches a year, and big spikes in your income once you nail your product launch sequence.

You probably see creators taking advantage of this methodology by leveraging cohort style open/close launches.

(And once you have enough leverage with your own audience you can replicate this model as well.)

But, again, you're not launching things weekly...

Which means you'll need/want sales coming in passively on a daily basis.

All the spots I have listed in this deep dive will allow you to do that, but there is one more thing that should be prioritized to make this work...

Always lead with value.