Well-known bloggers are switching to mailing lists

    image
    When entrepreneur Jason Kalakanis closed his blog in 2008 , replacing it with an e-mail newsletter available only by subscription, his move was seen as a personal reaction to the insulting comments of readers, and not the beginning of the trend. But now more and more famous bloggers have joined the venture. The founder of Drop.io startup Sam Lesin recently announced the closure of his personal blog and the launch of paid electronic newsletters, as well as the Letter.ly service, in which anyone can organize paid newsletters.

    image
    On the Drop.io blog, Lesin said that starting to write his personal blog, he was guided by a set of goals: to better understand the environment; as a public person, protect your identity online so that no one can write on his behalf; get rid of negligence in thinking and become stricter in judgment; Seriously engage in a blog as a regular job, as many spend their time reading and you need to approach writing with full responsibility.

    But after two years, he felt that he had achieved all his goals, but the feeling remained that writing on a public blog would be insincere and even hypocritical with respect to his belief in the value of information. Letter.ly was designed in such a way that each of the writers who issues their newsletter can set their own subscription price. For example, a Lesin blog subscription costs $ 1.99 per month. Sam also noted that there are more and more factors that contribute to the decrease in blog activity, such as Twitter, Facebook or other social tools that are easier to use and require less time.

    After the creation of Letter.ly, several other bloggers joined Lesin, including co-founder of AnyClip startup Nate Westheimer, who is going to blog, but at the same time he will publish all the most interesting in the newsletter, available on a paid subscription. Aviary.com co-founder Michael Galpert also launched his own mailing list through Letter.ly. And Jason Baptiste, co-founder of several startups including Cloudmatic, claims that although the newsletters are a bit old-fashioned, it's still a good business.

    image
    A Russian example is LJ user hectop, author of a blog about aviation. Recently, he stopped running LiveJournal, moved the blog to a separate site, and began to charge readers $ 5 for a monthly subscription or $ 50 for an annual one. Russian bloggers do not risk offering a paid subscription to their blogs. For example, Alex Exler believes that he can earn more from advertising on a free blog than from a paid subscription.

    Not everyone agrees that switching from a blog to a paid newsletter is a good move, however, for entrepreneurs and founders of startups sharing ideas with a wide audience, this step can be of some significance, especially if you are not very well known. However, your own blog is still a means to increase online popularity.

    Also popular now: