As a creator, you know growing your email list is a huge challenge. But that doesn’t stop you from being determined to do it. In fact, growing an audience was the top goal for part-time creators in 2021 and 2022.
That’s why we set up the Creator Network — to help creators grow their email lists together, faster.
With the Creator Network, you can recommend and be recommended by creators just like you, so you can work together to grow your email lists without the manual work of social media, campaigns, or cold outreach.
I’m in the alpha group of 50 creators, and I’ve definitely seen an uptick in new subscribers.
Building a list takes so much effort, so having other creators pitch in and help is… nice.
It takes a village to raise an audience. 😄
— Austin L. Church (@austinlchurch) March 6, 2023
But how does the Creator Network help you scale? How do you get noticed? What’s the best way to keep a healthy email list while you’re growing from recommendations?
We’ve got answers to these questions and more. Let’s take a look.
4 best practices to grow your newsletter list with the Creator Network
1. Set up your Creator Profile with discoverability in mind
The Creator Network is the only place you’ll find a wide range of creators in different niches. In the discover tab, you can search for creators you already know or use filters to discover creators you don’t know yet. With that in mind, you need your Creator Profile set up to put your best foot forward.
Craft a compelling bio
Your Creator Profile isn’t just a quick bio of who you are and a collection of your content — it’s also the card that shows up in the Creator Network discover tab. This helps you be discovered by creators who might want to recommend you. So while you’re setting it up, think about these two things:
- What do you want other creators to know about you while searching for who to recommend?
- What kind of content do you want potential subscribers to see that will make them want to subscribe to your list when you pop up as a recommendation?
Match your branding
Customize your Creator Profile to match the same color schemes as your brand to help continuity as your audience flows through your ecosystem.
📚 Managing your Creator Profile
Enable public posts
Having a few public broadcasts of your newsletters helps potential subscribers get a real look ] and feel for what they’re signing up for. If you have a paid newsletter, posting one or two public broadcasts from that paid offering gives more proof of the value you provide when someone chooses your paid tier.
Add links to your table stakes content
What are the most important content pieces you need a subscriber to see to join your list or have a creator understand your mission and vision? You have two places for this content:
- Links page. This is where you link to external sites like your highest-engaged social platforms, important landing pages, etc.
- Products page. This is where you can link to products you’ve set up in Kit Commerce
2. Decide what creators to recommend
Kit is already home to a large percentage of professional creators. So, when you think about connecting with people already using the platform, you’ll find a lot of like-minded creators. For example, we’ve got course creators, food bloggers, podcasters, authors, and musicians. You name it, and you’ll find it in the Creator Network.
Here’s a few quick tips to help you find creators that would be a good fit for you to recommend:
Find creators with overlapping content
One of the easiest ways to know that your audience will like another creator’s content is if they focus and create around a similar topic. For example, if you blog about baking, you could recommend a vegan food blogger to give your audience a new perspective.
It was a no-brainer to pick a couple of folks I respect and have overlapping content with to share with my audience.
– Nick True, Financial creator at Mapped Out Money
Recommend creators you already admire
Chances are if you like someone’s content, your audience will like it too.
I recommend newsletters I enjoy reading, the kinds of newsletter I used to manually send people to because they are genuinely that good.
– Anne-Laure Le Cunff, Writer & researcher at Nesslabs
Use the personal approach
Want a more personal connection but don’t know anyone using Kit? Think about two or three other creators you talk to that you know and enjoy their content. Pull them together and say, “Hey, why don’t we all get on the Creator Network together and recommend each other?”
Think about what else your audience needs
Find a creator with complementary content you know your audience will find valuable. For example, if you create content about building a newsletter list, find a creator to recommend who focuses on newsletter sponsorships.
I thought about who was most relevant to my audience and then about adding more diverse perspectives so that my readers could potentially get something I’m not giving them.
– Austin Church, Writer & Founder of Freelance Cake
📚 Creator collaborations: the what, why, and how + examples to inspire you
3. Cover the cost of your growing Kit account with your new Creator Network recommendations
Is your email list growing too fast with the recommendations coming in from the Creator Network? It’s not a terrible problem to have, but we understand budgets and the need to offset the cost of your growing Kit account.
Here are some tips to help you cover that increasing cost when growing in the Creator Network.
Take your Creator Network connections in the real world
The Creator Network community is the best place to find like-minded creators you can partner with on bigger projects. Think co-branded courses and joint webinars to promote each other’s products… the sky’s the limit on collab potentials.
I am where I am today because of partnerships. Every increase in sales and subscribers can be tied to teaming up with other creators like me, so I’m excited for @ Kit’s new Creator Network!
– Emily Mills, Illustrator, Author of The Art of Visual Notetaking
📚 How to find partnerships that scale your creator business
Focus on the work you love
With a passive flywheel of new email subscribers finding your newsletter via the Creator Network, you can spend less time marketing your content and more time creating content that helps you earn more money.
The Creator Network has helped me on my creator journey because it means that I can focus more on doing the things I really need to do, and that is creating the content. I can create new sourdough recipes without worrying about growing my newsletter list- that’s happening organically in the background while other newsletter creators are recommending me just like I’m recommending them.
– Maurizo Leo, blogger at My Perfect Loaf
Earn money with Kit Commerce
Whether you create ebooks, paid newsletters, coaching services, or online courses, you can set up a product page in just a few minutes in Kit Commerce and be on your way to earning a new income stream. Better yet, you can also list them in your Creator Profile.
I’ve found [Kit Commerce] so convenient. It connects to Stripe, which I already use for client invoices. And their payment setup and checkout pages are easy to customize.
– Claire Emerson, Writer of Flourish Weekly
📚 How top earning creators use Kit Commerce to grow their income
Monetize your newfound subscriber list growth
With Creator Network you can open up paid recommendation spots. You can then reinvest the money you’ve earned with these paid recommendations right back into your list growth by finding creators to partner with as a paid recommendation spot in their newsletter. And when that partner grows their list, you’ll grow yours too.
Since starting to use a paid channel to get referrals, I’ve been able to 2x my spend which has been much better than any other paid acquisition channel.
-Jason Resnick, founder of NutureKit.co
📚 How these 5 creators use newsletter referrals to grow their business
4. Maintain good deliverability as your list grows with the Creator Network
Kit is a leader in deliverability. And so far, creators have found that the subscribers they gain through the Creator Network are highly engaged. But we understand as you grow your email list, keeping those deliverability rates high will be top of mind.
Here are some tips to keep your deliverability rates high even with increased list growth.
Tailor your communications
By setting up a tailored welcome sequence for subscribers from the Creator Network form, you can make sure new readers who join your list know what you’re all about. This helps to maintain high engagement and low cold subscribers.
Welcome them and keep the high deliverability: I implemented a few automations and sequences that helped with transitioning referrals into my ecosystem.
– Jason Resnick
Make sure you’re introducing yourself to your new subscribers and that you’re clear about what you offer (or what you don’t) and why staying on your list will be valuable for them.
– Allea Grummert, Email marketing strategist and copywriter
📚 How entrepreneur Jenell B. Stewart uses Kit automations to grow her community
Recommend creators with similar content
One of the easiest ways to know your audience will like another creator’s content is if they create along a similar topic. By doing so, it’s more likely that your audience and the audience of creators recommending you will not only click to subscribe but they’ll also stick around and engage in your content.
I’m taking part in the “alpha” of @Kit’s newest feature: The Creator Network. Here’s what I’ve noticed in just a few short weeks:
So far, I’ve seen a jump in subscriptions to my email list from creators who are recommending my work… a 36% conversion rate, in fact. And I’ve been recommending my fair share as well, leading to 29% conversions for those creators.
– Mike Vardy, Productivity strategist
Continue following deliverability best practices
It’s important to continue following deliverability best practices to maintain a healthy sender reputation like:
- Regularly clear out your cold subscribers.
- Run A/B tests to learn what resonates with your new audience
- Ask subscribers to reply to your emails
📚 How this creator uses Kit to average a 60% open rate
And if you’re looking for more in depth information on deliverability, check out our podcast, Deliverability Defined.
Grow your email list with the Creator Network
If you haven’t joined the Creator Network, there’s no better time than now to set up your Creator Profile and turn on Recommendations. So many of your fellow creators are already in there and are looking for their next recommendation.
