Announcing my newest content series

PLUS: The growing shadow workforce that's fueling the Creator Economy boom.

Welcome! I'm Simon Owens and this is my media industry newsletter. If you've received it, then you either subscribed or someone forwarded it to you.

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Let’s jump into it…

Announcing my newest content series

Hey folks! I’m super excited to unveil something I’ve been working on over the last few weeks. It stemmed from my observation that there are lots of outlets giving strategic advice to creators and media entrepreneurs, but there’s very little written about the technical side of the equation. Every media operator uses a bevy of products that make their jobs easier, and I think we need an outlet focused on highlighting those products.

So I’m launching The Entrepreneur’s Tech Stack, an interview series where media operators, creators, and entrepreneurs can tell us about the tools — from hardware to software — that they can’t do without.

I actually kicked off the series by writing about the tools I use to run my newsletter and podcast. You can find my entry over here.

I’m super eager to find more creators and media operators to feature in this series. You can go here to find out about how to be featured.

I’m super excited to hear from you!

Quick hits

Post has really sleek design and seems to have siphoned off some of Twitter's user base, but I remain extremely skeptical that micropayments will work as a business model. I also think the platform has been slow to ship basic features. [TechCrunch]

Hard to tell whether this is just a temporary glitch or if Twitter is actively trying to hinder its users from linking to Substack, but if it's the latter, then that's a hilarious blow to Elon's claims to support "free speech." [The Verge] I've been testing out Substack Notes for a few days, and I can honestly say that Elon has reason to be worried. Unlike all the other Twitter competitors that popped up, Notes already has a built-in user base of highly successful writers who will be incentivized to use it.

There's a growing shadow workforce that's fueling the Creator Economy boom. [Digiday]

Do subscribers actually value the ability to "gift" free articles to their friends and family? "When gift recipients went to view the article sent by their friend or significant other, about 20% provided an e-mail address when asked." [Nieman Lab]

I think any podcast network that isn't forming some kind of YouTube strategy is making a huge mistake. There's clear data showing it's become one of the biggest podcast consumption platforms on the planet. [Bloomberg]

A brief note on ad sales in this newsletter

Longtime readers of this newsletter have probably noticed that I monetize it, in part, through paid ads. I debuted sponsorships about a year ago and was lucky enough to sell out my inventory for all of 2022 without sending out a single cold pitch. Every single advertiser that came in was sourced from my own audience.

But recently, ad demand has slowed down to the point where I regularly have weeks where there’s no sponsor. I’ve come to realize that I need to become more proactive about selling ads, but I haven’t decided yet whether I should sell them myself or outsource them to an outside agency. I’m in talks with a few folks who specialize in newsletter ad sales and will probably make a decision within the next few weeks.

Why am I telling you this? Two reasons:

1. If you sell a product or service that would appeal to my audience, now is a great time to reach out about placing an ad. You can find all the details on my sponsorship page over here.

2. If you’ve been on the fence about becoming a paid subscriber to this newsletter, now would be a great time to show your support. I work hard every week to deliver you actionable insights meant to help you in your career. My longform podcast interviews dissect successful media businesses so you can copy their strategies. For paying subscribers, I host twice-a-month, live Office Hours calls that go deep on subjects ranging from growing your newsletter audience to generating paid subscribers. This week, I hosted a call about selling online courses, and we had multiple guests that had sold over $1 million in courses. There’s no other newsletter on the planet that offers that kind of direct access to the world’s most successful media operators. I’ve had participants tell me that a single Office Hours call justified their entire annual subscription.

Anyway, if you’d like to support the work I do here, you can get 10% off using the link below:

Thank you, and have a fantastic weekend!