I ditched newsletter ads for paid partnerships this year.

The idea started when I met tech educator LaShonda Brown, I developed it with the help of multimedia creator Chris Nguyen and I cemented my plan after hearing what Ted Williams had done.

Newsletter ads work basically the same as newspaper ads. You create ad space and sell it to various companies.

But partnerships are anything you want them to be.

I sold my first newsletter ad last March for $35.

I booked my latest partnership at the end of December for $1950.

What exactly changed here? I’ll give you a hint: it was not the audience size.

In today’s issue, I’ll explain the mindset shift from selling ads to building partnerships and how to book your first partnership, if this revenue stream is new to you.

This is the last issue in our Revenue Series for now, but you can catch up on the other moneymakers any time.

What’s so great about paid partnerships

“I would refer to it as the minor league baseball stadium.” Ted Williams shared in an interview with Matt McGarry last November.

I happened to be in the audience of this live podcast taping where Ted went into detail about his partnerships strategy for The Charlotte Agenda which he founded and, a few years later, sold to Axios for $5M.

What he meant by the minor league baseball stadium was the types of companies that sponsor banners in the outfield and the type of swing (*har har*) they are taking with that kind of ad buy.

How Ted sold partnerships at The Charlotte Agenda

Before even launching The Charlotte Agenda, Ted landed his first partner.

The CMO of an orthopedic practice local to Charlotte. They met at a bar, Ted ran through his pitch deck and made an offer: be the “presenting sponsor” of this new publication.

For $35,000.

“You could argue that $35,000 buy was the best media buy in the city of Charlotte in the past decade.” Ted said in hindsight.

Why? Because The Charlotte Agenda became pretty hot, pretty fast and Ted took great care of his founding partner.

Ted got an enthusiastic yes that night and he’d go on to work this way with partners throughout his time running the Agenda.

Partners became 60% of their annual revenue by the time they sold in 2020.

They booked 25 partners per year at a five figure rate per partner (Ted didn’t recall the exact package pricing but the lowest number he threw out was $10k for a one off campaign and the highest was $75k so somewhere in there maybe).

Each partner was thoughtfully integrated into the publication with sponsored content.

They were also invited to an annual gathering to meet other sponsors—a cool offer for a city the size of Charlotte where there’s high likelihood you’d meet other people you’d want to do business with.

In other words, they were treated…like partners.

What’s different about this than having advertisers

Depends on how you work with your advertisers!

In some ways, ads, sponsors and partners are all the same thing but I’ve personally made a mental shift from:

“I have an ad slot. You can buy it for this much.” 

to

“I think my audience would benefit from getting to know you through my lens and we can do something fun and mutually beneficial together.”

The audience wins too when you choose partners you actually want to work with, who you know to be ethical operators and who you believe are genuinely offering a helpful product or service.

Tactically though, in my mind, partnerships mean:

• You have a longer relationship (at least a month, ideally more)

• You lend your reputation to them. Your brands become associated with each other.

• You vet them a bit more, especially if you care about audience trust.

• You have an opportunity to be more creative and take risks with how you execute the branded content side, thanks to it being more than one placement.

• You aim for higher value results over an “eyeball play.”

In my case, that means leveraging all my channels (my newsletters, my LinkedIn, my website and my love of live trainings) to give my partners the best chance of being considered an option by my audience.

It also means thinking about what I bring to the table as a marketer and as a writer to add value for the partners I work with.

Want to know what my partnerships look like? Scroll up! You’re experiencing one right now! You can also check out my partnership page.

Book your first paid partnership

Paid partnerships work at ANY AUDIENCE SIZE if you can think of a couple brands you could serve really well.

How I’d approach finding your next partner

1. Write down brands you already use regularly or rave about

2. Think about brands most of your audience needs or wants

3. Consider who you know and who has shown interest in your work

4. Ask other publishers or creators who they’re working with OR look at their sponsored content because often people who place ads do it more than once

5. Use a tool like Passionfroot (I’ll be real and say I think this tool is fading fast but you can still book stuff with them)

When I say brands, I also mean other publishers, other creators, local businesses and software tools you’re using. Tourism boards, museums, restaurants, film festivals, advocacy campaigns—the options are endless.

How I’d approach pricing

1. Start with your minimum “worth it” price—what’s the lowest price you’d even engage a partner for. For me, it’s $1000 now.

2. Consider the target revenue you want to make from partnerships. I love Ted’s model of 25 seats. That likely came from a revenue projection divided by the available inventory for sponsored content packaged up.

3. Play forward the return on revenue you think you could generate for a partner. Would they close major business? Get a lot of new foot traffic? Benefit greatly from your reputation?

4. If the return on revenue is higher than your target, use that estimate to set pricing.

5. If the return on revenue is lower than your target, use your target.

6. If the return on revenue is far below your target, find a middle ground between your target and your minimum.

Then, create a package of placements (where and when they will get seen or heard). You might want to make a list of your different social accounts, newsletter spots, podcast spots, display ads, event banners etc. That will help you choose what to include in the offer.

Pricing really is all over the place from the $35 I quoted my first sponsor to over $100k even into the millions and your audience size matters less than you think. You set the bar here.

Tools that can help with partnerships

• Sponsor Magnet: Justin Moore’s new book. Justin’s a sponsorships coach for creators and he specifically talks a lot about pitching and pricing. I’m going to his Sponsor Games event in March.

• Sell your next sponsorship: Chris Nguyen has taught me A TON about booking partners and I convinced him to make this toolkit. It was created for designers and the database is mostly tech companies, but if you think you’ll book more than $200 in sponsors this year, I think you’ll find the pitch templates, media kit and example videos well worth the money.

Let me wrap these insights TO GO for you…

My biggest tip for you on partnerships would be to thoughtfully pitch a small number of people you believe are likely to say yes, rather than pitching a bunch of brands.