S
H
Houck’s Newsletter
Login Join Starter Story
Source
Researched profile. Starter Story's AI research system compiled this page from 44 public sources — the founder didn't write it. Automated research can misread or misattribute a source, so treat figures as best-effort. How this works →
HS

How Houck’s Newsletter Grew

Houck’s Newsletter delivers startup strategies for founders

How did Houck’s Newsletter grow?

Summary of the sourced claims below

Houck's Newsletter grew through multiple channels including conferences, social media, and paid advertising. He used swaps with other newsletter writers and lead magnets on Twitter and LinkedIn to generate leads and subscribers. Social giveaways on Twitter and LinkedIn helped him gain over 10,000 subscribers in a few weeks. Additionally, Houck acquired two other newsletters to expand his audience.

Channels

30 channels · grouped by how Houck’s Newsletter grows

  • Organic social media

    · 7 mentions · 7 sources
    “also a lot of content marketing on, on Twitter/X now and then LinkedIn. You know, I have decent size audiences on both. I have fifty thousand on Twitter, forty thousand on LinkedIn, a little lower than that earlier in the year. And so just creating good content and putting my, you know, newslette...”
    high
    Show 6 more quotes
    “we were posting about it on social media. And so, you know, people who were still quarantining were super either interested or like outraged or whatever that these, these crazy people in Mexico, you know, building stuff together.”
    high
    “Expanding beyond the newsletter, it maintains a robust presence across platforms like Twitter and TikTok. Monetization stems from advertising opportunities and event listings, leveraging the platform's reach and engagement for revenue generation.”
    medium
    “For example, with Twitter I ran tests in the beginning to gauge engagement. Here’s how it worked: I wrote down on a piece of paper 3 hypotheses for topics people would be interested in that could be a part of my newsletter funnel. These 3 topics were exclusively what I was allowed to tweet about ...”
    high
    “Michael has been posting on Twitter since the beginning and it’s helped grow his newsletter since he links to the signup page in all of his threads. He is active on LinkedIn as well, with around 40k followers at the time of writing.”
    medium
    “Ran a lead magnet on Twitter and LinkedIn to generate leads. Got ~600 emails.”
    high
    “Integration with social media and podcasting platforms expands their reach and allows for richer storytelling.”
    medium

  • Brand collaborations and giveaways

    · 4 mentions · 4 sources
    “But on the growth side, yeah, I, I did a lot of, like, swaps and recommendations with other people early on... but also swaps, as I mentioned.”
    high
    Show 3 more quotes
    “Grown through social media, content marketing, swaps with other newsletter writers, paid ads, and lead magnets, and a whole bunch of things.”
    high
    “In 2023, Matt was the first winner of beehiiv’s Beach Club – a beehiiv partner giveaway that offers quarterly trips around the world for the person who generates the most affiliate sales that quarter. Not only did Matt earn thousands as a beehiiv affiliate, but he also won an all-inclusive round ...”
    medium
    “Lead magnets, giveaways – whatever you want to call them, they’ve brought in over 15k subscribers, FAST... He builds (or has a VA build) a database of relevant information for his ideal audience He posts a screenshot of the database and asks people to reply and RT to get the resource for free.”
    medium

  • Email List Growth

    · 4 mentions · 4 sources
    “And I put them on Airtable, and I email-gated access to the Airtable... They'd go to the link, put their email in and get access to the, the database... we did like six of those, I think, over the course of a month and a half or two months or so, and that got us from, from, yeah, about 13K to abo...”
    high
    Show 3 more quotes
    “I run the newsletter and the community attached to it. ... I survey everyone who joins the newsletter, as long as they're willing to take the survey.”
    high
    “I had a small initial email list from a previous newsletter I started that had ~1,500 emails on it, so I wasn't starting from 0.”
    high
    “The Google Doc helped Olly grow his newsletter to over 18k subscribers. That same lead magnet has indirectly led to $1.2M in revenue for his personal brand.”
    medium

  • Lead magnets

    · 3 mentions · 3 sources
    “The delta there was like lead magnets. So I made a couple of these like Airtable databases with like, you know, investor information in different niches or accelerators and how to apply to them, or curated threads and, and podcasts that might be useful to startup founders that are tagged by diffe...”
    high
    Show 2 more quotes
    “Lead magnets, giveaways – whatever you want to call them, they’ve brought in over 15k subscribers, FAST... He builds (or has a VA build) a database of relevant information for his ideal audience... They join his email list in order to get the database”
    medium
    “The Google Doc helped Olly grow his newsletter to over 18k subscribers. That same lead magnet has indirectly led to $1.2M in revenue for his personal brand.”
    medium

  • Online Community

    · 2 mentions · 2 sources
    “We're running events in person. We're running digital events. Fireside chat later today with Emil Michael, former chief business officer of Uber.”
    high
    Show 1 more quote
    “These startups excel at building engaged communities, offering a direct line to audiences with shared interests.”
    medium

  • Content marketing

    · 2 mentions · 2 sources
    “For the newsletter, I used swaps with other newsletter writers in my niche who were at a similar size, content marketing (viral threads) on X.”
    high
    Show 1 more quote
    “Grown through social media, content marketing, swaps with other newsletter writers, paid ads, and lead magnets, and a whole bunch of things.”
    high

  • Affiliate program

    · 2 mentions · 2 sources
    “I actually seen, uh, a lot of creators use like affiliate programs really well, and I'm evaluating that myself for, for an upcoming product launch as well. But, you know, offering generous affiliate commissions like 40, 50% either for at least a year or maybe indefinitely, that incentivizes peopl...”
    medium
    Show 1 more quote
    “The crazy part is — he earns 50% commissions (for an entire year) every time someone signs up to beehiiv through his partner link.”
    medium

  • Podcasting

    · 1 mention
    “Rowan Cheung runs an AI newsletter called the Rundown AI with over 400,000 readers. He’s one of the fastest-growing newsletters on beehiiv and also one of the highest-earning publications. Rowan leverages beehiiv Boosts to earn more with his newsletter and has already made $8,000 in total Boost r...”
    medium

  • Influencer partnerships

    · 1 mention
    “Go ViralOn DemandHow it works1 After subscribing to get access to the network, make a deposit into your Megaphone Wallet. Your deposits are how you'll boost posts...make a deposit into your Megaphone Wallet...Share the post's URL and how much you want to spend to boost it with Megaphone...Build a...”
    medium

  • Amazon

    · 1 mention
    “If you don’t have a local newsletter, collaborate with local businesses to provide special discounts and packages for your subscribers, creating mutual benefits.”
    medium

  • Brand partnerships

    · 1 mention
    “A really interesting and easy way to build newsletter subscribers is through swaps. Michael has successfully done this more than a few times.”
    medium

  • Cold outreach

    · 1 mention
    “We’re now pretty much relying on cold outreach.”
    high

  • Event marketing

    · 1 mention
    “Sam Parr reverse-engineered the event model by targeting Silicon Valley demographics to build the Hustle Con conference. Just six weeks after launching his newsletter, he grew to 4,000 subscribers and generated $60k in revenue from just 350 attendees. And this was his first event ever.”
    medium

  • Competitions

    · 1 mention
    “A spirit of competition, creativity, and community participation, can not only provide an exciting experience for your subscribers but it can also create a sustainable revenue stream for your newsletter.”
    medium

  • Accelerator program

    · 1 mention
    “Forum Ventures — the current accelerator we are part of — definitely helped with the outreach. They had their own relationships. That became a huge help for us.”
    high

  • Giveaways

    · 1 mention
    “For Megaphone, my newsletter made it simple. I expanded in concentric circles: ... Shared it with my paid founder community (~450 people) to see how a trusted audience would respond”
    high

  • Guest posting

    · 1 mention
    “Like, the best engagement groups are where you're not only just sharing links of posts back and forth, but you're also sharing advice on content. You're giving each other feedback. You're invested in each other's growth. You know, I've been in groups where that's happened that have lasted for years,”
    high

  • Side project marketing

    · 1 mention
    “Houck has acquired 2 other newsletters, with one of the deals happening just last week. This is a pretty rare strategy we’ve only seen in one other deep dive from Codie Sanchez. The first one Houck bought was called Daily Dose of Startups... The readers were in the same niche as Michael’s so it w...”
    medium

  • LinkedIn ads

    · 1 mention
    “We run ads on FB/IG and Twitter, and I also use SparkLoop for paid recommendations.”
    high

  • Networking events

    · 1 mention
    “Other than that, conferences worked pretty well for us. We’re now pretty much relying on cold outreach.”
    high

  • Video content

    · 1 mention
    “When I post like Fireside Chats that I'm gonna do with, with experts, that'll drive, that'll drive some.”
    high

  • Existing Tik Tok Content

    · 1 mention
    “Michael has been running paid ads for at least 5 months now to help grow his newsletter. I’ve been following the journey for a bit, and was able to capture a few screenshots of these Twitter ads... Here are some of the Facebook ads he’s currently running: Houck has also been investing in Sparkloo...”
    medium

  • Press

    · 1 mention
    “after about a week down there, we got written up in TechCrunch and New York Times reached out and had a quote from us in one of their pieces.”
    high

  • Video Ads

    · 1 mention
    “Whenever I post like one of the IRL meetups or happy hours that we do in a, in a different city, I always post like photos afterwards, and people actually see that, hey, I can meet founders by doing this. That drives it.”
    high

  • Partnerships

    · 1 mention
    “Collaborations can amplify your content's reach as featured parties often reshare it.”
    medium

  • Referral Program

    · 1 mention
    “In the early days, Michael used “expiring” referral bonuses to entice his readers to continue referring readers.”
    medium

  • Speaking at conferences

    · 1 mention
    “Speaking Gigs can deliver this expertise directly to your audience's doorstep. Building a robust personal brand through your newsletter can attract opportunities to share your insights and knowledge at events, conferences, and webinars (IRL or virtual).”
    medium

  • Webinars

    · 1 mention
    “Access to live webinars... Offers live support and Q&A sessions”
    medium

  • Reddit

    · 1 mention
    “The topics I ended up with were: 1. Newsletter 2. Reddit Strategies and 3. Success Posts. Those are the only 3 topics I'm allowed to post about. That’s it. ... The Reddit strategy as well.”
    high

  • Course

    · 1 mention
    “Promote an in-depth course related to the knowledge you’re offering via newsletter.”
    medium

How 2,706 businesses grow

Of businesses with mapped growth channels, the share using each — Houck’s Newsletter’s highlighted.
  • Referral/Word-of-mouth
    68% ◀
  • Social media
    60% ◀
  • Search/SEO
    57%
  • Email
    48% ◀
  • Community
    34% ◀
  • Content/Inbound
    32% ◀
  • Partnerships
    31% ◀
  • Paid ads
    24%
  • Events
    24% ◀
  • Press/PR
    17% ◀
  • Outbound/Sales
    16% ◀
  • Marketplaces/App stores
    9% ◀
  • Product expansion
    2%
  • Influencer partnerships
    2% ◀
S
Starter Story
Support Privacy Terms