How big an audience?

How big an audience is needed before advertising revenue can be a reality

[Bluestreak]

Hi all,

I developed a HTML/plain text newsletter a while ago that I currently suspended. However I noticed nobody left, deciding to wait till I return from my moratorium and resume the newsletter, if it comes to that. I'm wondering if maybe I should invest a bit more time and see if I can grow the subscriber base exponentially so that I can attract advertising revenues. My topic is highly specific, sort of a beginner's guide to computer based politics, hi-tech law enforcement and information/computer security. My question is, how big an audience would I have to develop before businesses show an interest in advertising in my newsletter? Is there a consensus on how big a subscriber would usually have to be before you can reasonably profit from it via advertising revenues? Can anyone share their own experiences in this regard?

Appreciate any advice. :-)

[martinibuster]

My experience with this is from the other end, as one looking for a great advertising opportunity. What I was looking for was access to a specific audience demographic, a niche audience so to speak. The more narrow your focus, the more that audience is worth; after all, the ideal audience for an advertiser is a targeted audience.

If you have a Rabbit Enthusiast newsletter: 1,000 Rabbit Enthusiasts is worth some money to a Rabbit Feed salesperson. With a conversion rate of say... 4% that makes 40 sales, at $20 each that equals $800 in sales. So to make that worth someone's interest, you may want to charge them...

Well now we're in the cpm territory and that's dependent on what your subscriber base is buying.

Here's an article from the January issue of New Architect Magazine [newarchitectmag.com] that talks about lockergnome and his newsletter success.

It's an eyeopening experience to solicit for space in someone's niche newsletter to find out what they are charging. But check their online newsletter archives and see how much they are selling at those prices.

[Jenstar]

I was going to say the same thing - 1,000 minimum for a niche market.

If you are under that, start doing ad swaps with similar-theme but non-competing newsletters to get exposure and increase your subscribers.

It also makes a big difference with the particular niche market. Using martinibuster's example, 1,000 Rabbit Enthusiasts is worth some money to a Rabbit Feed salesperson, but it might take 3,000 Guinea Pig enthusiasts to make it worth some money to a guinea pig feed salesman. You just never know.

Likewise, if you are the only rabbit enthusiast newsletter on the net, you would have a bigger draw to the advertisers and get more money for your ad space, but if you are only one of 1000 rabbit enthusiast newsletters for advertisers to choose from, you might find it harder to get advertising, or get the $ you want for your advertising.

[Bluestreak]

Thanks for the responses, I figured it was going to largely depend on the nature of the targeted audience. I guess I would just have to keep building the subscriber base until I hit that sweet spot. :D