Let us be as explicit as possible. This is not a fundraising email. But we’re asking for something money can’t buy: Your endorsement.
We need to double our free subscribers base and the data tells us that will only happen if you vouch for us.
Here’s the lay of the land. In the last year, we’ve hit a plateau in terms of subscriber growth. After cleaning our email lists of those who signed up but never opened the newsletter over the last twelve months, we settled on a consistent state of 10,000 subscribers. Of those 10,000, we’re objectively killing it on every metric. Our open rate hovers over 60% every issue, click through rate is 10%, we’ve consistently broken stories the big media organizations miss. With the annual Fall fundraising appeal, we’re approaching a financial place where the math begins to start math’ing on everything. But to survive in the long run, we need to dramatically grow our subscriber list in general. We’d love for the new subscribers to be paying, but we’ll more than settle for an influx of free subscribers because our experience teaches us that once they starting reading us, many will understand why its so important to support independent journalism.
Here’s what we know looking at our data. When people open Court Watch for the first time, it quickly becomes a years-long habit. Our retention rate for engaged subscribers is north of 93 percent. The problem is we need more people to sign up.
The state of the internet is stunting our growth. The news world is increasingly siloed, with algorithmic discovery being an expensive endeavor that a small news shop like ours can’t afford.
Our audience is comically broad, a Daily Wire journalist and an ACLU attorney are some of our most engaged subscribers. We have an overseas war correspondent and a federal clerk who both open every issue. Rural one-man newspaper reporters are as involved subscribers as as our other subscribers who read Court Watch before they read you the news on the cable and nightly news channels. Every month, our reporting goes viral. We fight the Courts when no one else will. Two years on, we still track the Trump Administration lawsuits when everyone else moved on to the next shiny thing. But unfortunately it hasn’t translated to a throng of new subscribers. This is where you come in.
We need you to recruit 5 new people to sign up for Court Watch. This costs you nothing but your time. But it means the long-term survival of our news organization.
Send personal texts, forward your favorite past issue, post on every social media platform a call to subscribe, flyer the parking lots, whatever strikes your fancy but we have to grow. And our data is very clear. We grow not by algorithms but by word-of-mouth. We need you to be our own personal algorithm. Encourage your followers and friends to sign up here: www.courtwatch.news/subscribe
We’re not going to give you canned language on how to get your friends, families, and social networks. You know your social circles well enough to make a heartfelt and effective pitch.
But if you need an incentive: The 3 most creative and effective public calls by our readers for new Court Watch subscribers earns the poster a free lifetime paid subscription.*
You’ve been in on the secret that is Court Watch. If you’ve enjoyed and appreciated our reporting, now is the time to go public with your love. Bring five friends in on the best kept secret in journalism.
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*If you’re already a paid subscriber, we’ll figure out a prize arrangement that reflects the work you put in. (exclusive Court Watch branded merch anyone?)