LiveIntent Blog
  • Solutions
    • Advertiser solutions
      Discover a new advertising channel for powering profitable growth.
    • Publisher solutions
      Maximize the revenue generated across email and web inventory
    • Identity data solutions
      Build stronger connections with addressable audiences everywhere.
  • Identity framework
  • Case studies
  • Company
    • Our story
      Learn more about us, our mission, vision, and the people behind it all.
    • Careers
      Grow and develop personally and professionally at LiveIntent.
    • Press
      Read up on how LiveIntent is innovating the digital ecosystem.
    • Events
      Check out our upcoming events and stay up-to-date with all things martech.
  • Resources
    • LiveIntent Library
      Learn how to harness the power of email with our eBooks, guides, and reports.
    • Blog
      Explore martech topics, strategies, and tactics with fun, insightful content.
    • Knowledge base
      Get answers to all your pressing product related questions.
    • Brand assets
      Everything you need to know about the LiveIntent brand all in one place.
Contact Us
LiveIntent Blog
  • Solutions
    • Advertiser solutions
      Discover a new advertising channel for powering profitable growth.
    • Publisher solutions
      Maximize the revenue generated across email and web inventory
    • Identity data solutions
      Build stronger connections with addressable audiences everywhere.
  • Identity framework
  • Case studies
  • Company
    • Our story
      Learn more about us, our mission, vision, and the people behind it all.
    • Careers
      Grow and develop personally and professionally at LiveIntent.
    • Press
      Read up on how LiveIntent is innovating the digital ecosystem.
    • Events
      Check out our upcoming events and stay up-to-date with all things martech.
  • Resources
    • LiveIntent Library
      Learn how to harness the power of email with our eBooks, guides, and reports.
    • Blog
      Explore martech topics, strategies, and tactics with fun, insightful content.
    • Knowledge base
      Get answers to all your pressing product related questions.
    • Brand assets
      Everything you need to know about the LiveIntent brand all in one place.
Log in Contact Us
  • Blog Homepage
  • Programmatic Advertising
  • Email Monetization
  • Identity Resolution
  • LiveIntent Culture
  • Real Time Banter
  • LiveIntentional
  • Subscribe

5 tips for email audience building in 2022

    • Email Monetization
  • April 5, 2022
Mark Dunning
Art Director

Publishers are increasingly investing in email to build engaged audiences and nurture subscriber relationships through 2022 and beyond. After all, email offers access to logged-in users, deterministic IDs, privacy-safe ad environments, and first-party data.

Also, it’s personal.

“It’s really about creating that connection,” says Ryan Kellett, Axios VP of Audience, in a recent Real Time Banter webinar. “[Your email] is in someone’s inbox next to the note from their mom and their bank statement. Everyone has email; it’s a very foundational piece of technology.”

Kellett would know. As an email-driven publisher, Axios runs over 30 unique newsletters like Axios Latino, Axios Crypto, Axios Sports, and Axios Science — and they’re just getting started.

“Newsletters are really critical to a lot of publications right now; you see the demand skyrocketing,” Kellett says. “You can have full products that are meant to be consumed in the inbox. You can have products that are link-driven directed toward web traffic.”

To help publishers harness the power of email for themselves, we’ll break down Kellett’s top tips for audience building in today’s digital world.

1. Identify your target reader

Publishers need to start by pinpointing their target audience.

As Kellett says, “You can have all the fancy tactics in the world, but if you don’t really understand who you’re trying to reach, it doesn’t matter.”

Axios identified its audience as smart professionals: people who are engaged in their work life and curious about the world. And every new email offering is built with those users in mind.

“How can you remain laser-focused on your audience and serve their needs above others?” Kellett says. “That clarity, that focus, can really go a long way.”

2. Understand their values

Once you know who your audience is, you can better understand their specific values, interests, and needs.

Axios, for example, realized many smart professionals were interested in community connections and leadership. So the publisher launched Axios Local, an email newsletter that will deliver community-related content across 25 cities.

“We are continuing to expand what the definition [of smart professional] is,” Kellett says. “And we’re thinking about how to serve that really focused audience — not just everyone out there.”

3. Sync with their daily habits

Digital content can play an important part in people’s daily routines. Maybe readers check their phone right when they wake up every morning. Or they shop online on their desktop during each lunch break.

It’s the publisher’s job to know these habits and build content that fits into them. That’s why Axios launched its AM/PM newsletter to reach daily readers when they wake up and before they go to bed.

“The smartest people out there are thinking about building habits and driving readers to be more engaged by adopting either a daily habit or a weekly habit of some kind,” Kellett says. “You have to try and help them understand the value that you provide.”

4. Gather qualitative and quantitative data

The best way to track and meet changing consumer habits is to gather data directly from your audiences.

“Data is incredibly important to an audience development person — whether you’re in editorial or not,” Kellett says. “Data practices are really at the foundation of that.”

Axios, for example, doesn’t just rely on quantitative metrics like email open rate and clickthrough rate. They also gather qualitative data through email surveys and direct replies from newsletter readers. And, of course, the more email newsletters you run, the more data you can continuously collect about your readers’ experiences.

“It helps to have a lot of different newsletters in this case; they cover a lot of different topics,” Kellett says. “When you have the same email address, you can say, ‘OK, this person is reading across a variety of verticals,’ or ‘There’s really only one.'”

5. Adapt and evolve to drive revenue

Many publishers run free email newsletters to start gaining subscribers and growing their audience. Once you develop that readership base, however, you can take your operation to the next level and try launching paid offerings to help increase revenue.

Axios, for instance, began delivering mostly free newsletters. But in 2022, they launched Axios Pro, a paid newsletter of hyper-relevant content and analysis across five industries: fintech, health, retail, climate, and media.

“Axios is lucky to have built some very large email lists and subscribers for our free products, and Axios Pro will represent an evolution of that,” Kellett says. “If you’re really successful in your newsletter and you’re really feeling not only your metrics, but you also see that engagement and feedback […] you can advance a little further by launching a subscription product.”

0
Tweet 0
Mark Dunning
Art Director

Must-Read Content

3 publishing priorities
    • Email Monetization

3 publishing priorities for 2023

  • Mano Pillai
  • December 21, 2022
    • Email Monetization

Staking a claim in $61.15bn in digital ad spend

  • Chris Hartley
  • December 13, 2022
    • Email Monetization

Why email is crucial to local publisher monetization strategies

  • Victoria de Leon
  • July 14, 2022
Learn more about Email Monetization.
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Consumer behaviors, email newsletters, and subscription fatigue with Mark Stenberg

  • Mark Dunning
  • June 13, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Email list monetization: What is it and why is it important?

  • Victoria de Leon
  • May 18, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

4 ways to monetize your first-party data in 2022

  • Victoria de Leon
  • May 3, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Unlocking and supporting business opportunities with first-party data

  • Nick Bolt
  • March 30, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

CNET finds the sweet spot between direct-sold strategy and operational ease with Native Ad Blueprints

  • Jennie Conway
  • March 14, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP): What it means for direct-sold deals

  • Nick Bolt
  • February 22, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Building audiences in today’s digital world

  • Mark Dunning
  • February 16, 2022
View Post
  • Email Monetization

Doubling down on direct-sold deals

  • Nick Bolt
  • February 9, 2022
LiveIntent Blog
Think outside the inbox and discover all the innovative ways email can help you grow your business.
© LiveIntent 2022
  • Solutions
    • Advertiser solutions
    • People-Based audiences
    • Publisher solutions
    • Identity data solutions
    • Identity framework
  • Company
    • Our Story
    • Careers
    • Employee Resource Groups
    • Press
    • Events
    • Contact us
  • Resources
    • Case studies
    • Blog
    • Knowledge base
    • Brand assets
  • Legal
    • Powered by
    • Content policy
    • Website privacy policy
    • Services privacy policy
    • Do not sell my info
    • Ad choices
© LiveIntent 2022
Popular topics
  • People-Based Marketing
  • Meet-a-LiveIntenter
  • Email Revenue
  • Identity Graph
  • Subscriber Acquisition
  • First-Party Data
  • Direct-to-Consumer
  • Cookie Apocalypse