A Niche Newsletter For Amazon Sellers Making $150K/Year
Turning a niche expertise into a $150k newsletter business
Hello! Can you introduce yourself and tell us about your business?
My name is Jon Elder and I'm 35, married to an incredible woman and have two sons. We call Dallas home but I will always be a Seahawks fan. I keep that part pretty quiet around these parts.
I run Amazon Insiders, the fastest growing Amazon Seller newsletter in America. At 11,000+ subscribers, the secret is getting out that this is the newsletter that every Amazon seller wants to be subscribed to.
I provide weekly hacks and strategies for optimizing and growing a brand on Amazon.
The whole purpose of Amazon Insiders is really to provide Amazon sellers, most of the time these are like private label sellers, so they're selling their own brand, and the whole goal is to provide really good, valuable information for them to grow their business faster.
How did you start this business? Take us through the process.
My initial Amazon success started in 2014 when I launched my own brand within a small golfing niche.
That lead to growing 5 incredible brands over 5 years and selling more than $10,000,000 over that time. It was all about finding that next niche. I've applied the same strategy to my newsletter.
Here are a few quick facts about me:
I started my own Amazon journey in 2014 with a simple golf tool priced at $24.99. Over the course of 5 years, I bootstrapped and scaled 5 private label brands to do over $10 million in revenue.
I exited my Amazon business in late 2019 for mid-7 figures.
Post-exit, I felt there was a need for authentic Amazon consulting rooted in experience and Black Label Advisor was born! Since starting, I've consulted Amazon sellers ranging from total beginners to 7-8 figure brands. To date, I've advised 100+ sellers from all over the globe.
Instead of another "marketing newsletter" I wanted to launch something truly special and one of a kind. That's how Amazon Insiders came to be!
I write with the average Private Label seller in mind. If you don't sell on Amazon, you won't like this newsletter haha. It's micro-niche by design and it has really taken off!
How did you get your first initial customers?
It was all about Twitter back in the day!
I say that as if it was eons ago but in reality, I started writing 1.5 years ago and used tools like Hypefury to get the word out, and LinkedIn and reposting my landing page that if you wanted more in-depth content like this, to sign up for my weekly newsletter. So that became really cohesive and that produced a consistent number of signups.
Once I got that to be a well-oiled machine, I started doing newsletter swaps.
I promoted it through other big name newsletters that had similar audiences. Some of them were service providers, think like a marketing agency for Amazon sellers. We just did a swap and so that worked pretty well.
I've also used tools like Sparkloop to find other similar newsletters for cross promotion. Other tactics like including top Amazon sellers on my newsletter landing page has really helped too.
Showing authority, sharing my story, and being transparent about past mistakes have really helped me grow this thing to a level I only dreamed about.
Since launch, what are your marketing strategies or channels to get new customers?
I really focus on social media (X especially) and newsletter swaps.
Sparkloop has been huge as well. It all has come down to finding Amazon sellers in all corners of the internet.
I also have a rather unique referral program set up; the first person that someone recommends, or signs up, they get my top five hacks directly emailed to them, and then it goes 10 signups, they get a hat, and then 25, it's a hundred dollars gift card for Amazon. So that is gonna become more and more popular over time.
Finding them is the hard part. Them subscribing is the easy part!
How does your business make money?
I monetize my newsletter through sponsorships and affiliates but the sponsorships probably make up 90% of the revenue.
I charge anywhere from $500 to $2,000 depending on the ad slot and how exclusive the sponsor wants the relationship to be.
These are mostly SAAS companies who are trying to land more Amazon Sellers as clients. Think AI software, listing optimization, copywriting tools, reimbursement software.
Basically, any service that wants to make the lives of Amazon sellers easier is my target sponsor.
I'd say that I do very minimal outreach to get sponsorships. I have a lot of great exclusive relationships with various software companies. Maybe posting once in a while on Twitter saying like: “Hey, I just landed another sponsor. If you're a software provider for Amazon sellers, feel free to reach out.”.
Most of the time it's the provider on the newsletter that click the link for my sponsorship that takes them to a media kit. And then if they're interested in the media kit, then they fill out a form and then I get that, and then, we’d take it from there.
I'm hovering around $150k/year right now and the goal is to ramp this up to $250k by next Christmas.
My other goal is to hit 100,000 subscribers by that same date. It's aggressive but I know I can get there with the right strategies!
Take us through a typical day in your life running the business as a solo founder
So, I have consulting clients, email correspondence, and content creation.
My average work day is 4-5 hours spread out over the day starting at 5am. I love to write and zero AI is used believe it or not!
I work from home while my wife homeschools our kids. It can get loud but I would never change it for the world. I use ConvertKit for my newsletter.
It's a pretty streamlined operation similar to what Justin Welsh does. This is by design so I can avoid the burden of full time employees.
Before you go, what advice would you give to another who wants to start a business like yours?
Pursue your passion!
Do what makes you come alive inside even if it might not ring home the most money.
I find that true satisfaction comes from doing a job that provides great pleasure!
Where can we go to lean more about you and your business?
Here are some links you can go to learn more:
Main website: https://www.blacklabeladvisor.com/
Newsletter: https://blacklabeladvisor.ck.page/amazon-insiders
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BlackLabelAdvsr
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonelder/