There’s a $525,000,000 playbook for local email newsletters that many agents still don’t know about yet.

So, I wanted to share what we learned from Axios, which sold for $525 million, that we used to start running a similar playbook across many different markets.

We produce roughly 25 unique email newsletters every month using this playbook.

(Not counting the amount of different segments we send within each account to different audiences. Some weekly, some biweekly, and some monthly.)

While email newsletters aren’t “easy,” they can be “simple” with a system.

If you don’t have an email playbook, email is the highest ROI (return on investment) marketing channel compared to every single other one (36-70X, +$36 earned for every $1 spent), and it’s still growing.

So, here’s ours so you can swipe it for yourself.

— Andrew

The local email newsletter playbook was written by Axios, a media company focused on writing smarter, more efficient content on topics shaping the world and always putting its audience first.

It planned to focus on:

They generated more than $10,000,000 in revenue in its first 7 months of short-form native advertising and sponsored newsletters.

With 200,000 subscribers, a 52% open rate, 11 newsletters, and 89 staff - it was time to scale.

They started national but then acquired a local company in 2020, Charlotte Agenda, in Charlotte NC, which started their next phase into many of the major metro markets in the US.

Their local newsletters focused on:

The rest is history.

But why does this even matter for agents?

Axios isn’t the only company to prove you can get attention and build an audience with newsletters.

Why?

So, back in 2021, I asked myself why there aren’t more local newsletters? That’s when I started writing a few myself.

As an agent, your goal is to be the “resource” so that when someone decides to buy or sell, they think of you.

My thesis is that if you become a local source for the important things going on in your market, you can become the go-to resource.

Gary Vee says to be the “Digital Mayor”

So, how do you get started with email newsletters? First, create a repeatable system by having a simple, repeatable structure.

1) Sources

If you don’t fuel the system with great information (content), then nothing else matters.

Here’s a few examples I follow in Tampa:

There’s more, but I look for modern media brands that stay on top of what’s happening now.

Use a Notion database like this to stores source of ideas.

2) Structure

I analyzed Axios, Morning Brew, MilkRoad, and many other million-dollar newsletter structures, so you don’t have to.

Back in 2021, I found this simple format and have used something similar ever since.

3) Support

After you have a structure, you need support to make it happen more easily.

Three of the more popular email newsletter platforms are:

Many use the first 2 because they’re great for multiple things beyond just email newsletters (landing pages, automation, etc.). ActiveCampaign isn’t bad either.

You can find 1 part-time person or get help from an admin/marketing person, so you don’t have to do this all on your own.

One example is a solo agent who hired a part-time admin VA and is also leveraging her to help with her newsletter.

Then scale this from:

A daily newsletter in real estate would be tough because most people don’t care about what’s happening in their area daily.

However, people do care about what’s going on in their neighborhood/town/city/etc. weekly.

After you scale the newsletter, you can add other layers of email marketing, a few examples:

Of course, there’s other things like action plans, etc., but if there’s anywhere to start, I’d start with:

Then, decide what else you want to send from there.

Use this as your real estate email marketing playbook.

In this YouTube for Realtors masterclass, meet Matt Lunden, a Realtor in coastal Delaware who scaled from 0 to $106,000 in income in year 1, $230,000 in year 2, and is already $350,000 for year 3 in only 4 months of the year directly from YouTube.

Whether you're starting from zero & no channel or experience, I asked him everything, and he was unfiltered.

He did this all with nearly zero experience, starting as a PGA professional in Pinehurst, NC, to moving back to Delaware as a new agent. So here's Matt's story!

We talked about👇 

So, if you want to level up your YouTube game this one’s for you!

Watch it now on Breaking and Building Leaders YouTube!

I wanted to find a way to share a few of the recent trends & patterns between everything from:

These are single agents selling to teams/brokers up to +$1.5B/YR, and everything in between.

So I created a video, but it didn’t turn out as expected, so I’m going back to the drawing board.

However, I wanted to at least share a few nuggets incase you find it helpful:

1) Trends in Real Estate:

2) Listing Strategies:

3) Buyer strategies:

4) Social & YouTube:

That's it for today!

But if you have any questions, then reply & let me know.

(This helps me create the right type of content hearing what you actually care about)

Let's have an amazing week!

Andrew Bayon

P.S. Want to level up your marketing in 2024 & attract clients instead of chasing Leads?

Then I’ll reply with “VIDEO” and I’ll send a video showing what we do.

Or you can schedule an time to chat where I’ll give you a marketing strategy you can walk away with and implement, complimentary.

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