⚡ I paid for your replies. Did it work?

Happy Canada Day to all my fellow Canadian readers 🍁

Here’s what’s happening in this edition:

→ Can you buy newsletter replies? I tried. |
→ How to build a $500k membership
→ The Hyper-Personalized Lead Magnet
→ Mark Manson’s subject line formulas
→ Best tools & apps for Substack writers

But before we get into it...

I have an update on last week’s “$25 Starbucks GC for a Reply” experiment.

Last week in my newsletter, I did something impulsive and unplanned.

I tried to buy replies — with a $25 Starbucks gift card.

I offered the GC to the first person who replied to my newsletter with a correct answer to (what I thought was) a pretty simple question.

The result? A whopping 6 replies 😂

Two replies had nothing to do with the question or incentive. And four came after I ​posted about it on LinkedIn​.

For what it’s worth, I had no idea how/if this would work. Expectations were low.

1 - If you actually want this to work — don’t bury it like I did. I could have made it way more prominent in the email so skimmers wouldn’t miss it. Instead I put it in a body of text. Only thorough readers (maybe 10-15%) saw it.

2 - Making it the “first to reply” created a Bystander Effect: everyone thought someone else probably beat them to it. It turned individual readers into a crowd of bystanders. My ​LinkedIn post​proved it as several folks admitted as much. According to Claude, I should have added something like “Most people won’t bother answering — be the one who does”

3 - The incentive was misaligned. Coffee is great. Lotsa folks drink it. But I should have offered something more enticing and valuable, like a 1:1 call with me, or a free onboarding audit or roast. An incentive that was better aligned with my newsletter and my audience would have been more effective (and technically “free” for me, too).

There are loads of ways to encourage more newsletter replies. (In fact, I have a ​free resource​ on that)

And since replies are the Gold Standard for engagement, I was very okay to invest $25 into this experiment.

Truthfully, the experiment alone was worth the small investment. While mostly unsuccessful, I’d still recommend it in the right situation — but with the learnings from above applied.

Will I try it again? Maybe! But more strategically.

Let me know: would you try this? Reply YES or NO.

Super curious to hear your thoughts.

My newsletter last week hit 60% open rate (for whatever that’s worth) -- hurray!

But it could’ve been even better.

Turns out all my Outlook email subscribers missed it — because it went straight to their Junk folder.

Sh*t.

How do I know this? Because I use ​SendGauge​.

Moments after hitting send, I got a not-so-rosy deliverability score of 30/100 from SendGauge.

In fact, Alyssa Dulin (who built this tool) was kind enough to create a filter for me in Kit so I can stop sending newsletters to cold Outlook subscribers.

SendGauge has already done a lot for me and it’s only getting better. I’m in regular contact with Alyssa, and she is continuously improving SendGauge.

You can run your own deliverability test now: ​free for 7 days →​

PS - Yes I’ve shared SendGauge in this resource section before. But it’s so good and getting even better that it’s worth sharing again.

PPS - I do not affiliate with many products. The ones I am an affiliate for, like SendGauge and Kit, are the ones I trust, have tested, and/or continue to use and enjoy.

I’ve been following Jay Clouse longer than I’ve been following *almost* anyone.

So it was an honor to co-interview him with Chenell — while in person — in Boise.

One of the things I admire about Jay is how thoughtful he is.

And it’s because he legit cares. He cares about his business. He cares about his family.

And he cares about his members and their experience in his community, The Lab.

He’s thoughtfully built a community that drives close to $500k in annual revenue while serving over 340 members.

Jay’s “overnight success” has taken years.

Jay fired up The Lab back in 2022 (it was called the Creator Companion Club at the time). And he launched it with a 200-member cap — while also using pricing as a filter to vet for serious creators.

He’s since eliminated the 200-member cap, added a beginner tier, and turned the higher tier into an application process.

In our interview, Jay shared why he made those decisions, along with...

→ The #1 metric he cares about
→ The crucial “middle” of community building most people ignore
→ How he onboards new members
→ How he structures his multi-tier membership and why
→ The surprising result of their best sign-up month ever (and what went wrong)

You can watch our interview live on YouTube or catch it on your favorite podcast player now :)

Curated links from others that I think you’ll enjoy.

⚡ How to get cited by AI ​through your LinkedIn posts →​

⚡ ​The Hyper-Personalized Lead Magnet →​

⚡ Mark Mansons’s email ​subject line formulas →​

⚡Gmail open rates suddenly look lower: ​Here’s what’s actually changing →​

⚡ ​Best Tools and Apps for Substack Writers →​

⚡ ​14 Landing Pages with a 50%+ Conversion Rate →​

Here are a few ways I’d love to help you:

1. Get clear on your newsletter strategy. Book a 1:1 Strategy Call With Me (​30 mins​ || ​1 Hour​)

2. Improving your newsletter engagement & reducing unsubscribes starts with how you onboard your new subscribers. Book a ​Newsletter Onboarding Audit >>​

3. Get daily newsletter support in a private setting from myself, Chenell Basilio, and dozens of other newsletter creators. ​Join the Growth In Reverse Pro Community today >>

See you in the inbox,

Dylan @ Growth Currency

​​LinkedIn​ | Twitter | ​Substack​ | ​IG​

PS - We’re hosting some really fun sessions in the GIR Pro community this summer and would love to have you ​join​. Here are a few I’m excited about: