---
aliases: ["Write Newsletter Growth E-book"]
Is A: Project
Belongs to: "[[25q3]]"
Advances: "[[responsibility-content-production]]"
Status: Done
Owner: "[[person-luca-rossi]]"
---
# Write Newsletter Growth E-book

## Overview

This project produced a 15,000-word e-book titled "The Newsletter Growth Playbook for Technical Founders" — a comprehensive guide distilling the Refactoring growth story, strategies, and lessons into a free downloadable resource. The e-book serves as a high-value lead magnet for subscriber acquisition and establishes authority in the growing "technical content creator" space.

The e-book drew heavily from existing content — the Codemotion talk from [[24q3-codemotion-talk]], pillar articles from [[24q2-10-pillar-articles]], and newsletter issues that covered growth topics throughout 2024. Rather than writing everything from scratch, the project assembled, updated, and expanded existing material into a cohesive narrative. [[person-sara-ricci]] edited the full manuscript over two rounds, and [[person-giulia-conti]] designed the cover and interior layout.

## Goals

- Write a 15,000-word e-book covering newsletter strategy, growth tactics, and monetization for technical audiences
- Structure in 8 chapters with actionable takeaways and real data from the Refactoring journey
- Design a professional PDF layout with custom cover art and clean typography
- Set up a landing page with email capture for the download (new subscribers get the e-book as a welcome gift)
- Generate 3,000+ new subscribers through the e-book in the first 3 months

## Key decisions

- **Free, not paid.** The primary goal is subscriber acquisition, not direct revenue. A free e-book with an email gate generates far more subscribers than a $9.99 paid e-book would generate in revenue. The subscriber lifetime value (through sponsorship revenue) far exceeds any reasonable e-book price.
- **Existing content as foundation, not writing from scratch.** About 60% of the e-book content was adapted from existing newsletter issues, blog posts, and the Codemotion talk transcript. This reduced the writing time from an estimated 6 weeks to about 3 weeks while producing a more proven and polished result (the content had already been validated with the audience).
- **PDF format, not a Substack post or blog series.** A designed PDF feels more substantial and "worth downloading" than a blog series. It also creates a sense of exclusivity and ownership that a public web page does not. The design investment was modest but made the resource feel premium.

## Notes

- The writing process was faster than expected. The structure emerged naturally from grouping existing content into themes: chapters on audience identification, content strategy, distribution, SEO, sponsorship, and community. New writing focused mainly on connecting threads and adding updated data.
- [[person-sara-ricci]]'s editing was particularly valuable for the e-book format. Newsletter writing can be casual and conversational; a longer-form document requires more careful structure and flow. She restructured two chapters significantly and improved the opening section.
- [[person-giulia-conti]]'s cover design was clean and professional — a minimalist style with the Refactoring brand colors. The interior layout used a two-column format with pull quotes and data callouts that made the dense content more scannable.
- The landing page conversion rate is approximately 42% (visitors who enter email and download). This is above the benchmark for e-book lead magnets (~25-30%). The high conversion likely reflects the specificity of the topic and the trust already built through the newsletter brand.
- At the 2-month mark, the e-book has generated approximately 2,300 new subscribers, tracking toward the 3,000 target. The e-book landing page is now promoted in the newsletter footer, on the podcast, and through social media. It has also been shared organically by readers, creating a compounding distribution effect.
- The e-book content will likely need updating in 6-12 months as strategies evolve. Built the manuscript in markdown with a separate build script for PDF generation, making updates straightforward. Feeds into [[topic-content-strategy]].
