The local media business

Every answer 46 answers

• Can a local newsletter be a six-figure business?

  Yes, if you really go after sales. Done right, it's a six-figure business in year two, sometimes year one, but only if you invest in subscribers early and sell hard. Operators I know make $3,000 to $20,000+ a month, and a few report around $500,000 a year. Without real sales effort, most stay small.

• Can a local newsletter compete with 6AM City, Axios Local and AI newsletter chains?

  Yes. Chains staff a city with an employee editing AI-fed news, or nobody at all. A local owner with a stake in the brand shows up at the chamber, grand openings and restaurants, and builds relationships a corporate model can't. Go smaller than them, into mid-size markets and small towns, and be the human they aren't.

• Can a local newsletter make money from the newsletter alone?

  Rarely. A local reader is worth far less than a B2B reader, local businesses don't buy on CPMs, and ads alone barely pay a living unless you run about ten newsletters. The money comes from what you build around it: a back-end business the audience trusts, plus social, a website, events, a directory and a job board.

• Can you run a local newsletter as a passive side hustle?

  Not if you want it to go anywhere. If your plan is to launch Meta ads, have AI write it and chat with a business now and then, don't. It works when someone actively sells: one podcast guest with a full-time job makes six figures by making sales calls on his lunch break. Expect to spend money and grind for months first.

• Do you have to be the face of your local newsletter?

  Someone does, though it doesn't have to be you or only one person. People trust people, and faceless newsletters won't last as AI floods the inbox. Put a real local person on Instagram and in the room, under a brand name that isn't theirs, so you can add creators later and the brand survives if one leaves.

• How can a local business use a local media brand to win customers?

  Launch a neutral local media brand with a human face (a newsletter, Instagram and a website named after the town) and mention your business only occasionally. I call it the Trojan horse model: people choose to read it, the brand earns their trust, and when they need roofing, insurance or a mortgage, they call you, not Google.

• How do I choose a niche for a local newsletter business?

  Run every idea through two gates: can you get the audience cheaply, and will advertisers pay well to reach it? Most cheap audiences fail the second. Then go one level deeper than just local: seniors, business owners, a cultural community. 55-plus is the only niche I've found that clears both gates so far.

• How do I compete with a big established local publisher in my market?

  Don't fight them for the hospitals and other giant advertisers; their sales relationships are locked. Win the mid-size businesses with real budgets and no layers of management, move faster, and make a lighter, more engaging product. In Texas I compete with a 20-year-old publisher and still have about 25,000 subscribers near me.

• How do I start an exclusive business owners group and fill it with Meta ads?

  Put the bar in the ad. I ran Meta ads for a client's club that said you must own a business doing $1 million a year or more, and leads came in around $2 each, including owners of $10 to $30 million companies. Screen every applicant with a form, don't invite the ones who miss the bar, and make your money on the back end.

• How do you build a modern alternative to BNI and the chamber of commerce?

  Aim for the middle: more structure than a casual coffee meetup, none of BNI's rigid rules. Run a short training, a monthly coffee and a happy hour, and a Slack or Facebook group so members keep talking between meetings. Bundle perks into one cheap membership. A local media brand is the natural host, because it already has the audience.

• How do you run local newsletters in many cities?

  Three main ways: one owner in one town, a company that owns every market and pays local people, or a partner or franchisee who owns their town while you run the back end. I started out preferring local partners. Lately I lean toward owning them and paying locals a revenue share, because I control it. Either way, someone local has to care.

• How does a local media franchise or licensing model work?

  Prove the system in one market, then let local operators pay you to repeat it. I call it a business in a box: each owner picks their own brand name, and my team supplies the software, Meta ad acquisition, playbooks and coaching for a flat monthly fee. Every launch makes money instead of costing it. It's a license, not a franchise.

• How does owning a local media brand make you the go-to person in town?

  It flips who wants to talk to whom. As an insurance broker at chamber meetings, people avoided me. As the local media guy with 25,000 readers, people line up, because I have the audience they want. It's a cheat code for becoming a super connector, but you still have to show up in person, and host or attend events.

• How long does it take for a local newsletter to be taken seriously?

  Usually one to two years in market. Subscriber count alone doesn't do it: even 25,000 subscribers in month three leaves you a brand nobody has heard of. Assume zero revenue for three to six months, maybe a year. My wife and I put about 60 combined hours a week in for five months before any revenue.

• How much does a neighborhood print magazine franchise cost to run?

  From franchisees I've talked to: $10,000 to $20,000 upfront, 10% to 15% of ad sales to the franchisor, and a print and mail bill of roughly $12,000 to $17,000 a month whether you sell ads or not. Several networks make you sell $10,000 to $15,000 in ads a month before you earn a dollar. A digital local brand costs about 90% less.

• How should a new local newsletter position itself against the local newspaper?

  Be the fun local media company. Newspapers are text-heavy and cover accidents and city council; you cover new restaurants, events, concerts and family fun, curated by a real local with memes, GIFs and Instagram. Give the brand a sharp identity, and make content AI and out-of-town operators can't: real stuff from your own town.

• Is a 55+ senior newsletter a good niche for local media?

  I think it's the best one I've found. 55-plus is the only vertical I've seen with both cheap subscribers and high advertiser value. My senior brands have bought subscribers for about 20 to 60 cents, with engagement about double my regular newsletters. The catch: the ads have to stay local, and it takes real sales work.

• Is a B2B newsletter for local business owners worth starting?

  Yes, if you'll give it real effort and cover a big enough area. Readers who own businesses or earn six figures are worth far more than a general local audience, and the money often comes from events, training and back-end services more than ads. I run mine across a whole county of about 800,000 people.

• Is a suburb of a big city a good market for a local newsletter?

  Yes, if it's far enough from the big city that residents don't care about it. A suburb beats the crowded, spread-out big city itself. A standalone city of about 100,000 or more with nothing around it is better still. A close-in suburb is the hardest version: weak identity and four other newsletters pitching the same businesses.

• Is an immigrant or cultural community newsletter a good local media business?

  I think so, in a big enough metro. People read a newsletter built for their own community word for word, so engagement would be sky high. Most big immigrant communities already have media, but it's mostly print, radio and weak WordPress sites. Be the first with newsletters, Meta ads and Instagram, and a face from the community.

• Is it better to sell tools to local media operators than run local media yourself?

  Often, yes. In a hot space the people supplying the tools tend to make the most money. Local is growing, and 99.9% of people who want in don't know the tech, so I build software (lightbreak, greetform), consult, and act as the back end for operators. The best buyers are legacy publishers with budgets, not solo operators.

• Is it easier to grow a local newsletter than a national one?

  For growth, yes. Local has far less competition and a built-in reason to care, and ads aimed at everyone within 10 miles stay cheap. A national senior newsletter didn't work for me; framed locally, that audience signs up for about 50 cents. The catch: local is harder to monetize and can't scale past the people who live there.

• Is it too late to start a local newsletter?

  No. You think you're late, but you're early. If you read about local newsletters, you're in a bubble: local newsletters are foreign to most people, including most business owners. Plenty of great towns still have nothing. AI will make this easier, which is why you want to own your town's audience before everyone else shows up.

• Is there a market for local political newsletters and media brands?

  I think so, though it's untested for me. State and county party organizations should have full media arms, and most don't because they don't know how. Build one umbrella brand with a newsletter and short-form social first, add a website, podcast and events later, and use signup surveys so campaigns know who their supporters are.

• Should I build a statewide media brand with local newsletters under it?

  In a smaller or lightly populated state, often yes. A statewide umbrella brand feels bigger to advertisers, and statewide businesses want reach across the state, not one county. Keep your city newsletters as sub-brands under it. I'm doing this with my Vegas brands in Nevada. It's a big-picture play.

• Should a local media brand start on social media or with a newsletter?

  If you have no money, start on social. It's free, you can film casually as you go about your life, the numbers are public and video builds trust best. If you have some money, run the newsletter at the same time, since growing a list usually takes ad spend. Long term, a media company can't live on one channel.

• Should a local newsletter add a digital marketing agency?

  It's a natural back end. Advertisers already ask you for marketing help: a website, Meta ads, SEO, AI. The newsletter earns their trust, then you ask what they're doing for Meta ads and sell a bundle, or refer it out for a cut. The risks are fulfillment quality and distraction, so get the newsletter working first and hire out delivery.

• Should a local newsletter cover one town or a whole county?

  Usually the bigger area. Combine adjacent towns into one brand of 150,000+ people instead of splitting them: cheaper Meta ads, bigger lists, more weight with advertisers, half the work. If I started over, I'd launch the county brand first and spin off towns later. Keep the newsletter local; the website and social can cover the region.

• Should a local newsletter launch a print magazine?

  Eventually, but not first. Print only works advertiser-funded, and it costs far more than a newsletter, so build the newsletter, social and advertiser list first. Then start small: a postcard or a 16-page ad pamphlet mailed to chosen zip codes, and don't print until the ads are sold. Business owners love print. That's why.

• Should a new local media brand start with a website or a newsletter?

  I've changed my mind on this. In 2025 I said start with the newsletter and add a website once you hit 6,000 to 10,000 subscribers. Starting over today, I'd launch the website and social first and add the newsletter last, because business owners understand websites and directories, and a site has unlimited room to sell.

• Should a new local media site launch without a news section?

  I did. I held my site back four months because I didn't want to deal with news: either I write it, or AI-assisted articles go out with no local human checking them, which is a legal and reputation risk. So I launched with a business directory and job board. Businesses pay for the directory; news earns the least.

• Should a realtor start a local news brand?

  It can work, and realtors are already out-reaching legacy local media on social. Keep self-promotion to about one in ten pieces; the rest is about the town. A realtor I know got five deals in a year from a 1,000-person list. Expect a long horizon, though: don't count on clients in the first six months.

• Should an insurance agent start a local newsletter?

  Insurance agents might be the best people to run one. Every reader is a potential client, and each client is worth $4,000 to $5,000 over time. The point isn't selling ads. It's becoming the person in town everyone knows and trusts, with your agency in the back. Expect little money in year one.

• Should you buy struggling local newsletters?

  Yes, if you know how to monetize them. Most local newsletters are started by side hustlers who sell ads only, hit 5,000 to 10,000 subscribers and quit, so some sell for almost nothing. Add sales, social, Meta ads and a local operator and the target is a $50,000 to $100,000-a-year asset. Check open rates first for fake lists.

• What did you learn in your first six months of running local newsletters?

  Building a local audience is easy if you pay for it: about 50 cents to $1 a subscriber on Meta. Six months in, my first two newsletters had about 14,000 subscribers. They also had zero ad revenue, because I hadn't put much effort into sales. Don't copy that part. And think of it as a local media company, not a newsletter.

• What is the future of local news?

  Smaller, cheaper and more human. With AI cutting costs, I think every town gets its own local media company again, run by someone who lives there, with in-person events at the center. As AI makes online content harder to trust, people will trust what they know locally. Realtors are already out-reaching legacy outlets on social.

• What population size is best for a local newsletter?

  Aim for a market of roughly 100,000 to 500,000 people. I call 200,000 to 400,000 prime, and most of my newsletters cover 100,000 to 300,000. Under 50,000 is usually too small for ad revenue unless you combine towns or want influence more than money. A metro over a million is where a million-dollar newsletter gets realistic.

• What's the biggest mistake when launching multiple local newsletters?

  Spreading them across unrelated cities. I launched six newsletters in six random cities, when 60,000 subscribers in one metro would have been worth far more than 10,000 each across six. Advertisers buy reach in a market, so stack your brands in one region and sell them as one audience to the regional players.

• Who should buy a done-for-you local newsletter, and who shouldn't?

  Established owners of high-value local businesses who'll treat it as active, not passive: insurance agencies, larger med spas, custom home builders, attorneys, maybe community banks. Not solopreneurs, and not most realtors or mortgage brokers. The buyer needs money, desire and patience, plus someone who'll show up in town.

• Why are legacy local news organizations slow to adopt newsletters and Meta ads?

  Unfamiliarity, a moral objection to paying for readers, and no incentive to change while the money still comes in. Most legacy outlets send a list of links or none at all and pay $2+ per subscriber. The fastest fix is software that turns the content they already publish into a real newsletter in minutes a day.

• Why did local newspapers fail, and what replaces them?

  Cost killed local newspapers, not lack of demand. Google and Facebook hurt, but print and salaried reporters made the model too expensive for one town's ad money. People still want local news, free and delivered to them. What replaces it is one local creator, maybe with a helper, running a digital brand for about 90% less.

• Why do big companies buy media brands, and what does it mean for local media?

  To reach their ideal buyers. HubSpot owns The Hustle and My First Million because those audiences are HubSpot's customers. With so many AI products around, the scarce asset is an audience, and a media brand is how you get one. Locally it's the same: an attorney, realtor or senior-care business should own the brand its buyers read.

• Why do local newsletters fail?

  Mostly: the operator burns out by month two or three, there's no money to grow the list, nobody sells the ads, or attention gets split across too many projects. The audience is rarely the problem. I've had my own versions, including six newsletters with good open rates and zero revenue because nobody was selling.

• Why do most local newsletter operators leave money on the table?

  Each one is siloed in a small market, so nobody has the incentive or staff to dig into the optimizations big B2B newsletters use. Most solo owners also run it as a personal project and protect readers from ads. Borrow the B2B ideas, treat it like a business with a human voice, and make sure every list has a real way to earn.

• Why should a local newsletter become a local media brand?

  Because a local newsletter alone is a weak business and a weak moat. I think of a local media brand as an octopus: newsletter, Instagram, website, podcast, events, directory and job board under one name. The newsletter is the foundation, the other arms give you discovery and more to sell, and the brand is the part AI can't copy.

• Will AI replace local news?

  No, but it will replace local news that's only aggregation. AI makes running a local brand cheaper, and a bootstrapped AI-run newsletter could be more profitable than well-funded human-only ones. What AI can't copy is the trusted local person, relationships and events. As AI floods the internet, people will trust what they know locally.