When I first decided to start a newsletter, I’d assumed it’d be just like publishing a blog, but with a different delivery method — but I was completely wrong. Although I do see blog posts as quite personal outputs, a newsletter is just different somehow. It’s hard to say exactly why, but I suspect it’s something to do with the fact that people have opted in to receive your updates. Sure, you could say the same of those who subscribe to your blog’s RSS feed, but publishing something that lands in a person’s inbox just feels inherently more intimate, and I’ve personally been surprised at how writing and publishing a newsletter has felt very different to writing and publishing a blog.
I completely agree. I’ve published a fair number of newsletter editions professionally but zero personally. That is, until I’ve begun Diversions. Though I haven’t yet published an edition of Diversions that lands in someone’s Inbox (that is coming soon), I can already feel a difference in publishing posts for members. It just feels different. Writing Diversions or recording voice memos, just feels different than even this post. It gets the juices flowing.
I’m really liking the feeling. The response to the membership has been incredible. I’m still just figuring things out. I’m still getting things set up. I’m just getting started and there is already a slew of posts in the hopper. It has been a lot of fun.