Welcome to GRO UP - a (new) content series as part of SEEDS where I’ll curate opinions and learnings from numerous APAC builders on how they use certain tactics to build ‘brands.’

First up: Newsletter Growth. A personal favourite topic of mine, what I think about a lot (more for the future than now) and also a topic I enjoy discussing at length, and that’s not only the audience numbers etc. I’m talking the art of curation, I’m talking writers who enjoy putting their thoughts out into the world, and I’m talking those who’ve simply at one point gotten started on articulating their worldview out there, whether by a Substack, or a beehiiv, or a Kit, a Ghost, a Buttondown, or any other means.

This won’t be the last GRO UP focused on newsletters either, and you can expect to see GRO UP every fortnight in 2026. Next topic: the art of event experiences you remember.

Gaz - Chief Chief at GROUP GROUP, building SEEDS

(PS, I always publish a LinkedIn post talking about my motivations for launching new curated works - whether written, event, podcast, or other - and you can see today’s one HERE, which contains a certain delicious irony)

You probably know the feeling, or the little voice in your head. It’s the one that’s whispered in your inner ear “you should start a newsletter” and it sounds remarkably like that same voice that said “you should start a podcast” back in lockdown times.

You will hear various statements from various specimens on occasion - usually on LinkedIn - defiantly claiming that 2026 is the year that ‘storytelling is the moat’ and ‘taste is the moat’ and ‘IRL is the moat’ but in all honesty, those have long existed. These are just things that people on LinkedIn enjoy saying.

But, I do fully agree on one particular statement: newsletters > social media

Or more specifically, building audiences on newsletters is something you own, your LinkedIn connections - which aren’t an actual community - are rented, and if you are to build a brand, personal or commercial, then newsletters are a highly effective way of doing so.

To provide something more objective for you, here are some statistics for you from the 2026 State of Newsletters Report produced by beehiiv back in January:

Why Own Your Own Editorial

How fast you can grow

How it turns into business

Some Numbers

Now, I think it’s important to provide a caveat here: we have far less (visible) newsletter writers in APAC, compared to say, a USA. And also what often feels like a more casual way of writing and pushing worldviews out there, as well as any combination of narrative, editorial, educational, trends reports, and more.

So I am motivated to curate a group of them, some you may know and some you likely won’t, but all know the value of driving a good narrative, tasteful storytelling, and not regarding newsletters as sharing photos of the event you last attended. It’s educating the market, it’s editorial and research-driven and it’s intended to start a conversation.

I curated these 4 newsletter writers to start, and I jumped in also. Have another 5 or so for the next issue already. I really love the broad and diverse mix here of each writer, and really appreciate their time sending me their answers, whether by voice note, google doc dump, carefully constructed emails and IG DM back-and-forths!

Feat.

Georgie Healy

Georgie has established herself as a leading and curious mind on all things AI, starting with her podcast ‘In The Blink Of AI’ and her Newsletter ‘Attention Is All I Need’ which you can read here: georgiehealy.substack.com/subscribe

Kayla Medica

On top of writing the DRIP DROP merch newsletter with yours truly, Kayla has self-published books focused on Product Marketing and writes ‘Mehdeeka’ to help B2B SaaS scale-ups bridge sales and marketing to align teams to the strategy, and the strategy to measurable activity, which you can read here: www.mehdeeka.com

Mufaro Mutowembwa

Mufaro is a cofounder of Rolodex Media: a top Australian business & culture newsletter on Substack, with more than 4,000 smart and engaged readers in over 100 countries, which you can read here: rolodexmedia.substack.com/subscribe

Sacha Judd

Sacha is a lifelong fan and passionate advocate for the creative, transformative power of fandom, regularly speaking on stages around the world on the subject. Her newsletter is an immersion in building and celebrating thriving fan communities, championing pop culture, film, television, music, and fandom itself, and you can read ‘What You Love Matters’ here: newsletter.sachajudd.com

Each of the guest contributors answered the same questions, check’em out below:

You have this sort of expectation when beginning to get a newsletter out into the world that ‘this is going to blow up’ or ‘x will occur surely’ or ‘y will get in contact after I publish that first issue.’

The reality is each of those interviewed have pushed out hundreds of articles already. There is no true ‘Do X, Y results, Success.’ They write, all the time. But there are learnings, lots of them, and some are incredibly surprising, or alter the direction of the curation, or can even be tinged with disappointment!

“There’s a real divide between “I’m doing this for commercial reasons” and “I’m doing this for the love of the game”. All external sources will push you to think about growth in a commercial sense, but if you’re doing it for the love of the game you’ve gotta ignore it and focus on having fun. 

For my personal newsletter (Mehdeeka) I’ve returned to the love of the game, and I mentally feel so much better about it. For DRIP DROP, it was made with a commercial outcome as the genesis of it, so I am in the headspace for the external pressures of growth on that one.”

“One of the biggest surprises has been the calibre, quality and international reach of our readership. We knew we were speaking to curious, culturally engaged people, but we didn’t anticipate how many founders, investors, operators and creatives (from Australia and well beyond) would find Rolodex and become regular readers. It has been incredibly affirming to see a distinctly Australian publication resonate with such a globally minded audience.”

“Choosing to ignore the numbers altogether! At first I was sort of obsessed with every new subscriber, wondering what had brought them in and if I could maintain it. And my list has basically doubled in size in the last twelve months and I’m not looking at it at all. If I was chasing growth, I’d be using a platform with more of that built in. But I’m just writing for me, and I’m delighted when anyone else connects with it.”

I don’t go for ‘most-popular’ guests if that makes sense? My goals are not to interview the Canva founders, or secure an exclusive with Mark Zuckerberg - the dorkus malorkus himself - as it’s just not that interesting to me to rehash those stories. So the more I niche down in a way on particular industries/verticals/themes, I find that will invite more growth in the subscribers, in a sort of 1000 True Fans sort of way. (And then I have to earn the right to keep them.)

What I have been surprised about from a few of the guest profiles so far - all really well-regarded and really respected people in their fields, & usually under-the-radar in their building - has been the want and willingness of people who are in their orbit or who know them well, to offer up their two cents on the impact these people have had on them, that’s been cool. Linkedin comments here, inbox replies there, I’ve found that really enjoyable.

Other side of the coin in terms of a surprise? Complete hesitancy of any APAC founders/investors/operators to pitch me for a feature. Literally less than a handful have jumped into the inbox - total - so I had sort of assumed that a few more would have been keen to put themselves forward if I’m honest. Does this speak to a hesitancy of APAC people to be a bit more direct with their asks and intentions? It would appear to me to be a yes on that front.

Like even with the DRIP DROP merch newsletter I send out weekly on a Friday with Kayla? Tons of readers, yet barely any companies have gotten into the inbox to attempt to show off their merch in a profile, or send some over, to do a bit more brand storytelling. I find that incredibly surprising, we would so feature great merch that got flagged with us!

It. Is. Hard. curating a lot of stuff all at once, usually as an independent creator. While GRO UP wont just lean into indie newsletter writers that are juggling a number of plates at once to get the writing out into the world, it can be difficult with context switching continuously in the pursuit of good curation and quality. So here’s a little insight into how these producers go about it!

“This stuff is still evolving. My biggest following is on LinkedIn, so that's where I know what resonates. I write a few posts a week there, and I get a gut sense of what people care about.

What works well on Substack is usually what's already working on other platforms. When I wrote about OpenAI and whether this is AGI or not, the way people reacted, commented and shared opinions gave me a good poll of what my network was saying. So it's not just my opinion - it gives readers a chance to see the sense of the room as well.

Tools-wise, I start by reading headlines and, frankly, Twitter and social media. I reflect on those, then have a chat between Wispr Flow and Claude while I'm ideating on themes. Then I write it myself afterwards.”

“Our starting point is always: what is our differentiated take, and why do we think this? So much is happening in the zeitgeist that simply covering a trending topic isn’t enough. We might begin with the same story everyone else is discussing, but we give ourselves time to sit with it, interrogate it and find the original idea or connection that feels distinctly Rolodex.

We don’t want to write for the sake of writing. What has worked well is being disciplined about only publishing when we have something original, intelligent and useful to add. In an oversaturated media landscape, a clear point of view (and the trust that readers will always hear our genuine voice) is what creates cut-through.”

“I love the idea of tools for this sort of thing, but every digital brain extension I’ve tried I’ve never stuck with. So, unfortunately, it’s just random links I email to myself, saved posts in Bluesky or Insta, and nothing more sophisticated than that.”

“Oh, this is world’s easiest answer, related to how I strategise a lot of my content planning, strategy and execution. Because it is a wide and varied mix of stories, I’ll look at Days of The Year weeks/months in advance, and often curate a story around a particular date as a content pillar, in both my own curation with SEEDS, and with clients.

Did you know that yesterday was World Octopus Day?

Did you know Oct 5-9 is International Plasma Awareness Week?

Now ya do, and now you know that likely this time next year I’ll be writing up stories on amazing APAC companies that do good stuff with BLOOD, while writing my review of the latest season of The Pitt, and playing the Queen of the Damned 2 soundtrack on repeat.

Also, and this is always appreciated by those a little more ADHD inclined, but a newsletter sent out at the exact same time every week has the most marvellous side-effect in ensuring accountability, and nuking option paralysis.”

“We do this not because it is easy, but because we thought it would be easy” is an oft-used quote - mostly in software/tech circles - but no doubt what a number of people would love to crack the code on. Write a newsletter for 20 mins a week, huge organic growth, tidy lifestyle business that pays the yearly mortgage if you’re an indie, drives the business commercials u0p and to the right if you’re a brand.

Not gonna just happen. But, growth does occur, so here’s the perspective on how that has come to be from these peeps, and what helped them get there…

“Constant promotion. That's the only thing that's worked. Links in my stories, a signature under my emails with a link people can follow. Increasingly people are recommending it to their friends, which I find wonderful and beautiful, but I still have to rely heavily on self-promotion.”

“Consistency and distribution. A few years ago everyone was raving about recommendations and referrals being the way to grow, but I operate in such a niche of a niche of a niche it never applied to me. I have tested ads, incentivised sharing the newsletter with lucky draws, endlessly promoted it in all sorts of places, and I think the one thing that works is showing up all the time. 

Because the effective channels change over time, the tactics change over time, but showing up is timeless.“

Just writing about what I care about, instead of trying to tailor it to a theme or a particular audience. When you sign up to hear from me you buy into the idea it’s going to be pretty eclectic. I don’t edit myself on topics really, and that seems to be working!

Gaz

I try not to resort to cheap tactics like nasty lead magnets etc - I’m focused much more on an editorial style so I’m usually quite cynical of the narrative that’s put in front of me by other growth focused newsletter writers. If their content is cheap and nasty and almost predatory, I just don’t care about leaning into whatever playbook they are trying to shill me.

I’d rather focus the growth on how I grow more as a writer, getting sharper and more curious, and find great stories as I go. Curating around great people and exceptional companies brings the audience as it gets distributed, no doubt.

But, I am also an incredibly frequent event organiser, so adding that audience to the email list always tops up the audience size fast, in lieu of running ads, which I’m not wanting to do, yet. And I know how to exploit LinkedIn very well btw, but Im actually more interested in growing via Bluesky, Threads and X in future.

I was fascinated to ask this one, and the responses were both A) surprising B ) comforting when I realised it wasn’t just me…

“A bit of both. Generally when I post on Substack, at least a few people reply by email to say they laughed or found it topical - that comes unprompted. But I also go looking for it through Instagram stories and sometimes LinkedIn stories to get a gut sense. I'm increasingly running polls on the more controversial things I write - do you agree, do you disagree? That really helps with engagement.”

“Basically nothing! Even when I beg for it. I’ve had to accept that I’ve built a very engaged audience in terms of consuming my content, but they are 99.9% lurkers (and they’re happy with that, so I am happy they’re happy.) I definitely get people coming up to me in person saying they read it and love it though, but I’m not out and about as much as I should be. 

It’s fun contrasting that with DRIP DROP because people do reply all the time just to say “I loved this” which is a very different experience.”

“We receive an overwhelming amount of positive feedback, often from people going out of their way to reply to an edition, send us a message or approach us at an event. What we receive far less of is constructive or critical feedback. The encouragement is incredibly meaningful, but we’re conscious that praise alone doesn’t necessarily help us sharpen the product. We are more than open to more candid feedback - particularly from readers who will challenge our thinking and tell us where Rolodex could be braver, clearer or better.”

“I will receive 1, maybe 2 replies per article, usually from someone encouraging me to keep going, and rarely ever from anyone sending through a suggestion/pitching. I always love being pitched by someone who takes a leap, even if I have to say quickly that it’s not right for me, I’ll send on a few thoughts on pitching to others, encourage them to keep going etc.

Conversely I will get plenty of replies often on Linkedin in the comments, and will rarely see those people commenting actually then open and signup to the newsletter. Content and platforms are weird.”

As I do with each guest on my articles, I’ll ask them for a recommendation of what keeps their brain happy, but this time, IN THE WORK:

“Unpopular opinion: if I put on music I really love - obviously Deftones, Korn, and increasingly Bring Me The Horizon now they're back in their heavy phase - I get too distracted. I end up listening to the lyrics and can't write.

So I go for niche electronica. Ratatat are amazing. Disclosure are really good - it feels like study music. And some of the more niche Radiohead, like OK Computer, keeps me focused without pulling my attention.”

“When I need to lock in, this is my “so loud and chaotic and hypnotic it drowns everything out and allows me to focus” playlist.”

“The Official Complete Succession Playlist by Nicholas Britell. 95 tracks and nearly three hours of high-stakes corporate drama. It makes writing a newsletter feel like negotiating a media merger, which is exactly the energy I need to treat every editorial decision as enormously consequential.”

“I’m a Lofi girl through and through for writing, but lately it’s been Hina’s new lume Descending Dreams.”

“I listen to my own ‘GROUPED’ curated playlists which I send out in my personal blog each Friday, usually themed in some way. This week’s one is ‘GROUPED DARKNESS.’ Failing that, I never would have completed my masters a while ago without BRAIN FOOD playlist.”

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