Where He Started
Started his own newsletter, Big Desk Energy, from zero as a side project
Twitter and LinkedIn following from career at Morning Brew and founding Beehiiv.
What He Did Daily/Weekly
Wrote one newsletter a week, every Tuesday, spending about five hours total per week
Teased the topic the night before on social media to build anticipation
Published each issue simultaneously as an email and a web post, gated so non-subscribers had to opt in with their email to read it
Promoted it on Twitter and LinkedIn
Periodically reviewed Boost partner performance and subscriber quality, cutting underperforming acquisition sources
What Was Slowly Built
A welcome automation that surveys new subscribers and asks for a referral immediately
A single-tier referral reward program (a deck PDF, then a merch discount)
A network of other newsletters organically recommending him
A two-sided Boost marketplace for passive subscriber acquisition and revenue
A public sponsorship storefront
A growing data picture of his audience (demographics, role, interests) that sharpened weekly content decisions
Tools He Used
beehiiv — the core platform, used for the website builder, newsletter editor, automations, survey builder, Boost marketplace, referral program, ad bookings, sponsorship storefront, and analytics dashboards
Twitter/X — primary channel for teasing content and driving traffic to lead magnets and gated posts
LinkedIn — secondary promotion channel, same use case as Twitter
Instagram — additional promotion channel mentioned for lead magnet distribution
Fourthwall — drop-shipping merch store used for referral rewards (no inventory held, zero fulfillment cost)
Stripe — payment processing for paid subscriptions (only fee beehiiv doesn't absorb)
Where It Is Now
~90,000–100,000 subscribers
$20,000–$30,000/month in revenue
Most growth and monetization running on autopilot — referrals, recommendations, Boost, and sponsorships compounding without daily intervention
The only remaining manual input is writing the weekly issue
By the Numbers
0 to ~90,000–100,000 — subscriber growth in 14 months
5 hours/week — time invested as a side project
$20,000–$30,000/month — revenue generated by the newsletter
22,000 — survey responses collected from new subscribers
30% — survey completion rate (22,000 of ~90,000 subscribers)
60% — of readers identify as founders (per survey data)
150–200 — other newsletters organically recommending Big Desk Energy
~200/week — free subscribers gained from the recommendation network
$2.50 — average cost per subscriber he pays via Boost
$2,000–$3,000/month — budget spent on Boost
155 — Boost publisher partnerships
5,200 — subscribers sent by his top single Boost partner
38% — open rate from that top partner
30% — open-rate threshold for auto-pause cutoff
~1,000 — total referrals generated (~1–2% of subscriber base)
5,000 signups — to the lead-magnet page within 6 months of posting it
143 likes / ~100,000 views — engagement on the tweet that drove people to the lead magnet
$7,000 — example sponsorship slot price on his storefront
$10 — flat fee paid per ad booking through beehiiv