A soccer newsletter that quadrupled its audience in three months
This article was originally published on Not a Newsletter: A Monthly Guide to Sending Better Emails.
I first met in May, and he told me a little about his new newsletter. Pit Gottschalk had created a daily soccer email covering all things German soccer, and it was up to 2,500 subscribers — not bad for a newsletter that was less than a year old!
I saw Pit again in August and asked him how the newsletter was going. Since the last time I saw you, he told me, I’ve quadrupled my audience.
Quadrupled? In just three months? I had to know more.
Pit’s been in the news business for over 20 years. In the early 2000s, he was the editor in chief of Sport Bild, a weekly sports magazine. Later, he led teams at Axel Springer and Funke Mediengruppe, two of Germany’s biggest publishers. Print’s still doing well in Germany — so well, Pit admitted, that he wasn’t always on top of digital trends.
“The biggest challenge an editor has is that when you’re too successful on the print side,” he said, “you don’t care about the things happening in the digital age.”
At Funke, he became interested in newsletters as a way to reach an increasingly mobile audience. He saw newsletters as a digital version of the morning paper that so many Germans still read. But over the course of his last 15 months at Funke, he struggled to get buy-in for newsletters at the organization.
When Pit left Funke at the end of 2018, he decided to finally launch a newsletter, and to do it around the subject he knew best: German soccer. He crowdsourced ideas for a name. One friend suggested “Fever Pit’ch,” a nod to both Nick Hornby’s best-selling soccer book and Pit’s own first name. Another friend suggested that Pit look into a newsletter tool called Revue. Pit had spent 15 months trying to launch newsletters at his old job. Fever Pit’ch was ready to launch on Revue in just three days.
He announced the newsletter on his social channels — thanks to his years in journalism, he’d built up a sizeable following on Twitter and Instagram — and quickly signed up a few hundred subscribers. He decided to send his first newsletter at an unusual time — 6:10 in the morning, not 6 or 6:30 — but for a smart reason: “Everyone remembers the time, because it’s not a normal time,” he said.
But to go from a few hundred subscribers to more than 10,000 readers required some real savvy. Early on, Pit identified an opportunity in the marketplace. There wasn’t a daily newsletter that aggregated German soccer news quite like Fever Pit’ch, and readers came to trust Pit’s judgment to find the most important stories of the day. As an independent voice on German soccer, Pit found a receptive audience. “Readers tell me, ‘You stand for something,’” he said.
Pit’s also unusually focused on building his brand and trying to expand it to reach readers where they are. He started licensing his content to other publishers and portals in Germany, where he can funnel traffic from his columns back to his newsletter. (The other benefit: Content syndication covers his costs, and has allowed him to make Fever Pit’ch a full time job.) He often appears on TV and podcasts to talk soccer, which gives him opportunities to promote his newsletter. He also thinks about how to serve readers who follow him on other social channels. For his most-engaged readers, he’s even given away tickets to matches, where they can sit next to Pit at a game.
But above all else, Pit says he’s been able to grow through word of mouth. Readers love his newsletter, and he encourages them to share his newsletter with their friends. Those referrals from readers are one of the most effective drivers of new sign-ups.
This month, the 250th edition of Fever Pit’ch hit inboxes. Next month, the newsletter will celebrate its one-year anniversary. What’s next? Pit has two goals: Reaching 25,000 subscribers, and being smart about potential expansion. He has a podcast now, and is pushing into video, but he’s also mindful that the newsletter audience needs to come first. “There is a quality level I need to stick to,” he said. “If I do too many things, the quality level could be lowered, and that’s something I cannot risk.”
Pit Gottschalk’s Four Rules for Newsletter Success
1.) Write about what you know best — “For example,” he told me, “one reader asked me if I could do this newsletter, but for rugby. I said, ‘I’d love to do that, but I cannot deliver a newsletter with the depth of knowledge on rugby.’ You need to have a great knowledge of the things you write on.”
2.) Create a sustainable publishing schedule — “There are hard times, like when I go for a beer in a pub, and I have to leave in time to write my story. Everybody’s drinking, everybody’s laughing, and I have to say goodbye because I have to write my story. People are waiting for my newsletter the next morning.” But Pit also says that when he needs to take time off, readers are understanding — as long as he’s transparent with them. They do know that he can’t publish a soccer newsletter by himself all year round, and he’s learned how important it is to build a schedule that works for him.
3.) Be honest with readers — “When I make a mistake — for instance, I once chose the wrong statistics for my story — the next day, I said, ‘Yesterday, I made a mistake. I’m sorry for that.’ And readers will say, ‘Oh, that’s fine!’” Being transparent with readers breeds trust.
4.) Be personal — “I try to share my success with people. I’ll say, ‘Hey, I’m so happy because of some big news with Fever Pit’ch!’” By sharing those milestones and achievements, his audience becomes more than just readers — they’re part of a community that can celebrate in his victories.
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