Subscriptions have been one way lawyers have made money for years. The Atlantic and the New York Times have information about using email newsletters for this purpose. They provide an alternative that may be preferable to social media for some lawyers.
Substack is one way to market your law practice and/or monetize an email list through subscriptions. It is a sort of echo/distribution service for lawyers. You can start a mailing list at no charge, using it to build a community. You have the option to begin charging subscribers for your content. Legal tech guru Tom Mighell uses this service.
Substack is free initially. They provide:
- Your own email list
- A website archive of all your posts
- Community features
- Control over what’s free and what’s only for your paying subscribers
Setup is quick and easy. Your email subscription list will be in the following format:
your.name@substack.com
There is no fee until you begin making money from your subscriptions. Substack then takes a 10% commission, so it is risk free (except for investing your time).
There are two drawbacks. Their use of the substack.com domain name:
- Reduces the effectiveness of your branding, and
- Makes it difficult to move your mailing list to another host/sponsor, should you decide to do so later
Despite these drawbacks, Substack looks like a good alternative for lawyers who would like to establish an email mailing list to expand their reach.
Medium.com has more information.