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Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

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Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#21

Post by wikwocket »

bmac27 wrote: post #19

Did you build the readership organically entirely from HN? Were there other sources from which folks signed up? Also have you considered some kind of daily edition? Or might that be considered overkill?

I believe at one point he said he got a lot of subscribers from a cross-promotion with the Now I Know newsletter (http://nowiknow.com/). I'm not sure if he has done this with other newsletters.

For daily content, I recommend http://dailyhn.com/. It provides a list of top daily stories with automatically-generated digests. The digests are of decent quality, but I just use it as a daily top ten list.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#22

Post by bmac27 »

wikwocket wrote: post #21
bmac27 wrote: post #19

Did you build the readership organically entirely from HN? Were there other sources from which folks signed up? Also have you considered some kind of daily edition? Or might that be considered overkill?

I believe at one point he said he got a lot of subscribers from a cross-promotion with the Now I Know newsletter ( http://nowiknow.com/ ). I'm not sure if he has done this with other newsletters. For daily content, I recommend http://dailyhn.com/ . It provides a list of top daily stories with automatically-generated digests. The digests are of decent quality, but I just use it as a daily top ten list.

Cool. Thanks for sharing. I'm wrestling with the daily/weekly question myself as I'm starting to publish my own newsletter. My own instincts run counter to wanting to receive an e-mail blast daily no matter how relevant it is. But I'm not sure whether others feel the same. Think I'll ultimately experiment with both to see if I can find a sweet spot.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#23

Post by duck »

bmac27 wrote: post #19

Did you build the readership organically entirely from HN? Were there other sources from which folks signed up? Also have you considered some kind of daily edition? Or might that be considered overkill?

Mainly from HN and other newsletters, but it was also mentioned on Smashing Magazine and a couple other popular blogs.

I have thought about a daily edition, but after doing some surveys it didn't seem worth the effort as there wasn't much interest in it.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#25

Post by duck »

tokenadult wrote: post #13

Be sure to keep hilarious endorsements like "Hacker Newsletter is great. It's reduced the time I spend on Hacker News from several times per hour to several times per hour plus the weekly newsletter." -Jason Seifer, Founder of Scheduling, Host of The Ruby Show That's what just convinced me to sign up. AFTER EDIT: And now that I have signed up, the usability suggestion I have for the archived issues is to make sure th…

Thanks! I like to add some humor to everything, and Jason probably nailed it perfectly with that testimonial.

Regarding the archives, yeah, they need some work. They are currently hosted on MailChimp, but looking to bringing up my own archive so I can control things like that and maybe add some other features.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#26

Post by beeps »

Havent thought either of these to implementation: 1. If you could somehow add a humorous one line caption to each post. 2. ranking? ..linux article with 100 votes trumps web article with 400 votes. Adaptive ranking based on my click through would be boss too.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#27

Post by simba-hiiipower »

kale, you seem pretty awesome by the way. and i'd say hacker newsletter is as well. feels exceptionally well put together and i appreciate you not cluttering it with ads (though i do enjoy the often cleverly delivered one that is there); hope the effort’s been paying-off for you.

and i’m hard pressed to come-up with feedback for the content or structure of the newsletter itself, but (and this, understandably, may be taking things in a direction your wholly uninterested in) i’ve always thought it’d be nice to have this content delivered as an app.. in addition to offering an alternative way to monetize (i’d gladly pay for it), i think it could really enhance the user experience, particularly on mobile devices. some user-specific benefits i could see from such an approach:

- open story links within the app (rather than switching between email and browser)

- better comment viewing experience (viewing hn on mobile generally sucks)

- direct access to all archived issues (would be nice)

thinking about it, and considering all the work that would have to be put in, it could make for a great mobile hn reader (integrated newsletter for highlights + mobile-optimized hn access for staying current).

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also just want to add, that your wayback letter [1] is beyond awesome! it’s really cool being able to step back at various intervals in time and see what was going on. i find it pretty funny seeing what was in-focus as recent as a month ago, and actually quite insightful reaching back a few years. as i said, beyond awesome and very well put together, encourage people to check it out.

[1] http://www.waybackletter.com/

Re: Ask HN: How can I make Hacker Newsletter better?

#28

Post by orangethirty »

Can you ad one article of original content (as in original to the newsletter)? Something like an email interview from a founder, hacker, or person of interest. It would be very nice. Also, on my newsletters, I've found that adding something not related to the subject at hand keeps it fresh. I sometimes link a funny youtube video, and have even included a lolcat. Makes people want to see what I'm doing next. If you want to chat about newsletters and stuff, feel free to email me (on profile). Note: I have been publishing newsletters since the dawn of time. In fact, dinosaurs knew they were going to be extinct because my newsletter "News-O-Saurus" told them about the meteor impact. Too bad those dumb lizards didn't know how to read. :)
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