table of funtents

1. 👋🏼 it’s me, hi

2. 🔊 NEW PRODUCT LAUNCH!!!!

3. 📓 lessons learned from 1 year of MM

4. 🚪 parting words

👋🏼 it’s me, hi

HAPPY WEDNESDAY MISFITS - AND WELCOME TO OUR 1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY EPISODE!!! 🎉

On this day last year, I launched the inaugural minority misfit episode to our first 100 subscribers. It was scrappy and didn’t have a sophisticated strategy other than offering more - more access, more honesty and more depth than I could anywhere else.

Since then, you’ve asked brilliant questions that have formed nearly all our episodes - from how to get your first client to working with multiple, all the way to structuring and pricing your offers and everything in between.

For today’s episode, it only makes sense to give you my no BS data and lessons from a year of writing this newsletter.

I share in hopes that should you take the leap to start your own newsletter, you can reach success in half the time via my learnings.

But before we dive in, I’ve got a present for you!!! Read below to learn more 🎁 

 🔊 NEW PRODUCT LAUNCH!!!!

My mission in building keshty publicly has always been to open the gates and democratise access to essential education.

As alluded to in the last 3 episodes, I’ve been in the thick of creating, testing and getting feedback on something really special for you (and she’s finally ready!):

🔊 paging your new misfit mentor: work directly with me!!

« keen to learn more? express your interest here! »

📓 lessons learned from 1 year of MM

0. data first

Here’s my no BS data for one year of MM’s performance (taken 20/9/25):

1. get clear on your why

I cannot stress this enough - a newsletter is a total labour of love. Next to a regular gym habit, I truly think it's one of the hardest to keep consistent.

Get crystal clear on why you want a newsletter. Is it to:

• improve your writing?

• codify your learnings?

• learn with a community?

• grow a genuine audience?

• build brand fans who'll market for you?

Personally, I think these are great reasons to start a newsletter.

On the other hand, if you're:

• trying to beat out others doing similar work to you

• hyper-fixated on metrics (like we often are on socials)

• driven by top of funnel growth (e.g. subscriber number only)

• hoping people will trust and pay you by doing the bare minimum

A newsletter is NOT for you. I'll tell you more about why in reason 5.

2. pick your poison

Once you’ve determined your why, you need to choose a platform. There are a handful of contenders:

• beehiiv: if your primary goal is to have a newsletter

• hubspot: if your primary goal is sales activity

• substack / LinkedIn: good for wide reach

• kit: most loved by marketers

• mailchimp: the OG

Ultimately I chose to go with beehiiv for a few reasons:

• they were the most cost-effective for what I needed ($39 a month)

• the team is still building and receptive to feedback

• their analytics are detailed and user-friendly

3. the proof is in the planning

Be prepared to just spend TIME developing your newsletter before going out to public.

If you're not a marketer and this is all new for you (like it was for me), here are some of the (time-consuming) firsts I experienced:

• buying the domain for your newsletter and connecting sites

• setting up automations (e.g. welcome email)

• creating the subscription landing page

• building the design and templates

• creating surveys and polls

4. quality has to start unscalable

My entire line of work centres around scale: the idea that we can do more with less.

In theory, email marketing is an excellent example of scale: in one email (and one output), you can reach thousands of inboxes.

In practice, one year on, I still write every. single. episode. myself. It typically takes 4-8 hours per. And I have no plan to change this, because this newsletter is my:

• passion-driven side hustle

• no BS playground

• creative outlet

It's where you get the realest me, and I can't filter that through ChazzaGPT or outsource my personality to someone else.

5. prepare for the long, quiet game

The sobering truth about newsletters:

You get almost NO feedback or interaction, despite putting so much of yourself in.

You see if people open, click and complete the end poll (this is my absolute highlight). Occasionally, someone emails back with thoughts / questions (this also gives me life).

But the only immediate feedback you get is unsubscribes - and I won't beat around the bush - they're shit.

Imagine: you've just spent 8 hours pouring your heart and soul to someone (at no cost to them, btw!) and their reaction is: 'ew, get out of my inbox.'

I try to remind myself unsubscribes are ultimately good, because they won't champion, amplify or buy from you.

And ultimately, newslettering is a long, quiet game. You'll want people around who make it fun and worthwhile.

6. this plot of land is entirely yours

When someone opts into your newsletter, they say "I intentionally want to receive this, so I'm clearing the path to do so."

With social media, there's no guarantee your biggest supporters will see your work. You're building relationships on rented space, at the mercy of an erratic landlord.

Take LinkedIn:

• constant complaints about algo changes

• fluctuations in reach you can't understand or control

• lil ol' you is in competition with bots and engagement pods

Or Instagram / Facebook, where users regularly get hacked or locked out of their accounts with no way to retrieve them, losing access to their 100k+ followers.

TikTok and X are largely influenced by a political climate that changes like the weather, making them unreliable as part of a long-term strategy.

With this newsletter, I've purchased this space. 

No matter what direction you've come from, I want you to end up here: in my house, at my dining table, having a conversation over the best cup of tea with the real me.

Week on week, you build real relationships with brilliant people in ways I just haven't quite as naturally on any other digital space.

That's the beauty of building on land that's entirely yours.

7. your communication will improve

We practice running or lifting, announcing to the world when we've hit a personal best.

We take up something creative like drawing, ceramics or knitting and get excited when the quality of our work improves.

Cooking, gardening, playing an instrument - all seen as skills to be built with joy.

Yet, writing is seen as a fact of life. Just something we have to do to be a productive member of society.

I think we've spent so much of our lives associating writing with school and work - purely as a method to translate our thoughts into something that's assessed - that we've forgotten it's a skill in and of itself.

With practice, you:

• learn to quickly filter / structure your thoughts

• expand your vocabulary and play with words

• find more specific ways to express yourself

• put ideas into text 100x quicker

• get a flair for your own style

It used to take me hours to come up with ideas for both LinkedIn and this newsletter, and even longer to put them into words. Then I'd check (and check again) before hitting post, and after I'd posted, I'd read them from 30 different perspectives and imagine what each archetype would take from my writing.

Now, it takes me 15 mins to draft a newsletter, 4 hours to write and 15 minutes to check. I spend 0 minutes agonising judgment or re-reading as different characters. I leave feeling stimulated, proud and relaxed.

Most importantly: I genuinely look forward to my next opportunity to write again.

🚪 parting words

LOTS in today, eh? That’s a wrap on our anni episode, misfits 🫶🏼

As always, I’m only a message away for thoughts, questions and topic ideas. I read and sincerely appreciate every single poll / email response! Please keep them coming.

Before you go, could you let a girl know what you thought of this issue with the pulse check below? Good intent feedback is always welcome ⬇️

xo, Neds