We wanted to learn more about Alex's journey to success and find out what it takes to become one.
With over 3,000 subscribers, The Modern Product Manager is a profitable enterprise dedicated exclusively to helping Product Managers. It was founded in 2013 by Alex and has since flourished.
What led you to create an email newsletter? And how did you go about getting your first subscribers? We want to know all about your journey!
Tell us about The Modern Product Manager?
The goal of the Modern Product Manager is to assist both new and prospective Product Managers in developing skills and building connections in the product community. We provide videos, blogs, courses, and more to help them do this.
What led you to start The Modern Product Manager?
I became a Product Manager seven years ago. There was not much advice available for new PMs, so I decided to write Building Digital Products five years ago. That's why I founded The Modern PM. I hope to help the PM community by providing free resources.
What type of content do the readers of The Modern Product Manager receive?
The podcast, blog, YouTube channels, Facebook pages, LinkedIn profiles, and our website are the main sources of the Modern Product Manager for content.
How have you monetized being a Modern Product Manager?
Through courses, newsletter advertising, and mentorship and coaching, we monetize The Modern Product Manager primary.
What did the advertisers get out of advertising with you?
Those on the Modern Product Manager newsletter have access to a highly skilled audience of current Product Managers and future Product Managers. This audience has significant influence on technical and product purchase decisions at their organisations, making them extremely busy.
How much is The Modern Product Manager making?
Currently, The Modern Product Manager is making between $25-$50,000 per year and has grown very quickly over the past few years!
How long did it take you to get to that point?
I started writing about Product Management eight years ago, although I've only truly monetized the brand in the last three years.
What was the biggest challenge or surprise you encountered when you first started?
There is never enough time to write as much as you want, experiment as much as you want, or try as many things as you want. Prioritization is critical, and you must be able to eliminate bad ideas (or those that are not good enough).
How much did it cost to start The Modern Product Manager? What are the expenses involved in running the business?
Aside from my time, starting TMPM was cheap. There are software costs (i.e., Mailchimp, Namecheap, Hosting), but I keep these to a minimum.
How did you build and keep your readership?
I continue to produce high-quality content and engage with my audience in a variety of ways. In addition, I've recruited other ambitious Product Managers to produce content for TMPM, an additional perspective that my readers have found interesting.
What are the tools you use to run The Modern Product Manager, and which one do you think is least utilised?
Using Medium as a marketing tool has been invaluable in establishing my Product Management brand, helping me rank highly for key SEO terms and directing top-of-funnel traffic to my brand. I've also learned how to integrate different email capture and traffic-driving tools into my Medium posts to generate the most traffic.
Any recommendations for new newsletter founders?
Find a niche or a niche of a niche (to be more specific) that you can own. Don’t make another “food” newsletter or “tech” newsletter. Instead, go two levels deeper than that and produce something in a topic you can own. After that, don’t overthink it! Invest serious time in producing high-quality and interesting content, and your audience will grow.
