Is email marketing still a profitable digital marketing strategy in 2025? How do newsletters make money? Should I put effort into monetizing email newsletters?
We frequently hear these questions from digital publishers registered on our platform.
We understand that the ever-evolving and changing digital marketing strategies, such as influencer marketing and high spam scores, make it difficult for publishers to decide whether to leverage email marketing.
This is also because beginners are often unaware of online newsletter monetization strategies that blogging businesses utilize. Therefore, in this guide, we’ll explore the most profitable strategies that digital publishers can use to earn from email newsletters in 2025. Let’s get started!
Use Direct Links to Make Money From Newsletters!
Does Email Marketing Still Work in 2025?
Mailchimp’s report highlights that the average open rate and click-through rate of emails are 35.63% and 2.62%.
Despite the myth that “people hate emails” and “emails are obsolete”, email marketing continues to add a personal touch and maintain smooth interaction for all lines of business in 2025.
Indeed, website owners and bloggers can utilize email marketing to create a newsletter monetization strategy and generate income from emails.
How to Make Money From Newsletters | Turn Readers Into Paying Customers
Use these super-effective email newsletter monetization strategies to turn your subscribers into paying customers. Let’s start.
Strategy #1: Leverage Direct Link via Ad Networks
Wondering what direct link ads are? Let’s make it a little easier to comprehend.
As a blogger, you add internal and outbound links to make the content more useful and productive for your readers. If desired, users can click on those links to access the content.
But what if we tell you that you can earn money from those links?
Here, direct links enter the big picture.
Direct links are just like the normal links you add to your blog posts. However, the key difference is that they enable you to make money by redirecting readers to the ads created by business owners and marketers.
Similarly, while creating your email content, you can leverage direct link ads to successfully monetize newsletters.
How is Direct Link Monetization Possible?
A direct link is a simple URL offered to publishers by ad networks. These links contain ads from various advertisers that digital publishers can use to monetize their content on platforms such as social channels, websites, blogs, and newsletters.
Whenever a user clicks on these links, they are redirected to one of the advertiser’s pages. Many ad networks offer direct links, including 7SearchPPC, Adsterra, Hilltopads, and others.
Most ad networks, including 7SearchPPC, Hilltopads, and Adsterra, offer a direct link to help digital publishers monetize their online content. For instance, the 7SearchPPC ad network allows its registered publishers to add a direct link on social channels, websites, blogs, and newsletters.
Online content creators and website owners can use direct links in several ways. A simple example of direct link monetization through email content is shown below.
Direct links are scalable and can be used in a variety of emails, including welcome, retargeting, offer, blog post, thank you, promotional, and content update emails, among others.
All you have to do is be a little sensitive when curating your content, so you don’t come across as overly salesy, and include direct links in a way that doesn’t disrupt the flow of your content.
Read About Ad Monetization Strategies Every Publisher Should Know.
Reasons to Use Direct Links
Direct links offer several benefits to publishers, some of which are listed below.
1. Non-Intrusive
Direct links are non-intrusive because they blend naturally within the content without sounding awfully promotional.
2. Higher Click-Through-Rate
Direct links can be placed on the most engaging and attention-seeking words that create curiosity in the reader’s mind and compel them to click. Thus, have a higher click-through rate compared to other ad formats.
Also Read: How to Make Money with Display Ads in 2025
3. Scalable Across Newsletter Audience
Digital publishers can embed direct link ads within their email content and send it to their newsletter subscribers. This makes direct links more scalable and rewarding for digital publishers.
4. Anyone can use Direct Links
Anyone, regardless of their business size or whether they have a website or not, can leverage direct links to generate income.
Use this post to learn how to use email to improve CTR.
Choosing the Right Direct Link Ad Network
There are several direct link ad networks, as mentioned above, but we suggest leveraging the 7SearchPPC direct link ad network, as it offers more transparency and control to digital publishers. It offers a hassle-free monetization experience and the following:
- A user-friendly dashboard
- Bi-monthly payouts
- Users with or without a website can easily monetize direct link ads
- Ability to choose between adult and mainstream ad content
- 24/7 customer support
- No technical skill is required to place the link
Strategy #2: Maximize Affiliate Marketing Opportunities
Have you ever thought about newsletter affiliate marketing? Yes, you heard us right. Promoting affiliate products and services through email newsletters is like adding icing on the cake.
However, if you’re sending generic email newsletters on the latest and upcoming topics, you’re missing a chance to capitalize on your subscribers’ interests. So, next time, don’t forget to customize your newsletters by integrating affiliate links naturally to maintain a content-first approach and increase affiliate commission.
Let’s say you’re a sports blogger creating content about fitness and training. Here, you can promote affiliate products, such as fitness trackers, jump ropes, running shoes, apparel, and resistance bands, to your newsletter subscribers. This helps them access a curated list of fitness training products and reduces the chaos of shopping search.
For affiliate marketing newsletter monetization, consider joining a popular affiliate program like Amazon or CJ Affiliate.
Read: Trending Affiliate Marketing Niches: Stay Ahead of the GameAffiliate
Strategy #3: Sponsored Newsletter Placements
Promoting sponsored content through emails enhances the relationship with brands and also creates co-branding opportunities, as you’re helping them achieve their sponsorship goals.
For instance, a lifestyle website can monetize email newsletters by creating a series of sponsored emails with engaging subject lines, such as: [brand name] has launched a festive collection with a 50%-70% discount. Grab it or miss it! Customize the entire email content, add eye-catching images, and a clear CTA button to redirect users to the official website and encourage a purchase.
Here are some tips on approaching brands for partnerships.
- Understand your niche and audience interest to target specific brands and influencers.
- Determine the brand’s true value and vision to create content that aligns with their overall content strategy.
- Create a portfolio to showcase the content variety and quality you can deliver.
- Stay professional during the interaction and set meeting hours to avoid miscommunication.
- Research and develop a payment structure aligned with industry trends.
- Stay aligned with the evolving industry norms and trends to keep your content current.
Also Read: Tips and Tricks to Increase Website Ad Revenue
Strategy #4: Offer Premium or Paid Newsletter Subscriptions
The next newsletter revenue model is paid subscriptions. If you’re creating insightful content and sharing a unique perspective with your audience, consider putting it behind a paywall.
Use newsletters to inform your readers about the perks of premium content, such as access to weekly product reviews, detailed reports, exclusive interviews, Q/A sessions, and webinars.
Let’s say you’ve a fitness website; you can create premium content, such as fitness training guides, mouth-watering nutritional diet plans, and personalized workout routines, for your readers.
Once done with paid content creation, use email newsletters to keep your subscribers informed about the perks of your paid tiers. This will help you turn free readers into paying subscribers.
Ways to increase paid newsletter subscriptions.
- Offer freemium content to showcase the type and quality of content readers can access with a premium subscription.
- Explore and identify popular paid subscription tools to manage and track newsletter subscriptions and payments.
- Create multiple membership tiers to make the content more accessible and get more paid subscriptions.
Read: Best Email Marketing Strategy To Grow Your Business And ROI
Strategy #5: Cross-Promotion and Partnerships
Partnering with other publishers, brands, or influencers that are ready for mutual promotion through newsletter swaps expands content reach and ultimately leads to monetization opportunities.
Publishers can collaborate with brands to highlight exclusive offers, host webinars, and promote affiliate products that are directly related to their target audience. Also, consider creating a sponsored section in your newsletters to promote others’ products/services to get paid. This will help generate engagement and revenue, creating a win-win situation for publishers and brands.
For instance, if you have a food blogging website, you can partner with a food and beverage brand to sell their organic and dietary supplements in your newsletters in exchange for some commission or revenue share on purchase, thereby potentially generating more newsletter monetization opportunities.
All the mentioned newsletter monetization strategies are cost-effective, efficient, and popular among digital publishers. Let’s now try to determine how digital publishers can assess the effectiveness of these methods.
Also Read: How Can You Make Money As A Blogger?
How to Measure the Success of Newsletter Monetization Strategies?
The success of these strategies from the publishers’ point of view depends on engagement and revenue. The key metrics include subscriber growth rate, open rates, spam score, and unsubscribe rate. Additional metric covers conversion rate per subscriber via newsletter advertising, paid tiers, and other monetization strategies.
To assess performance and audience interest in the content, A/B testing can be conducted using these metrics to refine the strategy and achieve better revenue per subscriber.
Hint: Strive to balance out strategies that maintain credibility and audience interest to monetize newsletters like no other.
Also, leverage worthwhile email newsletter monetization practices to generate more revenue.
Also Read: Most Profitable Blogging Niches for Publishers in 2025
Best Practices for Newsletter Monetization Success
Guessing: How do digital publishers monetize newsletters in the best way? They use different tips and tricks in their strategies. Some of them are listed below.
- Segment the audience to send personalized newsletters.
- Create newsletter schedules to maintain consistency.
- Utilize email automation tools to streamline the newsletter monetization process.
- Email copywriting practices to create catchy subject lines that grab attention and boost open rates.
- Use intuitive email templates with alluring graphics and structure.
- Send trend, event, and holiday-specific newsletters to avoid making them sound salesy all the time.
- Perform A/B testing to analyze and optimize newsletters.
- Keep the message short, concise, and free from 404 errors.
- Cross-check the email to remove inconsistencies.
What else can you do to maintain subscribers’ interest? Send informative content by incorporating in-depth analysis and interviews in a conversational tone, and include polls and puzzles to maintain engagement. Also, make messages device-friendly, so readers don’t find them annoying while accessing the content on handheld devices.
These practices are short and simple. If used effectively, it can deliver potential results and make it easier to monetize email newsletters.
Also Read: You Should Not Ignore These Trends in Traffic Monetization
Conclusion: Turning Newsletters Into Revenue Powerhouses
Direct links, memberships, premium content, and affiliate marketing newsletter strategies are all effective and easy to execute by digital publishers. We encourage digital publishers to leverage a combination of these newsletter monetization strategies to generate a consistent stream of income.
Treat monetizing email newsletters as a long-term asset, rather than a short-term investment, to effectively monetize your newsletters.
So, now you know how digital publishers monetize newsletters the best way!
Read: 16 Best Ad Networks for Publishers: How to Maximize Earnings in 2025
Frequently Asked Questions
How to start an email newsletter business?
Ans. First, select a niche that aligns with your expertise and audience demographics, and then continue to create trustworthy content. Once you’ve gained engaged readers for your content, select an email marketing automation tool to build an email newsletter business. Using the email automation tool, website owners and bloggers can easily manage and track subscribers and performance to determine the areas that need optimization.
How many subscribers does a blogger need to make money from newsletters?
Ans. To earn from email newsletters, bloggers don’t need a specific number of subscriber lists. However, it’s suggested to start leveraging newsletter monetization strategies, such as newsletter advertising, affiliate marketing, and others, after acquiring a sufficient number of followers. By doing so, it’ll be easier to monetize email newsletters.
Do I need a website to monetize newsletters via direct links?
Ans. No, it’s not a necessary condition. Bloggers who’ve earned engaged subscribers through consistent blogging on popular blogging platforms like Medium, Ghost, Blogger, or social media channels can monetize even without a website.
Can small-scale businesses and bloggers leverage newsletter advertising?
Ans. Yes, publishers of all sizes, whether large or small, can take advantage of newsletter advertising to monetize their content.
What are the most popular strategies to make money from email newsletters?
Ans. Some of the most popular email monetization strategies include direct links, newsletter affiliate marketing, sponsorships, paid content, and selling products and services such as ebooks, study materials, and consulting services.
How can I increase the frequency of email newsletters?
Ans. Use email marketing automation tools to automate and increase the frequency of email newsletters. But avoid sending too many emails, as it can increase your spam score.
How can I increase my newsletter subscriber list?
- Use the following points to increase your email subscriber list.
- Create content that meets user intent and relevance.
- Use audience demographics to decide the tone and style of the content.
- Post content consistently to maintain readers’ engagement and build authority.
- Invite your readers to join your newsletter for exclusive content and updates.
How can freelancers perform direct link monetization?
Ans. Freelancers can integrate direct link ads within their blog posts, newsletters, and social content using a direct link ad network like 7SearchPPC to have a hassle-free advertising experience.
