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Craig Swerdloff has been a successful entrepreneur for over twenty years, having founded…
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Craig Swerdloff posted thisThirty years ago I was an ambitious kid. Twenty years ago, I was impulsive and undisciplined. Some days, I still am. 1. October marks my 30th anniversary in online advertising. I started at Cliqnow! in October 1996, alongside Tim Mahlman, Scott Paternoster, Ami Goodhart, Ji Kim, Andrew Holloway, Peggy Goodfriend, Tom Hespos, Joe Apprendi, and so many others. What a way to start a career. 2. I reconnected with Marc Maltz, my executive coach at Return Path from 2006. Amazingly, he still had his files from our sessions. Reading them gave me a glimpse of who I was ten years into my career, including some things I've outgrown and others I'm still working on. 3. David J. Moore hosted a 24/7 Media Inc. reunion in NYC. It was incredible to reconnect with Darren Dunn, Guy Bavaro, Risa Goldberg, Steven Goldberg, Geoff Judge, Courtney McGovern, Danielle (Dani) Deacy, Jill Weiss, Gayle Meyers, Brian White, Julie Eckert, John Engler, and so many others. Thirty years later, I'm struck by something I probably didn't appreciate enough back then. We're far more complicated at 50 than we were at 20. Every experience changes us, but so do the people we share those experiences with. Looking back, I can see a little bit of everyone I've worked with, learned from, and crossed paths with in the person I've become. To everyone who has been part of that journey, thank you.
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Craig Swerdloff shared thisI'm incredibly sad to hear of Peter Bordes' passing. Peter was a mentor who always made time, a friend who encouraged more fun, a patient investor, and a gracious host when three of us were renting a single desk in his office while building LeadSpend. We talked a few weeks ago about fishing together this Fall. Sean M. McCormick, thank you for writing this. He was always present when we were together. He always made me feel cool being with him. Thank you Peter, you will be missed.Craig Swerdloff shared thisI struggled to find the right words for this one. The performance marketing industry lost one of its true pioneers this weekend, and I lost a friend of more than 20 years. I wanted to share a few memories of Peter Bordes, what he meant to our industry, and more importantly, what I learned from the way he lived his life. Rest easy, PB. You will be deeply missed.Peter Bordes: A Titan of Performance Marketing, and an Even Better HumanPeter Bordes: A Titan of Performance Marketing, and an Even Better Human
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Craig Swerdloff shared thisSolid insights here from Nathan May on newsletter subscriber acquisition strategies.Craig Swerdloff shared thisWe’ve seen dozens of newsletters fail to make paid acquisition work. The ones who scale to $50-$100k/month profitably do these 4 things: 1. Retarget free subscribers into paid Someone's already on your free list. You retarget them specifically to convert them into a paying subscriber. It gets you decent growth. But you're only ever pulling from people already on your list, so this alone won't drive real growth. 2. Free leads via Meta, then retarget to paid This works if you have a $150+ average order value. Bring people in for free through Meta first, then retarget them toward the paid tier. The economics only make sense if you understand the real timeline. I’ve seen as strong as a 1.5x ROAS - at first, that sounds awful. But what makes that viable is retention: Average subscriber retention for many paid subscribers runs 3-4 years. That creates a long LTV tail that more than covers the upfront cost. Judge this model by day-30 payback, and you'll kill a strategy that was actually working. Judge it by year-one-plus retention, and it makes complete sense. 3. Sell high-ticket products via a webinar For products priced at $1,000+, a webinar-based funnel works well. The paid newsletter subscription becomes one component inside that larger offer and not the entire product itself. 4. Buy ads in other newsletters The highest quality subscribers I have seen have come from buying ads in other newsletters. Think about the difference. With Meta, you're finding someone based on targeting signals. But with another newsletter, you're reaching someone who is already actively consuming newsletter content. There's even an interesting arbitrage opportunity here: A newsletter can buy traffic from another newsletter, and monetize that traffic through its own paid subscription or digital products. So the economics aren't necessarily: Buy subscriber > monetize subscriber once. They can be: Buy subscriber > sell subscription > sell digital products > monetize the relationship repeatedly.
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Craig Swerdloff posted thisFour reasons why lead generation campaigns are perfect for newsletter sponsorships: 1. You are asking for a currency the audience already spends. Every person reading a newsletter has already traded their email address for content. A lead generation offer asks for the same trade again, so there is no new behavior to learn, and the addresses you collect are inboxes the reader actually monitors. 2. A publisher's endorsement carries real weight, enough for a reader to say "the writer I trust surfaced this, I will take a look." Rarely enough for a stranger to hand over a credit card on a first visit. An email address sits at the level of commitment that borrowed trust can support. 3. The reader arrived in learning mode, and a lead offer is a learning offer. Nobody opens a newsletter to shop. They open it to read. The click that follows a sponsorship is curiosity, not intent. A page that offers a benchmark report, a buyer's guide, a calculator, or a short course answers the question the reader actually came with. A page that opens with buy now answers a question they were not asking. 4. Lead events happen often enough to be measured and optimized. At an average of 200 clicks per newsletter, a 0.4% purchase rate produces less than one conversion, which is noise. The same clicks against a well built lead offer produce 10 to 40 captured leads. Winners and losers separate after one send instead of after three months of accumulating spend, and budget moves toward the newsletters that work faster and more efficiently. Comment and connect, and I'll share specific examples of what types of lead gen offers have worked best at Wellput.
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Craig Swerdloff posted thisThe bot click problem is real. The trend is not. A Media Operator reported today that bot clicks have reached consumer newsletters. Over 90% human clicks in Q4, roughly half today. Jack Wrigley, friend and president of Omnivery US, says bot clicks are hitting both B2C and B2B and only getting worse. I would argue that bot clicks are not rising, but human clicks are falling, making the bot problem appear to be getting worse. Here is my hypothesis. AI has accelerated the shift toward zero click journeys in the inbox. Google put Gemini in front of three billion Gmail users in January, on by default. Apple Intelligence has expanded across a larger share of Apple devices since it was turned on by default in early 2025. Summarization in the inbox is here. If humans click less and machines click the same, bot share rises with no new bots at all. Same number. Completely different diagnosis. Full breakdown in today's Newsletter Sponsorship Insider.
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Craig Swerdloff posted thisHow did I miss this? WPP, one of the largest holding companies on earth, signed a global mandate with JLR where it gets paid for outcomes. Not hours. Not headcount. Not a percentage of media. Outcome based remuneration. First, performance marketing ate PR. Then it ate influencer. Is all of media next? These companies are betting on AI being able to measure outcomes. That's good, because the performance marketing industry certainly can't today. Johnny Hornby framed the outcomes as whether they are selling more product, and whether they get paid on selling more product. Compensation is tied to two things: measurable sales and brand performance. Cindy Rose OBE has since confirmed the contract has ceilings and floors, and that there is risk on both sides. She declined to give the commercials. The willingness was never the hard part. The measurement is. Who validates the number, and what happens when the two sides read it differently. That is the part worth watching. It is also the part nobody has published. 🍿
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Craig Swerdloff posted thisThanks Andrew Bacon for reminding me of this classic adage, "Stopping advertising to save money is like stopping a clock to save time." You're only borrowing from your future, and interest rates are rising. AI is going to reset the marketing landscape in ways that haven't been decided yet. What I am certain about, however, is that humans will remain human. We will still be guided by emotions like love and fear. Brands that invest in connecting with humans where they are engaged (email newsletters!) will continue to outperform those that don't.
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Craig Swerdloff shared thisExcited to be attending #RakutenOptimism this week in Phoenix! DM me if you're at the show and want to connect.Craig Swerdloff shared thisI’ll be at Rakuten Optimism with Craig Swerdloff next week in Phoenix!🌵 ☀️ Excited to connect with agencies and brands who are looking to go beyond traditional affiliate strategies and unlock new ways to scale through newsletter sponsorships with Wellput.io! If diversification is a priority for your program right now, let’s find time to connect.
Craig Swerdloff replied to a comment
2d
Nancy Mai Harnett I agree!
Craig Swerdloff replied to a comment
6d
Alison Aguiar, will do!
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Craig Swerdloff liked thisCraig Swerdloff liked thisA year ago, I was laid off (again) and trying to figure out what to do next. Fast-forward a year, I am working for myself, consulting with businesses I care about, doing work I actually enjoy. And I have the flexibility to have coffee with my visiting sister, with this view. Tomorrow morning I’ll be in the front row at my daughter’s Halloween parade, before going into an office - because I want to - to finish up another exciting, challenging, productive week. It hasn’t always been easy, but I am so grateful for this year of growth and opportunity. Here’s to year 2! ✨
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Craig Swerdloff liked thisCraig Swerdloff liked thisAfter the tragic school shooting in Bend this month, I was invited to say a few words to the Sandy Hook Promise media advisory board. Many old friends in the group. I was asked to describe how this horrible event felt on the ground in Bend. The most essential part of the Sandy Hook Promise is preventing more shootings and helping kids in crisis. They have prevented at least 20 school shootings, helped 8,700 kids in crisis, and worked with 1,300 kids who were at risk of suicide. In 80% of school shootings, there are warning signs. The media advisory board helps to spread the message. I have six grandkids who go to school every day. I count on them coming home safely every day. I have attached my remarks. Thanks to Pete Murray. Kevin Wassong 🧠 Dawn Lyons
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Craig Swerdloff liked thisCraig Swerdloff liked thisMy darling wife Daria’s first short documentary, “How I See It: Rocco,” premieres here in NYC on December 7. It’s an incredible film, and the kids and I could not be prouder of our creator, director, and executive producer. As a clinical social worker, Dar has spent decades getting to know many inspiring blind and visually impaired adolescents and young adults. For more than a decade, she’s dreamed of sharing their stories. She’s made that dream real, launching In A Nutshell with co-director/producer and dear friend Karen Shapiro. With an award-winning film team, Rocco is the first of what we hope will become an anthology of short documentaries about young adults living with blindness. The Center at West Park is hosting a full evening: the premiere, live music, a panel discussion, and time to mingle. Would be delighted to have the advertising and adtech community come out in force! Bring a friend, and see you there. Film, trailer, program and tickets: https://lnkd.in/eVBYnYMF
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DMA 2012 Email Marketing Post-Conference Certification Program
Co-hosted with Craig Swerdloff from LeadSpend, we taught a course called, "Master the World of Email Lists and Databases."
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