$ cat prompt.txt — Newsletter & Substack

Newsletter Niche Finder — Sponsor-Ready Niche in 30 Min

Find a profitable newsletter niche with proven sponsor demand and a clear 3-month growth playbook.

30–45 min intermediate Claude Opus, GPT-5, Gemini 2.5 Pro#newsletter#substack#beehiiv

intro.md

Most newsletters fail because the niche has no commercial intent — passion topics with zero advertiser demand. This prompt finds you 3 niches where sponsors are actively spending money, the audience size needed to monetise is realistic, and you have enough genuine interest to ship 50+ issues without burning out.

$ cat prompt.txt | pbcopy

The prompt — copy & paste

prompt.txt

You are a newsletter operator who has launched 5 newsletters past 10k subscribers and one past 75k. Your job is to find me a profitable newsletter niche — one with real sponsor demand, a realistic growth path, and topical depth I can mine for 12+ months.

MY INPUTS:
- My expertise / strong-opinion areas (3-5): {{expertise_areas}}
- Audiences I have insider familiarity with: {{audience_familiarity}}
- Realistic hours per week I can commit: {{time_per_week}}
- Primary monetisation goal: {{monetisation_goal}} (Sponsorships / Paid subscriptions / Product sales / Lead-gen for my services)

EXECUTE:

STAGE 1 — NICHE BRAINSTORM (8 candidates)
Generate 8 newsletter niche concepts that meet ALL these criteria:
- Sit at the intersection of 2+ of my {{expertise_areas}} (niches with no expertise overlap rarely sustain)
- Have a clear buyer in the audience (B2B SaaS users, freelancers, founders, specific role like 'PM at Series B', etc.)
- The topic has natural NEW content every week (not a one-time-read topic)
- Sponsor categories are obvious (you should be able to name 5 companies that would want to reach this audience)

For each: "[Niche name] — 1-sentence positioning"

STAGE 2 — SCORING (rank all 8)
Score each candidate 1-5 on:
- SPONSOR DEMAND (high CPM categories: B2B SaaS, finance, education, dev tools, premium consumer)
- AUDIENCE WILLINGNESS-TO-OPEN (do they currently follow other newsletters in adjacent spaces?)
- TOPIC SUSTAINABILITY (will I have something fresh to say in issue 50?)
- MY FIT (genuine interest + insider perspective)
- COMPETITIVE INTENSITY (5 = under-served, 1 = saturated)

Present as a sorted markdown table with TOTAL out of 25.

STAGE 3 — DEEP DIVE TOP 3
For the 3 top-scoring niches:

A. POSITIONING
- One-sentence newsletter positioning ("The {{specific thing}} for {{specific person}}")
- Tagline (under 12 words)
- "Why now?" — what's happening in the space that makes this the right moment

B. CONTENT PILLARS (5 recurring topic angles)
The 5 reliable types of content you can rotate week-to-week so you never face blank-page syndrome.

C. SPONSORSHIP MARKET
- 8 specific company / product names that would want to sponsor this newsletter
- Estimated CPM for this audience ($25-150 for niche B2B)
- Subscriber count needed to hit $X/month sponsorship revenue at this CPM (calculate for $1k, $5k, $10k monthly revenue targets)

D. GROWTH PATH TO FIRST 1,000 SUBSCRIBERS
- 3 specific tactics calibrated to my time budget
- Realistic timeline to 1,000 subs
- The single most important growth lever for THIS niche specifically

STAGE 4 — TOP RECOMMENDATION
Pick the #1 niche and explain WHY it edges out the other 2. State the 3 KPIs I should track in months 1-3 to validate whether this niche is the right call.

STAGE 5 — KILL LIST
Name 2 newsletter niches I should NOT enter given my profile, and why. Save me from the obvious mistakes.

REQUIREMENTS:
- Be specific. "Tech newsletter" is useless. "Weekly breakdown of YC batch trends for early-stage SaaS founders" is workable.
- Avoid recommending niches that depend on me being a household name to monetise — I'm starting from zero.
- Favour B2B over B2C for sponsorship monetisation (B2B CPMs are 5-10x higher).

$ variables_to_fill_in

$ man playbook

Step-by-step playbook

How to actually use this prompt for the best results.

01
Be honest about your expertise depth
{{expertise_areas}} should be areas where you can write 1,000 words without research. Areas you'd need to research from scratch every issue lead to burnout by issue 12. Pick from your actual life, not your aspirations.
02
Set a realistic weekly time budget
{{time_per_week}} is the single most predictive variable for newsletter survival. <3 hrs/week = bi-weekly cadence max. 5-8 hrs = weekly. 10+ hrs = weekly with deeper research. Most failed newsletters overcommit on cadence.
03
Run the prompt and pick based on conviction, not score
The top 3 will all be workable. Pick the ONE you'd genuinely want to read if someone else wrote it. Conviction translates to consistency, which is the real moat.
04
Validate by reading 5 issues of adjacent newsletters
Subscribe to 5 newsletters in the niche-adjacent space. Read 5 issues each. If you finish thinking 'I have nothing new to add', re-run the prompt with a different positioning. If you finish thinking 'I'd write this differently', you've found your wedge.
05
Use the next prompt for your first 10 issues
Once the niche is locked, use the 'Newsletter First 10 Issues' prompt to outline + draft your initial issues. Pre-writing 5-10 issues before launching prevents week-3 burnout when growth is slow.

$ man tips

Pro tips for better output

›B2B niches with clear sponsor demand (marketing ops, dev tools, founder finance) hit profitable monetisation at 2,500-5,000 subs. B2C niches typically need 25,000+ subs for equivalent revenue.
›Niche the AUDIENCE, not just the topic. 'AI newsletter' is too broad. 'AI newsletter for marketers in mid-stage SaaS' has clear sponsors AND a defined reader.
›If you have an existing audience anywhere (Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube), heavily weight niches that overlap with that audience — your first 500 subs come from your existing community 90% of the time.
›Don't pick a topic just because you find it interesting — pick one where your specific perspective makes the newsletter different. Insight is the only real defence against AI-written newsletters drowning the space.

$ echo $YIELD

What you'll get

output.md

8 newsletter niche candidates scored, top 3 with full positioning + sponsor analysis + growth path, a clear #1 recommendation with validation KPIs, and a kill-list of niches to avoid.

$ man faq

FAQ

Substack vs beehiiv vs ConvertKit in 2026?

beehiiv for sponsorship-led newsletters (best ad-network + analytics). Substack for paid subscriptions + organic discovery (network effects through Substack's recommendation engine). ConvertKit / Kit for established creators with multiple products. Most new newsletters in 2026 default to beehiiv.

How big does my newsletter need to be to monetise?

Sponsorships viable from ~2,500 engaged subs in commercial niches (B2B SaaS, finance, marketing — $200-500/sponsorship). Paid subscriptions need ~5,000+ free subs as a funnel + a strong personal brand. Both require 35%+ open rates — vanity-sub growth (giveaways, paid promos) lowers open rates and kills monetisation.

Can I run a profitable newsletter on the side?

Yes — most $5k+/month newsletters run on 5-10 hours/week once the editorial system is established. The first 6 months require more (10-15 hrs/week) because of audience-building work. After ~5k subs the writing time stays constant and revenue compounds via sponsorships + lead-gen.

$ ls /prompts/newsletter