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Built from studying 50+ profitable newsletters.

Revenue metrics Growth & unit economics Engagement & deliverability Composite scoring Common mistakes B2B pipeline metrics
Newsletter Metrics Cheat Sheet preview
What's Inside

Six metric categories. Every one with a formula.

Not a glossary. Every metric has its calculation, the benchmark to compare against, and a plain reading of what the number is telling you. Including metrics most operators never track.

Revenue
Effective CPM (eCPM)

What you actually earn per 1,000 opens. The number sponsors care about most, and the one operators most often calculate wrong.

Total Revenue / Total Opens × 1,000
Revenue
Revenue Per Subscriber

True monetization efficiency. Strips out list-size distortion so you can compare your performance against real benchmarks, not just your own history.

Total Revenue / Total Subscribers
Growth
LTV:CAC Ratio

Whether your acquisition spend is building or burning value. Below 2:1 is a warning sign. Above 3:1, you have room to scale.

Subscriber LTV / Cost to Acquire
Retention
30/60/90-Day Cohort Retention

Whether new subscribers actually stay. The most honest signal of content-audience fit you have. Acquisition numbers hide this completely.

Active at Day X / Cohort Starting Size
Engagement
Human Click Rate

Real engagement, without bot inflation. Critical for accurate sponsorship pricing and conversion attribution. Most platforms don't surface this by default.

Unique Human Clicks / Delivered Emails
Health
List Health Score

A composite score that flags list decay before it shows up in deliverability. Above 70 is healthy. Below 50 needs action before your next send.

(% Engaged × 0.4) + (90d Retention × 0.3) + (Rev/Engaged × 0.3)
Plus: Tracking best practices and the most common operator mistakes. The sheet closes with the measurement errors that skew most newsletter dashboards, including celebrating list growth while engagement drops, tracking raw opens instead of cohort data, and missing bot clicks in sponsorship reporting.
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Why This One Is Different

Most cheat sheets stop at the name.

Search "newsletter metrics cheat sheet" and you'll find the same 8 to 10 terms recycled across dozens of posts. Open rate. Click rate. Unsubscribe rate. Maybe churn. No formulas. No thresholds. No guidance on what to do with the number.

This one is built differently. Every metric includes the calculation, the benchmark to compare against, and a plain reading of what the number is telling you about your newsletter's health.

It also covers metrics most operators never track: eCPM, Revenue per Engaged Subscriber, LTV:CAC, List Health Score, Human Click Rate, and B2B pipeline attribution. You won't find this combination anywhere else. We built it because we couldn't find it ourselves.

What you get Others This sheet
Metric names and definitions ✓ ✓
Formula for each metric ✗ ✓
Thresholds and benchmarks ✗ ✓
Decision guidance per metric ✗ ✓
Revenue and monetization metrics ✗ ✓
Composite List Health Score ✗ ✓
B2B pipeline attribution metrics ✗ ✓
Common measurement mistakes ✗ ✓
The Newsletter Method

The cheat sheet is one piece of a larger system.

Knowing your metrics is step two. Step one is having the right positioning underneath them. Step three is knowing which revenue model fits your list and your audience's expectations.

The Newsletter Method is the complete framework. 200+ pages, 26 interactive tools, built from studying 50+ profitable newsletters across every major model: sponsorship, subscription, product, and service.

The cheat sheet tells you what to measure. The Method tells you what to do about it.

01
Positioning
What is this newsletter for?

Most newsletters drift because no one defined what they're for. Positioning locks that down before you write another issue.

02
Measurement
Is this actually working?

Four to six metrics that matter, a hierarchy that separates signal from noise, and a framework for acting on the numbers, not just reporting them.

03
Monetization
How does this make money?

A decision framework built on your specific audience and format. Revenue as a natural next step, not a risk you take when you feel ready.

Founders access is open now at $149. The price increases when the founding window closes. Subscribers to the cheat sheet get preferred access.

See the Full System →