There's are over 70,000 subscribers right now, correct? Mm-hmm. Do you have the click rate? 22%. That's absolutely monstrous. That's huge. I've never done any advertising. It's just word of mouth.
People like one by one forwarding it to their friends. A rare case where something is, like, so values driven.
I don't think most people are as principled in the way they run their independent projects and products as you are. Making money was a byproduct of the project.
Is the people in your life say that you need to do more selling, you need to do more ethically exploiting your audience?
When people hear how big my audience is and then they hear that I don't charge to read the newsletter, they're like, "What's wrong with you?" My motto is, like, just because you can, doesn't mean you should.
Welcome back to the Creator Spotlight podcast.
My name is Francis Zehrer, and today we're speaking with Rachel Mead Smith, creator of Words of Mouth, a free weekly newsletter sharing jobs and other opportunities for professional and creative expansion.
I personally have been a subscriber to this newsletter for nearly seven years, and she's been sending it for a decade, 10 years as of this January. So she sends it today to over 72,000 subscribers.
She makes a good deal of her living from it, but she says she's never really actively tried to build it as a business, only now she's starting to do that, but it does really well, and I think the reason why is because she has such a strong value system, and that really shapes and comes across in the newsletter.
I've really been looking forward to doing this one. I think you're gonna enjoy. Tell me what the worldview of your newsletter is. That there are ways to live in this world that can
pay you enough money and allow you to expand, connect, and ideally do something that is good for the world and humanity.
Basically, this myth that in order to survive under capitalism, you have to sell out, you have to, you know, upskill in the things you're not interested in. You have to work for the evil corporation.
You have to put in time, you know, selling dog food because it's just, like, how you get experience, and it's how you learn in this world. Like, I, I do not believe that, and
the newsletter aims to show people what's possible or, yeah, what's available, what is out there to do every day for money. Hmm.
Um, obviously, there are other things that don't have to do as much with money, but, you know, the core of the newsletter is jobs.
There's also calls for publication residencies, fellowships so you can, you know, further your practice, further your expansion in ways outside of your work as well, but I am a pretty practical person.
I've always been that way in addition to being, like, a, a seeker and a dreamer- Mm.... and kind of a, like, a sy- cynical optimist. I remember when I was 12 maybe, 13,
asking my dad... I was, like, in bed bef- like, it was at night, I was in bed. I was like, "Dad, what am I gonna do for work-" [laughs] "... when I'm a grownup?" Like, "I can't figure it out."
I was, like, 13, and I was so worried about this, and part of me wonders if that's because I, like, didn't have a lot of role models for, like, sustainable career paths. Um, my dad's a writer. Ah. [laughs] Um,
so I've been thinking about work and how to do... what to do with my life forever, and, um, I was at a point when I started the newsletter where I was, like, really confused, and I didn't know where to look.
I didn't have... You know, there weren't the dedicated job boards for, like, interdisciplinary people like me who had never had the same, same job title twice- Hmm...
who didn't have, like, a very clear-cut set of skills or a very clear-cut goal. I was like-- I actually was working somewhere where I thought when I got the job, I was like, "I'll spend the rest of my life here."
It was one of these places with lifers. You know? Ah, yes. Like, people who worked there from, like, when they graduated college, and now they're, you know, in their 60s.
And then it w- a year later, I was like, "I cannot be here. I'm so miserable." So I started this newsletter because I was like, "Where do I go from here?"
[lips smack] And I want to show people that there are places to go.
I hear all the time from people who say, "You know, I haven't found a job from the newsletter, but I've learned so much about what jobs exist, and I've learned about projects. I've learned about organizations."
So it's really like a discovery engine. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, it's not a matchmaking service. It's not a recruiting service. It's like... It's a, it's a platform for discovery. Um- Yeah... I've increasingly tried to
infuse the list with my values surrounding, you know, what is good work, and
it used to be a little bit more open and flexible, and then it's like, well, if it's, like, a cool consumer brand, and the job is, like, well paid, and it looks interesting, I'll post that.
I've posted inc- m- less and less of those, and now it's like, how can you use your talents, your energies to do things that are furthering equity, knowledge production,
um, you know, liberate, like, all of these kind of big ideas. Well, wait, wait. Let me, let me read it. You've written this down on your website, and so I wrote it down. You say- Okay...
"I feature hiring organizations working to create what I de- what I determine to be a net positive impact.
Within that, I choose listings based on their capacity to support creative activity growth or daydreams, increase access to knowledge and services, break down or combat systemic oppression, preserve or support cultural production."...
leverage design technology or the arts for people or planet over profit, expand social, political, and economic opportunity, or finally, fight forces endangering any of the above.
And it sounds like you're saying, like, over the decade of doing this, you've sharpened your, how you define these values, and I imagine too as the, as the platform has grown, it's been easier, like, more and more hiring organizations that fit these criteria have found you and have continuously submitted jobs.
And so the work of curating roles that fit those values has probably gotten a little easier over time in those two ways. Definitely. Yeah, definitely.
I would say n- 92% of the jobs that are submitted to me fit within those criteria. Mm.
Every once in a while there's one that's, like, on the cusp, and I'm kinda like, "Can't you just, like, look at the archive and know that this isn't really the place for you?"
[laughs] But it's, it's very subjective, um, how I choose, but I do use... Those values have really, uh, helped me hone the kind of curational focus of the newsletter. Yeah.
Uh, when you started it, I know that it was you looking for jobs, then you kept finding more and more that y- you, you didn't necessarily need to apply to, but you thought maybe your friends might be interested, and so you started sending a list around to couple friends, few dozen friends.
When did it formally become a newsletter and not just you emailing, like, your social group? It was from the beginning. Oh. I... Yeah. It was... I, I have the email records.
I didn't really remember this, but a few years ago, it was, like, the seven-year anniversary, and so I looked it up. And I guess I was, I was working in design, so I kinda had this,
this, like, drive to brand and like- Mm... bring a... Yeah. Just, like, name the thing. You were working for a company that, like, helps design museum exhibits, right? Yeah, I was. Yeah.
I had, I guess I had been looking for myself for so long and I had been finding these things, I hadn't necessarily been, like... I had probably been sending them as one-offs for, I don't know, a few months, like,
to Kate and to Sarah and to Jodie, whatever. But then I just realized, like, this is something I can offer, and so I actually sent out an email... This is from memory. I think- [laughs]... I sent out an email to, like,
I don't know, 50 people, and was like, "Would you be interested in getting an email every week including cool jobs?"
S- you know, those people said yes or no, and then I think that's when I was like, "Okay, the first email's going out. It's called Words of Mouth," and those people were on the list.
So it, it had a name from the very first week, which was, like, January 25th, 2016. It had the Words of Mouth at the top, and I had, like, a whole, you know, system and layout and everything.
And it's changed a lot since then, but honestly not that much considering how long it's been. [laughs] So, yeah.
I mean, I look, I look back to six years ago, the oldest one in my personal inbox, and it's, I mean, the design has changed slightly, but it's still quite simply, like, "Here are some jobs. Here's who. Here's what it is.
Here's where it is. And here's how much it pays," if they've lis- listed it. Like, it... That's... It's quite simple [laughs] at the core. Yeah. Yeah.
Um, okay, so you told me when we first spoke that, uh, about a week ago, that there's are over 70,000 subscribers right now, correct? Mm-hmm.
Can you recall the flow of how this audience has grown, like when it hit 1,000 or 10,000? If there were moments where suddenly thousands of new people flocked when it hadn't been growing that much, this kind of thing?
No. It's been really, really steady since the beginning. Mm. I've never done any advertising. There have been moments, I guess, I think in the beginning, um, you know The Creative Independent? Of course, yeah.
That website? So I think way back- Started, by the way for the listener who doesn't know, it's a daily interview product, newsletter, uh, that originally... I think it actually is still part of Kickstarter.
It's, like, this editorial thing that Kickstarter puts out. But it's, it's a great interview product. Uh, they publish an interview with some creative person every day. So many years ago,
s- I think someone who was interviewed mentioned Words of Mouth. Mm. And I think that, you know, brought in a lot of people, and was kind of archived in the web search as well. Ah.
So, like, little things like that where it just started to be kind of picked up and linked in other roundups, and then, um, like, university, like, a lot of art school university, design universities, design programs would put it into their career resources.
So it started kind of having... It, it, like, was doing its own work out in the world, and then I just kept sending it every week. And it's really very true to its name. It's just word of mouth.
It's been very consistent. Um, I will be honest with you right now, I do not keep really close tabs on analytics. Mm. I, even in preparation for this conversation- [laughs]...
did not look, like, at, at trends or anything. Like, because to me, it's never, there's never been anything- It's not the point... noticeably, uh, like, awry or other, or the opposite.
Like, it's just always been consistent, open rates consistently growing, and, and it is not the point really. Yeah.
Like, even if my growth rate was to be cut in half, A, I don't know if I would notice, B, I would just keep sending the newsletter in the same way. So, uh, yeah, I, I'm, like- [laughs]...
so bad at running a business in this way, but, um, it hasn't hurt me yet because it's just kind of doing its own work. Like, the people are out there sharing it. Everyone who gets this shares it with someone.
Like, sometimes people will accidentally reply to me- I've probably told dozens of people about it honestly myselfYeah, it's just like, it's just math. It's just like systems theory, you know?
Um, but yeah, sometimes pe- people will like forward it to me instead of forwarding it to their friend. [laughs] It's really fun. But they'll be like- [gasps]...
I saw something on here, like check out the, you know, X role. I think it would be good for you. And I'm like, "This is how it happens." Yeah. It's just people like one by one forwarding it to their friends.
So that's how it's gone. Hi there. My name's Tom. I'm the producer of the Creator Spotlight podcast. Just jumping in real quick to ask you to double-check that you've subscribed.
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Okay, back to the episode.
One that I do have that you've listed on the website, and this is from when you had 65,000 subscribers, so pretty recently, is that the open rate averages around 72%, which is quite remarkable- Still does, yeah...
for, yeah, a newsletter this size. I wonder, do you have the click rate? Because I... This is a newsletter meant to be clicked on, so I imagine it's quite, quite high. Click per unique open or, or click rate?
Whichever one's larger, I guess. [laughs] Click per unique open is 22%. That's absolutely monstrous. That's huge. [laughs] Okay, cool.
[laughs] Monstrous is maybe the wrong word, but no, that- that's really, that's really impressive.
It doesn't necessarily surprise me because, again, like the purpose of this newsletter is for people to click on jobs and apply to them- Yeah, yeah... and find opportunities and click them. Um, yeah.
That, that's, that's really good. I, I was just curious. That's amazing. It's good to have that, that feedback. Yeah. Yes. 'Cause again, I'm like, I just compare it to the week before. Yeah. So I'm like, is it stable?
Yeah. Then I'm happy. You know? No. So- I mean, this means that people are using it to find jobs, which is, is the point. Let's, let's talk a bit about the, the business side though.
As you said, you're, you're horrible at running a business. You, uh- [laughs]... are... You, you know, you should have taken a course on running a newsletter to, to run this better. But again, the...
You don't necessarily need to.
I think this is the rare case, and this is why I wanted to talk to you, is a rare case where something is like so values driven that like that is just what drives it, and everything kind of comes in the wake of that.
I think that when you have such a consistent point of view, and you have this integrity in the way you run it, it becomes such a strong organizing principle.
And honestly, I don't think most people are as principled in the way they run their independent media projects and products as you are, uh, to, [laughs] to be honest. But, um, yeah, okay.
When we first spoke, you told me that people in your life, I'm gonna quote you here. You s- you said, "The people in your life say that you need to do more selling."
And here's the real quote, "That you need to do more ethically exploiting your audience." Can you recount some of these conversations? Yeah.
It's, um, you know, when people hear how big my audience is, and then they hear that I don't charge to read the newsletter, they're like, "What's wrong with you?" [laughs] "People should be paying a dollar a week.
Like it's a service. It's not that hard. It's not that expensive to just give a dollar a week." Yeah. Um, that's one thing.
Another thing is people are like, "Why don't you just put advertising in there and make a bunch of money?"
Or, you know, "You have all this data about people," which by the way, I do not, 'cause I do not collect data other than emails and names. People can voluntarily tell me
where they're located and what they're interested in, and that's- No survey here. Yeah. No. Um, but you know, people are like, "You have all this data.
You could sell the emails to, you know, some organization that wants to sell them information about job hunting or whatever." Um, I guess to- You could be acquired by Indeed, et cetera... I could be- This kind of thing.
Totally. You could, you know... "Have you ever thought about selling the newsletter?" Um, I... All of these suggestions assume that [laughs] I have like gone into this with the intent to make money. Mm-hmm.
Making money was, uh, sort of like a byproduct of the project. I will say now I am incredibly grateful that it does make money because it has allowed me to have... I don't have a full-time job now. Yeah.
I ran this newsletter for a long time with a full-time job, and it was very hard. And I do not have to have a full-time job now. I have a job that only I can fire myself from- [laughs]...
which today is a huge thing as we know with like just continuous layoff season. Uh, I am so grateful that people decided that I should make money from this project.
Um, however, I have struggled a lot with the notion that I am not taking advantage of- Hmm... the audience I have in some way. I'm not... You know, I'm a, I'm a writer and an editor also.
Like, that's the work I do for other people. And people are like, "Why don't you write content? Why don't you..." Or like, "Curate editorial content about
work, and about job seeking, and how to craft, you know, the perfect resumes." Like, these are not things that, A, I am particularly interested... Like, I'm actually very interested in kind of critical- Hmm...
examinations of work, and we can talk about that. But- But less the service journalism side of that. But, yeah, like the how-tos, that stuff, I don't know. I'm not even an expert in that. Like- [laughs]...
I'm actually pretty good at getting in... I used to be pretty good at getting interviews when I was applying for jobs, but that's just 'cause I applied for so many jobs.
So, you know, this idea that like, because you have this audience, you should be feeding them content was really so not aligned with my like outlook on, on life, on the internet, on- Yeah...
what needs to exist in the world. Like my mottoIs like just because you can doesn't mean you should. You know, there's so much crap out there. We do not need another voice, like, chiming in on these topics.
Like, there are experts who can help you. You can find them. So anyway, I always just... I knew my role. I knew what I wanted my role to be, and that was providing this service for people to discover what's possible,
and I was able to sustain that. Not only sustain it, but also sustain other parts of my life because of it without having to feed people slop or- Yeah... do work I didn't wanna do. So- Yeah... yeah.
I'm, I've stuck to my guns and stayed in my lane, and I'm, I'm happy for that. Although it's- And, and- It- Mm...
I just, it's, it's an interesting point right now for me because I am, I have this book coming out about job seeking, and that was my first offshoot project- Mm...
from the newsletter outside of a newsletter format, and I'm really happy with it. I'm really excited about it, and so I am thinking more about how my work can exceed the newsletter related to,
you know, asking what is work, what does it do to us, um, you know, all of these kind of more anthropological questions about- Mm... vocation that I'm interested in. Um, but again, none of that is money-making.
[laughs] That's the opposite. Yeah. It's like I would like to spend, you know, a year studying, um, you know, how people, uh, train to be nurses at night. Yeah. And, you know, so anyway.
I'm not, I do not have a, a money-making, um, instinct to... Like, that's not my, my- No... my, my ambitions are never- But-... in that direction. They're always in the other, [laughs] other direction.
There, there are... I think, I think there's four ways it makes money, right? There's donations from submitting employers, which, uh- Mm-hmm...
are not required, but if you choose somebody, you, you, you request, "Hey, if you'd like, here's a donation," um, link. There are donations from reader members I think through Patreon.
There are classified ads in every newsletter, and there are occasional weekly sponsors. I don't... I feel like I don't see these in there that often. But- They're not very often...
those are the four ways you make money, right? Yes. Those are the four ways. Um, let me think. Yeah, yeah. That's right. Well, was the... Which one came first? What was the first...
When did you, like, first make any amount of money from doing this? Uh, the employer submissions. Hm.
So I can't remember exactly when, but maybe from the beginning I was asking like, "Oh, hey, if you wanna give me a few bucks..." Like, maybe, I think probably once I had some established audience.
It's like, "Hey, if you wanna give me a few bucks to post this, um, you can send it to me here." And that has become the most reliable way that I make money. Mm.
And, um, again, it's optional, so every time an employer submits a job, which happens... There's... Again, I really should know this stat. But I- 20 times a day or... [laughs] No, no. No, no, no.
Um, maybe like 20 a week. Okay. Yeah. Um, when they submit a job, if I want to accept it, I will say, "Great. I'm happy to post this in the newsletter.
This is our requested donation, um, am- range, and these are, like this is my, this is how many audience me- readers I have. This is the open rate.
The only way I can keep it free for subscribers is through donations from people like you." I do also ask for a referral bonus if people find- Mm... hire someone through the newsletter.
I'm like, "You can also send me a referral bonus, uh, if you end up hiring." And every once in a while, almost never does that happen. Yeah. But people do pretty reliably, um, when they submit and are accepted.
They will re- pretty reliably send me, you know, a, a bit. A- a- again, you're not, like, worrying about growth, thinking about growth. But is there a point where
could there be too many people on the list, where it, it's almost like this is no longer... This is overwhelming for employers who are on this list- Yeah... because I'm sending them too many. Do you...
Is that something you think about? Yes. Um, some... There have been a few times when I have this option to include your direct contact info if you're submitting directly. Mm.
And, you know, the point is that people wanna know that there's a real human submitting the job and actively reviewing applications, so it's a signal to them for that.
Um, but occasionally people have been like, "We got so many emails, and I'm one person, and I can't handle this." And like, "Can you please take it down?" And I'm like, "No, it's a newsletter. I can't take it down."
[laughs] Um, that does not happen very often, but the...
I have thought about how like, s- you know, if I were to do advertising and be like, "Subscribe to my newsletter," like, I, I just truly don't know why I would do that because I don't get donations- No... from readers.
Wouldn't make sense for you. But also, I don't want... I, I mean, the competition is already so fierce. At this point,
I know that if I post something on the newsletter, it's going to be incredibly fierce because I will say my readers are top-notch. They are high quality people, okay? Mm.
I have heard this so many times from people hiring. They're like, "The applicants we got from Words of Mouth were the best."
So I know if I post a great job there and it gets th- uh, over a thousand clicks and hundreds of people apply for it, that competition is fierce. And so yes, there can be too many people on the, on the list, but- Yeah...
um, that's... It's like an ecosystem. Like, I feel like it has to kind of balance itself out somehow. Like, it just means I need to post more really good jobs, I think. Yeah. Uh, okay.
Well, back to, back to the various ways that people do pay you. There's classifieds. I counted in the most recent issue as we record, February 9th, uh, there's six of them. And you charge 65 to $200.
There was one for-Like a creativity workshop. There was one for, I think, a design agency, maybe a yoga or wellness class, one for to subscribe to a newsletter, right? So it, it, it varies. Um, are...
And I think you have, like, around five or six per newsletter, but I'm curious about the sliding scale. Like, do people respect that, or is it kind of abused and so is the lower end? No, people do respect it.
I will say the classifieds are really valued by folks who I think are just starting out and don't have an audience- Mm... which means they maybe don't have as much to throw at, um, other advertising opportunities.
So the sliding scale offers them a place to just get off the ground. And, um, yeah.
So I will say, like, it's definitely closer to s- the average payment is definitely closer to 65 than 200, but it's not because people are abusing it. Like, I kinda check in. Like, if someone...
And because it's a sliding scale, people do feel the need to explain. Like, if they're- Mm...
paying 65, they'll kinda tell me why, and sometimes I wish they didn't, 'cause I'm like, "You should not be buying a classified right now- [laughs]... if you can't pay your utility bills." Um- Oh, man... but yeah.
So it's just taught me how hard it is to find places to get in front of people if, like, if you need, if you wanna advertise a service or a workshop, which so many people are doing now.
They're hosting their own, um, workshops, like cohorts, facilitated events, all of these things, which is really cool, and, like, a lot of therapists and coaches and- Mm...
creative consultants who just, you know, need to reach new networks for cl- uh, new to expand their clients, client base. And, um, yeah. So the newsletter has become kind of like a bulletin board for,
for a lot of folks who just otherwise would not have access to new people. Um, I will say I am working with someone right now to kind of revamp my strategy on some of this stuff. Mm.
And the classifieds, I do have to raise the price, because they fill up so far in advance. Um, it's... And I get a lot of- How far out are you right now? Mm, like I'm, uh, eight weeks or something.
[laughs] Maybe s- six, six or eight, six to eight weeks. Yeah. Somewhere in there.
And I don't like that, because people are like, "Hey, I have this workshop next week," and, or, you know, "I'm starting this class and I need to fill it up," and I don't have room for them.
Like, I- it, it asks people to, to, like, to wait, to put things on hold, and people will change their deadlines, you know? Um, and I don't like that.
I'd like it to be more of, like, an immediate, serving an immediate need, like what's happening right now. Um, and yeah. So f- that and just because [laughs] I have not raised my rates in so many years. Yeah.
Um, I'm raising my rates, and I'm also... It's still gonna be...
It's, like, a gonna be a tiered system, so instead of a sliding scale, it's gonna be, like, this amount, this amount, or this amount, and it's, like, how, helping people identify what they should pay between- Mm...
those three amounts.
Will you then have, like, also tiers of, let's say, timeliness where maybe it is, like, I'm always gonna reserve some where here's the thing that's next week, and then there's gonna be some that are a little more evergreen.
Or we, we talked a little bit earlier about the, the weekly ads- Mm... and I wrote down how you have priced these on your website at this moment in time. It says for one week it's 500 to $1,000.
Two weeks it's 1,050 to 2,100. Three weeks it is 1,250 to 2,500. So you're, those aren't happening that often. Do you then sort of change that product and it is maybe a lower price, but it then absorbs some of these
f- uh, classifieds that fit that category better? You know- [laughs]...
I should have asked you about this before I ever- [laughs] I'm working on that too, on, um, on, like, revamping the sponsorship as, as well, because, uh,
that is a place where I don't think I've been maximizing the opportunity as much. I think I, I do plan on reserving that for,
uh, orgs, projects that have bigger budgets, 'cause I think that's where I can be, like, ethically leveraging my audi- my reach a little bit more, and trying to align with,
you know, initiatives, I will say, entities- Mm... that have funds that would like to get in front of my audience and would be of value to my audience. Um,
n- so that space I think is gonna hopefully start featuring some more of that stuff soon at a probably- Yeah... a higher price point given that I have been told that I am kind of like a bargain, [laughs]
a bargain basement, uh, situation right now. Mm. Considering the open rate and the audience and- Well, and yeah, considering, like-... the conversion rate...
the, the, yeah, the open rate, the click rate, et cetera, but considering the, like, the clarity and quality of audience that you have. Like, the value is in your values and how you have- Right. Yes...
like, baked these into the newsletter over a decade, right? [laughs] Like, that's the real value beyond the s- like, the size just magnifies that, right? Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, there's, like, I'll say it again, like, the quality of people, and I guess that's, like, a weird thing to say, 'cause, like, [laughs] how do you judge someone's quality? But- I don't know...
like, the people I have met from the newsletter and the things I have heard from hiring orgs, like, these are good people. They are talented people. They are good people who, um, yeah, their values align with mine.
They want to be spending their time and money on things that align with their values. Like, they are, I guess, like, the audience that a lot of, um, of, that I can imagine being, like, very appealing to certain
brands, orgs, projects, whatever. Um, but it's hard because I just have a high bar. Yeah. I have a high bar, really high bar for what goes in the newsletter, for what I get behind, um-You know, this like, you...
Yeah, it's incredibly values-driven, and it can be a slippery slope with, "Oh, well, these people wanna give you, you know, $3,000 to feature their AI product in the newsletter," and it's like, "AI for good, so, like, don't worry," and, you know, that gets slippery, and
I trust in my, like, moral foundation that I can make the call, but once you start offering opportunities to make more money more easily, I can just see how that can go sideways. Yeah.
And I've been reluctant to even, like, allow that possibility. So, you know, the next six months or whatever, I'm exploring this with a partner, a consultant, um, who shares my values and understands.
She's been a newsletter subscriber for, you know, like, almost the whole time. So that was very important. If I'm gonna hire someone to work on this with me, like, they really need to get it, and they- Mm-hmm...
they can't be, like, trying to convince me that I'm leaving money on the table or that I need to loosen up or whatever. So we're gonna see. It's an experiment because I don't know if my... if I can, like...
if those projects, brands, orgs, whatever exist really in, um, plentiful numbers that have the money to pay for, uh, those, you know, primary, prominent spots in the newsletter, and then if not, I don't know, maybe Francis will go and do what you suggested and make that more of, like, a d- democratic, um, accessible space for, you know- Well, we, we could, we could talk-...
special, special-... if it, if it gets to that point. Yeah. [laughs] Uh- Yeah... so with... but the one other thing, the last way that this does bring in some money is the Patreon. So I checked.
As of today, there are 596 members, and this isn't some extra content thing. This is just a, like, you are a reader and you wanna support this project. Uh, there's five, or three tiers, excuse me.
A $1 a week, $5 a week, or $10 per week. I know that there's also, like, a free option, so I don't think all 596 of those people are paying. Um, but, ag- so I'm reminded of...
I had Melanie Ehrenkranz of the Laid Off newsletter on- Mm-hmm...
about, um, almost a year ago now, but we were talking about this too, and, like, you know, charging recently laid-off people for membership to this group, and it makes sense w- with hers, right?
I, I think, I think the newsletter, I think all of the issues might be free. I can't quite recall right now, which is embarrassing, but membership into this, like, Slack or Discord community she has- Yeah...
is, is for a fee, which makes sense 'cause then you're getting access to the space where you can commiserate with people and help each other find the next thing.
Um, long way of saying I think that if you are, like, a job seeker and
you, you subscribe to Word of Mouth, $1 a week is not that much for something that can be quite meaningful, and maybe there's people who then found a great job through your work, and now they pay.
A long [laughs] w- setup, though, for, to ask you to just tell me about this Patreon donation program, which is so value-aligned because you don't need to find, like, companies.
It's just, like, these are people who like my work and wanna, like, do, contribute. Yeah. The Patreon is... Right now, I think there's, like, 305 Patreon people who pay. Hmm. Um, a- almost...
Like, maybe it's 302 of which pay $1 a week. [laughs] Yeah. [laughs] So, um, it's, it is, um, very... I've really under-leveraged Patreon, I will say. Yeah.
I was just talking to a friend who's been a [laughs] newsletter subscriber for years, and she's like, "You have a Patreon?" Like, people don't know because
I probably do a poor job of messaging it even though it's in the heading text of every newsletter. It's like, "You can become a patron." But then that thing just becomes invisible. You know, people skip that.
Yeah, exactly. Right. You don't, you don't look at it. Mm-hmm.
So, um, this is another thing I'm, I'm exploring this year is, like, a campaign to let people know that there is a Patreon, that they can become a member for, you know, $4 a month, and, um, I...
But it's like what you were talking about with Melanie. Like, I actually think $1 a week for some people, it might not actually be, um, life-changing, but it feels that way when- Yeah...
they have been out of work for six months or a year, or- It's another straw on the camel's back. Yeah. It's just something else, um, that adds up. So I get why it's a psychological hurdle to do that.
Also, just from a user experience perspective, it's a hurdle. [laughs] Like, people are like, "What do you mean? I just signed up. Now I have to go to the Patreon and sign up?" So,
um, there are other platforms that do this better than Mailchimp. So, so yeah. I understand why people do not sign up as patrons. Um, but it's also just never been my primary focus.
Like, I, like I said, I focus on the people who are doing the hiring. They're the people who should be paying me. Yeah. No, totally. The people who are hiring, who are looking for work. Um, I would love...
I'll tell you, this consultant who I'm working with was like, "Rachel, your patron subscription rate is.4% of your subscriber base." [laughs] "We can get that to 1%." Yeah. Like, 1% is not
a, that is not a, a, you know, a high bar. Yeah. So my goal this year is to get to 1% [laughs] on Patreon. Um, and I know that to do that, I'm gonna have to actually let people know that a Patreon exists. Yeah. So yeah.
I think I have heard consistently over the years how much the newsletter means to people. I know what people spend on coffee and sandwiches in New York and Los Angeles. I think
a lot of people could give, give a dollar a week. Um, and I'm hoping to, to get there soon. [laughs] Yeah. You will. Yeah. Uh, okay. Earlier, you said that you are no longer working a full-time job.
For a long time, you were working a full-time job while also doing this, and I do wanna hear about-...
the, the amount of work that goes into this and how that's fluctuated over the years, especially as you've gotten more dialed in and more submissions.
But for how long have you been not working a full-time job and able to support yourself partially through, uh, what comes in through Words of Mouth? I've been working freelance part-time since December 2019. Oh, wow.
Um, so just in time- [laughs]... for everything to go offline. What happened then? Yeah. Um, and yeah, I've been working between 9 and 20 hours a week on contract work over that time.
I will say recently I've been working, like, less contract and more book and newsletter stuff, um, than ever before, which has been great. Do you have like, do you have like a, a lower limit?
Like, I need at least X- X, Y, Z jobs. How many jobs is that? I have a template in the, in my, uh, like my newsletter has a template where there's just, like, a set... [laughs] I don't even know how many it is.
I think it's 30. Um- There was 31 in Monday's, I can tell you that. Okay, okay. So yeah, it's like 30, and I f- I aim to fill that, and then I'll go over sometimes.
And very rarely I'll, honest- around holidays and sometimes in the summer I'll have to take out empty listings, but I try to fill it up. Yeah. What about the calls? Yeah.
So in, in, in Monday's, Monday, February 9th, there was 31 jobs, six classified ads, and 26 calls for, for grants, incubator applications, residenc- residency applications, and, like, art and writing submissions. Mm-hmm.
What about the calls? So the calls come in a lot through my email, just like jobs. Um, people who are hosting an exhibition and they wanna invite proposals or submissions.
Um, res- people who host residencies, they wanna invite applicants. So most of those I get through direct submission. Occasionally I'll also find one or two or three. Yeah.
I try not to post too many of those 'cause they just take up a lot of space, and then they, I keep them in the newsletter through the deadline. So every week I have three empty spaces for calls.
Um, so yeah, those are, they're basically, I find them the same way as I find jobs. And- Mm-hmm... um, I, I like the calls because they can be really, really diverse.
Like, it can be kind of your standard residency, but it can also be, like someone submitted a job this week for a free writing workshop that's meeting, like,
uh, for a week or something, where it's, you're meet- you get to meet with an au- like work with an author, um, and it's free. And it's like you can just apply, and it's for Muslim women and gender non-conforming folks.
And I just, anything that's free where it's, like, open to people- Yeah...
and you're just giving them an opportunity that bene- Like, it's just, [laughs] it's rare, and I really like to call attention to those 'cause, um, again, it's like the classifieds.
Like, people just don't have- Platform... you need to, you need to partner with people who have platforms in order to do that, and, um, it's, it's hard.
It's hard to find, to get access, so I like to share kinda smaller things. Oh, and like, I share a lot of calls for journals that are just starting out. Like- Mm-hmm...
there are a lot of Gen Z-ers who just [laughs] really love making magazines, and, and so they'll po- God bless them. Yeah.
[laughs] So they'll post via Words of Mouth, and they'll be like, "We filled the whole magazine [laughs] with people who submitted from Words of Mouth," or like so it seems. Mm.
And, and that's cool because they're like little subcultures, you know? It's not for everyone, um, but it's for enough people that it's, it's like, it's kind of earned its spot in, in the newsletter.
And, like, there's someone out there fulfilling their dream because they got to post about their new textile publication, and the first issue's theme is octopus, and everyone, there's like, you know, 15 people for whom that's a perfect fit.
Yeah. And they're like, "This is my dream come true." And that's kind of, like those little connections, um, is what I, like, I really am kind of proud of and, and so happy to, to steward and facilitate.
In this way, like, I don't know, maybe this is reductive, but I feel like Words of Mouth is sort of this, like, central casting or recruitment agency for this certain segment of, like, liberal-minded creative class people who probably live in New York, maybe LA, other cities too.
But it's like, like, that's, I mean, I say that as part of that demographic, right? But it's like- Yeah... central casting [laughs] for that demographic. I know. I, I want, I think there- [sighs]...
someone should do, like, a parody satire of, like, the, the Words of Mouth reader and- Yeah... like, what their bio would be, because there's definitely a satire, yeah. You know, but you know what this is?
The, maybe, uh, here's another way to use your platform and put the thumb on the scale for young talent.
Maybe there's, like, a, a cartoon, a little comic every week in there, and, and you, you have rotating people, uh, make, making such parodies.
I've wanted to do something like that for a long time, like feature work from readers and somehow just call attention to- Well, but this, this-... maybe people in the audience.
But- Sorry to interrupt, but I feel like this goes back to what you were saying about, like, well, do I really wanna build this editorial around this? Exactly, yeah.
Like, what if it's, like, really about this one function? And totally, 'cause there are people who would open the newsletter and be like, "I do not care. Just show me the jobs." Yeah, exactly.
"That's the only reason I'm here." And that might be the majority of readers, I would think. I do.
Okay, well, actually this, this, uh, I, I interviewed this guy, Surge Kapoor, um, in the summer, and he has a, a links roundup newsletter, um, aggregation newsletter where it's, i- he, he started it when he was working at a VC firm, and it was this internal newsletter that he made to serve, uh, the often young-Tech founders and like engineers at their portfolio companies where it's like, "Here's really good writing and thinking that you should read that'll, like, make you a better manager and smarter," and all this kind of stuff.
Uh, and he added a comic, uh, I think he's been doing it now for like, I forget, it's like eight years or something, and eventually he left and they gave it to him 'cause they didn't wanna run it anymore, and now he makes his living doing it and running ads in it.
But he added a comic, and I remember him say... Like, I really liked the comic. I was like, "Oh, this is so fun." And he said that, um, he'd gotten great feedback on it. So that's, that's one data point for you.
Oh, people liked it. People liked the comic. People liked it. Ooh.
Yeah, 'cause otherwise it's like his newsletter it's, I think it's seven links, and it's like one paragraph he writes sort of summarizing the main point of each, and that was it.
Um, so it's a little more condensed than yours. Mm-hmm. But to that point, I have often spoken to people whose newsletter or product is a form of aggregation, curation, editing.
Um, Casey Lewis was an early person I spoke to for this and, you know, she rhine- rounds up like four headlines, four or five headlines from Gen Z culture every week.
There's, uh, the aptly named Links I Would Gchat You If We Were Friends by Caitlin Dewey.
There's a bunch more of people I've interviewed who, whose like the core of their work is finding links, content from around the internet and aggregating it with new context, and that's what you do as well. So in that,
with all that context, three words, aggregation, curation, editing. What are the differences between these words to you? Aggregation I think of as... Actually, I think what you just described is my process over the week.
Mm. So aggregation is I start by just kind of pulling in everything that might be interesting, and this is very, um, like ad hoc, like, uh... Ad hoc's not the right word. This is very intuitive. It's like- Yeah...
I don't have to read the full job listing. I will just save, save, save, save, save, ignore, save, ignore, save, ignore. And then after I have like a critical mass, that's when I go in and I think, "Is this right?"
Read a little bit more, Google something, um, and I'll decide to feature it or not. And then as the newsletter fills out, I become, like, more sensitive to what's already in the newsletter.
Like, where does it need to balance out? Are there too many senior level roles? Do I wanna do something, like are there, is there, is it all New York this week? Do I need to feature some- one in LA?
Um, you know, do I wanna do something... Like, do I wanna feature one that's more like a hands-on job, you know, manual? Um, is, are there too many comms roles?
But all of that calculus is happening, uh, kind of like s- like on a subterranean level. Yeah. Like I'm, I'm not like checking things off on an inventory spreadsheet, you know?
It's just at this point like really kind of baked into my fingers. And,
um, so I'd say like the aggregation and the curation are both intuitive, but they have like different points of emphasis and, and attention given to them.
Um, the curation takes the longest because I need to be thoughtful and I will also need to kind of like go out on expeditions and find things to fill in and, um, replace certain things.
Um, and I guess that's the editing, too. So editing and curation go hand-in-hand. Like it's, it's, um, uh, curation is editing in this case. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. That makes sense.
Yeah, it's like the harvesting and the quality control. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Harvesting. Uh, okay. Let's, let's talk about the book. So you are publishing an anthology about looking for work.
It is called Search Work: A Collective Inquiry into the Job Hunt. You first put out the call for pitches, uh, about one year ago, I think January, February 2025. And pitches, I think you gave about a month for pitches.
You received 1,100. There are 30 contributions in the book. And it's a way of honoring a decade of doing this work, right? Yeah.
I saw the decade anniversary on the horizon last year, and I had just a wild idea [laughs] that I would make a book because- [laughs]... um, that seemed like a fun thing to do.
And I also was very cognizant of the fact that the newsletter exists on my website. It is an archive page with, you know, hundreds of links, and that just didn't feel like enough of a, of an, a, a record.
Like, I wanted there to be an artifact for this community and this project. So, um, also I'm an editor and I like books, and I thought this would be a great way to collaborate with people from the newsletter community.
Because like I said, I don't get to really interact with people that often, so I wanted to bring other people's voices into the conversation. It's not just me.
It's like how can I, um, share the depth and complexity of this experience, which I just think about so much- Mm-hmm... and is so, uh, im- it's just so important to the human experience- Yeah...
and has not been explored in critical ways. And I wanted to give... I thought, you know, I think Words of Mouth readers are like the perfect people to do that exploration right now and put it on paper
and start this conversation. So yeah, I decided to make a collaborative book. Um, I love collaborating, but I do a lot of work alone. So I work remotely. I, the newsletter's all me. I do not have any employees.
Um- How's this consultant you're working with? Uh, is that like the first person you've... Well, you've worked with somebody on the design. Yeah. Hannah Nathans is a friend. And she, that was very, like, siloed work.
Like we would, we've done like a few rounds over the course of 10 years of like- Okay. Yeah... revamping certain things. So it's not ongoing.
Um-And yeah, so this is the first time I would be like really collaborating with people on something related to the newsletter, and I wanted that really badly. Hmm.
I really wanted to open up my, my practice and my work to collaboration last year and, and I certainly did. I, um, I found four contributing editors, all of whom are newsletter readers, um, some of whom I knew.
Others came from re- their own, from their referrals, like within, you know, this group of four. Um, and we... They became kind of like my, my brain trust and- Mm-hmm... and my core collaborators on this project.
Um, yeah, we got 1,100 pitches through the pitch call. We chose, I think we chose 20, somewhere in the 20s. Um, we had to cut a couple pieces in the process, 'cause that's show business.
[laughs] And then I commissioned two other pieces. Um, and then we also feature, uh, dozens of like mini stories, mini quotes in the book that are also from Words of Mouth readers.
So at a certain point, um, we were in, like a few months into the editorial process, I sent a survey out to the, um, to readers, and I was like...
I don't remember exactly the question I asked actually, but it was maybe something like, "Tell me a job hunting story in 40 words or less." Um, and so those, combined with some
excerpts from pitches that were not accepted, 'cause there were so many good pitches that we couldn't accept. Wow.
So a lot of the pitches that we couldn't accept, we excerpted into short quotes, and we have four text collages in the book that feature like dozens of little stories and voices.
So the point being, like there are just so many stories that we could not fit in this book about job hunting.
It's so many different things to so many people, so here's just like a little, a smattering of, of those stories, of the spectrum of experiences related to job hunting. We managed to pull it together pretty quickly.
So there was very rigorous editorial process from like May through September, um, and then we just sent the final production files off last week. So it's shipping in March.
[laughs] Um, pre-orders are open, and I'm so excited because somehow it's just like magic that it actually lined up where like this 10-year anniversary year we actually have this artifact that opens the project up to the wider world, where people who've never heard of Words of Mouth, who do not live in New York or other metro areas in the States, um, will learn about the project.
But more importantly, they will get to be involved in this conversation about job hunting and what it means and what it does to us, and maybe how to make it better, and, um...
Yeah, so it's a big, it's a big moment, and I'm really excited that the people who are in the book get to have their stories told. It's a lot of first-time- Yeah...
not first-time writers, but people who haven't had work published, um, in, you know, in a, in a way that can, allows for a lot of people to hear their stories. In an artifact as, like that, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
And that was one of my early, um...
Before I had decided on it being a book, I was like, should I start a kind of like a, a residency publication, where every month I publish a piece from someone, uh, about, you know, loosely related to work or job hunting, um, and as a way to give people an opportunity- Mm-hmm...
to be published? 'Cause I thought, I was thinking a lot about the t- at the time about how there's just so many people out there who wanna get their work out in the world.
And, um, a lot of my audience is, is, are writers and- Yes... um, so I was thinking a lot about those people. And, you know, obviously this is, I did not wanna do a sustaining project, like that had no end date.
That scares me a lot for a lot of reasons, but I thought the book is perfect because it's gonna be a lot of work, and then it's gonna be done.
It's gonna exist in the world, and it can bring a lot of people together in one shared space. So, so that's what we did. You already have one sustaining, endless project, so there- Exactly...
there's no need to, to add another. Exactly. Yeah. Had you ever edited something like this or been involved in publishing any sort of book in, in any of your day jobs maybe?
Um, I, I've done a lot of collaborative editing, mostly for journal pieces and, and like essays, and, um, not necessarily books. Hmm. So it was my first book project. Yeah, yeah. That's awesome. Mm-hmm. Are you...
Did you have to spend a lot of money to make this? Are you, is it paying for itself? Yeah. No, no. What did it take like resource-wise? I spent a lot of money, yeah. Yeah. [laughs] Um, I paid everyone.
So I, I paid my editors. Um, I paid contributors. I wish I could've paid them more, but I, I paid everyone, you know, out of
my pocket, but I just kind of thought of it as, it's like the newsletter's paying them. And- Yeah... um, and then I did run a fundraiser in the fall to sort of try to recoup some of the costs.
Um, I'm working with a publisher also who gave me a small advance, but it's like a radical leftist publisher- Yeah. [laughs]...
that works out of like a 10-foot space in the East Village, and they're absolutely the perfect partners for me, but they do not have giant budgets. So they gave me a s- a small advance, which I'm grateful for. Mm-hmm.
Um, and who knows? Maybe because it was so small, I'll actually get a good amount of royalties, [laughs] you know, down the road. I, I... It's like, it doesn't matter.
It's like [laughs] I kinda went into this being like, "You're gonna lose money. Hopefully you'll break even." Um, I just felt really, really passionately about doing this, and I did not
do the math beforehand, 'cause I knew if I did, I wouldn't wanna do it- Yeah... 'cause the math wouldn't make sense. But I actually do, I do not think I'm ultimately losing money on it, too much money on it.
[laughs] Well, I'm gonna purchase a copy. And anybody who's listened this far into the podcast, I hope you go purchase a copy. Wait, where should people find it? Is it on wordsofmouth.org or...? Yes. So you can...
It's linked on my website right now. Um, you can also go to orbooks.com- Mm... orbooks.com, and you can search the catalog for Search Work. It's, uh, yeah, we're taking pre-orders, and it'll ship next month.
So there's also a launch event on April 1st in the East Village where you can buy copies. Nice. I'll come to that. Mm-hmm.
Is there anything else that you, that we haven't mentioned that you wanna get into before we wrap it up? I don't think so. I think this was great. It was fun to unpack. Awesome. Good.
I, happy to give you the platform for it. [laughs] Thank you for coming on. [outro music] Hi there. My name's Tom. I'm the producer of the Creative Spotlight Podcast.
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