Thank You FinTech Community!
This week we hit an exciting milestone — our 100th newsletter!
It’s not an easy task to produce resource-filled content week-in and week-out, but we made it.
I wanted to take a pause and reflect back on how we started this whole journey and give context on where we want to go with future content.
our vision at the BEGinning
6 years is a long time to be writing on the same topic.
I started this website back in 2017 to serve as a helpful resource for the industry’s early adopters & enthusiasts to learn about the financial services innovation. At that time, there was minimal awareness of FinTech as an emerging sector. No industry insider was openly writing about innovation in finance & technology OR posting weekly content.
The challenge boiled down to consistency AND desire. Proper planning and time management can make consistency less challenging. Maintaining a calendar and blocking out time slot is most of the battle. Desire is more difficult as it can fluctuate based on other priorities.
On the plus side, there’s a continuous flow of new products, new founding teams, and growth in FinTech. The dynamic nature of this global industry and pace of change has kept me engaged for over a decade. I’m constantly learning and gaining new insights from events and working experience.
WITH MOMENTUM in PLACE, what next?
Back in September 2020, I published my 100th article with FinTechtris.
This particular post reflected on my personal journey (from retail banking to FinTech) and my new focus with the community — to share actionable, domain expertise in building new platforms.
From 2019, I leveled up my career with hands-on FinTech experience (in the bank-fintech partnership sector with Banking-as-a-Service). New articles contained perspectives from risk reviews, program approvals, and trends from actual platforms with deposit, credit, and crypto products.
In meeting with hundreds of founders & product teams, the outstanding revelation was the amount of conflicting information across the industry. There was so much variability in how to structure a basic deposit & card program — from account types, flow of funds, limits, and Know Your Customer (KYC) requirements.
This blocker lead to poor due diligence, decision-making, and a loss of time & resources. Education was the gap I sought to address with the next 100+ articles.
The same questions that I was answering in weekly meetings & calls came from a lack of awareness:
What’s needed to launch a banking program?
How should I evaluate infrastructure partners?
What will I be asked for from banks?
What types of programs are likely to be approved?
I wanted an avenue to share key industry insights and news in a direct & automated manner — the FinTechtris Weekly newsletter (launched at the end of 2020) was the best way to do so.
FINTECHTRIS WEEKLY — from ‘1 to 100’
Substack was an easy-to-use platform to start a new (newsletter) channel.
It’s easier to be more conversational, open, and authentic about industry perspectives through a newsletter. There’s a ‘closeness’ with readers who are able to provide immediate feedback though ‘likes’, comments, emails, forwarding newsletters, and new signups. Metrics are updated frequently to show new subscribers, number of views, and open rates.
The difficulty comes from the weekly cadence of publishing AND finding ways to avoid content from becoming stagnant.
In 2021, I made it all the way to September with weekly publishing but got so busy with closing new partnerships that I stopped. I picked it pack up at the end of January 2022, but stopped again in May and only published 2 more times before the end of that year.
I made a firm (final) commitment at the start of 2023 to stay consistent from January to December. In going from #53 to #100 this year, I gained critical insights:
Understand your audience — with the abundance of newsletters covering the same topic, a differentiator comes from designing weekly posts for specific readers (instead of a general audience); a new-to-industry professional will be interested in topics that don’t match what industry veterans demand;
Be clear on the value being offered — newsletters can be great aggregators of industry news, provide in-depth analysis on a topic, or act as an educational resource for a segment of professionals; spell out your value clearly from the start;
Be concise with content — this may seem obvious, but it’s easy to get carried away and cover a laundry list of topics; avoid being all over the place with coverage (which is easier said than done);
Easy-to-follow, ‘readable’ format — readability increases the likelihood that a newsletter is read from start to finish; this can be as simple as smaller paragraphs, quality visuals, and informative subheadings;
Iterate and update regularly — Review key metrics and engagement on a monthly basis; ask for reader feedback often; combine the two to refresh content & formatting;
The above takeaways can change based on setting milestones for the year such as number of subscribers. Also, a free newsletter or one charging a subscription can make certain criteria more important than others (e.g. value being offered).
COMMITMENT for 2024
It’s time for us to iterate and kickoff the New Year with a new approach.
There’s too much variety in content being featured. Between the topic of the week, industry news, and funding milestones, it becomes difficult to grasp what the community should take away. Publishing a lengthy, dense essay with layers of content isn’t reader-friendly either.
Here’s what we will execute going forward:
Be a convenient industry resource that saves members time in sifting through multiple sources (websites, newsletters, blogs);
Be a community hub for new perspectives, analysis, or insights on key topics;
To this end, we’ll be separating out industry news & milestones into its own newsletter discussion and cover community discussion topics in parallel.
Starting in January, we’ll shift to more weekly touchpoints in brief, 5-min reads:
Weekly news & milestones every Tuesday and Thursday: A cadence of 2x weekly will prevent a specific newsletter fro becoming too lengthty;
Saturday’s ‘Weekly Recap’: This is a review of the week (including any new updates from Thursday and Friday) and a discussion topic for community members to participate in;
These smaller, concise newsletters can be read in coffee breaks throughout the week and keep the community informed about the financial services industry without any heavy lifting.
For industry veterans, investors, and operators/builders, we’ll plan ahead with in-depth pieces on product design, business models, and go-to-market (GTM) strategy — however, this would be a monthly/quarterly basis as an add-on option.
We’re excited to get this new format going soon AND make changes based on community feedback!
Join our community @FinTechtris for more industry content & insights (including deep dives & sector spotlights).
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