Good morning! Today’s edition of the Vietnam Weekly is out of the ordinary, and I’m taking a break from mid-week paid subscriber articles by making this available to everyone.
The exclusive articles will return next week with a review of the year for Vietnam as we hit 2024’s mid-point.
I recently realized that I missed the Vietnam Weekly’s sixth birthday back in April and - inspired in part by the transparency of Tanmoy Goswami of Sanity By Tanmoy and Bill Shaner of Worcester Sucks and I Love It - I’m taking this opportunity to give you a peek at the numbers behind the newsletter.
When the Vietnam Weekly debuted on April 20, 2018, I had no real goals other than a desire to fill (partially, at least) a void in English-language analysis of the country.
The first post covered the arrests of government officials for land-related crimes and an update on Vingroup - my, how things haven’t changed, though I’m proud that the newsletter has come a long way from simply aggregating a few short news items.
You can explore all previous editions in the archive, though anything older than three months is behind the paywall.
The information void that spurred this newsletter, of course, still exists.
Over the years, multiple people have told me that this is their sole source of information on Vietnam - that is simultaneously flattering and frightening, as I certainly can’t cover everything and make no claim to do so. (Plus people should look for Vietnamese voices.)
To be honest, I’m surprised nobody else has tried something similar. There’s more than enough happening here to accommodate numerous independent newsletters, but here we are.
Where do the numbers stand?
The Data
When asked face-to-face, I’m more than happy to share these details, but I haven’t shared subscriber data publicly before - at least not to my knowledge.
In terms of total readership, I couldn’t be happier with how things have gone. The overall subscriber count is 7,339, and growth has never stopped.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F13d1a8d9-9ad2-4134-9527-acb2205f3026_1441x696.jpeg)
You’ll notice a few spikes over time - that bulge in mid-2021 coincided with the hard lockdown in Ho Chi Minh City when people (especially foreign residents like me) wondered what the hell was going on due to confusing official messaging.
So, that’s all great. I tend to pick up a few new readers daily, and you are an engaged audience - posts average a 40-45% open rate, considerably higher than the general newsletter average.
Paying subscribers, meanwhile, have flatlined. I’m very happy with growth over time, but there’s been a lot of churn in recent weeks, and the current number of paid readers is 660, down from the early May peak of 670.
This is in line with the 5-10% paid reader conversion rate that Substack claims is normal - I’m currently at 9.13%, which is inarguably good!
Revenue over time tracks with the number of paid subscribers, though I left out the y-axis as I’m not comfortable sharing quite that much financial info. Still, you can see that it has plateaued.
This is challenging to analyze, as interest in Vietnam is growing thanks to its geopolitical and economic importance - as my growing overall audience indicates.
Attracting and retaining readers willing to pay for your work is the most difficult part of any project run by an individual creator. That said, I’m always open to feedback and would love to hear what would create more value for readers.
Adding an administrative note as well - sometimes subscribers drop due to banking/billing issues and I always reach out to people when this happens, but rarely get a response. This may be because the emails are coming from my personal account - so if you see an email from matatarski@gmail.com, that’s me!
Setting that aside, I don’t mean to sound doubtful of where things are going. Total traffic has never been higher, and I see no reason why this upward trend won’t continue - one aim is to reach as many people as possible, and that’s happening.
The state of the Vietnam Weekly, then, is pretty strong. I’m pleased with the reception to the podcast, though this is a particularly difficult format to quantify.
At the start of the year, I had promised more collaborations with other newsletter writers - that hasn’t panned out yet, and I’m still weighing whether to take the leap into short-form video. This has been a one-man team from the start, and further expansion would likely require bringing someone on to help.
Whatever this evolves into in the future, I’m beyond grateful to everyone who has supported me over the last six years. I genuinely enjoy writing the newsletter (both the free and paid editions!) every week and have connected with many great people from around the world while learning an incredible amount about Vietnam.
I look forward to continuing these conversations - and don’t forget to share the newsletter with your friends, family members, and colleagues interested in Vietnam!
If you have any questions or comments, just hit ‘reply’ to this email.
Back Friday with the weekly recap.
Mike Tatarski
You do a great job, thanks - essential content for so many people. When’s your book deal contract coming through? 👏👏👏👏
I appreciate your newsletter! Thank you for sharing your analysis.