The Future
Looking ahead, there are many directions this can go. The first goal is to expand the breadth of the content channels – especially, creating some more “serial feeds” where new subscribers start with the first in the series rather than the latest. These serial feeds could be used to create an educational series on different topics – spread over 30 days (microns). Additionally, channels could also move beyond text to have rich content – images, animations, audio or embedded video.
The second idea is to “platformise” MyToday – making it possible for publishers to create a channel on their own and start their own service. Since there is a double opt-in for subscribers, there is no worry that publishers can spam their subscriber lists. This will help us scale it out and offer a breadth of choices to subscribers.
The third possibility is to build in the option of payment for creators – on the lines of what Substack and ScrollStack are doing.
There are more ideas: use a combination of an app and WhatsApp for subscription management, allow subscribers to set the time they want to receive the content, automate the content for some channels, bring in AMP and dynamic content in the emails to showcase the power of the medium by enabling greater interactivity (can be especially useful for puzzles and real-time updates), and maybe even create our own email inbox service just for MyToday. The possibilities are many.
Of course, first MyToday has to work. My operating belief with all new projects is that they are failures until they succeed. So, a lot has to be done to create a service that people like and spreads virally. Three key metrics that are important for me are: R (reproduction number) for MyToday needs to become 2 (so that each person brings in two new subscribers), S (average subscriptions per person) needs to be 3, and the T (the time between an email arriving in the inbox and it being read) needs to be less than an hour.
MyToday is both a B2C and B2B initiative. I am trying my hands again at B2C after a long time. A lot has changed in the world in the past decade. Mine is an idea from the past. Will it work? Let’s see!
