Performance analysis across sends, with narrative summaries for leadership and detailed breakdowns for the strategy team.
Field Notes reached 2,847 subscribers this month, up 6.2% from last month. Open rates averaged 24.8% across four sends. The March 28 issue on financial intelligence pulled strongest at 27.1%.
Question-format subject lines pulled 5+ more points of opens than wrap-up sends. Readers responded to Courtney's diagnostic voice on all four sends this period.
Readers clicked through to the Planning to Scale book page more than any other destination (41% of all clicks). The book is doing the work of pulling people deeper into Forge's content. Unsubscribes are flat at 0.2% per send, healthy for this list size and cadence.
One thing to watch: the February wrap-up pulled a 21.3% open rate and the highest unsub rate of the period (0.29%). Recap-style sends underperform across the board. Either drop the format or rebuild it around an argument.
Average open rate by content theme over the last 12 sends. Themes are tagged from the body of each newsletter.
| Date | Subject Line | Sent | Open Rate | Click Rate | Top CTA | Unsubs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 28 | What your financial reports aren't telling you On voice | 2,847 | 27.1% | 0.9% | Book page | 0.18% |
| Mar 14 | The delegation trap nobody warns you about On voice | 2,790 | 24.6% | 0.8% | Workshop | 0.21% |
| Feb 28 | Field Notes: February wrap-up Drift | 2,734 | 21.3% | 0.3% | Blog | 0.29% |
| Feb 14 | Why your best people keep leaving On voice | 2,681 | 26.1% | 0.9% | Workshop Blog | 0.15% |
Three actions for the next quarter, based on this period's data.
Question subjects pulled the strongest opens this period (26.4% avg) because they activate Courtney's diagnostic voice. That's where engagement is coming from.
Forge's audience — founders, COOs, CFOs at Series B+ — burns out on curiosity-bait subject lines faster than typical lists. Two months of over-rotation pulls open rates back toward baseline. Pair question subjects with crisp directive lines that respect their time.
February's recap shipped without a thesis carrying it. Five topics summarized in chronological order with no argument tying them together. Readers saw inventory and tuned out. 21.3% open rate, 0.29% unsubs — both worst-of-period.
Recap sends compound when they carry an argument. The minimum bar: one big idea, three sends that proved it, what changes for the reader. Drop the format if you can't carry that load. Don't ship inventory.
Book-page CTR is currently 41% of all clicks. Most of that is launch novelty. Newly launched titles typically see CTR halve by month three and settle 50–70% below peak. The next 60 days will move more traffic through the book page than any other 60-day stretch this year.
Capture book-readers' info on the book page itself, route them to a workshop or diagnostic assessment, and build the post-book sequence (workshop → assessment → call) before traffic decays. By June, the book page should rotate behind workshop and diagnostic CTAs in send priority. Right now it's leading every send.
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