Life’s a Journey, Not a Destination (So Is Blogging)

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I’ve been thinking a lot about AI lately. My website is small, my Twitter is mostly filled with follow-for-follow accounts, and my YouTube isn’t even worth mentioning. Still, I get flooded with spam.

It’s sad. But it’s also impressive.

Scammers have built massive automated systems that spray their nonsense into every corner of the internet—no matter how small.

The OnlyFans e-girl sphere slides into my DMs. The AI entrepreneurs fill my inbox. Political grifters want me to share their stuff. It’s everywhere, all the time. Before long, real, authentic content might make up just 1% of the internet—while the rest is bots and scammers trying to sell junk to each other.

That made me stop and ask myself: How do you even find an audience in an environment like this?

The only answer I can think of: do what the scammers don’t do.

What does that mean?

Here’s an altered version of the kind of email I get at least once a day: The best all-in-one AI solution to grow your business!

Scam products are always the best, the first, the ultimate, the final solution. The price is always free to join, the lowest, the best, discounted, limited-time only.

What you never see is: Watch us develop in real time. Give us feedback on our startup. Help us improve. See us fail until we succeed.

Scammers can only sell if it’s “the best,” “free to join,” and “only available for a limited time.” So they never advertise the real truth, they advertise only bullshit.

But I don’t have to play that game. I can tell you that I’m still learning, trying, testing, failing. I can write about the book that didn’t sell, the blog post no one read, the Twitter account nobody follows. By doing that, I become something AI never will: human.

Life’s a journey, not a destination, they say. The same goes for blogging—at least when you’re human. Plans fall apart, we fail more often than we succeed. Why not write about that too? Why not write about failing 99 times until the 100th try becomes a success?

I believe this isn’t just the future of blogging. It’s already the present.

The Mailing Service I Use For My Newsletter

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Finding a mailing service that actually fit my (very basic) needs turned out to be a nerve-wracking process. After trying out about a dozen platforms over multiple weeks—and fully setting up a few of them—I finally settled on MailerLite.

This isn’t a sponsored recommendation. I just want to document what I’m doing as I try to build an audience for my writing. There may be even better options out there, and if I come across one, I will switch. But for now, MailerLite checked all the boxes I cared about:

  • A free entry-level plan
  • A built-in (and free) autoresponder
  • No overbearing marketing nonsense
  • An easy-to-use dashboard

Currently, MailerLite lets you use its service for free with up to 500 subscribers. I’m nowhere near that. At the moment, my mailing list has exactly two subscribers—both from personal connections.

I expect my numbers to stay low for months, maybe even years. That’s why I wasn’t looking for a pricey provider that would charge me $20 monthly just to send an email to two people—something I could easily do manually as well. If I ever grow a real audience and start making money from my work, I’ll happily pay. But until then, I don’t want to fund my writing project with money from other projects. So free was a must.

The biggest dealbreaker with most services was their so-called “free tier.” Many offered it, but without an autoresponder. I specifically needed an autoresponder so that new subscribers would automatically receive a free book I’ve written exclusively for them, called Endless.

For example, Mailchimp doesn’t include an autoresponder unless you’re on a paid plan, even if you only have a handful of subscribers. MailerLite, fortunately, does.

Another point that mattered to me: I didn’t want to be bombarded with marketing and sales pitches the moment I signed up. The worst experience I had was with a service called Kit. On paper, it seemed perfect—free plan, autoresponder included, easy setup. I spent about an hour getting everything ready, only for them to lock my account after the setup until I scheduled a mandatory sales chat with one of their reps. My entire setup was deactivated until I listened to their pitch for a paid plan. Honestly, that was one of the most disgusting business practices I’ve ever seen. My advice: avoid Kit completely.

So far, MailerLite hasn’t annoyed me once. Setup was smooth, everything works, it just does what I need it to do, and it’s all free.

For now, if you’re starting out and looking for a mailing service for your own list, I can recommend: MailerLite

You’ll need to sign up for the mailing list again to get the free book (sorry!).

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I apologize to everyone who already subscribed, but Mailchimp restricted my account because I refused to give them my phone number. As a result, I no longer have access to the old list and can’t import it into the new email provider I set up yesterday.

So, if you were already subscribed and you’d like to get the free book, I can’t send it to you directly—you’ll need to re-enter your email address using the form here: Newsletter. Once you do, you should automatically receive an email with the book.

Sorry again for the inconvenience.

The bottom line:
Having a mailing list is just another thing you don’t truly own. The provider controls it, and they can do whatever they want with it. It’s like social media—your account can be banned and years of work can vanish in an instant, leaving you no way to reach your audience.

That’s the reality of much of the internet today.

Setting up a mailing list is painful

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Oh boy, setting up a mailing list turned out to be a huge pain in the butt. It was an odyssey I didn’t need.

I remember doing it more than 10 years ago, and back then it was pretty easy. I used Mailchimp, which was intuitive and even offered fair free plans for beginners.

So naturally, my first impulse was to return to Mailchimp. But wow, things have changed. The backend is such a mess that just finding your way around is so consuming. Sure, designing forms and emails comes with way more options nowadays, but beginners don’t need all that. Give us a simple, clean interface to get started—don’t confuse us with dozens of options we can’t even use on a free plan anyway.

Yet, what really killed it for me was that Mailchimp no longer offers autoresponder emails on free plans. Since I wanted to give away a free book to new subscribers, this was the one feature I needed most. I don’t have an audience yet, no big mailing list to import—I’m literally starting at zero. So why would I pay right away for a service that won’t make me money in the foreseeable future? Once the list grows, I’ll gladly pay. But not before.

And then came the final straw: they told me today that unless I hand over my phone number for two-factor authentication, I won’t even be able to sign in anymore.

Give us your money. Give us your data. Give us your soul.

So yeah… adios, Mailchimp.

Next, I tried Kit (formerly ConvertKit). At first, things looked promising. The interface was so much better—clean, intuitive, perfect for beginners. And they even offered autoresponders in the free tier. I thought I had finally found my service.

But not so fast, kiddo. Just an hour after setting everything up, most of my account functions were suddenly disabled. The only way to unlock them? Go through a forced conversation with support about how their service could “elevate my business.”

Excuse me? I don’t have a business. I’m an indie author starting from scratch. I don’t want to buy—I just want to try. Maybe in a few years this will turn into more than a hobby, and then sure, I’ll pay. But not before I even get my first subscriber.

So after wasting two hours building a mailing list with an autoresponder, Kit basically locked me out unless I sat through a sales pitch I never asked for.

Therefore: Goodbye, Kit.

For now, I’ve moved on to a smaller service called MailerLite. They seem to allow free autoresponders, at least until you hit 500 subscribers. Who knows, maybe in an hour, tomorrow, or two weeks from now they’ll pull the same nonsense as Kit and Mailchimp.

But at the moment, the mailing list is working. I’ve tested it myself. If you haven’t subscribed yet, go check it out—you’ll get a free book in return for your email address.

And if MailerLite also starts annoying me, well… the odyssey will continue. And I’ll definitely keep you posted.

Get My Latest Book “Endless” For Free

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I finally finished setting up my newsletter form. It’s been quite an odyssey, and I’m still not 100% sure if it will remain stable in the future. But I tested it today, and it definitely works for now.

If you sign up with your email here: https://michaelbrig.com/newsletter/ you’ll automatically receive an email from me with a link to my latest book, which you can download as a free PDF (in English and German).

I hope you enjoy reading it!

Best regards,
Brig