How You Can Harness the Power of Recurring Revenue as a Writer
By Michele Peterson

Did you know …

The average American buys a home once every 13 years.

And homeowners who use a professional housecleaning service get their homes cleaned once every 2-4 weeks, or 12-26 times per year.

That means homeowners do business with housecleaning companies anywhere from 156 to 338 times in the same 13 years that they do business once with a realtor.

So, would you rather be a realtor with a once-in-a-while revenue business model or run a housecleaning company with a recurring revenue business model?

Before you give a final answer, let’s look at the estimated revenue in each case …

Buying and selling real estate agents typically split the 6% commission on the sale of a home. So, each would make $12,678 on a $422,600 home sale (the national average in 2025) from a single client in 13 years.

On the other hand, if the housecleaning company was getting the national average of $200 per cleaning visit, it would make $31,200-$67,600 from a single client in 13 years.

Did your answer change seeing that you can make 3-5 times more from the same single client who does recurring, repeat business with you?

That’s the power of the recurring revenue business model. And it’s a power you can harness as a writer, too.

One of the easiest ways to do it for us as writers is by writing email newsletters.

The Basics of Email Newsletters

Email newsletters are formatted emails sent on a regular basis to give readers valuable content. They tend to be informational and/or entertaining. But either way, they’re conversational and can be super fun to write.

Email newsletters are short (generally 1,200-1,500 words). And they’re typically sent on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly schedule.

That’s a regular, recurring schedule for sending email newsletters, AND regular, recurring revenue for the writer producing the content needed for those newsletters.

In addition to being short, simple, and regularly recurring, a key characteristic of email newsletters is that they are not directly sales-y or overly promotional. Rather, an email newsletter helps a company nurture and build relationships with their current and potential clients.

They help a company stay top of mind so that when the reader is ready to buy, they’ll buy from the company they regularly hear from rather than searching for solutions elsewhere.

Who Sends Email Newsletters?

Companies of all sizes and across nearly all industries send email newsletters to their customers, clients, patients, and prospects. In fact, 81% of small and midsize businesses use email as their primary channel to acquire new customers, and 80% use it for customer retention, according to Oberlo.

Consider these examples of types of Professional Service Providers that send email newsletters on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly basis:

• Bookkeeping
• Accounting
• Human Resources
• Payroll
• Insurance
• Financial Advisors
• Marketing Agencies
• Staffing Agencies
• Lawyers
• Real Estate
• Housecleaning
• HVAC
• Gardeners/Lawn Care Services
• Doctors
• Dentists
• Chiropractors
• Veterinarians

The list goes on and on, but you get the idea.

In fact, chances are good that you have several email newsletters in your inbox right now. Who is sending them to you?

An Excellent Opportunity for Writers

Clients who need content written for email newsletters are everywhere. They’re right outside your door, down the street, and in your local community.

You are likely already doing business with some of them. Take another look at the list above.

While I’ve written for many of the types of businesses on that list, local professional service providers have been some of my best email newsletter clients. I think it’s because their own business model is based on recurring revenue, so they are very much in tune with the need to stay in touch and provide added value on a regular basis.

And to give you an idea of just how big this opportunity really is, there are over 900,000 professional service firms in the United States alone.

Professional Service Providers — and other types of companies, too — are willing to pay you good money (in the range of $1,200-$2,000 per issue) to write their email newsletter for them. They consider it money well-spent because it allows them to keep their own schedule free for billable work.

And once a company commits to a publication schedule their readers come to expect, they need to remain consistent with it. This means that you, as their writer, can count on consistent work and revenue coming in as well.

Also, remember that email newsletters are short, easy, fun projects to work on. They follow a consistent formula and format, so they’re fast, too. So, you can take on as many email newsletter clients as you want or have time for.

Imagine this … if you have just five clients who pay you to write email newsletters for them, you could be making $6,000-$10,000 per month.

Plus, once you’re writing their email newsletter, you may have the opportunity to do other writing for them as well … if you want to do so.

For example, the bookkeeping and accounting service provider I write email newsletter content for recently decided to develop an online course teaching entrepreneurs bookkeeping and accounting basics they need to know when just starting a business. And they came to me to write their course materials as well as the copy to support the marketing, sales, and delivery of the course.

Seize the Day … and the Recurring Revenue

You can learn how to write email newsletters in a really short amount of time. In fact, you could learn the simple formula in just a weekend if you choose to do so.

And once you have the knowledge and skill, you’re ready to get your first email newsletter client. Then your next, and the next, and so on.

The opportunity to harness the power of recurring revenue with email newsletters is real, and it’s just waiting for you to reach out and take it.

So, what are you waiting for?

To get started on the path to steady, reliable income working with clients you enjoy, you just need a little training. So in AWAI’s self-paced program, you’ll learn everything from setting up your writing business … to landing clients … to mastering that ONE writing skill virtually every professional in this niche needs … and much, much more.

Everything you need to have your own recurring “monthly paycheck” writing business is “in the program!”