For years, I’ve subscribed to dozens of marketing newsletters, hoping to find the ones that actually make me better at my job.
Most get deleted without reading. Generic advice, recycled LinkedIn posts dressed up as insights, or just thinly veiled pitches for someone’s course.
But the ones I actually read? They’re the ones where someone’s sharing what they’re learning whilst doing the work, not just theorising about it. The ones that make me think differently about a problem I’m wrestling with, or show me what’s actually working for other marketers right now.
If you’re looking for marketing newsletters, Substack is where a lot of the best ones live. It’s become the go-to platform for independent marketing voices – people sharing real lessons without corporate filters, all in one place that’s easy to manage.
Here are the marketing substacks I’ve actually stayed subscribed to.
The 12 best marketing substacks for 2026
- This Month in Content for creative marketing inspiration through standout B2B content examples
- Customer Focus for accelerating growth by putting customers at the heart of your business
- Elena’s Growth Scoop for building predictable, sustainable growth systems for B2B
- Content Folks for practical lessons from someone doing content marketing alongside you
- Because of Marketing for staying inspired by the campaigns shaping cultural conversation
- MKT1 for understanding how marketing fits into wider company strategy
- Contentious for navigating the messy realities of working in-house at a startup
- Full-Funnel B2B Marketing for developing ABM programmes for high ACV, long sales cycles
- Inside Product-Led Content for naturally weaving your product into content without sounding sales-y
- Growth Unhinged for connecting marketing to company growth and demonstrating ROI
- The Future of SEO for understanding how SEO and search are evolving with AI
- Marketing Ideas for battle-tested, unconventional marketing tactics that actually work
This Month in Content
✍️ Newsletter author: Tabitha Whiting
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Content marketing, campaigns
🎨 Specialism: B2B startups, impact startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Creative marketing inspiration through standout B2B content examples
This Month in Content is my own newsletter, and I started it because I’m constantly hunting for great marketing examples myself. What creative things are brands doing? How are my peers approaching their work? How could I make what I’m doing more interesting?
Whilst it’s largely content marketing focused, it’s really about creative marketing ideas and inspiration – and content runs through every part of marketing anyway.
Every edition covers one standout creative content marketing example – creative video series, original research campaigns, SEO content that actually works, brand campaigns that don’t feel like marketing. It’s bi-weekly, and each edition breaks down not just what they did, but why it works strategically and what you can learn from it.
Recent editions include UserEvidence’s ‘The Long Game’ YouTube series (vlog-style interviews with marketing leaders on ski slopes and golf courses instead of in a studio) and Typeform’s ‘Get Real’ campaign (interactive research featuring 146 video survey responses about authenticity in influencer marketing).
Customer Focus
✍️ Newsletter author: Alicia Carney
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Product marketing
🎨 Specialism: Startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Accelerating growth by putting customers at the heart of your business
Customer Focus is written by Alicia Carney, a product marketing expert and now Head of Marketing at Ravio. It’s a newsletter about keeping your customer at the centre of everything – from GTM strategy to product positioning to measuring commercial performance.
Alicia shares tips, hard lessons, and free frameworks from working with startups at every stage. For instance, her edition “From MVP to revenue: What I learned talking to 50+ founders about early GTM” breaks down the three biggest validation mistakes she sees, based on actual conversations with founders navigating that messy early stage.
Another recent edition, “The discipline of being selective”, tackles something every marketer feels – being asked to be everything, everywhere, all at once. She connects this back to product marketing fundamentals: the founders who grow fastest are the most selective about their ICP and focus.
Elena’s Growth Scoop
✍️ Newsletter author: Elena Verna
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Growth marketing, product marketing
🎨 Specialism: Startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Building predictable, sustainable growth systems for B2B
Elena Verna has over 15 years scaling companies through product-led strategies at places like Miro, SurveyMonkey, Amplitude, and Dropbox. Now she’s leading growth at Lovable, and her newsletter documents that journey alongside frameworks and lessons from her career.
She writes about creating sustainable growth systems for B2B, navigating leadership and career decisions, and the realities of advising versus operating.
Her recent edition “Growth lessons behind Lovable’s $6.6B valuation” breaks down the strategies driving Lovable’s rapid growth. Another standout is “Building In Public is scary. Do it anyway” – where she tackles the vulnerability of sharing your work whilst you’re still figuring it out.
For growth marketers in startups, this newsletter is essential reading.
Subscribe to Elena’s Growth Scoop →
Content Folks
✍️ Newsletter author: Fio Dossetto
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Content marketing
🎨 Specialism: B2B startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Practical lessons from someone doing content marketing alongside you
Content Folks is written by Fio Dossetto, Brand & Content Lead at Float, and it reads like getting advice from someone who just figured something out and wants to share it whilst it’s still fresh.
Recent editions cover how to approach competitor comparison listicles and how often to update them for SEO, or finding content/market fit as a startup brand.
Short lessons, practical examples, and insights about the daily realities of content marketing.
It’s the newsletter for when you need tactical advice from someone in the trenches with you, not theory from someone who hasn’t done the work in years.
Because of Marketing
✍️ Newsletter author: Rachael Higgins
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Brand marketing, campaigns, advertising
🎨 Specialism: B2C, ecommerce
🫶 Who it’s best for: Staying inspired by the campaigns shaping cultural conversation
Because of Marketing is a marketing and media brand for people who genuinely love this industry – the work, the ideas, the culture, the creativity behind it all. Founded by Rachael Higgins in 2020, it’s grown into a trusted resource for marketers and entrepreneurs worldwide.
Each week you get a roundup of campaigns worth studying – largely B2C, ecommerce, and big brand advertising – plus thought leadership on where marketing is heading. Recent weekly roundups have covered J.Crew’s ‘The Wishlisters’ holiday campaign, Spotify Wrapped 2025, and Starbucks’ seasonal campaigns.
They also publish deeper analysis pieces like “The $37B Creator Surge: How the Creator Economy Became Advertising’s Fastest-Growing Channel”, breaking down how creator-led advertising has more than doubled in three years and why brands are treating the creator ecosystem as a full-fledged media channel now.
Subscribe to Because of Marketing →
MKT1
✍️ Newsletter author: Emily Kramer
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Growth, marketing leadership, all marketing functions
🎨 Specialism: B2B startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Understanding how marketing fits into wider company strategy
MKT1 is written by Emily Kramer, who’s led marketing at some of the fastest-growing B2B startups over the past 15+ years. Now she shares what she’s learned about marketing leadership and strategic thinking for B2B startups.
Recent editions include thought experiments for getting unstuck on marketing planning – like imagining what would happen if you created no net new content for a quarter. Another explores how to build a LinkedIn flywheel instead of treating every post as a disconnected effort.
For marketers who want to understand how their work connects to wider business strategy, or who have leadership ambitions, this newsletter shows you how the best marketing leaders think.
Contentious
✍️ Newsletter author: Lauren Lang
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Content marketing
🎨 Specialism: B2B startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Navigating the messy realities of working in-house at a startup
Contentious is written by Lauren Lang, currently Marketing Director at Uplevel, and it tackles the real, messy scenarios we all face working in content – with actionable takeaways based on what actually works.
Her recent edition on content stakeholders immediately went into my saved folder. We’ve all been in that meeting where stakeholders say content matters but won’t actually engage when you need their expertise. Her advice? Stop explaining why collaborating on content is important and start showing them what’s in it for them. “Reverse engineer for conversion.”
It’s the newsletter for when you need someone to validate that yes, this is hard, and here’s what’s worked for others in the same situation.
Full-Funnel B2B Marketing
✍️ Newsletter author: Andrei Zinkevich
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Growth, demand generation, ABM
🎨 Specialism: B2B startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Developing ABM programmes for high ACV, long sales cycles
Full-Funnel B2B Marketing is written by Andrei Zinkevich, co-founder of Fullfunnel.io. They help B2B companies with high deal sizes and long sales cycles develop full-funnel ABM programmes.
This isn’t your typical growth newsletter full of case studies from Figma or Airbnb. Instead, Andrei writes about growing B2B companies with high ACV, long sales cycles, and complex sales – sharing 18 years of experience doing ABM.
Recent editions cover why sales ignore your marketing playbooks (and how to fix it), and how to create playbooks for long sales cycles with multiple buyers. If you’re marketing to enterprise buyers, this newsletter shows you how to get both teams working together on revenue generation.
Subscribe to Full-Funnel B2B Marketing →
Inside Product-Led Content
✍️ Newsletter author: Masooma Memon
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Content marketing
🎨 Specialism: SaaS
🫶 Who it’s best for: Naturally weaving your product into content without sounding sales-y
Inside Product-Led Content tackles one of the hardest challenges in SaaS content marketing: how do you feature your product in content without making readers run for the hills?
Masooma Memon is the expert on product-led content, and each edition breaks down real examples done well, plus templates and frameworks to help you scale production even with freelance writers who don’t know your product inside out.
Recent editions explore the differences between product marketing, product-led content, and content marketing, or practical strategies for scaling conversions through product-led content. If you’re constantly wrestling with how to make content that’s both useful and drives product adoption, this newsletter is for you.
Subscribe to Inside Product-Led Content →
Growth Unhinged
✍️ Newsletter author: Kyle Poyar
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Growth marketing
🎨 Specialism: SaaS
🫶 Who it’s best for: Connecting marketing to company growth and demonstrating ROI
Growth Unhinged is written by Kyle Poyar, co-founder and operating partner at Tremont, a VC firm backing enterprise SaaS and AI companies. His newsletter covers marketing and growth strategy for B2B, giving you the wider context your marketing work fits into.
Recent editions have covered using vibe coding tools like Lovable for marketing teams, and how Webflow is adapting to AI search (which converts 6x better than Google for them).
If you need to connect your marketing to wider company growth, get a seat at the table, or understand how traffic and engagement metrics are shifting, this newsletter provides the strategic context you need.
Subscribe to Growth Unhinged →
The Future of SEO
✍️ Newsletter author: Eli Schwartz
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Growth, SEO
🎨 Specialism: Startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Understanding how SEO and search are evolving with AI
The Future of SEO is Eli Schwartz’s weekly thoughts about the future of marketing, SEO, and growth. With AI search engines changing how people find information, understanding what’s coming next for SEO matters more than ever.
Recent editions tackle questions like “What metrics should you use for SEO/AEO?” (his answer: revenue, not rankings) and “It’s time for voice search to shine, are you ready?” exploring how voice search has finally become the real deal after years of being the “next big thing.”
If your marketing depends on organic traffic, this newsletter helps you stay ahead of the curve instead of reacting when changes hit.
Subscribe to The Future of SEO →
Marketing Ideas
✍️ Newsletter author: Tom Orbach
🛍️ Type of marketing covered: Creative marketing, campaigns, all marketing functions
🎨 Specialism: Startups
🫶 Who it’s best for: Battle-tested, unconventional marketing tactics that actually work
Marketing Ideas is written by Tom Orbach, Director of Growth Marketing at Wiz (a $32B cybersecurity company). Every Thursday he shares one powerful marketing idea that’s battle-tested, unconventional, and actually practical.
Recent editions have covered Timothée Chalamet’s “leaked” internal marketing meeting for his new film – a fake Zoom call that went viral because it feels like you’re seeing something you shouldn’t. Tom breaks down what works and how to apply it to your own marketing (try this with Slack screenshots, internal memos, “accidental” drafts).
Another edition cuts through the noise with his top 9 marketing books actually worth your time – saving you from wasting hours on the other 91. For marketers who want creative tactics without the fluff, this newsletter delivers.
Subscribe to Marketing Ideas →
Which marketing substack should you subscribe to?
Start with the ones that match where you’re working and what you’re wrestling with right now.
If you’re in a B2B startup trying to figure out your GTM, Customer Focus and MKT1 will give you frameworks that actually work. If you’re responsible for growth metrics, Elena’s Growth Scoop and Growth Unhinged show you what’s working for similar companies. If you need creative inspiration or want to understand what campaigns are landing culturally, This Month In Content and Marketing Ideas deliver that weekly hit.
The beauty of Substack is you can try a few, see what resonates, and adjust. Subscribe to 3-5 to start, give them a month to prove their value, then be ruthless about unsubscribing from ones that don’t deliver.
The newsletters worth keeping are the ones that make you better at your job – whether that’s giving you tactical advice you can use tomorrow, strategic thinking that changes your approach, or just reminding you why you chose this industry in the first place.
Tabitha Whiting: High-impact content for high-impact startups 