Tyler Denk on Newsletters, Creator Businesses and AI Publishing

Shira Lazar and Jenny Stojkovic introduce a special episode recorded at the LinkedIn studio during Cannes Lions. Their guest is Tyler Denk, founder and CEO of beehiiv; the episode description offers a beehiiv promotional discount.

Denk says beehiiv has expanded beyond newsletters into websites, podcasts, digital products and an advertising network. He presents company growth and payout figures as part of his description of the business.

He traces his background to Morning Brew, where he says he built infrastructure and worked on growth. Seeing newsletter-first media companies grow, he decided to turn lessons from that work into a platform.

Denk writes a founder newsletter about hiring, strategy, fundraising and the difficulties of building a business. He says transparent communication has helped readers understand the company’s priorities and build trust.

Stojkovic asks how long-form content fits alongside short-form media. Denk sees the formats as complementary: creators may combine video, podcasts, newsletters and in-person events.

He argues that creator businesses can also combine subscriptions, advertising and events rather than relying on one revenue source. He connects beehiiv’s product expansion to that broader mix.

Denk describes a product release event and says the attention it attracted helped bring in strategic funding. His account is a founder’s perspective on the company’s growth, not an independent audit.

Asked whether newsletters are saturated, he says no: email is a distribution protocol for many kinds of content. He contrasts it with reliance on a single social platform’s changing algorithm.

He recalls publishers investing in Facebook audiences before changes to distribution priorities. He also discusses changes at other platforms and search, arguing that overdependence on any one source of traffic creates risk.

Denk sees email as a portable counterbalance because creators can use different sending services and readers can use different clients. Ownership still depends on consent, deliverability, contractual terms and applicable privacy rules.

Stojkovic describes her own newsletter and asks what someone should write about. Denk says businesses can use genuinely useful content to attract an audience, offering beehiiv’s own creator-focused publication as a marketing example.

For beginners, he recommends starting on a sustainable schedule and writing about subjects they enjoy. He says copying a daily publication can be a grind and that a weekly or monthly habit may be more manageable.

Denk acknowledges that writing for a small audience can feel discouraging. He compares early newsletter work with creators’ long periods of practice, emphasizing consistency and gradual improvement rather than a guaranteed income.

Lazar adds that learning from other creators, collaborating and experimenting with automation helped her grow. She asks how AI fits into the publishing workflow.

Denk describes a creator who spends more time on administration than creating. He wants AI to help with reporting, outreach and engagement analysis so creators can spend more time on their work.

He introduces beehiiv’s integration using Model Context Protocol, or MCP, which can connect an assistant to software tools. He gives examples such as asking about engaged readers and advertisers instead of manually exporting a dashboard.

Denk describes an automation that identifies potential advertisers among new subscribers using business information. He says he reviews the results for outreach; use of subscriber data should be governed by consent, privacy obligations and the relevant platform terms.

He discusses using the integration with other services to organize leads or draft messages. The example illustrates his own workflow rather than a guarantee that every setup works the same way.

The conversation turns to AI indexing and compensation. Denk describes a partnership with Cloudflare that he says lets publishers see and block certain automated crawlers; he presents payment for content access as a possible future business model.

The hosts thank Denk and LinkedIn, direct viewers to the show’s links and say they hope to continue the conversation in a longer episode.