Free Tool
Email List Growth Planner
A list grows by arithmetic, not by hope: new subscribers in, unsubscribes out, referrals on top. This planner runs the months — and prices the list in the revenue mode.
Planning estimate, not financial advice. All figures on this page are estimates or scenarios for planning purposes only, built from the numbers you enter. They are not financial, tax or legal advice, and no earnings are promised. Read the full financial disclaimer.
What this tool does
Enter the starting list size, the monthly signups, the monthly unsubscribes and the referral rate, and the planner shows the list size month by month for a year, the month it crosses any target you set, and the total growth. The arithmetic is compound: a list that grows 5% a month is not 60% bigger in a year — it is about 80% bigger.
The revenue mode asks how the list pays for itself: the share of subscribers who open, the share of openers who click, the conversion rate and the average value per conversion, or the number of paid subscribers and the price per month. Two prices for one list — revenue per subscriber and revenue per month — tell you whether the list is an asset or a cost.
Try it
Waiting. Fill in the list figures, or switch to the revenue mode, then press Calculate.
How it works
Each month the list is the previous month plus new subscribers, plus referrals — the referral percentage of the current list — minus unsubscribes. The referral term is what makes the growth compound: as the list grows, the same percentage produces more new subscribers.
The revenue mode is a funnel: subscribers times the open rate gives opens, opens times the click rate gives clicks, clicks times the conversion rate gives conversions, and conversions times the average value gives promotional revenue. Paid-subscriber revenue is paid subscribers times price. The total divided by the list size is revenue per subscriber.
Assumptions and limitations
The planner projects your rates forward. It cannot find them.
- The rates you enter are assumed constant for 12 months. In practice signups fall as a lead magnet ages and unsubscribes spike after a bad send — re-run the planner when the rates change.
- Referral growth is a percentage of the current list. A 1% referral rate sounds small; on a list of 10,000 it is 100 new subscribers a month, before any other signups.
- Revenue per subscriber is an illustrative figure from your own funnel rates. It is not a prediction of what any list earns, and it assumes the conversion value is the same for every conversion.
- No list provider fees are subtracted here. If the provider charges per subscriber, the net per subscriber is this figure minus the fee — run the pricing against the provider’s own page.
Worked example
Example (illustrative inputs, not a real list). A list of 400 with 120 signups a month, 8 unsubscribes and 1% referrals:
| Item | Figure |
|---|---|
| List after 12 months | About 1,871 subscribers |
| Growth | About +1,471 |
| Target of 1,000 reached | Month 6 |
| Revenue per subscriber (2,000 subscribers, example funnel) | 0.19 per month |
Frequently asked questions
What is a healthy unsubscribe rate?
Under 0.5% per send is common for a healthy list; above 1% usually means the content, the frequency or the audience match is wrong. A rate that spikes after one send says more about that send than about the list.
How much does referral growth matter?
More than it looks. Referrals compound: the same percentage produces more new subscribers as the list grows. A list that grows only from signups grows linearly; a list with referrals grows faster every month.
What does revenue per subscriber actually tell me?
Whether the list pays for itself. If the per-subscriber revenue is under the provider’s per-subscriber cost, the list loses money on every subscriber it keeps. Above that, the list is an asset worth growing.
Why is the open rate not the whole story?
Because an open is not a click and a click is not a sale. The funnel shows where the list leaks: a high open rate with a low click rate is a content problem; a high click rate with a low conversion rate is an offer problem.