How we work, and why you can trust the data.
Building a complete OS for newsletter creators. Today that starts with observed placements in public newsletter issues, not invented spend, not a scraped inbox.
How matching and source data work
Match percentages help prioritize sponsors worth investigating. They are optimistic research scores, not probabilities of interest or deals. Strong, Decent and Weak fit describe topic relevance to newsletters a brand sponsors. Activity shows the latest observed sponsorship, and evidence describes the available source links. Limited evidence does not by itself mean weak fit. New prospects are ordered by fit tier, then by our activity-weighted research score within each tier.
Specific, less common topics carry more weight. Broad topics alone do not qualify a prospect. We compare the full topic sets, using both the closest publication and the average across qualifying publications. New prospects must have an observed placement within 180 days. Previous sponsors are shown separately.
These percentages and fit labels are starting points for outreach, not probabilities of interest or deals. Subscriber estimates, reader demographics, budgets and audience overlap are not scoring inputs. Topic corrections in your account affect your own results.
Placement records come from collected newsletter issues. Open the original issue to check the context; detection can be wrong and public coverage can be incomplete. Counts here deduplicate a brand within the same issue when an issue ID is available. Last seen is the placement date; last checked is the source newsletter’s latest successful collection.
About our data and its limitsWhat we are building
Newsletter creators still stitch sponsorship together from screenshots, spreadsheets, and guesswork. Emil is meant to be the operating system for that work: who is buying, whether they fit you, and, as we ship it, how you run outreach and history in one place.
Market
A directory of brands buying newsletter placements, plus a live pulse of recent activity.
Fit
Paste your URL and see advertisers already in similar newsletters, and those not yet in yours.
Report
A fuller exported sponsor list for your newsletter, sent within about 24 hours.
Workflow
Weekly drops, saved sponsors, outreach, and history. The rest of the OS ships as paid plans.
How a match is made
The free analysis on the homepage is the same idea as the rest of Emil: start from what brands already do, then score how close that is to your newsletter.
Add your newsletter
Paste a public newsletter URL. Emil does not need an account, an RSS login, or access to your inbox.
Emil reads the public record
We look at publicly available issues and at the brands already buying placements in newsletters like yours: publication topics, placement dates, and formats.
You see who already spends
Matches are brands with observed activity in your niche, not a guessed list of companies that “might advertise.”
Where the data comes from
Emil monitors publicly available newsletter issues and records the brand, the newsletter, the date, and the format when we can see it. New issues are added as collection succeeds; coverage and freshness vary by newsletter.
We record
- Placements we have actually seen in public issues
- Which newsletters those brands bought in
- When we last saw them, and how often they appear
- Publication topic overlap with your newsletter
We do not
- Invent or estimate advertising spend or CPMs
- Promise a deal, a reply, or a booked placement
- Show contact details we have not legally obtained
- Read private subscriber lists or your email account
What a match means
A match is a brand observed advertising in publications with overlapping topics. The match percentage is an optimistic research priority, not a probability of a deal. Strong, Decent and Weak fit describe topic relevance. Activity shows the latest observed sponsorship, while evidence describes available source links. Stronger fit tiers appear first, with recent and repeated activity helping order prospects within each tier. It is a starting point for outreach, not a guarantee that they will buy from you. Similar newsletters can still have different rates, inventory, and relationships.
Free, waitlist, and what is next
| Today, free | Waitlist | Building |
|---|---|---|
| Analyze a newsletter URL. Browse the directory and market pulse. See a first set of matches. | Full exported report within 24 hours, and a place in line for weekly drops and paid plans. | Weekly personalized drops, outreach tools, alerts, and the full directory. That is the rest of the OS. |
Still building: weekly personalized drops, outreach tools, alerts, and the full directory.
Limits, on purpose
Emil currently focuses on newsletters. Analyses can miss issues that are not public, and we rate-limit the free tool so the data stays usable. If a niche is new to us, the first pass may be thinner. The waitlist report is how we dig further.
See who is already buying in your niche.
Paste your newsletter, no account required. Or create a free account to run sponsorship from one place.