--- title: "How Tech Safari Built a 15,000-Subscriber Audience on beehiiv" canonical: https://www.beehiiv.com/case-studies/tech-safari description: "How a Substack-to-beehiiv switch unlocked referrals, better data, and faster iteration" source: live-converter generated: 2026-05-15T15:39:24.058Z --- # How Tech Safari Built a 15,000-Subscriber Audience on beehiiv # How Tech Safari Built a 15,000-Subscriber Audience on beehiiv ## How a Substack-to-beehiiv switch unlocked referrals, better data, and faster iteration ![How Tech Safari Built a 15,000-Subscriber Audience on beehiiv](https://images.prismic.io/beehiiv/aXcL9AIvOtkhB7C__Untitleddesign-12-.png?auto=format,compress) Written by Kanishka Kumawat Published on 07 Apr 2025 [](https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.beehiiv.com%2Fcase-studies%2Ftech-safari&title=How%20Tech%20Safari%20Built%20a%2015%2C000-Subscriber%20Audience%20on%20beehiiv&summary=How%20a%20Substack-to-beehiiv%20switch%20unlocked%20referrals%2C%20better%20data%2C%20and%20faster%20iteration)[](https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.beehiiv.com%2Fcase-studies%2Ftech-safari&text=How%20Tech%20Safari%20Built%20a%2015%2C000-Subscriber%20Audience%20on%20beehiiv)[](https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.beehiiv.com%2Fcase-studies%2Ftech-safari)[](https://www.threads.net/intent/post?text=How%20Tech%20Safari%20Built%20a%2015%2C000-Subscriber%20Audience%20on%20beehiiv%20https%3A%2F%2Fwww.beehiiv.com%2Fcase-studies%2Ftech-safari) ### Table of contents ## Situation: Caleb Maru started Tech Safari to tell Africa’s tech story for both African readers and a global audience. He was already seeing traction on LinkedIn, but it came with a problem: he did not own that audience. He wanted a central place to publish consistently, build a deeper reader relationship, and create something his team could operate together, not a personal feed that could vanish with an algorithm change. Tech Safari launched as a twice-a-week newsletter covering African tech news, trends, tools, and events. Over time, it became the foundation for a broader media business. ## Challenge: Maru ran into limitations with the platform he started on. - Substack did not give him the customization he wanted. - He could not get the level of analytics and insight he needed to understand what readers actually cared about. - He wanted growth tooling, especially referral mechanics, because he had seen referral programs drive real outcomes in past startup work. - As the newsletter evolved into a team effort, he needed workflows that supported collaboration, QA, and consistent publishing. He needed a platform that treated growth, data, and operations as first-class features, not add-ons. ## Solution: Maru migrated Tech Safari from Substack to beehiiv to get more control over growth and the reader experience. What beehiiv changed for Tech Safari: - **Referral-driven growth:** Maru specifically valued referral campaigns as a scalable growth lever that Substack did not support in the way he needed. - **Stronger audience insight:** beehiiv became the “home” for content and reader relationships, with dashboards and engagement data that informed decisions. - **Polling as a business tool:** Tech Safari used polls to collect reader input and reduce risk before making moves. Examples included testing demand for events in specific cities and validating new products. - **Automations to improve list quality:** The team used automations to remove subscribers who were not engaging over a set period, trading raw list size for stronger readership focus and better engagement. - **Team-friendly workflow:** They drafted in Notion, then used beehiiv for final editing, test sends, and QA, reducing surprises when issues went live. The newsletter became a testing and distribution layer for everything else the business wanted to do. ## Results: Since moving to beehiiv, Tech Safari grew to **more than 15,000 subscribers** in under two years and became a platform for broader business expansion. Beyond audience size, the bigger outcomes were operational and commercial: - The team improved engagement by cleaning the list through automations. - Polls helped them validate event plans and new initiatives before committing resources. - Tech Safari expanded monetization beyond simple ads, including paid editions, sponsored events, and a content service that evolved into an agency. - The newsletter helped Maru build authority in a defined niche, turning Tech Safari into a recognizable voice in African tech. In Maru’s framing, the newsletter was not only a publishing channel. It was the foundation for a media company. If you are building a niche publication and want to grow it into something bigger than email, this is the playbook. **Start using beehiiv** to build a newsletter that can grow into a real media business. ## Related Case Studies ![How AdQuick Scaled Industry Sponsorships with beehiiv's Ad Network](https://images.prismic.io/beehiiv/Z_VpXHdAxsiBwdKG_adquick.png?auto=format,compress) ### How AdQuick Scaled Industry Sponsorships with beehiiv's Ad Network Solving scale and visibility challenges in B2B marketing [ Read Case Study → ](/case-studies/adquick) ![How Particle for Men Generated a 1.73 ROAS Through Newsletter Ads](https://images.prismic.io/beehiiv/abfLOrbci2UF6CEY_Untitleddesign-34-.png?auto=format,compress) ### How Particle for Men Generated a 1.73 ROAS Through Newsletter Ads Scaling newsletter advertising to 8.3M readers while achieving 809 conversions with beehiiv [ Read Case Study → ](/case-studies/particle-for-men) ![The Founder Who Turned His 400k+ Newsletter Into a Negative CAC Machine](https://images.prismic.io/beehiiv/afL59cBOoF08xfCT_Untitleddesign-36-.png?auto=format,compress) ### The Founder Who Turned His 400k+ Newsletter Into a Negative CAC Machine How Open Source CEO pioneered model where newsletter ad revenue offsets customer acquisition costs with beehiiv. [ Read Case Study → ](/case-studies/open-source-ceo) ![](https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,onerror=redirect,format=auto,width=640,quality=75/www/boosts-promo-2x/rockets.svg) ## The Only Writing & Publishing Tool You Need [ Start Your Free Trial ](https://app.beehiiv.com/signup?plan=max)