This is the challenge for a majority of the people on this platform. Some of the most successful people here already were famous or well known in their field. Part of me starting a Substack was to see how far I could get as a regular person without a following. I’m pleased to say that I’ve achieved my own version of success but it has taken a lot of hard work on my part to get discovered
I started my Substack because there was content that I wanted to talk about and share with other people. I would often find myself going "I wonder if anyone has ever talked about X?" and not finding any articles or very few related to that topic. So writing a Substack became an outlet for those desires. I knew that a lot of topics I wanted to write about (Understanding Bitwise Operators, C strings, Programming lore) were niche and wouldn't have a large audience to begin with. This plus the fact that I had zero following meant that I needed to set realistic goals. They were roughly
1. 100 followers by the end of the year
2. 52 articles in 52 weeks
3. 10,000 views across all of my articles.
It's been 9 months and I'm happy to say I'm 3x the number 1 goal (with a few paid subscribers as well), 1 article ahead of my second goal, and well above my third.
So I make a little money, and I've exceeded or am ahead of my goals. Plus I am satisfying my personal reasons for writing. So by all metrics I've set for myself I am successful.
The key is that I have not moved the goal posts for this year. Just because I have achieved my goals early doesn't mean that I should now be disappointed if I am not at 1000 subscribers by the end of the year. I shouldn't get upset when I loose 2 or 3 subscribers over the course of a few days, or if someone decides to pause their paid subscription. About the only expectation I have moving forward is that if I stick with it I will slowly grow my audience. Maybe one day I will hit that 1000 subscriber mark, and I'll treat myself to a nice dinner. Do I fantasize about being able to support myself full time with Substack? Of course! We all do. But I recognize that is a much more ambitious goal, and not one that I would be able to reach any time soon.
There isn't some secret. I have to actively work on cultivating this feeling of contentment over my success. It's easy to see other people who are much more successful at this than me, or see people with social media followings much large than mine, and become bitter and jealous. When I start to feel those feelings (which I am not immune to) I actively have to reign myself back in. So success for me is being able to satisfy my writing itch, and share it with more people than I ever expected it to. I am happy with my success and I hope that anyone who desires to achieve those same feelings can do it here with their Substacks.
"Success for me is being about to satisfy my writing itch, and share it with more people than I ever expected to."
I feel similarly! I don't have a large social media following elsewhere, and am just getting started on Substack at a pace that's sustainable for me. Reading your response here helped me keep things in perspective.
Wow, thank you for sharing this Diego. So many lightbulbs went off for me while reading your response, particularly in this part:
“I have to actively work on cultivating this feeling of contentment over my success. It's easy to see other people who are much more successful at this than me, or see people with social media followings much large than mine, and become bitter and jealous. When I start to feel those feelings (which I am not immune to) I actively have to reign myself back in.”
Working on cultivating contentment over success according to *my* definition instead of mistaking other people’s achievements as the bar for success... THIS is the guidance I’ve been needing!
I feel this! As someone lacking a previous following on other platforms, I am trying to create my own metrics and version of success. Many of the popular stacks in my niche (fashion, sustainable fashion) had a different pathway that led them here, but I believe I have something worth saying that adds to the greater pool & I'll stick to my grassroots efforts when it comes to growth!
This has been my problem for my whole writing life! I'm very hopeful that some of these new moves will help me spread my work without spending fruitless hours on social media.
I loved social media for the connections with people from so many stages of my life. Then it became a place where I saw the worst sides of people I loved and respected and I had to play time consuming games to get my work out in front of people who weren't friends and family. It's exhausting and I don't have time for that. I have a job and family on top of my writing!
That's the point.. you should not think of it as selling but SHARING your work.. we got to talk about it - if we don't feel good telling others about our work, who will..?? I think the mental block is the EXPECTATION that they would like what we have to say.. "Say what you want to say..!!"
Same here.. my Book (Something Divine) has been gathering cobwebs in Amazon since 2012.. not a single copy sold. I am hopeful here but I need to find a way to pivot my extremely varied thought process. I am now working with my second book, Teaching is Out, Learning is IN for something more pressing.. but being discovered and receiving some traction would sure help..!!
I just did Yesterday! Purchased 5000 postcards to send to selected bookstores in the United States in the hope that I can get some traction for my book The Other Side Of The River: a story of love, war, cattle and cowboys. I used a QR code on the postcard. Seems like a great idea.
Me too. This is exactly the kind of innovation that this particular Substacker has been waiting for (and banged on about on various 'Office Hours' threads).
I feel I've done quite well in building my subscriber base given the huge obstacle that I don't have any social media presence (which never could suit the kind of writing I do anyway).
Thanks. The tagline is a line from a W B Yeats poem. What do I write about? Why not press the Subscribe button and take a free subscription. If you like Rob Henderson's Substack you'll probably like my stuff too.
Sep 14, 2023·edited Sep 14, 2023Liked by Hamish McKenzie
Substack has changed my life and my career, and I can't wait to see what it does for other writers.
I've been a full-time professional writer for 15 years, and I've always loved my job. I just accepted that I had to work for my clients, and couldn't ever be fully independent.
My little feminist side project on Facebook got tons of attention, but the money all went to Facebook--and I regularly got put in Facebook jail for such crimes as calling my pet ducks assholes or saying that my dog had covered the house in mud.
I started posting to Substack on a lark, hoping to make some extra cash. I also needed a backup plan for what felt like the inevitable: that Facebook's bots would flag my content so often that I eventually got banned.
Nine months ago, I decided to start posting regularly and take Substack seriously. I'm now my own biggest client, and if my growth trajectory continues, by January I will have completely replaced my old freelance income with Substack.
Which predictably is a lot like IG jail which is how I was initially finding subscribers. Backed off of giving that platform too much energy. As Im anonymous here I knew I was setting myself a challenge to build an entire new audience of people who don’t know me. It’s hard but not as hard as I thought it would be. I constantly go back and forth re the anonymity but the truth is I just wouldn’t be writing what I’m writing about without it.
"You’re going to notice some changes." is a n ominous af phrase that's only ever been used by either a) someone who just gave you a hero dose of lsd or b) parents getting you ready for a divorce PLZ LET THIS BE A BIG DOSE OF PSYCHEDELICS TYSM
Can you clarify this, because I’ve never heard it before: “exceptional writing, considered argument, and robust debate—the key factors, as we have learned in six years here, that drive subscriptions.”
Exceptional writing I totally get. Do you have data to suggest arguments and debating increase subscriptions? What do those kinds of posts look like? Thanks!
While I don’t have any data to offer, I have a couple of personal anecdotes that might shed some light. (1) Until 10 years ago I owned a small bookstore in an equally small, rural community. In the mid 90s I became embroiled in a local controversy that, over several months, resulted in dozens of letters to the editor of our weekly newspaper, of which I was the author of about a third. A few years later at the farewell party for editor of that paper I asked him why he kept printing my letters when I had clearly exceeded his one letter p/month rule. He answered, “Are you kidding? We were setting sales records every week! I hated to see it all come to an end.” (2) My bookstore included a section of political books, with “liberal” books on the left, “conservative” books on the right, all the others down the middle. In a small community political affiliation is generally not a secret, and over the years I watched Ds reliably select books from the left side, Rs from the right. One day a regular buyer of the left side came in for a new book I hadn’t yet received. As the writer he was looking for was known for humor and witty insights, I suggested a similar author from the right. He was clearly stunned by this suggestion, so I offered to let him take the book home until his book came in, which he refused. Then I offered to just give it to him—he still refused. For the next few weeks, I conducted a little experiment: when someone bought a book from one side I offered them a free book from the other—no one ever accepted the free book. My conclusions: First, argument/debate is profitable for a publication if enough people engage in it, and more people engage when it’s free or nearly free (our little paper was 50 cents and our little battle increased weekly sales, not subscriptions). Second, people will pay to have their opinions/views reinforced, but not to have them challenged.
Wow, that's amazing on two fronts: First, that you offered a free book from the other side and, sadly, that no one took the free book. I would have taken the free book if I'd lived in your town but I'm one of the few people I know who read media from all sides of the political spectrum.
To me, the connection between the three factors and driving subscriptions is intuitive. Excellent writing requires reasoned arguments to be excellent, and to make readers desire more. Engagement of readers thru healthy debate creates relationships and often improves the arguments.
Hamish is saying argument and debate are two of three key factors driving subscriptions, ahead of other possible factors like education, positive community building, interactivity, friend recommendations, and more. He says they’ve learned this, which implies there’s data.
Not every Substack writer wants to write opinion pieces or stir debate, but I think it would be useful to learn, from real data, what kind of Substacks are succeeding the most in generating subscriptions.
Hell yes. I've been an author for nearly twenty years and just started a Substack after seeing just how refreshing and committed the space is to help *both* readers and writers grow together. The online space can be amazing, but it can also do such a number on our creative minds and spirits -- I'm so eager to see how everything continues to unfold! Thank you for what you're doing and I'm stoked to be part of the Substack family now!
As a writer (essays on poetry) I am not interested in payment, just readership. So I appreciate having the “free” option. As a reader, I would like to be a paying subscriber to more writers, but I am frustrated by the payment choices. At a minimum of $60/year a pop, I can’t afford too many subscriptions. So I pay for a few but mostly am doomed to be a freeloader. I still subscribe to newspapers and magazines, so my budget for reading material is strained. Could there be a “customize pay” option? Is it possible that some Substack writers would be willing to accept a lesser, customized amount? I wish I could spread my money around to more of the writers whose work I admire.
It does feel hard to financially support all the writer I would like to support. Perhaps if there was a way to package 5 or 6 publications together, paying a smaller lump sum to curate our own little magazine? I’m not sure, but I know there are SO many publications I wish I could afford to read more of.
Yes to this! As more and more writers move towards a paid model, which as a writer I understand, it feels frustrating as a reader when I keep clicking on articles only to be cut off before 'the good stuff'!
Yes! I totally second this. Or at least, until I find my readership, the whole payment situation feels rather irrelevant to my own substack experience. My whooping 29 followers at the moment doesn’t warrant a paid subscription model. I do subscribe to a few paid substacks, but there’s a real budget limit to how many is reasonable.
I was able to set an annual subscription rate of $30/year, i.e., half-off the minimum monthly rate. I have reservations about charging no less than $5/month for my paywall content, as that strikes me as a bit steep. I would like to offer a monthly option of less than that, as I think it would encourage a broader paid subscriber base and I think that setting such a high minimum discriminates in favor of more famous writers and larger, team-run Substacks. But I also suspect the transaction processing fees make it impractical for them to allow a lower subscription price.
Another way of driving subscriptions is to cite each others' work in our own, especially if we're popular. My subscribership increased fourfold because of a mention on another popular Substack.
Thank you a lot for this. I really like Substack the product, but it leaves me feeling like I still have to go “do social media stuff” after I write a post. Would be fantastic if I could skip that part and just focus on writing...
Substack would be more appropriately titled SubstanceStack since it is the caliber and depth of its substance that sets it apart from the swill being peddled on social media platforms.
As I wrote in response to your Note, Hamish, where you ask, “How would you describe Substack to a friend who’s unfamiliar with Substack?”
I'm excited because I need the discoverability since I write about wrestling. But I'm also cautious. I hope this feature rolling out in the next months boosts readerships for the smaller newsletters & shifts the balance between extremely big, big, medium, and small writers who all give different perspectives about their passions and not just: what's trendy!!!!
Substack has designed a beautiful home for us writers. Our voices were shrinking. Algorithms were slowly replacing us. You had to be a brand first before being a human being. You had to play to the tune of the traditional media. In short, we were half dead writing and our creativity was sunsetting for good. But, thanks Substack for rebirthing us, reviving our shattered voices, candling our light again, and giving us tools that we wouldn't have afford. From Africa, I am more than happy to write my heart out here. Asante
That‘s good to hear. I‘m wondering if that‘s the case for other writers from Africa, too. Because I personally have the impression, that Substack serves disproportionally well writers from the parts of the world that are in power (which means belong to the Global North and are English speaking). Maybe I‘m wrong, so I would like to see some data from Substack.
So far, I think Substack is really improving and creating tools for writers. Apart from Stripe which doesn't cover Africa, Substack had in one of the Office Hours indicated that they are testing other payment models which is a good step. It is really working to making the platform better and better based on the tools that they normally provide us with. So, I have a strong believe in Substack and their progress and vision. Thank you for expressing yourself.
“If you’re a new writer without a pre-existing audience, how can you break out?” Really excited about this particular focus!!!
This is the challenge for a majority of the people on this platform. Some of the most successful people here already were famous or well known in their field. Part of me starting a Substack was to see how far I could get as a regular person without a following. I’m pleased to say that I’ve achieved my own version of success but it has taken a lot of hard work on my part to get discovered
Oh my. I was hoping hard work would sneak in with trying to be patient.
Yeah. Hard work too!
Hi Diego. Its a difficult question but how would you define success for you?
I started my Substack because there was content that I wanted to talk about and share with other people. I would often find myself going "I wonder if anyone has ever talked about X?" and not finding any articles or very few related to that topic. So writing a Substack became an outlet for those desires. I knew that a lot of topics I wanted to write about (Understanding Bitwise Operators, C strings, Programming lore) were niche and wouldn't have a large audience to begin with. This plus the fact that I had zero following meant that I needed to set realistic goals. They were roughly
1. 100 followers by the end of the year
2. 52 articles in 52 weeks
3. 10,000 views across all of my articles.
It's been 9 months and I'm happy to say I'm 3x the number 1 goal (with a few paid subscribers as well), 1 article ahead of my second goal, and well above my third.
So I make a little money, and I've exceeded or am ahead of my goals. Plus I am satisfying my personal reasons for writing. So by all metrics I've set for myself I am successful.
The key is that I have not moved the goal posts for this year. Just because I have achieved my goals early doesn't mean that I should now be disappointed if I am not at 1000 subscribers by the end of the year. I shouldn't get upset when I loose 2 or 3 subscribers over the course of a few days, or if someone decides to pause their paid subscription. About the only expectation I have moving forward is that if I stick with it I will slowly grow my audience. Maybe one day I will hit that 1000 subscriber mark, and I'll treat myself to a nice dinner. Do I fantasize about being able to support myself full time with Substack? Of course! We all do. But I recognize that is a much more ambitious goal, and not one that I would be able to reach any time soon.
There isn't some secret. I have to actively work on cultivating this feeling of contentment over my success. It's easy to see other people who are much more successful at this than me, or see people with social media followings much large than mine, and become bitter and jealous. When I start to feel those feelings (which I am not immune to) I actively have to reign myself back in. So success for me is being able to satisfy my writing itch, and share it with more people than I ever expected it to. I am happy with my success and I hope that anyone who desires to achieve those same feelings can do it here with their Substacks.
Thank you for sharing Diego this is immensely helpful and articulates beautifully what many of us feel.
Very helpful. Thanks!
This is such a refreshing and healthy attitude. Thank you for sharing.
"Success for me is being about to satisfy my writing itch, and share it with more people than I ever expected to."
I feel similarly! I don't have a large social media following elsewhere, and am just getting started on Substack at a pace that's sustainable for me. Reading your response here helped me keep things in perspective.
Wow, thank you for sharing this Diego. So many lightbulbs went off for me while reading your response, particularly in this part:
“I have to actively work on cultivating this feeling of contentment over my success. It's easy to see other people who are much more successful at this than me, or see people with social media followings much large than mine, and become bitter and jealous. When I start to feel those feelings (which I am not immune to) I actively have to reign myself back in.”
Working on cultivating contentment over success according to *my* definition instead of mistaking other people’s achievements as the bar for success... THIS is the guidance I’ve been needing!
Thank you, thank you, thank you 😊
Fantastic reply, and I agree!
Thank you for honestly sharing your journey. Perhaps you can be one of the case studies in this new focus for Substack.
Do you promote your posts on Substack or elsewhere?
Oh and 1000 SUBSTACK SUBSCRIBERS.
Learning something helpful, and communicating it to others convincingly.
Same here
Totally!
I feel this! As someone lacking a previous following on other platforms, I am trying to create my own metrics and version of success. Many of the popular stacks in my niche (fashion, sustainable fashion) had a different pathway that led them here, but I believe I have something worth saying that adds to the greater pool & I'll stick to my grassroots efforts when it comes to growth!
This has been my problem for my whole writing life! I'm very hopeful that some of these new moves will help me spread my work without spending fruitless hours on social media.
I'm with you 100%. I detested social media lol. Nobody is looking for more ways to waste time, particularly writers. This all sounds so promising.
I loved social media for the connections with people from so many stages of my life. Then it became a place where I saw the worst sides of people I loved and respected and I had to play time consuming games to get my work out in front of people who weren't friends and family. It's exhausting and I don't have time for that. I have a job and family on top of my writing!
I loved it right up until Covid. Then I got burned out and had to regroup.
I love that you say “regroup.” Apt word choice for the little village of characters and interests that we writers really are dee
Deep inside
Yes, I agree. I compare it with selling, which I do not like to do at ALL!
I hate selling and I'm terrible at it.
That's the point.. you should not think of it as selling but SHARING your work.. we got to talk about it - if we don't feel good telling others about our work, who will..?? I think the mental block is the EXPECTATION that they would like what we have to say.. "Say what you want to say..!!"
Food for thought. Thanks.
I know this maybe somewhat of a stretch but you can try a social learning platform called Mentza where I have a channel.. hope it helps!
I agree! It’s one thing to bring a list and it’s another to be starting from zero. It will be interesting to be tuned into this new territory.
Welcome!!!
Go to coingecko and get How to Bitcoin
How are you with the word “patience”?
I myself am an American which means I’m allergic to it.
However, as many others suggest (really require) it to succeed here, I’m doing that too.
It is the hardest lesson I am learning in life besides acceptance 😭😂
Ooops I left that one out too!
For me, rabid feminist that I am, it has Baan “surrender”
Use hashtags ########
For example: #BartSimpsonForPresident #Kimkardashian'sHair
When I started using hashtags, my reads increased by about 3X.
In Substack, just after you hit "publish", a page comes up with a box to add hashtags.
Same here.. my Book (Something Divine) has been gathering cobwebs in Amazon since 2012.. not a single copy sold. I am hopeful here but I need to find a way to pivot my extremely varied thought process. I am now working with my second book, Teaching is Out, Learning is IN for something more pressing.. but being discovered and receiving some traction would sure help..!!
Z. S. - read my post about how I am going to try to get my book out there. Postcards and QR code to bookstores.
Is this like a new Zine? May look into it.
My bet is Sign Spinning a QR code on street corners
Lol I have never used a QR code in my life.
Until now!
I just did Yesterday! Purchased 5000 postcards to send to selected bookstores in the United States in the hope that I can get some traction for my book The Other Side Of The River: a story of love, war, cattle and cowboys. I used a QR code on the postcard. Seems like a great idea.
Yes!!! Same here.
Me too. This is exactly the kind of innovation that this particular Substacker has been waiting for (and banged on about on various 'Office Hours' threads).
I feel I've done quite well in building my subscriber base given the huge obstacle that I don't have any social media presence (which never could suit the kind of writing I do anyway).
Love your tagline or whatever it is called. What do you write about?
Can someone explain what hashtags are for? Are they like BISAC codes?
Thanks. The tagline is a line from a W B Yeats poem. What do I write about? Why not press the Subscribe button and take a free subscription. If you like Rob Henderson's Substack you'll probably like my stuff too.
The good old “persistent hard work” should do it
Me too, especially considering writers in languages other than English.
Indeed, the most exciting bit, because without reach, external social media are nothing more but a black hole.
Substack has changed my life and my career, and I can't wait to see what it does for other writers.
I've been a full-time professional writer for 15 years, and I've always loved my job. I just accepted that I had to work for my clients, and couldn't ever be fully independent.
My little feminist side project on Facebook got tons of attention, but the money all went to Facebook--and I regularly got put in Facebook jail for such crimes as calling my pet ducks assholes or saying that my dog had covered the house in mud.
I started posting to Substack on a lark, hoping to make some extra cash. I also needed a backup plan for what felt like the inevitable: that Facebook's bots would flag my content so often that I eventually got banned.
Nine months ago, I decided to start posting regularly and take Substack seriously. I'm now my own biggest client, and if my growth trajectory continues, by January I will have completely replaced my old freelance income with Substack.
It's pretty awesome.
"i'm now my own biggest client" is so fucking cool and so well deserved Zawn! CONGRATS
Thanks! Now, if I could channel your coolness as a counter to my zero cool points, and make feminism cool...
That's how we become millionaires.
hahaahah omg if high school me could read this comment it would make his life
also I am all in for making feminism cool!! let's figure out some collab or something idk??
Lol. My brother literally gave me lessons on how to be cool in high school. They... did not work. And totally. You know where to find me.
What were your brother's pointers for being cool?
Please don’t tell me you’re trying to tell me I’m not cool.
Freedom of speech definitely includes what you call your ducks and your dog. Congrats!
LOL> I have friends who have been in FB jail multiple times. You are in good company
Which predictably is a lot like IG jail which is how I was initially finding subscribers. Backed off of giving that platform too much energy. As Im anonymous here I knew I was setting myself a challenge to build an entire new audience of people who don’t know me. It’s hard but not as hard as I thought it would be. I constantly go back and forth re the anonymity but the truth is I just wouldn’t be writing what I’m writing about without it.
"You’re going to notice some changes." is a n ominous af phrase that's only ever been used by either a) someone who just gave you a hero dose of lsd or b) parents getting you ready for a divorce PLZ LET THIS BE A BIG DOSE OF PSYCHEDELICS TYSM
It's as ambivalent and nerve-racking as reading the words “special sauce” on a menu.
With you haha
ha!
yes, that phrase landed rather weirdly :) (fasten your seatbelts?)
going to wake up to a million subscribers and deleting my substack in a fit of hallucinatory disorientation
Still waiting! https://youtu.be/wkjVk0SAr20?si=PluYUCeGLefEnrUs
!!!!!
LOL
Can you clarify this, because I’ve never heard it before: “exceptional writing, considered argument, and robust debate—the key factors, as we have learned in six years here, that drive subscriptions.”
Exceptional writing I totally get. Do you have data to suggest arguments and debating increase subscriptions? What do those kinds of posts look like? Thanks!
While I don’t have any data to offer, I have a couple of personal anecdotes that might shed some light. (1) Until 10 years ago I owned a small bookstore in an equally small, rural community. In the mid 90s I became embroiled in a local controversy that, over several months, resulted in dozens of letters to the editor of our weekly newspaper, of which I was the author of about a third. A few years later at the farewell party for editor of that paper I asked him why he kept printing my letters when I had clearly exceeded his one letter p/month rule. He answered, “Are you kidding? We were setting sales records every week! I hated to see it all come to an end.” (2) My bookstore included a section of political books, with “liberal” books on the left, “conservative” books on the right, all the others down the middle. In a small community political affiliation is generally not a secret, and over the years I watched Ds reliably select books from the left side, Rs from the right. One day a regular buyer of the left side came in for a new book I hadn’t yet received. As the writer he was looking for was known for humor and witty insights, I suggested a similar author from the right. He was clearly stunned by this suggestion, so I offered to let him take the book home until his book came in, which he refused. Then I offered to just give it to him—he still refused. For the next few weeks, I conducted a little experiment: when someone bought a book from one side I offered them a free book from the other—no one ever accepted the free book. My conclusions: First, argument/debate is profitable for a publication if enough people engage in it, and more people engage when it’s free or nearly free (our little paper was 50 cents and our little battle increased weekly sales, not subscriptions). Second, people will pay to have their opinions/views reinforced, but not to have them challenged.
Wow, that's amazing on two fronts: First, that you offered a free book from the other side and, sadly, that no one took the free book. I would have taken the free book if I'd lived in your town but I'm one of the few people I know who read media from all sides of the political spectrum.
To me, the connection between the three factors and driving subscriptions is intuitive. Excellent writing requires reasoned arguments to be excellent, and to make readers desire more. Engagement of readers thru healthy debate creates relationships and often improves the arguments.
Hamish is saying argument and debate are two of three key factors driving subscriptions, ahead of other possible factors like education, positive community building, interactivity, friend recommendations, and more. He says they’ve learned this, which implies there’s data.
Not every Substack writer wants to write opinion pieces or stir debate, but I think it would be useful to learn, from real data, what kind of Substacks are succeeding the most in generating subscriptions.
I’d like to know this too. I decided on my own “what this means”, but I’m hardly ever right.
Hell yes. I've been an author for nearly twenty years and just started a Substack after seeing just how refreshing and committed the space is to help *both* readers and writers grow together. The online space can be amazing, but it can also do such a number on our creative minds and spirits -- I'm so eager to see how everything continues to unfold! Thank you for what you're doing and I'm stoked to be part of the Substack family now!
Welcome!
Thank you Linda! Loving it already! 🥰
As a writer (essays on poetry) I am not interested in payment, just readership. So I appreciate having the “free” option. As a reader, I would like to be a paying subscriber to more writers, but I am frustrated by the payment choices. At a minimum of $60/year a pop, I can’t afford too many subscriptions. So I pay for a few but mostly am doomed to be a freeloader. I still subscribe to newspapers and magazines, so my budget for reading material is strained. Could there be a “customize pay” option? Is it possible that some Substack writers would be willing to accept a lesser, customized amount? I wish I could spread my money around to more of the writers whose work I admire.
It does feel hard to financially support all the writer I would like to support. Perhaps if there was a way to package 5 or 6 publications together, paying a smaller lump sum to curate our own little magazine? I’m not sure, but I know there are SO many publications I wish I could afford to read more of.
Yes to this! As more and more writers move towards a paid model, which as a writer I understand, it feels frustrating as a reader when I keep clicking on articles only to be cut off before 'the good stuff'!
Interesting. You should be able to get some at $30 a year. (we do that for ours: https://everydaypoems.substack.com/ and https://thewritetopoetry.substack.com/ )
Yes! I totally second this. Or at least, until I find my readership, the whole payment situation feels rather irrelevant to my own substack experience. My whooping 29 followers at the moment doesn’t warrant a paid subscription model. I do subscribe to a few paid substacks, but there’s a real budget limit to how many is reasonable.
I was able to set an annual subscription rate of $30/year, i.e., half-off the minimum monthly rate. I have reservations about charging no less than $5/month for my paywall content, as that strikes me as a bit steep. I would like to offer a monthly option of less than that, as I think it would encourage a broader paid subscriber base and I think that setting such a high minimum discriminates in favor of more famous writers and larger, team-run Substacks. But I also suspect the transaction processing fees make it impractical for them to allow a lower subscription price.
I’m starting from literally zero, so can’t wait for further content on breaking out
Welcome.
Hello!
Another way of driving subscriptions is to cite each others' work in our own, especially if we're popular. My subscribership increased fourfold because of a mention on another popular Substack.
That's amazing! It's uplifting to hear that larger pubs are giving smaller ones a leg up in this way.
Thank you a lot for this. I really like Substack the product, but it leaves me feeling like I still have to go “do social media stuff” after I write a post. Would be fantastic if I could skip that part and just focus on writing...
I’ve tried other platforms geared towards writers but I’ve never felt a community quite like what’s been created here on Substack.
Great writers like Max Blumenthal, Aron Mate' sold me on navigating here(Grayzone). True crime & news stuff is looked at here. That's been great.
Substack would be more appropriately titled SubstanceStack since it is the caliber and depth of its substance that sets it apart from the swill being peddled on social media platforms.
As I wrote in response to your Note, Hamish, where you ask, “How would you describe Substack to a friend who’s unfamiliar with Substack?”
“Substack is where writers and readers converge to educate the mind, elevate the conversation, and edify the soul.” (https://substack.com/profile/3567-hamish-mckenzie/note/c-15222816)
LET'S GO FOR IT!!!
I'm excited because I need the discoverability since I write about wrestling. But I'm also cautious. I hope this feature rolling out in the next months boosts readerships for the smaller newsletters & shifts the balance between extremely big, big, medium, and small writers who all give different perspectives about their passions and not just: what's trendy!!!!
Substack has designed a beautiful home for us writers. Our voices were shrinking. Algorithms were slowly replacing us. You had to be a brand first before being a human being. You had to play to the tune of the traditional media. In short, we were half dead writing and our creativity was sunsetting for good. But, thanks Substack for rebirthing us, reviving our shattered voices, candling our light again, and giving us tools that we wouldn't have afford. From Africa, I am more than happy to write my heart out here. Asante
That‘s good to hear. I‘m wondering if that‘s the case for other writers from Africa, too. Because I personally have the impression, that Substack serves disproportionally well writers from the parts of the world that are in power (which means belong to the Global North and are English speaking). Maybe I‘m wrong, so I would like to see some data from Substack.
So far, I think Substack is really improving and creating tools for writers. Apart from Stripe which doesn't cover Africa, Substack had in one of the Office Hours indicated that they are testing other payment models which is a good step. It is really working to making the platform better and better based on the tools that they normally provide us with. So, I have a strong believe in Substack and their progress and vision. Thank you for expressing yourself.
in terms of the Substack community lifting each other up
I run a Twitter groupchat called "Substackers" where we share our work and discuss writing, marketing, publishing, etc.
Feel free to DM me on Twitter (https://twitter.com/realChrisBrunet) and I will add you. The groupchat is non-political.
the reason this happens is because Christopher here has the setting for only verified people to DM him.
I example DM a company few minutes before this with out problem. Its a setting thing.
this was a big thing in the art community the other month.
You had my curiosity, but now you have my attention.