New on Substack: Self-serve special offers

We’ve just released a new feature that lets writers set special offers for readers. If you have paid subscriptions enabled for your publication, you can now offer free trials or percentage discounts right from your Substack dashboard.

This feature can be helpful if you want to offer prospective subscribers a special price for, say, Christmas, or if you want to encourage new readers to see what it’s like to be a subscriber for a while. We’ve seen that special offers can be highly effective for converting casual readers into paying subscribers, so we wanted to make it as easy as possible for writers to issue them.

To set up a special offer, go to Section 3 of your Settings page and click “Manage Special Offers”. Then:

• Click “New special offer”.

• Pick a percentage or free trial and stipulate the desired time period.

You can share special offers via a customizable link or a button in a post (find it in the “Buttons” dropdown list in the Substack editor). Or you can set it so that anyone who subscribes via your site during a given time period will get the special price.

Thanks to the Substack publishers who have helped us figure out the best way to implement this feature, and for the feedback from those of you who have been requesting something like this. We will continue to improve the product and welcome your input.