I'll chime in with my experience as a normal, plus point to one other normal (that I found via Notes) that seems to be having an exceptional amount of subscriber growth.
Here's my experience: I started a Substack about a 10 days prior to the launch of Notes. I have not promoted my Substack at all. I haven't even emailed any friends or pos…
I'll chime in with my experience as a normal, plus point to one other normal (that I found via Notes) that seems to be having an exceptional amount of subscriber growth.
Here's my experience: I started a Substack about a 10 days prior to the launch of Notes. I have not promoted my Substack at all. I haven't even emailed any friends or posted on social media about it. My partner, my dad, and my rabbi are subscribers, but otherwise no one that I know subscribes to my Substack. I've been a heavy user of Notes (in fact I invited to use it as a Beta tester as a Substack reader). I currently have 36 subscribers. So Notes has gained me 33 subscribers. That's not an insane amount, but I think it is cool. The thing that I think is even more cool is that some of the subscribers are people that I have been reading for years and admire. And even more cool than that, despite the fact that 90% of my subscribers are strangers, I've had open rates of 55%, 92%, and 75% on the 3 posts I've sent out.
Did you go in with a specific Note strategy? How regularly were you posting? Do you read a lot of Subs such that perhaps your Notes are visible to a wider audience? (I know I can go click and check these things out, but it's early and I'm pouring coffee right now haha)
My main strategy is to try to engage with other people and add the most value that I can to whatever conversation is going on. Otherwise I haven't been intentional about how often I am posting or what exactly I am posting. I do subscribe to a bunch of Substacks (over 100 now, 15 or so paid), and so I have probably ended up in people's feeds via conversations with larger writers.
Interesting, thanks. Great that you've had success and broadened your readership via Notes.
To be honest, that's been my main focus via specific post comment sections. I love engaging with others via comments, it feels like a nice slow-burn place to have thoughtful thoughts.
The most engagement I've gotten is, unsurprisingly, by interacting with other larger writers. On a couple of occasions I've had writers re-stack my comments, or just continue to engage in a way that keeps the conversation in their reader's feeds. I'm also posting my own notes. In terms of frequency, it is highly variable. I may spend 30 minutes on notes, respond to a few other writer's notes, post one of my own, re-stack a quote I like, then go do something else for several hours (or a day) and come back later to do the same thing.
So... basically drafting on someone with bigger reach? If I understand your point correctly, my original comment stands. I COULD draft on someone more famous like I did on twitter for variously other identities, but I’m retiring all of them and just bring me here. It’s amazing how many followers you can get when people see you have proximity to fame...
That's the network effect, if one person has a telephone, it's useless. Two? still useless, 10? Getting a bit more useful but over there that thing has 1000 users, which is more useful than your 10-user phone. Bring those 1000 over to your "phone" and suddenly those 500 over there will want to switch too etc... maybe your "phone" isn't the best (VHS) and there is a better one (BETAMAX), but still you have the users so BETAMAX whatever! ;)
Yes, I think you're right that indirect reach is helping here. A couple of the subscribers that I have gotten have very large (100,000+) readership. I've also re-stacked a couple of articles that I really like, with notes about why I liked them, or had comments on articles that have been re-stacked by the writer. Network effects are definitely at play, but since I can't have any impact on that directly, I'm just trying to engage in the most thoughtful way to everything I encounter. Also, I love speculative fiction and just subscribed to your Substack! So I guess you kind of got a new subscriber via Notes (in a roundabout way) :)
Wow thank you - I just read all of your comments and found them so helpful. It was honestly like reading a mini article haha (and honestly more helpful than a lot of other full length articles about using Notes). I love that you are focused on engaging to everything you encounter in a thoughtful way. So much social media is about quick and meaningless engagement, but I think Notes really has the potential to be helpful and authentic. That is going to be my strategy going forward to. Thanks again for all of your insights! (:
Your comment is so inspirational and gave me a different perspective compared with the article about notes that I was reading. Thank you for this helpful insight and push of motivation. I am also new to Substack (10 days old) and I am trying to learn about ways of getting my writing in front of more people.
Notes is the perfect gathering place for writers to bitch and complain. 🙂 it’s good to have a place where we can communicate about things. I’m not sure how this platform might be good for subs, but I think it will be a good water cooler area for ideas. I like it. Follow me for more sarcastic positivity. It’s my brand.
I'll chime in with my experience as a normal, plus point to one other normal (that I found via Notes) that seems to be having an exceptional amount of subscriber growth.
Here's my experience: I started a Substack about a 10 days prior to the launch of Notes. I have not promoted my Substack at all. I haven't even emailed any friends or posted on social media about it. My partner, my dad, and my rabbi are subscribers, but otherwise no one that I know subscribes to my Substack. I've been a heavy user of Notes (in fact I invited to use it as a Beta tester as a Substack reader). I currently have 36 subscribers. So Notes has gained me 33 subscribers. That's not an insane amount, but I think it is cool. The thing that I think is even more cool is that some of the subscribers are people that I have been reading for years and admire. And even more cool than that, despite the fact that 90% of my subscribers are strangers, I've had open rates of 55%, 92%, and 75% on the 3 posts I've sent out.
For another case of someone else without a large following, Noah Berlatsky wrote a post about how he went from 1,225 subscribers to 1,870 in a couple of days on Notes. https://noahberlatsky.substack.com/p/whats-it-like-to-go-sort-of-viral
So that's at least two cases of people you haven't heard of before that have seen some subscriber growth.
That's great to hear.
Did you go in with a specific Note strategy? How regularly were you posting? Do you read a lot of Subs such that perhaps your Notes are visible to a wider audience? (I know I can go click and check these things out, but it's early and I'm pouring coffee right now haha)
My main strategy is to try to engage with other people and add the most value that I can to whatever conversation is going on. Otherwise I haven't been intentional about how often I am posting or what exactly I am posting. I do subscribe to a bunch of Substacks (over 100 now, 15 or so paid), and so I have probably ended up in people's feeds via conversations with larger writers.
Interesting, thanks. Great that you've had success and broadened your readership via Notes.
To be honest, that's been my main focus via specific post comment sections. I love engaging with others via comments, it feels like a nice slow-burn place to have thoughtful thoughts.
The question is, are you using it by interacting with others? Just posting? Or how frequently?
The most engagement I've gotten is, unsurprisingly, by interacting with other larger writers. On a couple of occasions I've had writers re-stack my comments, or just continue to engage in a way that keeps the conversation in their reader's feeds. I'm also posting my own notes. In terms of frequency, it is highly variable. I may spend 30 minutes on notes, respond to a few other writer's notes, post one of my own, re-stack a quote I like, then go do something else for several hours (or a day) and come back later to do the same thing.
that would indicate indirect reach via someone with reach subscribed to you since your notes will show up on those people's feeds, maybe? Also, the time of day may factor into it. Either way, it's the network effect. Do you like speculative fiction? https://open.substack.com/pub/alexanderipfelkofer/p/future-now?r=26onua&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
So... basically drafting on someone with bigger reach? If I understand your point correctly, my original comment stands. I COULD draft on someone more famous like I did on twitter for variously other identities, but I’m retiring all of them and just bring me here. It’s amazing how many followers you can get when people see you have proximity to fame...
That's the network effect, if one person has a telephone, it's useless. Two? still useless, 10? Getting a bit more useful but over there that thing has 1000 users, which is more useful than your 10-user phone. Bring those 1000 over to your "phone" and suddenly those 500 over there will want to switch too etc... maybe your "phone" isn't the best (VHS) and there is a better one (BETAMAX), but still you have the users so BETAMAX whatever! ;)
Yes, I think you're right that indirect reach is helping here. A couple of the subscribers that I have gotten have very large (100,000+) readership. I've also re-stacked a couple of articles that I really like, with notes about why I liked them, or had comments on articles that have been re-stacked by the writer. Network effects are definitely at play, but since I can't have any impact on that directly, I'm just trying to engage in the most thoughtful way to everything I encounter. Also, I love speculative fiction and just subscribed to your Substack! So I guess you kind of got a new subscriber via Notes (in a roundabout way) :)
What you see is this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect
simple as that. Notes are great for established networks and do close to nothing if you are new unless you have a booster, which you had/have.
edit: ha! thanks for the sub. Of course, that was my evil plan all along! Get one get them all! 😎
Wow thank you - I just read all of your comments and found them so helpful. It was honestly like reading a mini article haha (and honestly more helpful than a lot of other full length articles about using Notes). I love that you are focused on engaging to everything you encounter in a thoughtful way. So much social media is about quick and meaningless engagement, but I think Notes really has the potential to be helpful and authentic. That is going to be my strategy going forward to. Thanks again for all of your insights! (:
Your comment is so inspirational and gave me a different perspective compared with the article about notes that I was reading. Thank you for this helpful insight and push of motivation. I am also new to Substack (10 days old) and I am trying to learn about ways of getting my writing in front of more people.
Notes is the perfect gathering place for writers to bitch and complain. 🙂 it’s good to have a place where we can communicate about things. I’m not sure how this platform might be good for subs, but I think it will be a good water cooler area for ideas. I like it. Follow me for more sarcastic positivity. It’s my brand.