735 Comments

Elizabeth Held has generously offered to answer any questions related to her Grow interview yesterday if anyone wants to jump in during Office Hours! https://on.substack.com/p/grow-series-6

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So many words to count in today's thread! Excited to see the ways you all begin to use video and explore writing in new languages.

Our team is signing off today. In the meantime, our resources are here for you:

- https://support.substack.com/

- https://substack.com/resources

See you next week for shoutouts!

Katie + Bailey + Rose + Kelsa + Jasmine + Kendra + Hanne + Chloe + Sarvar + Ben + Jonathan + Sophia + Erica

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A year ago (the 28th) I created my substack account and spent a month learning how it worked, planning out marketing, etc. as I didn't launch until end of February. I had barely 200 subscribers and now there are thousands so keep writing, posting, sharing, marketing, and creating!

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Here is a thing I learned recently: I used to have the simple rectangular "subscribe" button on my posts, but then realized that if you paste a link to your newsletter instead, you get a nice large box with the newsletter's one sentence summary and a subscribe field. It looks nicer and is more noticeable than just a simple button. Please scroll to the bottom of the following article to see what I mean: https://moviewise.substack.com/p/the-meaning-of-life

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Idea/experiment: I’ve reprinted other people’s work a few times in my daily newsletter. Maybe someone here wants to try? Specifics:

1. Looking for really great first-person stories about change, or learning, or growth — things that let readers see the world through someone else’s eyes. Wide variety of topics, voices, etc.

2. Recent example: https://www.understandably.com/p/plenty-of-daylight

3. I’m at Understandably.com. Launched 2019, 500+ editions, 125,000+ free subscribers. I pay for reprints (a bit, usually $50). You’ll probably get some new signups.

Interested? Email me at bill@understandably.com. Maybe put “pitch idea” as the subject. I’m always open to other ideas on how to work together, too. Thanks all!

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Last week Jasmine @ Substack, and other contributors, suggested using a subreddit as a posting place. I posted a the latest zoetic message there “Move Mall to High Mall” and know it was read on substack to the tune of 11 % of all views.

Being my first post it has not shown up for me to see, but I persist.

Today I added a poll in the same subreddit and to my surprise there are 440+ votes, with more commentary ever realized at the substack posts.

This is all good, as possibilities are materializing to convert these interested people into subscribers.

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Hi everyone! Wanted to share a little bit about my experience using threads. For the first year or so on Substack, I didn't use threads at all. I had this idea that they were better suited for nonfiction Substacks. Maybe that's true, maybe it isn't. But lately I've been playing with threads and I've found that there is value for those of us who are writing fiction and creative nonfiction. The thing is, instead of asking about the story directly, I try to pick an aspect of the story and see if I can create a question out of that. By way of example, I wrote a silly story about trying a new frozen pizza brand, then a few days later, I did a thread asking readers to share their favorite frozen pizza recommendations. Tbh, I was pleasantly surprised by the response. Yes, I picked up a few new subscribers, but I think the real win was that it sparked a conversation among readers I'd never heard from before. Also, lots of readers who tend not to comment or email me hit that Like button, which was a nice way to let me know that my stories do hit the mark. That said, I'm still trying to refine my thread game, and just like writing a Substack, there's a learning curve there in terms of developing an understanding of how to spark a conversation.

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I had to take 6 weeks off from my newsletter (writing humor while grieving was too hard) and now that I'm back I'm almost overwhelmed by all the new stuff. Feeling a little lost, but excited to jump back in. Can't wait to check out the new layout, word count, image sizes, etc.!

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“It’s getting better all the tiiime…”

Great new changes this week. I’m excited to see the changes at work and use them myself. I checked my growth over time and it’s been slow and steady, literally one subscriber at a time. I’m hopeful, though and still trying.

What do you hope will be your biggest success this year? Mine? A single paid subscriber. 😌

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Just dropping by to say a quick but BIG THANK YOU for the new magazine layout. I am loving it. (Also the feature that allows using images in full width)! BIG THANKS!

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Thank you to whoever it was last week who suggested that when promoting on FB, Twitter or LI that you include a photo and description in the main post and then a link to your newsletter in the comments rather than the main post. It made a big difference in how much I showed up in other people's feeds. My posts got a lot more likes and comments.

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Three cheers for word count! Huzzah! Bravo! Well Done!

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I am so excited about the word count that I could just burst!

Plus I launched a new Substack this week called Unseen St. Louis (it's my 3rd 😂 ) and it's growing fast. So never doubt yourself (or the advice of your writer friends!) if you have a good idea.

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My newsletter has many corporate readers. I've been asked if LinkedIn could be added to the share button. Thank you.

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Many thanks to the Substack team for being so responsive to requests--magazine layout, video, wordcount,right-to-left script...and as always the community building. See you all at Substack Go!

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Excited to say goodbye to my "Substack word count" Google doc! I know writing is about quality, not quantity, but it's soothing for a perfectionist like me to know that every post is about the same length, so thank you!!

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Substack I need help balancing growing a large newsletter with the newsletter actually making it into the inbox folders and not spam or promo folders. How does one balance growth and delivery to new subscribers?

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Folks, if anyone needs help with graphs and charts, I'd be happy to help (for free—i don't know, maybe just give me a credit somewhere?). You can see some of my work at sunderji.substack.com.

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Word count! Finally

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I loved the substack post yesterday on free speech, trust and censorship. I think it would be so helpful to use in marketing for all of us who struggle to explain the subscription concept to people who are used to getting things “free” online. So if there are ways to adapt it and put it in buttons and on emails, let me know. I want to send it everywhere !

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If you haven't already, I'd highly recommend signing up for George Saunders' Substack called "Story Club." He's an absolute genius, and he offers fabulous (and free) advice for writers. Particularly, he takes you inside his head, so that you get to watch him think his way through the process. It’s really helped me trust my intuition and pay attention to the craft of writing well, rather than simply following a quotidian list of dos and don'ts.

I’d recommend this post as a good place to start, particularly the section called “The Meter-in-My Head is How I Make My Living.” Hope it helps!

https://georgesaunders.substack.com/p/first-thohts-on-reviision

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Hi everyone. The events arranged by Substack are great, but the timezones often aren't ideal for those of us in some parts of the world. So I'm organising a network of people around the Pacific region - that's Australia, New Zealand, Pacific nations and anywhere on the Pacific rim including SE Asia - basically anyone in time zones from Asia to the American west coast. I'm having a Zoom meetup on Sunday. Here's the link if you're in the right time zones and would like to register. https://lu.ma/ruxv1e42

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Thank you so much for adding word count Substack!!!

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Three cheers for the word count!

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Thank you Substack Team for the new features. You continue to listen. Loved listening to and seeing Patti Smith on vocals.

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As a professional artist first (50+ years) and published writer second (11 yrs), I'm looking forward to visually clean video posts without the YouTube chaos. Video, including time-lapse drawings, helps tell the stories of creatures and features I write about. So thank you.

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Hi, everyone. Like many of you, feeling a little overwhelmed, as opposed to over nourished (that was November and December). Glad to see the word count on here. Also would be interested in a feature that tells you how long it will take to read a particular piece. Especially with the emails, that could be helpful.

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Curious to where others syndicate their content to drive growth to their substack? I have syndication on one website, looking for others. Medium I have found to be useless.

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Keep the updates comin'...love it!

Would love to have the ability to have a longer automated email sequence for new subscribers.

For example, if I have a paid member I'd love to be able to have a set sequence of 2-4 emails to onboard them slowly over time.

One welcome email is good, but I feel like having the option to set up a couple more would be even better!

Also, the PDF upload feature in my welcome email doesn't seem to work. Anyways else experiencing this?

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Looking forward to the start of Substack Go in February!

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Great features! Thanks for adding them.

Here's some uplifting music for all my fellow writers!

https://open.spotify.com/track/6aG9xp2yV5mgPxKMpGb86v?si=SNHuy3bCSvaeu3fgzoqZaQ

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Engagement question: I just started posting my new newsletter on substack on Mondays and I am so excited. This week's post resulted in several people whom I know personally texting me such positive responses - how can I encourage people to like and comment ON the substack post itself?

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Hi all, I'm totally confused about one thing--I have a high open rate percentage--it's gone from like 15% when I started to consistently 60/70% in the 9 months I've been on Substack. But they don't translate into actual subscribers. It's a miracle if I get one or two a month. What am I doing wrong or can do?

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New Substack writer here! I'm a librarian by trade, and I publish a weekly newsletter all about accessing U.S. government information: https://theciviclibrarian.substack.com/. I use current events to choose the resources I highlight each week. Does anyone co-write regularly with experts in a field you're featuring? I'm thinking about starting to do that about once a month (e.g. I have a friend who is an astronomer - thinking that we could collaborate on a piece about NASA). Thinking it could be a good way to grow my audience and enrich the information I offer.

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I just figured out something. I didn't realize that I could see the images people put in their newsletter if I clicked on the title and went to the substack website. It's a much better reading environment than what comes in my email. Questions: 1. Should I put something in my newsletter to explain that to people? 2. Is that the reason why I get higher readership than the actual counts of my subscribers? Because people are being counted twice, once from the email and once from the webpage?

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I have a writing schedule. It is even in my calendar. But this last week news both personal and public threw me off course. The rumors of war and huge surge on the one side and several local Covid deaths including someone i know and liked very much on the other.

What I write is personal and visceral and flows from heart and mind to the page. I will try again tomorrow. Guerney Halleck tells young Paul Atreides in Dune that mood means nothing when it comes to fighting. But I am not sure that applies here. On the other hand, if left to mood entirely I might have no schedule at all, and I must sing for my supper.

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I'm curious to see how video gets used. Given the opportunity for revenue to be created via YT and embedding it in Substack, I wonder what the benefit of having natively hosted videos in Substack is vs YouTube.

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Great news on the word counter! I also like the new "See the discussion" button

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I'm new to Substack and thought I'd put together a content calendar so that I could plan and prepare in advance. Is there anywhere that I can get a list of content ideas. Things like: Do an Interview, QandA, Article etc. Thank you.

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I am a songwriter/musician but am also an author - traditionally published (not vanity, though not against it). I had created a demarcation between my music mailing list and my other writing. In hindsight this greatly hindered what I was sending out and how frequently I published.

Reading Jeff Tweedy's substack changed that for me.

https://jefftweedy.substack.com/

I gave my mailing list subscribers a "warning" of sorts. I explained that I was returning to my pure writing roots - ie: songs, poetry, essays, stories - are all what I do. Lucky them, eh?

My fear was that I would lose subscribers. Of course, subscribers you don't send to are like not subscribers. ;-)

My fear was realized... Over the past 3 weeks I've lost 8 subscribers. But, on a single day I gained 14 for my post about addiction. I realize that, ultimately, 100 subscribers who want you in their inbox is better than 5,000 who can take you or leave you. It's an important and liberating realization.

I wrote a little about this in my "Happy & Discontented" post this morning. It was written in response to a friend's blog yesterday about three questions you can ask yourself in order to boost your happiness.

In any case, I work in technology - data analytics and content creation - and am happy to answer any questions. And to the substack staff - please add embedded mp3's as a media upload type. ;-)

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I have a plea for substack. Would you consider expanding the newsletter categories to include "outdoors." I feel like mine doesn't really fit well into the existing categories on the platform.

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I want to run a free writing contest on substack. Has anyone ever run a contest on substack? The thought would be to teach a lesson and have user submit 250 words based on the lesson. I would run it once a month for a year (12 winners). They win a craft book and an Amazon card. Thoughts/ Help?

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I'm at the point now where I have truly engaged paid folks, and about 350 people as free subs, and most of the free-s are between 3-5 stars for participation. I have two free posts per month as archives, and leave all new posts as free for 30 days...so as long as one is keeping up with the reading, they can read everything, except old material. I think it's time to change this up and have paid-only posts.

Does anyone have any other thoughts for encouraging those 350?? I already tried a "deal" just after the holidays, and only 2 went for it. And said I wouldn't do it again until next December...so that's off the table. (And didn't do much anyway!)

I change up my "reminders" frequently. If they weren't doing so much opening/reading, I'd be worried about my content... but they are reading; they're just not paying :)

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Hellooo everyone!

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Ooh, happy to see word count! Any chance of returning the "nearing/over email limit" to the bottom bar? I'm having to scroll up and down....

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I'd like to thank everyone that had a hand in the censorship post yesterday. Every word seemed open, fair and well-considered. My newsletter 'Brace Yourself' can sometimes touch on topics some folks don't want to consider, so I really appreciate Substack's approach. We writers can breathe a sigh of relief knowing we are a little less policed. At least on this corner of the web!

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I don't often make it to these Office Hours, but when I do it is very informative. I am still trying to grow my readership. Most of what I have is people I had in my email list. Although, from time to time, I get one that gets a lot of views. My readership is, I guess minimal. I am still relatively new and unorganized. I have averaged between 50-100 readers for some of my more recent posts. It's a little disheartening as I see most of the people here have thousands of readers. I am not in it for fame and fortune. I like research and I like to vent (mostly sarcastically) through my writing. I try to be creative and entertaining, but other than numbers, I don't get any comments or feedback. That is often useful and always motivating. I'm not sure I have a question, just reading through all the ideas and suggestions and trying to integrate them. Thank you for answering many of the questions I didn't know I had. Keep writing!!

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I just moved my blog and email to Substack. Prior I was on WordPress and MailChimp. I find Substack to be a better experience for my writing and getting a newsletter out. A question is that my prior newsletter would have a summary of new posts and link back to the WordPress blog, but was wondering if it might be more effective with Substack to just do one post per newsletter. I have avoided this as my pieces tend to be long? Anyway, trying to adapt to the new landscape with my Mind Wise newsletter/blog.

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I wrote an exclusive last week on a Gold Star family suing Alec Baldwin for $25 million. I was the only reporter with the case filing and interviews with the family and lawyer.

BUT the story for picked up by every media outlet and not one linked back to me or gave attribution. The AP wrote it and said a local paper had it first and linked to it but the date stamp is after mine. I have tweeted for a week that these outlets have to give credit to my substack but they just ignore me.

This is the fourth time my exclusives on substack are taken by national media with no credit or links.

What can be done to force media to credit substack as a journalism outlet and abide by the ethics of attribution?

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Hello Everyone! I have been free posting a science/philosophy newsletter since August, with a fairly consistent readership. Is it typical that I haven't had any comments or likes and is it possible that readers can subscribe to a free post? in the stats, it says most of the readers are viewing the newsletter by e-mail; what does this mean exactly. Thanks for any help; I'm an old timer from the typewriter age more than the computer age but I'm willing to listen and learn. To substack; Thanks for listing updates on previous posts; I had asked about it and you responded. This is helpful to know if new readers are looking back at older posts.

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