Have questions about publishing, growing, or going paid on Substack?
The Substack team, and your fellow writers, are here to help!
Today we’re hosting Office Hours with a special guest, Casey Botticello, author of Blogging Guide, a newsletter focused on helping writers navigate the digital publishing landscape and earn money from their writing. Casey knows a lot about publishing and Substack. We’ll be in the thread to answer writer questions for an hour with Casey and the Substack writer community.
How do you increase paid subscribership? To get started: Casey shares 17 strategies he used to reach 100+ paid subscribers on Substack in two months plus a whole host of learnings from writing on Substack.
Seeking inspiring ways to celebrate with readers? Check out The Persuasion Festival. Writers, contributors, and friends are coming together to celebrate all they have accomplished in defending and reinvigorating the values of a free and fair society in their first year on Substack.
Curious what style of writing works best on Substack? Over 325 unique publications were mentioned in the Shoutout Thread last week.Lyle writes memoir-style with a dash of advice column.Sneaky Art posts drawings from sketchbooks in public places. So Relatable shares delicious snacks with a curated list of reads on creative process and writing. A wide array of different writing styles were on display.
Drop your questions in the thread and we’ll do our best to supercharge each other.
Our team will be in the thread today with Casey from 9 am - 10 am PST / 12 pm - 1 pm EST answering questions with you.
We’ll host this thread again next week with a special guest from Substack’s Product team who is are eager to learn more about the publishing tools writers most want. Save it to your calendar so you don’t miss it.
Looking for more ways to connect with writers? Casey hosts a Substack Writers Facebook group.
Thank you for joining us for this week for Office Hours! And a BIG thank you to Casey Botticello for co-hosting with us.
We are wrapping this week's thread but we’ll host this thread again next week with a special guest from Substack’s Product team who is are eager to learn more about the publishing tools writers most want. Save it to your calendar with the link in the top of today's post so you don't miss it.
Be sure you subscribe to Casey's Substack for ongoing resources for navigating the digital publishing landscape. https://bloggingguide.substack.com/
I also wanted to add a few links that may be useful to Substack writers looking to promote their newsletters.
These are newsletter directories. Newsletter directories give you backlinks to your website, which increases the ranking and searchability of your website. They also help readers find newsletters covering a specific topic of interest. Here are a few of the top ones:
I'm reading everything you linked here and finding so much valuable information! I really hate the marketing/PR aspect of substack because I'm selling myself now, which is a lot harder than selling the bigger brand (media outlet.) Have you ever heard of someone who does the marketing/branding/PR for substack writers so we can pay for it instead of just procrastinating and avoiding it?
Haha I've helped a few people myself, but I don't know of anyone who specifically caters to Substack writers (and actually knows what they are talking about). That said, you can always feel free to reach out if you need dedicated help!
Alternatively, you could look for someone who can help you with the specific marketing tasks you don't like, as opposed to an all-in-one Substack specialist. For example, a link building expert to get your posts better backlinks, a content marketer to help you boost content production, or a graphic designer to create custom images, etc.
Thanks, Casey, for your info. I'm interested in such newsletter directories in spanish. Do you know some of them? Any idea on how to find them? Thanks a lot.
I'm currently approaching 1,000 subscribers. I'm considering going to a combination of paid and free subscriptions when I get to about 2,500. Is it possible to do both? I've found no guidlines for how to do this in the help section. Is it even advisable? Or am I better off going paid only? My plan is to offer loads of free content and the ability to comment to paid subscribers. Haven't found any info on how to set that up either (I know it can be done because others are doing it).
Hi Kyle, Yes it is possible to offer a combinator of free and paid posts to your subscriber list. Sorry you had trouble finding information on that.
When you turn on paid and go to publish a post, one of your options will be to send to "send email" to everyone or "send email to paid subscribers."
As a general rule of thumb we encourage writers to have a combination of free an paid content, making their best work free. It's the best possible marketing. Even though every fibre of your being may tell you that your best work should go behind the paywall, it’s smart to make your most thoughtful and accessible content free to everyone. That way, it stands a chance of being shared and widely read.
Just remembered another question. I like that Substack automatically embeds youtube videos right on my site. However, so far it hasn't with Bitchute. I've not yet tried Oracle. Are there any plans to enable that ability with Bitchute, Oracle and others?
I'm struggling with whether to add a paid subscriber option. I could use the extra support, but I don't have the capacity to produce anything extra for paid subscribers right now. What do you think about adding a paid option without extra content, purely for optional financial support of the newsletter? Alternatively: what are some creatives ideas for paid subscriber content that can be managed on an already full and tight schedule?
Discussion threads are a quality (and less demanding of your time) way to offer something extra for paying subscribers. I've done them for both all and paid subscribers, and they really help generate a feeling of community among my readers.
Yeah, I'd really like to do a Friday mailbag-type thread every week, and a monthly thread where paid subscribers can pitch me ideas of what they'd like to see me write about when I got the subscription base to do so!
Would love to hear about creative ideas here. I know one writer offers bi-weekly dance classes on zoom to paid subscribers! (https://raha.substack.com/)
Beyond those creative ideas, one thing to remember is that not every post you publish needs to be at an equal level of depth, especially if you’re publishing more frequently. Here are a few ideas for what to offer readers that reminds them you exist, but doesn’t require as much work from you:
* Paid posts that are rough notes, off-the-cuff ideas, sketches, or other “works in progress” that reveal your writing process
* Audio posts where you narrate something you’ve written, or just say hello to your readers
* Podcast interviews, which you can publish right from your Substack. Interviewing others can be just as much work as writing, depending on your level of polish, but can also help break up your writing schedule.
* Guest posts from other writers. In addition to giving you a break from writing, guest posts are also a great way to cross-promote your newsletter with others.
* Discussion threads, where you ask readers a question. Bonus: they get to meet and interact with other readers, without additional work from you.
* Ask me anythings (AMAs): Use discussion threads to host regular AMAs, either with yourself or with a guest.
* Private community: Offer paid subscribers access to a private discussion forum or community so they can interact with other readers, even on days when you’re not publishing.
I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers cant read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers onlu. I hadnt intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this.
I've shared this before (so forgive me if I sound like a broken record) but Cherie Hu, who writes the newsletter Water + Music, wrote this excellent post on how to think about asking for reader support -- as in, what's the value proposition? It's really, really good:
Andrea, a Substack called Liberty's Highlights has done just that. Payment is completely optional. I believe that he has at least 100 subscribers paying him $12 per month.
Reading this now -- wow. I am incredibly impressed, and now have a lot to think about as I approach the date I intended to turn on paid subscriptions (Aug 1).
Indeed, I don't have a paywall, everything is free.
I have about 4,500 free subs and about 188 paid subs right now, so around 4% going paid (but I turned on the paid option only 4 months ago, so I don't know where it'll settle -- so far that % is going up every month, but it won't go up forever..).
Could I ask, what's your thinking around not paywalling some content for paid subscribers? I've paywalled some of mine, but I'm leaning toward doing what you're doing.
Hey Terrel. Happy to discuss. Can you email me at my domain name @ substack.com or DM me on Twitter (same twitter username as my website domain name -- DMs are open).
My blog has about 5% conversion to paid with no pay-gate on content. If you have significant subscribers, some amount of them are actually waiting to pay and can't.
That's really interesting. What is your thinking on that, vs. paywalling off some content for paid subscribers only? Love to hear your thoughts (as it's something I wrestle with too).
I haven't tried pay-gating, so I don't really know. When I initially made the decision to move to paid, it was after one of my articles went crazy (by my standards, 75k hits-ish) and I was going paid a lot earlier than I thought. My thinking being that would let people express goodwill even if my overall catalogue of work wasn't enough to pay for yet.
I've thought about gating some content since then, but I'm a sissy and don't really want to.
Curious how many of those 75k hits were email subscribers, RC. I've had some articles also take-off (not quite "viral") but ten times the number of email subscribers. I am going on the assumption that building email subscribers is the main metric. But maybe not?
I am thinking about offering the simple pay option as well. Those who are deeply engaged might be ten times as valuable as those who are just passing through, and many like not just the subjects, but the quality of the writing and might be willing to pay. (I am not looking for this to support myself, but this is a kind of full-time job!)
Have you ever thought of adding a feature that would allow readers to pay for just one article? I know a lot of people are hesitant to sign up for a monthly and yearly subscriptions but might gladly pay $1 or $2 for access to an article on a topic that really intrigues them.
I understand that "micropayments" can be a pain in the butt to administer and many people don't think it's worth it. But it still seems to me that this is leaving a lot of money on the table.
We have thought about this, but we want writers to have consistent revenue - a sense of what they are going to make over the year to make the model sustainable for them. So we prioritize annual and monthly subscriptions.
Thanks for responding. I don't think allowing one-off payments would cannibalize subscriptions. Just the opposite in fact, I think it might boost them. Of course, I'm basing this on my own behaviour so I could be totally wrong. It does seem, however, that this would be something worth testing.
I can't speak for Substack but one way to think about this "micropayment model" is to essentially dramatically increase the quality/value of a single article.
After all, even $5 per month (with the intention to cancel) is essentially a micropayment (as are all subscriptions, in a way, if you consider that most users will not truly subscribe to your newsletter indefinitely).
That way, maybe, some readers will pay for a single VERY high quality/must read article (at say $5 monthly subscription price) since they view that single article as a reasonable deal for such essential content. They are actually subscribing for a month, so chances are they will at least read a few other articles before cancelling their subscription. And a subset of these readers, might then keep subscribing for additional months.
The beauty of a paid newsletter is not only that you generate a revenue stream for some period of time, but that people are actually paying to read (what could be viewed as) a promotion to subscribe for future content.
As a writer, I would definitely rather have a monthly or annual subscriber than a one-off reader, but I think it's a far higher hurdle to consent to monthly payments than to make a one-off purchase.
I often find myself in a situation where I would happily pay $1 for a paywalled article, but I won't buy a subscription. I don't understand why publishers leave this money on the table other than that they believe the margins are too thin, which, as someone who closely follows the industry, I don't think is true.
Hello! Thanks for the shoutout in today's email! I also just joined Casey's Facebook group. :)
I have a question about cross-promotion. I've done mentions in other newsletters, guest posts, and guest editing sections, and I've found each method has diminishing returns over time. Are there any creative cross-promotion techniques you've found interesting or successful?
Ive been contacted by a couple of subscribers that said that they'd found my work in their spam folders. My last article didn't go into any mailboxes. I've read that articles heavy in visual imagery are seen as spam and rerouted from the readers inbox to spam. Any suggestions as to how I can make certain that my work gets to my subscribers inboxes every time? Thank you.
This is a constant problem for me. I hear all the time from subscribers who arent getting anything. One thing I did was send an email to my list (you can download it) from my personal email, which is more likely to get into their inbox, with the subject line "Let me slide into your inbox!" and easy instructions for fixing this problem (add my from email to your contacts list or drag one of my emails into primary). I heard from a few that the email helped, but I'm not sure how much. I find this really really frustrating!
I worry about this, too. I've had some subscribers contact me to ask why they aren't getting the newsletter. It seems to be Gmail. The problem with putting something in your newsletter about how to fix the Gmail problem is....they aren't getting the newsletter in the first place so they don't see that message!
Hi, Heather, I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers can't read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers only. I hadn't intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this. I was wondering if you might have any insight regarding this mystery. Thanks- TK talbert
Hi, Andrea, I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers can't read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers only. I hadn't intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this. I was wondering if you might have any insight regarding this mystery. Thanks- TK talbert
I think you can assume that at least some of your subscribers are having that problem. It's endemic. I suggest writing about the Gmail Promotions tab issue in your "welcome e-mail" to subscribers when they sign up.
Hmmm, I do that now, mostly to proof, but I'm thinking I should use my gmail account and test that since Gmail seems to be where most of the problems arise. Thanks Fintwit!
Just cracked the 100+ subscriber milestone on my Substack Scaled and Failed (https://scaledandfailed.substack.com/) and curious about what to focus on for growing next.
1. Is going for more one-off well-exposed or viral growth strategies i.e. shoutouts from people in the startup community or are more slow-burn growth methods better?
2. What are some strategies to get reader engagement in the comments and for sharing the newsletter?
I had the same question. I try to add a question at the end of the post to invite comments, but they are few and far between. Does it make sense to even bother about it as long as they're reading?
Bailey and team thanks for hosting Casey hope to jump back on then. Casey thanks for all the great posts and adming the Substack group on Facebook. I learn so much from the comments from this diverse and helpful community. Keep up the good work.
Started my newsletter, The First Years of Marriage (https://www.thefirstyearsofmarriage.com/welcome), recently and was able to increase my subscribers by 100+ a week. Casey, curious to hear:
1. How do you make your content shareable so that readers are eager to send it to people who would also benefit from it?
2. What are ways you make sure you're writing information of value for your audience?
3. What's another way to monetize the newsletter rather than charge subscription fees?
1. Typically you either make article titles very catchy (easy to share and be shared on social media) or through keyword heavy post titles which might rank organically (SEO).
2. The best way to ensure this is to regularly survey your audience. It's important to get feedback from a wide range of your subscribers. While it's good to listen to complaints or super positive feedback, these types of responses may not be indicative of a larger reader consensus about what constitutes "value" to them.
Here are the TWO things that helped me get 100 new subscribers fast.
1. More VALUABLE content:
I decided to put out THREE newsletters a week - all of varying length - but all filled with value. Since it's a brand new newsletter, quality + quantity = gives people a reason to build a relationship with the newsletter, look forward to reading it, and want to share it with other people.
2. A giveaway:
People love giveaways. I did a simple one - $25 gift card + $25 worth of books and used a free app to help setup the giveaway (KingSumo). This helped so much in getting people to enter, subscribe to the newsletter, and share it.
When you start something new, it's important to get people excited, give them free value, and make them eager to share what you started with their network of people.
One tip on the "shareable" question is visuals. If you have visualizations of data or animations, it can help existing readers absorb and comment on/share your articles faster. We've heard from some writers that their posts with visualizations outperform their others on shareability.
I was wondering if the Substack team can do more research about the % of readers who convert to paid based on engagement.
I’ve seen the general numbers you guys put out in the past, but I think it would be more helpful if you took reader engagement into account.
For example, right now we can see how active/engaged our readers are based on the star system you guys have in place (5-star, 4-star, 3-star, etc). Should we assume our 5-star readers will convert to paid?
Basically, if you could gather data from all Substack newsletters to see how likely readers convert to paid based on their engagement, that would be super helpful. And then maybe include a section for writers that says something like, “By going paid, you could earn $X dollars based on your readership and engagement.”
Heyo! I can share this feedback absolutely. Certainly a subset of our writers would like more know-how about analytics, and we're aware of that :)
It sounds like you've already heard this but we commonly see conversion rates between 5-10% from free -> paid subscribers. Here's a bit more granularity.
Use this paid conversion rate
Less than 30% -> 3%
30-50% -> 5%
Greater than 50% -> 10%
Disclaimer: your open rates are not perfectly predictive of your conversion rate, in any direction! We’re just using these numbers as a rough proxy for estimating what you could make.
Now you’ll need to identify a price. Again, we’re just doing napkin math this week (we’ll get into newsletter pricing next week), so if you’ve got a personal newsletter, we recommend using between $5-10/month, or $50-100/year, as your estimate. If you’ve got a business newsletter (meaning, something you think at least some of your readers could expense for work), use $10-50/month, or $100-500/year.
Multiply your free email list size by your conversion rate, using the table above. Then multiply that by your price.
Here’s a quick example to demonstrate:
Sally writes about food on her free newsletter, Food For Thought. She has 5,000 free subscribers on her list.
Her open rates are usually in the 55% range, so she uses a 10% conversion rate.
Sally multiplies 5,000 x 10% = 500 paying subscribers. She figures she can charge $5/month or $50/year, so her earning potential is $25,000-30,000/year.
What number did you get? Compare it against your financial goals. Is it what you expected? If so, that’s great! If not, read below to figure out what your next steps should be.
Hello!! Not sure if this has been brought up before, but is there a specific way through Substack to submit our newsletter site to Google so it can be crawled/fetched and be searchable? Thank you!
Hi Erin, Casey includes some great tips in his guide in regards to SEO and getting Google to recognize your publication. Here are a few from Casey:
* Don’t underestimate the value of the plain but well-optimized text—Use visual components appropriately and only when they improve content. Random images or GIFs may be entertaining but they can slow down rendering time for a reader (especially in their email).
* Improve headlines and text—It takes time to generate catchy content for your newsletters. Use test emails to analyze how motivating they are. Would you personally click on such an email?
* Apply basic on-page SEO techniques—Use keywords in your headlines (H1 tags), subheaders (H2 tags), and the body of your content (text).
*Use the alt attribute for images—Substack lets you customize alt tags for images in your post. The alt tag is used by screen readers, which are browsers used by blind or visually impaired people. These tags can affect SEO. Google’s article about images has a heading “Use descriptive alt text”. This is no coincidence—Google places a relatively high value on alt text. They use it to determine what is on the image but also how it relates to the surrounding text. Ideally each image should have a unique tag, but at a minimum, any custom featured images, should include descriptive alt text). Note: Captions are not a substitute for alt text!
* Fill out all basic newsletter fields—This seems basic, but I notice many Substack writers who have not properly filled out some of the basic fields attached to their newsletter. These include Publication name, One-line description, tags, Subscription benefits (all three lines), etc.
* While it’s true that Substack has a ways to go on improving its features to optimize each post (i.e. meta descriptions, canonical links, etc.), Substack itself, the website actually has pretty high domain authority and it is certainly possible to rank highly in Google.
For example, if you Google the search phrase: Medium vs. Quora you will see that my post on Substack (through my newsletter Blogging Guide) not only ranks on the first page, but it is the featured snippet for the term.
FYI this is a common question because substack doesn't work well with Google SEO. I do every thing they recommend (I've been writing professionally online for 10 years) and I still get no traction from google searches. Substack is going to have to do more to get us seen.
thanks for being here, Emily! You are right, we have lots of work to do on SEO. It's part of our product and engineering team's focus as they grow their capacity to help writers do more.
I have about 4,500 free subs, and I keep hearing relatively frequently from would-be paid subs that they tried to join for a while but couldn't figure it out and were confused.
I realized that they're just logged out of substack on that browser/device and when they click the "subscribe" button they end up on the page when the field to enter your email and nothing else.
I think it should be made much clearer how to login (it's hidden, low-contrast in the corner) and why you have to login to see the paid options.
I'm sure it's happening to everyone else too, even if they don't know, so improving this would help substack as a whole.
(Another request: I wish crypto had its own category, instead of taking over finance, business and tech -- it really is its own thing).
Hi Liberty, thanks for being here. I'm passing this along to our team as feedback, it seems to be a common confusion as readers move to different devices.
I second this - I've clicked the "subscribe" CTA in some substacks I get, and just get directed to a page to enter my email to sign up (which I've already done). Being directed to a page with the subscription rates/options immediately instead I think would help writers tremendously.
Hi! I started my newsletter (https://ana.substack.com featuring a broad selection of essays about creative influence) about 1.5 years ago and am only up to 40 free subscribers. I actually had a bit of an uptick but realized that I was getting bot subscribes. Granted, I started it to practice writing so I haven't done a lot of promotion beyond social media but I'm wondering if there are any stats on the growth trajectories of successful paid newsletters and their early days.
I spend about 8 hours a week on it and I'm wondering if there's something about how slow it's growing at the moment that indicates it won't ever take off or if the advice is to keep going. (I've tried not to wait for perfection though so am continuously iterating on my about page, for example.) Thanks!
Thank you for joining us for this week for Office Hours! And a BIG thank you to Casey Botticello for co-hosting with us.
We are wrapping this week's thread but we’ll host this thread again next week with a special guest from Substack’s Product team who is are eager to learn more about the publishing tools writers most want. Save it to your calendar with the link in the top of today's post so you don't miss it.
Be sure you subscribe to Casey's Substack for ongoing resources for navigating the digital publishing landscape. https://bloggingguide.substack.com/
Until then, happy writing!
Katie + Bailey + Casey
I just read all the posts and want to shout out to Casey, Katie and the Substack team, it was SUPER useful, lots of precious insights. Thanks!
Thanks for checking it out, Gaía! We're glad it was useful.
Thanks, Gaía! That is very kind of you to say 🙂
Thanks for having me! Always happy to help fellow passion economy creators!
Hey everyone,
Thanks for the intro!
I'll try to add a few responses to questions, but feel free to ask me any questions here, and I'll do my best to respond.
Here are a few Substack FAQs and Tips:
https://bloggingguide.substack.com/p/substack-faqs-and-tips
I also wanted to add a few links that may be useful to Substack writers looking to promote their newsletters.
These are newsletter directories. Newsletter directories give you backlinks to your website, which increases the ranking and searchability of your website. They also help readers find newsletters covering a specific topic of interest. Here are a few of the top ones:
https://inboxreads.co/
https://findnewsletters.com/
https://letterlist.com/
https://www.radletters.com/
https://thanksforsubscribing.app/
https://inboxreads.co/
https://newsletterjunkie.com/
https://mereku.com/
https://inboxstash.com/
https://www.newsletters.co/
A few more free resources writers may find useful:
⭐ Royalty Free Images for Substack Posts ➡️ https://unsplash.com/
⭐ Create an Online Community (easy to add to Substack) ➡️ https://peerboard.com/
⭐ Emojis to Add Flair to Substack Posts ➡️ https://emojipedia.org
⭐ Force Update Post Previews ➡️ Facebook: https://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug/ | Twitter: https://cards-dev.twitter.com/validator | LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/post-inspector/
⭐ Articles on Substack and Subscription Newsletters ➡️ https://bloggingguide.com/guides/newsletter/
⭐ Miscellaneous Tools ➡️ https://bloggingguide.com/tools/
I'm reading everything you linked here and finding so much valuable information! I really hate the marketing/PR aspect of substack because I'm selling myself now, which is a lot harder than selling the bigger brand (media outlet.) Have you ever heard of someone who does the marketing/branding/PR for substack writers so we can pay for it instead of just procrastinating and avoiding it?
Haha I've helped a few people myself, but I don't know of anyone who specifically caters to Substack writers (and actually knows what they are talking about). That said, you can always feel free to reach out if you need dedicated help!
Alternatively, you could look for someone who can help you with the specific marketing tasks you don't like, as opposed to an all-in-one Substack specialist. For example, a link building expert to get your posts better backlinks, a content marketer to help you boost content production, or a graphic designer to create custom images, etc.
Thanks, Casey, for your info. I'm interested in such newsletter directories in spanish. Do you know some of them? Any idea on how to find them? Thanks a lot.
Here is an article containing some newsletter directories: https://bloggingguide.com/newsletter-directories/
Thank you, Casey!
I'm currently approaching 1,000 subscribers. I'm considering going to a combination of paid and free subscriptions when I get to about 2,500. Is it possible to do both? I've found no guidlines for how to do this in the help section. Is it even advisable? Or am I better off going paid only? My plan is to offer loads of free content and the ability to comment to paid subscribers. Haven't found any info on how to set that up either (I know it can be done because others are doing it).
Hi Kyle, Yes it is possible to offer a combinator of free and paid posts to your subscriber list. Sorry you had trouble finding information on that.
When you turn on paid and go to publish a post, one of your options will be to send to "send email" to everyone or "send email to paid subscribers."
As a general rule of thumb we encourage writers to have a combination of free an paid content, making their best work free. It's the best possible marketing. Even though every fibre of your being may tell you that your best work should go behind the paywall, it’s smart to make your most thoughtful and accessible content free to everyone. That way, it stands a chance of being shared and widely read.
Katie - Thanks for the information. As to the other part of my question: How do I set up the ability for paid subscribers to comment?
You can enable comments in the settings and then for each unique post decide if you want to offer commenting privileges to paid or free subscribers.
Here is our guide: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/360037832711-How-do-I-enable-or-disable-comments-on-my-posts-
Just remembered another question. I like that Substack automatically embeds youtube videos right on my site. However, so far it hasn't with Bitchute. I've not yet tried Oracle. Are there any plans to enable that ability with Bitchute, Oracle and others?
If not, how do I embed them?
Thanks again!
No question from me today. I just came to say thanks for the shout-out!
Hi Lyle 👋
Hi Lyle!
I'm struggling with whether to add a paid subscriber option. I could use the extra support, but I don't have the capacity to produce anything extra for paid subscribers right now. What do you think about adding a paid option without extra content, purely for optional financial support of the newsletter? Alternatively: what are some creatives ideas for paid subscriber content that can be managed on an already full and tight schedule?
Discussion threads are a quality (and less demanding of your time) way to offer something extra for paying subscribers. I've done them for both all and paid subscribers, and they really help generate a feeling of community among my readers.
FYI - Terrell is a role model for discussion threads :)
Thank you, Bailey!!!!! ❤️❤️❤️
Yeah, I'd really like to do a Friday mailbag-type thread every week, and a monthly thread where paid subscribers can pitch me ideas of what they'd like to see me write about when I got the subscription base to do so!
Would love to hear about creative ideas here. I know one writer offers bi-weekly dance classes on zoom to paid subscribers! (https://raha.substack.com/)
Beyond those creative ideas, one thing to remember is that not every post you publish needs to be at an equal level of depth, especially if you’re publishing more frequently. Here are a few ideas for what to offer readers that reminds them you exist, but doesn’t require as much work from you:
* Paid posts that are rough notes, off-the-cuff ideas, sketches, or other “works in progress” that reveal your writing process
* Audio posts where you narrate something you’ve written, or just say hello to your readers
* Podcast interviews, which you can publish right from your Substack. Interviewing others can be just as much work as writing, depending on your level of polish, but can also help break up your writing schedule.
* Guest posts from other writers. In addition to giving you a break from writing, guest posts are also a great way to cross-promote your newsletter with others.
* Discussion threads, where you ask readers a question. Bonus: they get to meet and interact with other readers, without additional work from you.
* Ask me anythings (AMAs): Use discussion threads to host regular AMAs, either with yourself or with a guest.
* Private community: Offer paid subscribers access to a private discussion forum or community so they can interact with other readers, even on days when you’re not publishing.
Thanks, Bailey! Hosting two guest posts and an interview in the coming weeks!!
Thanks for this, Bailey! I’m working on getting ‘guest bakers’ to interview 🍰
Oooh! Can I put my hand up as a guest baker?
😂 love it! 🍰 email me!
thanks for this!
These are some really good ideas.
I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers cant read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers onlu. I hadnt intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this.
I've shared this before (so forgive me if I sound like a broken record) but Cherie Hu, who writes the newsletter Water + Music, wrote this excellent post on how to think about asking for reader support -- as in, what's the value proposition? It's really, really good:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/five-lessons-from-my-first-year-running-patreon-page-cherie-hu/
She also wrote this great follow-up, about the value of building a community among your readers:
https://blog.patreon.com/journalist-patreon-cherie-hu/
Hope these help!
Yes they do, thank you!
Andrea, a Substack called Liberty's Highlights has done just that. Payment is completely optional. I believe that he has at least 100 subscribers paying him $12 per month.
https://www.libertyrpf.com/
I love the way they described what they're doing/asked for reader support here:
https://www.libertyrpf.com/p/like-what-you-see-become-a-supporter
Reading this now -- wow. I am incredibly impressed, and now have a lot to think about as I approach the date I intended to turn on paid subscriptions (Aug 1).
Thanks for reading, Sarah! 💚 🥃
Thank you for reading, Terrell! 💚 🥃
Hey! That's me!
Indeed, I don't have a paywall, everything is free.
I have about 4,500 free subs and about 188 paid subs right now, so around 4% going paid (but I turned on the paid option only 4 months ago, so I don't know where it'll settle -- so far that % is going up every month, but it won't go up forever..).
Could I ask, what's your thinking around not paywalling some content for paid subscribers? I've paywalled some of mine, but I'm leaning toward doing what you're doing.
Hey Terrel. Happy to discuss. Can you email me at my domain name @ substack.com or DM me on Twitter (same twitter username as my website domain name -- DMs are open).
Sure thing! DM'ing you now...
My blog has about 5% conversion to paid with no pay-gate on content. If you have significant subscribers, some amount of them are actually waiting to pay and can't.
That's really interesting. What is your thinking on that, vs. paywalling off some content for paid subscribers only? Love to hear your thoughts (as it's something I wrestle with too).
I haven't tried pay-gating, so I don't really know. When I initially made the decision to move to paid, it was after one of my articles went crazy (by my standards, 75k hits-ish) and I was going paid a lot earlier than I thought. My thinking being that would let people express goodwill even if my overall catalogue of work wasn't enough to pay for yet.
I've thought about gating some content since then, but I'm a sissy and don't really want to.
Curious how many of those 75k hits were email subscribers, RC. I've had some articles also take-off (not quite "viral") but ten times the number of email subscribers. I am going on the assumption that building email subscribers is the main metric. But maybe not?
I am thinking about offering the simple pay option as well. Those who are deeply engaged might be ten times as valuable as those who are just passing through, and many like not just the subjects, but the quality of the writing and might be willing to pay. (I am not looking for this to support myself, but this is a kind of full-time job!)
Im in the same boat Andrea!
Have you ever thought of adding a feature that would allow readers to pay for just one article? I know a lot of people are hesitant to sign up for a monthly and yearly subscriptions but might gladly pay $1 or $2 for access to an article on a topic that really intrigues them.
I understand that "micropayments" can be a pain in the butt to administer and many people don't think it's worth it. But it still seems to me that this is leaving a lot of money on the table.
We have thought about this, but we want writers to have consistent revenue - a sense of what they are going to make over the year to make the model sustainable for them. So we prioritize annual and monthly subscriptions.
Thanks for responding. I don't think allowing one-off payments would cannibalize subscriptions. Just the opposite in fact, I think it might boost them. Of course, I'm basing this on my own behaviour so I could be totally wrong. It does seem, however, that this would be something worth testing.
I can't speak for Substack but one way to think about this "micropayment model" is to essentially dramatically increase the quality/value of a single article.
After all, even $5 per month (with the intention to cancel) is essentially a micropayment (as are all subscriptions, in a way, if you consider that most users will not truly subscribe to your newsletter indefinitely).
That way, maybe, some readers will pay for a single VERY high quality/must read article (at say $5 monthly subscription price) since they view that single article as a reasonable deal for such essential content. They are actually subscribing for a month, so chances are they will at least read a few other articles before cancelling their subscription. And a subset of these readers, might then keep subscribing for additional months.
The beauty of a paid newsletter is not only that you generate a revenue stream for some period of time, but that people are actually paying to read (what could be viewed as) a promotion to subscribe for future content.
As a writer, I would definitely rather have a monthly or annual subscriber than a one-off reader, but I think it's a far higher hurdle to consent to monthly payments than to make a one-off purchase.
I often find myself in a situation where I would happily pay $1 for a paywalled article, but I won't buy a subscription. I don't understand why publishers leave this money on the table other than that they believe the margins are too thin, which, as someone who closely follows the industry, I don't think is true.
In the spirit of sharing, here's a terrific article about how to promote newsletters on Twitter: https://www.newslettercrew.com/blog/how-to-promote-your-newsletter-on-twitter
Hello! Thanks for the shoutout in today's email! I also just joined Casey's Facebook group. :)
I have a question about cross-promotion. I've done mentions in other newsletters, guest posts, and guest editing sections, and I've found each method has diminishing returns over time. Are there any creative cross-promotion techniques you've found interesting or successful?
I'd love to hear from other writers on this! Elle Griffin shared some ideas with us in our recent Spotlight On: Ficiton. More here: https://on.substack.com/p/spotlight-on-fiction
Ive been contacted by a couple of subscribers that said that they'd found my work in their spam folders. My last article didn't go into any mailboxes. I've read that articles heavy in visual imagery are seen as spam and rerouted from the readers inbox to spam. Any suggestions as to how I can make certain that my work gets to my subscribers inboxes every time? Thank you.
This is a constant problem for me. I hear all the time from subscribers who arent getting anything. One thing I did was send an email to my list (you can download it) from my personal email, which is more likely to get into their inbox, with the subject line "Let me slide into your inbox!" and easy instructions for fixing this problem (add my from email to your contacts list or drag one of my emails into primary). I heard from a few that the email helped, but I'm not sure how much. I find this really really frustrating!
I worry about this, too. I've had some subscribers contact me to ask why they aren't getting the newsletter. It seems to be Gmail. The problem with putting something in your newsletter about how to fix the Gmail problem is....they aren't getting the newsletter in the first place so they don't see that message!
Hi, Heather, I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers can't read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers only. I hadn't intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this. I was wondering if you might have any insight regarding this mystery. Thanks- TK talbert
How kind of you to take the time. Thank you for your generosity, Heather.
Of course. We're all helping each other!
Hi T.K. First, congrats on getting the job drawing for the graphic novel! I don't have a paid newsletter, but I did find this article in Substack support: https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/360060408872-How-do-I-turn-off-paid-subscriptions-
Maybe that will help you. If not, I would contact support at support@substack.com. Hope that helps!
I worry about the same thing. Thanks for asking!
Thanks for the acknowledgment, Andrea, I glory in any certainty that my work is being veiwed by someone on substack. Best of luck to the both of us.
Hi, Andrea, I had to stop writing on substack back in April because I landed a job drawing a graphic novel. I just returned, and I find that my subscribers can't read my work because it now sends them a message saying that my newsletter is for paid subscribers only. I hadn't intended to charge anyone until I'd built up a decent amount of subscribers. How do I return my newsletter to being free? I've looked through the settings and there's nothing that I can find that allows me to do this. I was wondering if you might have any insight regarding this mystery. Thanks- TK talbert
Ask each of them to move the mail to the primary inbox. That will help Google's algorithm to learn that your newsletter is not spam.
That helps if the subscriber lets you know, but otherwise, you have no way of knowing which is frustrating
I think you can assume that at least some of your subscribers are having that problem. It's endemic. I suggest writing about the Gmail Promotions tab issue in your "welcome e-mail" to subscribers when they sign up.
Tip: send yourself multiple test emails as you’re writing your work to make sure it’s going into your main inbox
Hmmm, I do that now, mostly to proof, but I'm thinking I should use my gmail account and test that since Gmail seems to be where most of the problems arise. Thanks Fintwit!
Just cracked the 100+ subscriber milestone on my Substack Scaled and Failed (https://scaledandfailed.substack.com/) and curious about what to focus on for growing next.
1. Is going for more one-off well-exposed or viral growth strategies i.e. shoutouts from people in the startup community or are more slow-burn growth methods better?
2. What are some strategies to get reader engagement in the comments and for sharing the newsletter?
Congrats Amil! What was your strategy in getting to 100?
I'm also looking for more comments - I have hundreds of people read each post and like the same two people comment!
I had the same question. I try to add a question at the end of the post to invite comments, but they are few and far between. Does it make sense to even bother about it as long as they're reading?
Bailey and team thanks for hosting Casey hope to jump back on then. Casey thanks for all the great posts and adming the Substack group on Facebook. I learn so much from the comments from this diverse and helpful community. Keep up the good work.
You are most welcome, Liz! I appreciate the kind words!
Started my newsletter, The First Years of Marriage (https://www.thefirstyearsofmarriage.com/welcome), recently and was able to increase my subscribers by 100+ a week. Casey, curious to hear:
1. How do you make your content shareable so that readers are eager to send it to people who would also benefit from it?
2. What are ways you make sure you're writing information of value for your audience?
3. What's another way to monetize the newsletter rather than charge subscription fees?
1. Typically you either make article titles very catchy (easy to share and be shared on social media) or through keyword heavy post titles which might rank organically (SEO).
2. The best way to ensure this is to regularly survey your audience. It's important to get feedback from a wide range of your subscribers. While it's good to listen to complaints or super positive feedback, these types of responses may not be indicative of a larger reader consensus about what constitutes "value" to them.
3. https://bloggingguide.com/how-to-monetize-your-newsletter/
I have googled your titles Casey and they appear at the TOP of many Google searches. Your titles are also "catchy." I am learning, learning, learning.
wow - great growth - what's the secret! and keep going!
Writing 3x a week has been the best idea an the most helpful growth strategy.
Hey Jen! Great newsletter. What strategies did you use to grow 100+ in a week? Was it all organic? Or was it existing audience from other platforms?
Here are the TWO things that helped me get 100 new subscribers fast.
1. More VALUABLE content:
I decided to put out THREE newsletters a week - all of varying length - but all filled with value. Since it's a brand new newsletter, quality + quantity = gives people a reason to build a relationship with the newsletter, look forward to reading it, and want to share it with other people.
2. A giveaway:
People love giveaways. I did a simple one - $25 gift card + $25 worth of books and used a free app to help setup the giveaway (KingSumo). This helped so much in getting people to enter, subscribe to the newsletter, and share it.
When you start something new, it's important to get people excited, give them free value, and make them eager to share what you started with their network of people.
Thank you so much for this information! I'd love to get 100 subscribers per week!
I don't know if this is helpful to you, but I have seen some newsletter writers incorporate relevant paid advertising into their newsletters!
I want to do this when my subscriber list goes up!
Re #2 - do you seek feedback from your readers (especially the most engaged ones) in any way currently?
What are some good best practices for doing this?
This is a great idea/topic for a newsletter, btw!
Thank you so much
One tip on the "shareable" question is visuals. If you have visualizations of data or animations, it can help existing readers absorb and comment on/share your articles faster. We've heard from some writers that their posts with visualizations outperform their others on shareability.
Fascinating topic. New subscriber here
I appreciate that, Michael!
I was wondering if the Substack team can do more research about the % of readers who convert to paid based on engagement.
I’ve seen the general numbers you guys put out in the past, but I think it would be more helpful if you took reader engagement into account.
For example, right now we can see how active/engaged our readers are based on the star system you guys have in place (5-star, 4-star, 3-star, etc). Should we assume our 5-star readers will convert to paid?
Basically, if you could gather data from all Substack newsletters to see how likely readers convert to paid based on their engagement, that would be super helpful. And then maybe include a section for writers that says something like, “By going paid, you could earn $X dollars based on your readership and engagement.”
Heyo! I can share this feedback absolutely. Certainly a subset of our writers would like more know-how about analytics, and we're aware of that :)
It sounds like you've already heard this but we commonly see conversion rates between 5-10% from free -> paid subscribers. Here's a bit more granularity.
Use this paid conversion rate
Less than 30% -> 3%
30-50% -> 5%
Greater than 50% -> 10%
Disclaimer: your open rates are not perfectly predictive of your conversion rate, in any direction! We’re just using these numbers as a rough proxy for estimating what you could make.
Now you’ll need to identify a price. Again, we’re just doing napkin math this week (we’ll get into newsletter pricing next week), so if you’ve got a personal newsletter, we recommend using between $5-10/month, or $50-100/year, as your estimate. If you’ve got a business newsletter (meaning, something you think at least some of your readers could expense for work), use $10-50/month, or $100-500/year.
Multiply your free email list size by your conversion rate, using the table above. Then multiply that by your price.
Here’s a quick example to demonstrate:
Sally writes about food on her free newsletter, Food For Thought. She has 5,000 free subscribers on her list.
Her open rates are usually in the 55% range, so she uses a 10% conversion rate.
Sally multiplies 5,000 x 10% = 500 paying subscribers. She figures she can charge $5/month or $50/year, so her earning potential is $25,000-30,000/year.
What number did you get? Compare it against your financial goals. Is it what you expected? If so, that’s great! If not, read below to figure out what your next steps should be.
Thanks!
Hello!! Not sure if this has been brought up before, but is there a specific way through Substack to submit our newsletter site to Google so it can be crawled/fetched and be searchable? Thank you!
Hi Erin, Casey includes some great tips in his guide in regards to SEO and getting Google to recognize your publication. Here are a few from Casey:
* Don’t underestimate the value of the plain but well-optimized text—Use visual components appropriately and only when they improve content. Random images or GIFs may be entertaining but they can slow down rendering time for a reader (especially in their email).
* Improve headlines and text—It takes time to generate catchy content for your newsletters. Use test emails to analyze how motivating they are. Would you personally click on such an email?
* Apply basic on-page SEO techniques—Use keywords in your headlines (H1 tags), subheaders (H2 tags), and the body of your content (text).
*Use the alt attribute for images—Substack lets you customize alt tags for images in your post. The alt tag is used by screen readers, which are browsers used by blind or visually impaired people. These tags can affect SEO. Google’s article about images has a heading “Use descriptive alt text”. This is no coincidence—Google places a relatively high value on alt text. They use it to determine what is on the image but also how it relates to the surrounding text. Ideally each image should have a unique tag, but at a minimum, any custom featured images, should include descriptive alt text). Note: Captions are not a substitute for alt text!
* Fill out all basic newsletter fields—This seems basic, but I notice many Substack writers who have not properly filled out some of the basic fields attached to their newsletter. These include Publication name, One-line description, tags, Subscription benefits (all three lines), etc.
* While it’s true that Substack has a ways to go on improving its features to optimize each post (i.e. meta descriptions, canonical links, etc.), Substack itself, the website actually has pretty high domain authority and it is certainly possible to rank highly in Google.
For example, if you Google the search phrase: Medium vs. Quora you will see that my post on Substack (through my newsletter Blogging Guide) not only ranks on the first page, but it is the featured snippet for the term.
More from Casey here: https://bloggingguide.substack.com/p/substack-faqs-and-tips
Thank you so much!!
I just googled Medium vs. Quora and Casey's Substack was at the top---in a FRAME!! Casey obviously follows his own advice!
Not directly, no. That is not to say Substack doesn't index well in Google.
Section 4 of https://bloggingguide.substack.com/p/substack-faqs-and-tips talks a bit about the few SEO features you can control on Substack.
Note to Substack: Features that would be useful seo-wise: Meta-Description Customization and Canonical Links would be nice!
Thank you Casey. All of this info is very helpful and appreciated.
Casey! Tipping my hat to you! Thank you!!
FYI this is a common question because substack doesn't work well with Google SEO. I do every thing they recommend (I've been writing professionally online for 10 years) and I still get no traction from google searches. Substack is going to have to do more to get us seen.
thanks for being here, Emily! You are right, we have lots of work to do on SEO. It's part of our product and engineering team's focus as they grow their capacity to help writers do more.
Hi, thanks for doing this!
I have about 4,500 free subs, and I keep hearing relatively frequently from would-be paid subs that they tried to join for a while but couldn't figure it out and were confused.
I realized that they're just logged out of substack on that browser/device and when they click the "subscribe" button they end up on the page when the field to enter your email and nothing else.
I think it should be made much clearer how to login (it's hidden, low-contrast in the corner) and why you have to login to see the paid options.
I'm sure it's happening to everyone else too, even if they don't know, so improving this would help substack as a whole.
(Another request: I wish crypto had its own category, instead of taking over finance, business and tech -- it really is its own thing).
Thank you
Hi Liberty, thanks for being here. I'm passing this along to our team as feedback, it seems to be a common confusion as readers move to different devices.
Thank you Katie! I appreciate that
I second this - I've clicked the "subscribe" CTA in some substacks I get, and just get directed to a page to enter my email to sign up (which I've already done). Being directed to a page with the subscription rates/options immediately instead I think would help writers tremendously.
Same question regarding the confusion about joining/subscribing.
Hi! I started my newsletter (https://ana.substack.com featuring a broad selection of essays about creative influence) about 1.5 years ago and am only up to 40 free subscribers. I actually had a bit of an uptick but realized that I was getting bot subscribes. Granted, I started it to practice writing so I haven't done a lot of promotion beyond social media but I'm wondering if there are any stats on the growth trajectories of successful paid newsletters and their early days.
I spend about 8 hours a week on it and I'm wondering if there's something about how slow it's growing at the moment that indicates it won't ever take off or if the advice is to keep going. (I've tried not to wait for perfection though so am continuously iterating on my about page, for example.) Thanks!