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Some product updates and reminders from the Substack team:
Customizable, shareable images. Highlight any text within a post and select โshare quoteโ to generate a shareable image. Customize the background and sizing so that itโs ready to use on the social platform of your choice.
Get to know your subscribers. Your subscriber dashboard enables you to filter and view segments of subscribers based on subscription type, email opens, activity, and now bestseller status. This is a powerful tool when identifying writers for collaboration.
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๐งโ๏ธ Does anyone else have a problem of readers coming on to your site and 'Liking' your posts but not then also pressing the 'Subscribe' button?
I do that! I read so, so many Substacks but am also easily overwhelmed by emails. I often (like, at least several times daily) show support by liking, commenting, and sharing people's writing even if I'm not interested in becoming a subscriber at that time.
As a writer, I sure do love when folks subscribe. But I also love when they like, comment, or share (even without subscribing). There's just SO much great writing here, and if I subscribed to everything I liked or even love, reading would be a full-time job. (I read the entirety of every post when I do subscribe, so never subscribe to tons of pubs at once.)
I enjoy reading on the app vs. my Inbox, so I created a filter where every Substack subscription is automatically marked as "Read" and then moved to a folder called "Newsletters" so I can visit it later if I want to. That helps me keep my Inbox more organized.
I do the same, Clint! It keeps newsletter reading & email processing separate which I love. I also use Reader (Readwise's save now, read later tool) to consolidate non-Substack newsletters and will sometimes save my favorite Substack essays to Reader so I can highlight lines to revisit later
I do the same Dana. There are so many articles I want to read and I can't subscribe to them all. If I appreciate the writing I want to comment on it and contribute to the author's community in some small way. I appreciate it when others do the same even if they don't subscribe.
How do you get readers?I have written 13 articles but very few readers even though Substack account is written on my twitter bio and email address. Thanks Dave
Doctor, I've read a couple of your pieces and I'm going to assume your comparative lack of response is commensurate with the relative narrowness of your market. I don't consider myself an idiot (at least not in every subject area) but I can tell you your stuff (though well written and interesting) is at least slightly above my pay grade. Either dumb it down (for people like me), broaden the subject or tailor an email list to academics and professionals in your field. I would assume the latter would be the most effective strategy in the short term. If you reached a critical mass of 50 enthusiasts, word of mouth could take you where you want to go.
I can like a piece without feeling the need to subscribe, and I understand it when others do it on my site, as well. We can't subscribe to everything, but we can 'like' a lot of them.
Oh, I really like your dance metaphor, Graham! Maybe a like is a wave or a wink from across the room. Maybe a follow is a joyful watching of your dope grooves. Maybe a comment is a turn toward you to momentarily jam in sync. A share is a nod to others to circle up and watch you rock in the center for a moment. Any may lead to a subscribe. I dig em all. ;)
I think there are many different reason why people don't subscribe. I like a number of posts, but I just can't subscribe to everyone's substack. My inbox is just too full, and I am an inbox zero person so I am very selective. However, if I see something in Notes and I like something then I press the little heart button. I think for me personally that being seen at all is a gift. There is a huge sea of writers out there.
For sure. I am a mother with five children, two of whom are disabled. I am a part-time student and for work I do child care. I wish I could support the many great writers out there, but I really can't. I hope the people who have written the great things I have commented on or liked understand that not paying is not a matter of not thinking their writing is not of value. It is a matter of feeding my own family and being able to sustain myself and my studies. And I would also like to note that just spending the time to read posts takes away from time when I could be writing to make money. So it isn't like there isn't some type of literal monetary sacrifice already being made.
I wonder as Substack grows how it will meet this challenge- especially since it specializes in long-form. You can only really meaningfully engage with so many newsletters. How to discern from the noise and find your people and help them find you?
That is very true. That's why I'm looking to do most of my growth offline, hopefully drawing in new Substack users so that they can go through these same trials and tribulations. There are still plenty of readers out there, we just need to get them here.
I'm not sure if it will work, but I'm going to try drawing subscribers with my card game, and vise versa.
Yes, this happens to me, but I don't think of it as a problem. I do the same thing. I can enjoy an article and hit the like button, but not be ready to subscribe.
As I mentioned in another comment here, I use the bookmark (save) feature to easily find a publication again where I read (some say lurk :) ) sometimes for weeks before I decide to sub. Like many, I like to manage my email so I don't get overwhelmed.
I feel the same way, and I do that on YouTube as well. I won't subscribe unless I feel confident that I will enjoy a creator's body of work, which is not the same as liking a single post.
I have the funny problem of people following me but not subscribing. I'm like-- Don't do that! Save yourself! I'm an unhinged person in the notes section!
I'd like to believe I'm funny. My sister tells me I'm funny. But then again, she's like 3/4 of my subscriber base, and I routinely send her texts at 2:00 AM saying: "WAKE UP, MY ONLY READER, I NEED YOUR AFFIRMATION. LIE TO MEEEE."
Does that make me a funny gal? Or a gal whose raging insecurities are occasionally kinda funny? I wish I fuckin' knew, CK.
I take it to mean: Alexandra, it's fun to watch you skid around on black ice in notes, but we don't want to read all your earnest lil pieces on mental health crisis. I'm like a court jester!
I wish they'd put a counter up on your page so you know how many followers you have. Sometimes I send special blurbs out to my subscribers and it goes into their inboxes, and only remember half an hour later that I should tell my followers as well. If there was a number, maybe it would remind you that they're there. I just counted them yesterday and found out I have 102!
It takes a little work. You have to go to your own home page and when you find the part that says SUBSCRIBERS, click it. You'll see a list of subscribers, and then two other beside it, Followers, and the for the ones YOU follow. It's hard to find because it's not something we look at every day. But it's there. And you literally have to scroll through from top to bottom in order to count them.
I quite enjoy it when this happens. Happy if someone has swung by, had a read, Liked and then left. I get it that Subscribing is not always something someone wants to do.
Do you automatically subscribe every time you stumble across a post that you like by an author whose work is otherwise unfamiliar to you? I don't know about you, but subscribing is not always a decision I make on the spur of discovery; it usually takes prolonged exposure to someone's work before I decide to subscribe. Don't dismiss readers who like, but don't subscribe right away. First of all, be glad you're getting that exposure beyond your existing subscriber base. Secondly, that person may be in the process of deciding whether or not to subscribe to you down the line. They just want to see more from you before they pull the trigger, and IMO that is not unreasonable.
I don't mind Likes, in fact, I welcome them, because it means someone actually consumed my content. And now I hope they come back for more It can take a while to become convinced to subscribe. I like try before you buy.
I agree with Dana, there is so much subscription worthy writing in this community, that it could be a full-time job reading it all! Besides, I like browsing and sort of trying a new genre when I have spare time during the week.
I love it when people subscribe but know how overwhelming it is to be inundated with new posts. If I share my latest post in a note, people can decide to read it or keep scrolling. As a relative newcomer, I don't have hordes of subscribers, but I do have a high open rate that I'd lose by subscribing just to gain a subscriber. Those who choose to read me are keen, and I like it that way. A transactional approach can work on Instagram but I don't see a case for it on this reader-focused platform.
I subscribe to support others' work, but I don't open emails. I prefer to use the app or desktop version and read when I get a break from my responsibilities. Great stacks get lost amid the emails of "Get 30% this Black Friday". As a writer, I prefer when people like and engage rather than subscribe and never read my email.
Good rundown. abot oversad abut the democrats win.
The gun safety items was left out of the ananlysis,why?
We have constant news of killing people with machine guns kown as automatic rifels.
The third rail issue fails to bring this problem into focus,
We admit to havinf many "nuts" with a problem they will never address rationally, so why do we still have the perfect tool for mass murder readily avaailble to teenagers who are pist toff becaude they can't get a date. In Prison they will find themselves very popular with the guys doing life.
In NYC, mass kilings are not possible with the folks not tollerating this AR-15, 16 and soon the AR-17. We are not drunken hillbillies demanding their "rights" and NYC had not had this type of assult since 1998. (one guy lasted 3 miutes with a macine - gun at the Empire state bldg. He was quickly killed when he was shooting at tourists up in the observation deck. (4 minutes to respond by trained police officers)
โ๏ธ๐ง I've noticed a new, smaller link embed style with an action prompt that reads "Read full story" followed by an arrow. (You can find an example of what I'm talking about here: https://www.wonkette.com/p/joe-manchin-wont-seek-reelection)
๐ง Hi everyone! This is a tip I shared on a recent Office Hours, but I did it really late so hardly anyone saw it. In the hope itโs useful, here it is againโฆ
If youโre wondering what your social media strategy could be & how it could promote your newsletter, or youโre just looking for a way to write that can REALLY get your readers to lean in & engage, try this:
๐คฏ ** Share your enthusiastic response to learning about something amazingly interesting for the first time ** ๐คฏ
This was my social media strategy on Twitter before it became....erm, whatever it is now. I did it with excited-sounding threads, promoting a sciencey story I just learned about for the first time. The biggest of these totally blew up, reached 10 million people and sent 6,000 free subscribers to my newsletter. (Substack interviewed me about it here: https://on.substack.com/p/grow-series-7)
I'm very far from the first to discover the power of this approach (and thereโs even some good science on the neurological mechanisms behind it: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364661322001346). For example, it's why "unboxing" videos work on YouTube, or why footage of audience reactions to big moments in films get millions of views. Itโs emotionally affecting and it triggers us in a *good* way for a change. So it's incredibly useful for newsletter writers wanting to reach new people, make them feel something, and get them intrigued enough by *your* reaction (and their reaction to your reaction! etc etc.) to want to click through and learn more.
Mike - you said something in that interview that I've found to be the key to success in writing..."find something that excites you." I came from the world of software marketing, and over the years I had forgotten how much I actually like marketing. Marketing is super interesting. And I've found that if I share that excitement in my newsletter (which is about the language of marketing), people respond. Social media is often about generating a negative response from people. I love writing a newsletter because people seem to respond the most when something is positive, optimistic and - as you say - exciting to the writer.
I really love this. Thanks for saying that, Jared, and I totally agree - we're so easily triggered by negativity bias, but it often seems a pretty bad way to motivate anyone to do anything positive (and negativity and anger does a lot of damage to us along the way, no matter what the outcome is).
Absolutely. I always write better when I'm excited about the topic, too, so carrying that over to social media only makes sense. And the same thing happened to me. I'm in software design and I have to constantly rediscover my hunger for design so things don't get stale!
I love this perspective. I'm in marketing too but it confounds me. People should make good stuff and demonstrate why it's good vs. all the faux marketing. Once you cut through that then the product doesn't live up to the hype.
This feels like a good challenge to become an active reader on Substack.
As I read, I try to find one moment that genuinely excites me. I'll re-stack, and sometimes I'll rant on it. I've only done this for a few weeks so far, but it seems like I'm slowly growing my audience by being a better / more social reader (I dropped Readwise Reader since it's siloed). Maybe this is obvious to the people here, but the majority of writers I know still don't read in the app.
Thanks for this point Mike. While a "Restack with Note" doesn't have the visual hype of an unboxing video, it's a reminder for me to unpack my own perspective ("Hey writer, here's an unfiltered glimpse of what you're essay stirred up in me'").
I pride myself on engaging really thoughtfully with someone's work. I try to like, comment, and restack when I really like something I read. I know the feeling when someone does that for me so I put that back into the Substack space.
A restsack is the equivalent of reposting someone's work. But it's essentially the way to show appreciation and engage with other people's work. This is one of the ways to build community on the platform. Hope this helps a little!
Restacking someone's work and leaving a comment is something like a two-way street. You put the writer's work out on your network of followers and subscribers, and you leave a comment that others can read and comment on as well. Another good way of helping a writer is CROSS-POSTING. When you cross-post an "article" it goes to your email list and goes into the inbox of all your subscribers. People do this when they want to bring a writer to their followers' attention. A lot of people don't do it for a variety of reasons, the first being they don't know what it is, so they won't try it. Another reason is they don't want to clutter up their readers' inboxes, thinking they might get unsubscribed. I've come to the realization that if someone unsubscribes, it's usually someone who doesn't read your stuff very often. You want the readers on your subscribe page who have stars beside their names. The more, the more they read you stuff.
Thatโs a good point. Sometimes I just restack something I love, but itโs valuable to contribute my perspective on it and what I think is worth understanding from it.
So tell me Mike, does THREADS really work, or is it a waste of time? I haven't bothered with it yet. If it does work, maybe we should ask the powers that be to replace the Twitter feed they offer when you POST, with a Threads feed instead.
I enjoy using it the way I was loving the best corners of Twitter and other social media platforms - as a focused way to connect with cool people I wouldn't otherwise be able to talk to, and make a few new friends. But the sciencey threads I'm doing are also designed to hook new free subscribers - and in that sense, it's starting to work in the way Twitter did: over the last few weeks it looks like I've had over 200 new subscribers come via Insta/Threads (and it's definitely Threads when it says "Instagram" as a source, because I'm doing nothing on Insta.)
But also, what I'm trying not to do with Threads, which I learned not to do with Twitter, is scroll and scroll and just react to stuff that triggers me in a really negative way. It's hard, it's so easy to fall for it, but it's worth the effort to fight it: not by avoiding the bad things going on in the world, because we all need to be aware, but making an effort NOT to respond to things actively designed to enrage me enough to reply, by people who are *pretending* to be providing discourse, but actually not doing it with even the tiniest shred of good faith on their part. They just want hate-clicks and anger and fury and shame-quotes and the rest of it, because, what better way to get attention (AND drag everyone down into hopeless rage)? So far, I've seen much less of that on Threads. I'm sure it'll arrive in force. But I'll be drawing my own line there!
Nope! I just hope that enough people like it and share it that it gets noticed by yet more people and by the algorithm. At first, when I only had a couple of hundred people following me, it was mostly crickets. But the more you do it, the more people follow, and you grow (I'm now at 4,650) - and then you can circle back to that stuff you posted when you had a tiny following, and re-promote it to that new, bigger audience.
Yeah, I had to get off Twitter because there was so much shit. That's why I've stayed away from Threads. I don't want all that hate speech and the shit people throw at you. If you say one thing, everyone jumps all over you and drag you through the mud. I don't need that. I just want to put up a link to my stories and fuck off out of there. I've been hanging back on things like Instagram, and Facebook (still post links there and on LinkedIn) but I'm just letting Substack promote me. Get Recommendations and some Restacks, loving the comments, but just not pushing myself the way I should be.
It happens! But I tend to find that if you don't react to that stuff, and you show up with something from a place of good-natured self-mocking enthusiasm, you deter 99% of those folk just by tone alone. Or maybe I've just been lucky!
(I'm also not unaware that I have a lot of privilege on my side, being a middle-aged white bloke on the internet - and something of a thick skin from being a travel writer accustomed to seeing people slag off some of my articles in a passive-aggressive way. Not taking either of those for granted, and therefore, this advice always comes with a "Your Mileage May Vary" disclaimer.)
But also, I've tried the "posting a link in a single post" thing and it absolutely doesn't work for me - maybe because it's what most people do, but I think also it's asking too much, too quickly. It's saying to most people who see it "you don't know me yet, but hey, click through and read my thing!". Which is a lot to ask, so most folk go "nah". So instead, I stay on the platform for a bit and tell some or even most of the story on there, and eventually I've got to the point where I've proven I'm worth paying attention to - and THEN I ask, at the end of telling that story and having held their attention for a few minutes of scrolling through the thread. That usually works nicely for me.
The negativity bias is what gets me, that and the instant gratification people want on this platform. Yes, the beginning sucks, it's like your begging for subscribers. In the end, it'll be worth it. At least that's what I tell myself. *Stares into the ceiling in despair*
It can feel like that, yes. And if it does - either they way we're on these platforms could be done in a different way, or it's just not worth doing at all - because NONE of this stuff is worth it if we can't find a way to make it fun. If it just sucks 100% end to end, we can't show up with the kind of energy that will persuade other people into signing up to our work. We can't fake it enough to overcome that. Everyone can see it a mile off if we're faking it. Readers are too smart to fool, at least not for long.
So - yeah, the huge social media platforms can be a negative place to do things, and that can infect us with cynicism after a while. But it can also be an opportunity to provide a contrast: to be that rare person who is just doing stuff mainly because it's fun and trying to spread that sense of fun around a bit. It's possibly to stand out in this way. And I think it's a huge opportunity - as long as you can keep your brain safe from all that toxic stuff and not fall for the weaponised negativity other people are using to hijack attention for their own crappy purposes.
This is such an awesome idea, Mike. I just took to Twitter with a thread about an old post I wrote to see if it does anything -- I'm sure it won't, because my engagement on Twitter is abysmal, but I'll try it on Threads, too :)
Great strategy, Mikeโthanks!. I am going to try this...but I do write about poverty issues, not exactly an upbeat topic:-) I get excited because I learn something new and fascinating every time I research a post, but I'm sure I will struggle to turn that into excitement for lots of people...?
๐ง Writing opens doors. My Substack led to business opportunities, speaking engagements, and even an upcoming case study. So keep writing and have a long term view.
This is so encouraging to hear. The Site Formerly Known as Twitter did the same for me, and Iโm looking forward to growing more of a community of creatives on here.
I love that perspective! I have a small following but I've had the privilege of forming really genuine connections through Substack and meeting some incredible people. I think of it like a "currency of connection." You never know where those connections will lead or what doors will open through them.
I just changed my bio to state that I'm looking for an agent to represent my first novel, just as an experiment really but being on Substack has really made me believe anything is possible with genuine intent and an open mind!
This is awesome! Can you share a little more about how the speaking engagement came about? I hadn't considered that as a byproduct of writing, but it makes total sense.
Multiple people who were subscribers reached out to me to speak. This includes universities, podcasts, and more. You need to keep writing because you never know who will discover you.
๐ง I'm finding the customizable shareable images to be good only in terms of choosing the text you want to feature, but not in terms of the artwork from the post. It's blurry and difficult to decipher the images. I miss the old shareable images that featured the full title and subhead onlyโNOT the first paragraph. Can you make those old shareable images an option again?
Completely agree with Sari. The old format (title and subhead only) was exactly what I wanted for my social media strategy, but I havenโt been able to post in a week since the update. Please let us know what the product team says about bringing it back. ๐๐ป๐๐ป๐๐ป
I don't understand why the link can't be embedded in either of those shareable images. They seem pretty useless, otherwise. If I'm going to share a post somewhere, adding the link automatically brings up the title and the main image. I like that so much better.
I like them because they are a nice visual for social. When I share to IG, I note "Link in Bio"
When I share to Stories, I include a link to the post, when I share on FB, I include my Substack link in the text. The context is still just a click away!
I guess I can understand why you would use it on Instagram, but I don't see how it's better for Facebook when you can simply paste the link onto your post and the title and main picture appear--and look good.
The reasons I do it on FB rather than a link to the new post are 1) I like the visual of the jpeg better, and now that I've been using it people can instantly ID as a new Substack drop and 2) I like to link to my Substack home page so new visitors can see all of my content rather than the new post.
Same, I like them for Instagram. We just need *more* options is what Iโm hearing from other people. Itโs a lovely feature I donโt have to worry about!
I agree with this. I ended up creating my own copy of the old shareable image in Photoshop so I could customize the text that way, but it would be nice to get a choice that's built-in.
As a Newbie I don't know the old style. As a creative director, I agree that the images and display text are NOT enticing. I sort of tried to edit one, but I'd never share it. I do applaud your efforts to provide sharing images! ๐๐ฝ When you get it right, it will be awesome!
Agreed! I was posting the shareable images every week when they only included the title and description. Now theyโre filled with extra text that I donโt want and canโt delete. Betty, please ask the Substack team to prioritise this!
Agree also! The older style was more of a tease to incite curiosity for people to read. The newer style gives it all away by including the first graph. Plus the blurry pic. Weird. I stopped sharing my posts on social media because they weren't showing what I wanted to show. This is a bummer because social sharing was bringing me new subscribers. Please give us the option of using the older, cleaner style. Thank you!
โ๏ธ I'm approaching 500 subscribers! Any ideas for ways to celebrate this milestone with my readers? I'm wondering if I can also tie this into some kind of holiday gift-giving ask, so ideas welcome there too!
Milestone emails like this are a great way to pause and reflect in front of readers about all that you've built (together!) and often can get a reader who appreciates your work to consider upgrading to paid as well. We even have a guide on this: How to write a great milestone post https://on.substack.com/p/how-to-write-a-great-milestone-post
I've decided that all (9, so far) of my PAID subscribers will get a POD copy of one of my novellas when I collect enough PAID subscribers to afford it. I got hold of printer in town and he sent me a quote as to how much it would cost. I need a minimum of at least 65 paying readers to save enough money to print up copies and send out to readers -- with the promise of at least 3 books a year once things get rolling.
It sounds like you are going to do a *print* copy ... something I'd like to do also. How are you getting the addresses? And, what are you going to do about foreign postage?
I'm going to email everyone my address, and ask them to send me a postcard from where they live, with their return address on them. It sounds tedious, but I want a hard copy of their addies in case something happens (ie. the computer crashes and burns). Besides, all those postcards from all those cool places? Why not! As for the postage, it will be covered in the cost of the subscribers. If I get my 65, that's about $3500/year. The cost of printing varies, but for 150-170 pages, it's close to $2200. My short 'novellettes' (less than 20,000 words) would be about 100 pages. My novellas, closer to the 150-170 range.
Now, getting the PAID subscribers is the hard part, but it's just a matter of time.
Well, since I only have 333 subscribers, I think it's going to take a long time. I refuse to take money out from anywhere else except my "writing" account. I have to do this through what I earn. I can do whatever I want with the money I make (all $40/month).
That's amazing! I'm happy for you! If your Substack offers tips/advice, you could offer some kind of checklist/worksheet/best practices for them? Or what about soliciting questions your readers may have for you in Notes and then creating a post with answers? I also like the other Substacker's idea of a follow-up of the most read post. :D
A Q&A is a great idea! I recently sent an email to my top readers (4-5 activity stars) and offered them a 25% discount on a paid subscription. No takers yet but I'm also playing around with how to cultivate and nurture the relationship with my most engaged readers. I'd love to hear others' ideas!
That's great that you're experimenting with engagement... you'll never know unless you try, right? Speaking of which... I am going to turn on a paid version come January. We'll see what happens!
Go for it! I turned it on from the beginning with zero expectations and several of my friends/family became paid from the start! It was such a boost in confidence and humbling to have their support.
Thatโs awesomeโcongratulations! Maybe you could engage with readers via a poll or short survey to find out what theyโre interested in? Or schedule some sort of live online event where they can meet you and you can get to know them better?
Congratulations. Looking briefly at the focus of your writing, what about ideas around interrupting notions of what 'gift giving' is about. What would make gift giving more meaningful? Opening a dialogue (chat) with your subscribers about the best non-commercial gift they ever received? Not sure that's a great idea for celebrating the 500 but it might give you engagement. Toss or keep. Just riffin' here.
How about a round up of your best writing along with a discount?
Or a live celebratory session with everyone's fave reads?
Or a nice post-mail hand written thank you note to any new paid subscribers? (this could go a bit nuts, but I love the idea of hand writing and sending stuff to people to their actual mailbox.)
Do you have any paywalled content you could remove the paywall on? A special post you could make public to everyone? Or you could make all the archives free for a week?
I was offering a free 8" x 12" giclee photograph, value $32.99 for founding members and got no takers. My gut instinct was people might not want to give out their mailing address.
Interesting! And have you had any other ideas on how you might be able to get around that? Or maybe you'd rather offer something different? I love how susbtack is such an experimenting space.
Its tricky yeah. I'm sure you'll get a lot of input through these office hours. I've always found them interesting to read through everyone's comments and replies.
As for me, I have made a point for myself which is: just write. Just writing what I feel I want to write and making the best out of it, while staying consistent. I'm only 2 months in so I'm sure I haven't yet reached the real consistency barrier test somehow but I'm just focusing on this day in and day out, engaging where I feel and it all seems to eventually come back to you. Good work and good energy always come back, and I guess I've chosen to trust this regardless. There's so many ways to do things, so learn from everyone but do your very own creative thing, and the right people will follow. My five cents! ๐ฅฐ
I like that too. They have some pretty cool writing paper and envelopes available at Amazon. I still like the idea of sending out PODs for the stories I write.
Congratulations! I don't have experience of this but perhaps write a follow-up to your most read post because it's likely to be v popular with your readers too.
๐ง Just wanted to point out that some weeks ago, I posted a comment in Office Hours to the effect that Substack really needs to implement a tip jar feature, so that readers can make a one-off contribution if they're feeling reluctant to subscribe. This comment is *still* getting Likes from people catching up on old Office Hours. Just saying, it seems to be a pretty popular idea.
I agree, Douglas, and have made that request previously. You can add a button or a page for that in the interim. Buy Me A Coffee is a Stripe product, so you already have an account with them if you set up for paid subscriptions. Others use Ko-Fi (and I'm sure you could link to whatever you want). I think the hesitancy from Substack is that they want to push for a paid sub (so they get their cut) rather than one-offs. But, they aren't getting anything from the current tips, so it sort of behooves them to do it. However, since I set up my tip jar, I haven't gotten any. LOL. I mean, people have clicked on it, but the minimum tip is still $5 (on BMAC). I'm hoping the folks who clicked are considering going full sub. xo
The reason why Substack hasnโt done this so far is because micropayments have been proven to not work, and to discourage subscription. Theyโve talked about this in the past but I canโt find it now!
Some day we could maybe offer a version of this to readers who already pay for a subscription, but other than options like that it damages the economics for writers of this model. We totally understand the impulse, but also want to defend the writersโ ability to make a living !
Then I would like to see the data and I would scrutinize it closely, because I find the argument entirely counterintuitive. From my own experience as a person of limited resources, I would offer a writer a one-time $5 tip for a piece that I really liked more easily than I would commit to a $5/month subscription, automatically renewed unless I choose to terminate it. A subscription is a commitment, a tip is a buck you toss into a street musician's case to reward their talent. Honestly, I see no point in offering a tip jar to people who are already paid subscribers. They are already paying you; why would they make an additional one-off payment?
This is a great idea! This would help folks that canโt afford to fully support still contribute. I find the set minimum subscription pricing frustrating for this reason. Sliding scales (that scale low enough) are important.
I think many of us (if not most) would make more money if readers had more flexible support options. Substack would make more money, too. Right now, the only way to allow readers to tip is to include a link to Buy Me a Coffee, Ko-fi, or PayPal, or some other service that enables tipping โ and they get the transaction fee, not Substack.
๐ง I recently crossed the 1,000 subscriber mark, nearly at the same time and after a similar tenure on Substack as my friend and fellow writer @Michael Mohr. The main suggestion that I think we'd both have in terms of "growth" is just to "Write what you want," as he put it, and to think of big-G Growth as "learning, evolution, expansion, creation, depth, fire, soul, and heart," and not let yourself be sidetracked too much by the pursuit of small-g subscriber growthโwhile, at the same time, owning the truth that as writers we probably all want everyone who might appreciate our work to discover it.
๐ง - Substack team: is there a reason why we can't restack comments? There is some awesome advice in here from Bowen that I want to save, share with my readers, and riff on. I've found similar friction in the comment section of others essays. While I'm able to push my own comment as a note, I can't extend other comments or sub-replies to the feed.
Hi Michael! There's no way to restack sub-replies at this time. You can only restack the original comment. I can pass along this request to our product team for consideration!
Cheers Michael! and, good idea, I've found myself wanting to do the same thing at times as well. You could deeplink to the comment https://on.substack.com/p/office-hours-92/comment/43361008... or just to my original post. Thanks for sharing.
Nice work! I had to write some notes to myself to stay away from the FOMO of lack of initial growth because of how easily it can become an obsession. But I do permit myself a few dedicated days per month where I get to deep dive into researching growth strategies and note which one's I might try out next.
Oh gosh, this feature has been requested so many times! I believe it has a been a founder bias - one of our founders may have felt for some time that it would negatively affect design of articles - but now it's likely just not been prioritized as something to solve for. I can flag it to the team tho!
All I want to do is centre a * (or any kind of dingbat) within my writing instead of having a left-aligned * or a full linebreak, which often doesn't look great when writing fiction.
Oh you mean like a divider? I make PNG graphics for that! Is that what others need center text for? For anyone looking for a divider I use Canva to create it (and sometimes Procreate to make a custom one).
Give Canva a shot sometime when you have a little downtime. I was in the middle of finding inspo for my own Substack rebrand and graphics changes and such, and I've seen some other Substackers with nifty dividers and either clicked on their image they use for the divider, or right-click, "inspect" (in Chrome) and found the dimensions there.
Then I'd make a new design in Canva with those custom dimensions and then place whatever in the center, download it as a png, and you're good to go!
(Truthfully though, I play around with it and may tweek it a bit as I place it in a draft to see if I *actually* like it, haha!)
A founder's bias should not eclipse customers' needs in a situation like this. Hopefully they will come to understand that and add this feature. Thank you for flagging it for the team, Bailey.
I don't see anyone centering text for their entire newsletters, BTW. I have *one* section each week that would benefit from this, and it's such a basic feature that is incredibly frustrating to not have access to.
I use that feature for block quotes but the very start of my newsletter, where I share the phrases for the week, would look really dumb with the pull quote feature. I have no intention of centering my entire newsletter or posting it all in Comic Sans. Though tbh that's not really a problem the founders should be trying to control. This is a really basic feature that should be available because their customers want it to create a specific experience for our own customers. It's incredibly frustrating as a customer to not have access to a very basic feature because one dude doesn't want us to have it.
โ๏ธ Hi! I just hit the 200 subscriber mark after 2 consistent months, with a few paid subscribers already and really good engagement...I'm mind-blown and grateful.
I'm mostly teaching health and doing courses along with Q&As, mostly on preventative health, integrative medicine, emotional education and burnout prevention. After being on other platforms, I'm loving how easy it feels here on Substack. I haven't seen however as many health substacks (I'm a MD) besides the amazing big, informative ones about medical updates on vaccines, public health policies, news and similar stuff, but none on practical health prevention. So I'm curious about this and here's my 2 questions:
1. Do you offer courses on your Substack? If yes, I'd love to hear your experience regarding engagement and marketing. I love what I'm creating here but I'd love to learn from other's experiences too.
2. Have you seen other prevention health / emotional education / integrative medicine substacks out there? If yes, I'd love to know. I'd be grateful if you can tag them here. Teamwork truly makes the dream work!
That's it! Thank you so much and have a lovely day/evening you all! :D
Hi Marianna, Congrats on your first two months and growing community of subscribers!
I'm a doctor of Chinese Medicine and offer online, self-guided courses in that medicine for students and licensed practitioners. While that's not the focus of my Substack (which is addiction recovery, sobriety, and soulful living), I weave it into essays and keep a tab on the home bar and link on the side bar that go to my courses (and my medical practice).
Sounds a bit different than what you're describing, but I do think I've gotten some course sales and remote consults that way. Sometimes, I'll add a CTA as a PS on essays as well.
Hi Dana! Oh wow that's fascinating. Eastern medicine has so much more integrative views to offer and I totally advocate for it. I've studied Ayurved in detail for the last 8 years and I use it in my practice every day. Bridging the best of both worlds seems the best way to me. So happy to learn about you!
It sounds interesting what you shared about, specially about the remote consults. Curious to know how you promote the consults, if I may ask? I'm going to start offering them from January onwards and I want to have a good think about it. I'm going to check yours out!
Hi Mariana! I don't do tons of promoting around it, but have a link that goes to my website (where, if folks look at Acupuncture & Herbs, they can book in person or remote). Really though, I think I should promote the remote consults more. I use Jane App for my charting and scheduling, and it has a great video feature built in for remotes (so it's all in one place, HIPPA compliant, etc.).
Oh! And Marlee Grace, who writes Monday Monday, often promotes their live offerings (courses, workshops, classes) on their Substack. I'm actually participating in a really cool one this very minute called Flexible Office. https://marleegrace.substack.com/p/the-effort-it-takes-to-begin
Congratulations! I donโt offer courses, but I do regularly offer free online workshops on specific topics. Theyโre always advertised first to Page by Page subscribers, and then opened up to the rest of the world via social media. And then I โwrite upโ the discussion later for a later PBP post. Iโd love to know more about how you offer your coursesโdo you run them on Substack?
Ah this is so great! Thank you Mary :) Yes! Im running them here. It's been the best place to put it all so far. A course a month with a Q&A. Except the first course is actually a big one I had created a while back and it's been refreshing to bring it here in its updated version. Best response ever! The engagement I'm getting is truly remarkable and I'm honestly pleased. I've been on Mailchimp, Thinkific, my own website and on health columns too, and nothing has felt so great like Substack so far.
It's not only courses that I'll be doing - there will be indeed workshops, and offline activities I had been doing for a while, which I want to reflect somehow in here as I bring the online version over Substack. As I said, big plans - step y by step. And I'm eager to learn from everyone and work like an ant, consistently, happily, day after day.
I dont think I qualify on nr 2, but I do write about my journey to reach my dream job with neuro and mental health problems. Trying to write about what worked for me and so on.
Iโve thought about offering courses but I know Sarah Fay of Writers at Work here on Substack does! You could check out her model and she also offers help herself to improve Substacks :)
So I actually have a question related to your work. I do a trivia/word game/other-such-things newsletter, and I'm wondering if you have a health issue in mind that you think people need more information on. I would love to work it into my next newsletter. I'd also be happy to give you a shout out in the newsletter in return for your time.
So each week I create 11 'cards' and send them out newsletter style. Some weeks I have a theme. For example, for my Week 1 newsletter, I focused on the Amazon Rainforest and highlighted the work of Jungle Keepers, an organization trying to create a massive reserve in Peru.
But even during normal weeks, I like to add little informative notes. So for example... Your latest post is about stress. Which of your tips do you think is the most important one? #1? I can create a 'card' related to light. In the answer section, I can write a little informative note and/or leave my readers a link to your article.
I want my newsletter to be successful for my own selfish reasons, but I also think I can use it to connect my readers to good information, and even to Substack authors like you. Reading inspires a lot of my 'cards', and as long as I'm reading I might as show the authors a little love.
That's great, Heidi! Definitely go for it. I went straight in with putting my courses here (currently on the first one) and I've been nicely surprised to how well people are responding to it all. I know everyone's experience is different...but just a nudge for you, if I may: why not start trying regardless of your list number? I started sharing the course when I had like 20 people.
1.5 month later I have 200. I think the consistent sharing started precisely bringing people in. In my case it's been the course. But maybe you're being consistent with other stuff too. ๐ฅฐ
That's fantastic advice, Mariana. I hadn't even considered it but thank you for that nudge. I'm consistently posting once a week, but a course might be exactly the right thing for me to start. Thank you! ๐ฅฐ
This is amazing - congratulations Marianna! Iโm a life coach helping people bridge the gap between their inner and outer worlds to incorporate more authenticity into their lives - so the emotional education component of your work really speaks to me. (As do the other parts of your work, preventative health is so deeply important!)
Looking forward to following your work, and perhaps chatting about collaborating one day!
Aw thanks Alexa! So great to hear, and I totally hear you...prevention is truly everything, alongside awareness too. It's so great to know of others in the field, thank you for showing up here so I can read you too! And yes, let's keep that idea in mind, love it. :)
๐ง Iโm sharing this piece of advice that seems to be working with me: to engage outsiders to pop on Substack and read, it works best to use Instagram as advertisement campaign and slap the link (to notes, posts and pages) often. But what really breaks it there is not to just post links to our own things but to diversify and highlight other writers. More visits! More views! The sneaky algorithm of IG loves new things, and probably our regular readers too.
Did yโall read/listen to the recent On Substack post about converting Insta followers to Substack? I thought it had a lot of good ideas.
One Iโve just tried (no data yet on how it works but I like it) is ditching a 3rd party app for insta linkinbio and using a hidden Substack post for this. Gets ppl straight to the Substack ecosystem. Hereโs my 1st draft for an example: https://wecanfixit.substack.com/p/linkinbio
Hi Helen! I just published without sending by email, and after pub unpinned/exclude from top posts. It is still visible in the archive but I am ok with that. Like 6 ppl have opened it so itโs not a big distraction. :) Hope this helps!
Thanks for this! Iโm an IG newbie, and am still figuring out how to optimize it to attract subscribers. I like the idea of highlighting other writers on thereโitโs such a great community here, and itโd be good to share that on IG.
I like the fact that by highlighting others, we can also expand our readership pool. It is like when a friend of a friend recommends something, we check it out and maybe we find something useful for us too!
Coming on this page every Thursday is a great way of getting your name out there. When you make comments and people read them, they're more inclined to look at what you have to offer. I used to end every comment with a link to my ABOUT page, so people have a better idea of what I have to offer. It actually works: https://benwoestenburg.substack.com/about The thing you have to do is to keep going back to your ABOUT page and updating it. People forget to do that. It's one of the most important features you have on your 'Stack, because that's where everyone can see what you have to offer.
I like that! And thatโs definitely the spirit of Writer Office Hoursโthis is where you get to know the Substack community a bit better and see whatโs out there.
Haha Iโm so pleased to have offered a useful Instagram tip!! I am still pretty new there and I find that platform super un-intuitive which is all the more frustrating bc everything there is made to look so easy and pretty but it takes a ton of work!! So Iโm happy I could share a helpful tidbit. :) Good luck!
The thing that I'm finding with IG is that links aren't clickable unless you actually buy an ad. I can have one link to my Substack on my bio, but that's it (I think). How do you make your links be effective?
In posts, links are not clickable. But nowadays nobody sees posts, it is either reels or stories that attract visitors and in both cases, you can use links for free - still!
I'll have to play around with this. Can you only add the clickable link if you create the story/reel on the app on your phone? I almost always create on my computer (through a third party scheduling app).
I'm not sure about that.... I haven't posted stories from Instagram in a browser versus the app (or via a scheduling app). In the app, you add a link by choosing the link option from the menu where you can also add stickers, a hashtag, etc. It may be that isn't available in the browser-based version. (Please note that you can add up to 5, I think it's 5, urls in your bio now, too. It used to be one, but they increased it.)
Instagram did recently change the one link in bio โ you can have a few now. People still have to click into the bio to view all of them, but it's something. I'd also be shameless and ask individual followers to share your newsletter on their stories to cast a wider net of potential subscribers.
Is your IG public (i.e. are you trying to attract people on IG outside your followers), or are you speaking more about engaging your existing network of followers?
โ๏ธ๐ง I'm not quite clear on how/when to use Notes vs Chat. I've been using Notes quite a bit, but I can't figure out what Chat does that's different. I'm looking for strategy here.
๐ง Notes go to a broader Substack audience, a bit more like social media (but without the horrible algorithms). Chat tends to be conversations specifically among you and your subscribers (you can select whether all subscribers or just paid subscribers).
Ah, thanks, Bryan. That nuance had escaped my notice--about using Chat as an kind of internal mini-Slack channel to hold sidebar convos with subscribers. Now I get it!
But aren't you using algorithms now? I really liked it when Notes let you choose to see posts from everyone (in real time?) or just the people you followed. Now I'm only seeing Notes from the same 5 people over and over.
I think it requires a fairly massive audience for Chats to be worth the effort. Even some of the bigger accounts I subscribe to have very quiet Chats. I generally think Chats was an idea that didn't work.
I would tend to agree. Except that I want subscribers to be able to share photos. Since they canโt post images to comments, I end up adding a monthly chat thread to a photo prompt. Not that itโs working ๐คฃ. Or it is depending on how you define working. Letโs just say โsmatteringโ might be an exaggeration of how many photos the chat threads get (way less than the typical comment engagement). And I LOVE the photos that do come in.
I think weโre (or least Iโm) typically read in email, so itโs a button too far to get all the way to chat thread.
I'm not 100 percent sure how to read the data. But you get a general idea of where views are coming from in stats and then traffic. For me, the top source is email. Not sure if this is the right read of that ...
The only Chat I am a part of that is vibrant is from a newsletter about running and people share their photos/stories from their daily jogs/races. But that's really it.
โ๏ธ - When I become a world-famous celebrity Substack humor writer, how should I let Taylor Swift know that I'm very happily married, so please stop calling and writing songs about me?
Okay, great, in which case I'm going to need a *percentage* of the percentage of the royalties you demand. Ya know, for coming up with this whole dastardly scheme in the first place...
Alexandra, you are going to go far in this business! I'd like to be your agent. Which means I'll need a percentage of your percentage of my percentage.
Joe (Can I call ya Joe? Taylor does...), you're gonna have to talk to my manager first... Her name is also Alexandra. She doesn't get out of bed for less than $5,000,000. If you want to just wire that over real quick, I can set a business lunch up between the two of you?? Alexandra's treat, of course.
Tay calls me "Joey-Boo" which really gets under my skin but yes you can call me Joe. I'll be happy to send Alexandra $5M, as long as she accepts checks and agrees not to deposit it until payday.
๐ง If anyone is on here to become a better writer and wants to measure up to the high bar of writing set on Substack, people found this Writers at Work workshop really helpful: "Write Personal Essays Substack Subscribers Will Pay to Read." Replay available: https://www.writersatwork.net/p/write-personal-essays-for-substack-subscribers
๐ง Hey substack team, I have a question - Iโd there any way we can monitor the read times of our emails to know whose reading and whoโs just glancing?
That would be helpful. I often wonder if the open rate is inflated by programs like Gmail that automatically open emails (or so I've heard).
I've also been wishing that Substack could offer some kind of average for growth rate for folks who start at different stages? Realize it's all individual. But I still have little sense of whether the folks that are featured in Reads and such are realistic models or outliers, and whether I ought to feel good or frustrated about my own growth rate after starting at zero in March 2022. 1,600+ subscribers feels like good growth over 19 months with no preexisting following? It might be encouraging (or motivating) to know where I fit on the curve for people who started at a similar stage.
I started at zero at the end of Jan and have only recently clicked over into the 400s.
I will say though that growth seems to have tapered a bit. I'm not sure if that's a generalisation across Substack, or just the nature of the (mostly) Fiction niche I find myself in.
Thanks, Nathan. My paid growth has definitely plateaued. Free subscribers are still steadily climbing, though. I think it's true that genre has some bearing (fiction is rumored to be a tough area for growth).
1,600 since March of 22? I started in Jun and only have 330. I think you've done an amazing job. I know how hard it is starting from zero, because that's where I started from.
I've got about 3 hundy in 6 months so far, but it seems to have levelled about as dramatically as something can level out. How did you break the thousy barrier?
The company line on this is consistency and quality. And I'm sure that plays a role, both in attracting new subscribers and retaining existing readers. Substack's internal network continues to contribute to slow and steady growth.
But I think the main driver for a lot of people is getting amplified by someone with a bigger platform. My early growth was spurred by frequent posting in private FB groups (which nearly always got me banned eventually, so I've stopped that ๐คท๐ปโโ๏ธ). One of those groups had 20K+ members, which helped a post go viral. The Chronicle of Higher Ed requested to reprint it. That tripled my following in a week. I think consistency and quality have helped me avoid the churn and trolling that a lot of people describe as fallout from viral posts. But everyone needs some big gains once in a while, too.
That said, I have no secret sauce for converting folks to paid subscriptions. So I still feel very much a novice.
Oh, hell no, you think I want to know how many people are actually casually ignoring me?! Let me cling to my sad little number of views, please, pleaseeee. ๐
There's no way to do that right now. It's not a Substack thing, it's just an email thing. The best proxy you have is link clicks. If you're getting a lot of clicks on something at the end of an email, odds are high people read through the whole thing. Trying to get read/open time based on people's inboxes is a huuuuuuge privacy issue. If they come directly to a site you own, it's possible through tools like Parsely and Chartbeat. But analytics beyond "Did someone open and/or click a link in this email" is essentially no man's land and with good reason.
Just to throw something else in the mix. I read almost exclusively in the app. So I delete emails. I open them first (thinking of peopleโs open rates, tbh). But my read times wouldnโt reflect my engagement level. (I mean I do think the reading in the app is rare on the other hand.)
I'm with you. I much prefer to read in the app. But I don't usually open them in my email. Just in the app. I still think they get open stats from those that are opened in the app, though.
There is no real way to monitor read or even open time. Unless they run a javascript timer that sends blips back to their server to timestamp how long a window is open. Whether in email or on the website, the best it can tell you would be if a window is open - not, of course, whether anything is being read.
With something like a YouTube video, it can track how long the video plays. But even that doesn't mean they don't have the audio turned down and are not truly paying attention.
Your best gauge of actual reading is some form of interaction (likes, comments, etc.).
That's a shame! Maybe it's better not to know how many are half glances anyhow.
๐ง I have another question - one of my users has opened every email, but they've only got a 3 star subscriber rating. Does anyone know why that might be?
In reading what the stars indicate, it could be that they open their email but do not ever click onto the site.
I have, for certain subscribers, emailed them directly.. sort of a message of thanks. I indicate that the Internet/Substack gods tell me they've engaged in X fashion and then I may ask them a question about my content, what they like the most and what they like the least, etc.
I've only done this a couple times for specific reasons. It has never been poorly received.
To your original question: I assume stars are a combination of opens and clicking through to the article.
๐ง The shareable assets were recently updated with new font and a longer text snippet. I miss the old font and the shorter snippet! Any chance of going back to how it was?
๐ง Is there a way to specify which newsletters we want to show up under the Recommendations heading on our home page? Only 5 newsletters appear, but I have more than 5 that I recommend. I'd like to be able to pick the 5 that I want to appear on my home page while also still recommending the others.
โ๏ธ - I really want to keep my Substack free AND want to have people become paying subscribes. I know I can use paywalls to entice readers, but I rather not do that. I know the feeling of really wanting to read someone's work but the paywall becomes a factor. I really believe people would support if they can. Has anyone experimented with other ways of getting people to become paid subscribers without offering anything different? I really believe my work is worth paying for - interested in what other folks have had success with.
Context: I write letters to my newborn every week to process being a first time dad.
Iโve personally paid to subscribe to Substacks because I either wanted to be a part of a paying community where the author offered other benefits (see @alexdobrenko and @donnamcarthur) or I just wanted to support that particular writerโs work or both.
Thanks for sharing CK. I am going to be patient. I am happy to know there are others out there who would just rather keep the work available to everyone. Organic is the way!
Hi Marc, I think Can We Read by Sarah Miller (for some reason I cannot link to her substack here?) has been doing an "experiment" to see if she can run on opt-in pledging/support, but offering all subscription for free (the NPR model, if you will). Might be worth checking her out to see how it's going.
PS - love your substack. My baby is a few weeks older than yours. Congratulations - what a lucky kid to have such a dedicated parent.
Cafe Anne has kept all her stuff free and just given the option for readers to support her. They donโt receive any additional content - simple the satisfaction of supporting one of their favorite NY journalists !
I just heard about her from one of my favorite writers on here. I think that's going to be my approach. It says volumes about someone's work people just want to support just because. Thanks for sharing!
I have paid subs enabled but don't use any paywalls on my posts. I give the option to pay if they like. And several DO pay even though they don't have to.
โ๏ธ How do y'all find the balance between posting regularly (daily, weekly, etc) while also feeling like you have enough time to unpack your thoughts and generally maintain high-quality content? If anyone has the added struggle of trying to post regularly whilst they maintain a full-time job, even better :)
๐ง It can sometimes feel like it's up to every writer to figure out the best marketing/growth strategy for them. While that to some degree is inevitable, are there any channels or strategies that you think all Substack writers should follow or invest in, to grow their audience?
I struggle a lot with this. I have two kids and a full-time job and have been writing/posting one story a week for about three years (first on Medium and more recently on Substack). Mostly, I write about how hard it is for women to have kids and a full-time job!
My two cents:
1. Focus first and foremost on quality and consistency of your writing. Growth will definitely be slower if you don't have the time/emotional energy to invest in a ton of engagement, whether on Substack or social media, but don't prioritize that over the writing you're here to do.
2. Segment your engagement time (I try to read one other Substack story a day at lunch and respond to comments once a day instead of as they come in. This doesn't always happen, but I try!)
3. Find the time of day that works best for you for writing and be intentional about carving it out. I go for a run, walk my kids to school, and then eek out 30 minutes of writing before starting my workday. That time when the house is quiet and my brain isn't yet bogged down by work demands is golden for me. My partner also understands that, unless something dire comes up, writing one story a week is non-negotiable and he's gracious about giving me time to sneak off to a cafรฉ on the weekends if I've gotten behind.
4. If you're in a boring Zoom meeting for work, take some time to respond to other people's posts during Substack office hours! (Shhh... don't tell.)
Kerala, these insights are really helpful. This past year, I haven't had the time to invest in growing my readership, but I committed to writing twice per month. I was in the middle of a huge life change when I started my newsletter, and that seemed manageable to me. Now I feel like I can do a bit more, but it's been hard to determine what "more" means...
Thanks for such a thoughtful, detailed response :) Reading your comment is making me realize where I really struggle: I'm pretty good at sticking to a consistent writing schedule, but not to a consistent publishing schedule. I never want to publish until I really feel like I've fully unpacked an idea (which can take over a month!). So, to your first point about prioritizing writing over engagement, what about finding the balance between prioritizing the trade-off between quality of writing and frequency of publishing?
That's a great question, and in this day and age, I really appreciate that you want to take the time to unpack an idea. So many people just fire off posts for the sake of posting them. My instinct (based on nothing but gut) is that it's important to post at least twice a month so your readers don't forget about you. Sometimes if I have a PTO day or two to spare, I'll write rough drafts of a few different stories to build a small backlog so I at least have something started.
Also, quality is important but I can potentially revise a story forever, so sometimes best to just take the plunge and publish :)
So true: people are thirsty for depth, especially if they're taking the time to consume simple and plain prose over e.g. video content, but people also need to remember who you are. A twice-a-month goal seems like a good compromise :)
I made a no frills document - a table in Word called "editorial plan" which lives in a shared drive on Google because I collaborate with another writer. We we meet, I drop in ideas for posts. They could be as detailed as you want. But having lots of ideas and drafts "in the bank" is helpful in terms of managing the stress around having enough content to keep going.
I outline most of mine the same way, and either use my phone or old teletype sheets from the printer on my desk at work. That way I can chip away at it when I have a few minutes or as ideas strike.
I always set an input goal rather than an output goal. As in: I write for two hours every day. However many posts that gets me is however much is my output. That being said, I aim for 1,000 words per post, so if a topic expands to 2,000 words or more I split it into a series! Before I was doing this full time that resulted in 1x/week. Now 2-3x.
I like this a lot! I have a 2500 word draft ready to be published, and I've been thinking of breaking it up. Do you have any strategies or tips around how to frame the series-based posts, so you can still attract first-time readers to your blog, who may not want to go back and read the first post, if they just got to the second? Said differently, do you aim to keep each post, even when they are a series, evergreen?
Well, I always look for if I'm trying to make more than one point, because then I can split it up into two posts, each with their own point and longevity.
For example, a series I did on culture was originally one long post. But I split it up into two:
Hi Jeff, I post twice a week and I have a full time job and a part-time business. When I did not have time to unpack my thoughts as you say, I will write a short post sharing a piece of content I've enjoyed that week. It takes minutes to write and edit, and my subscribers appreciate the short content. It is also a great way to build relationships with other creators and become a curator that people will lookup to.
I've been thinking about this S,M,L strategy, but not sure if it's right.
(S = daily, M = weekly, L = monthly.)
The daily posting is part of my morning routine (15-30 minutes). The weekly post is a single-sit down once a week (2-4 hours). And for long-form, I meet with 2 friends once a week, and we publish on the 1st of every month (a 10+ hour effort). You could scope each pace so it fits with your current lifestyle.
It sounds good in theory, but it's been tricky for me to pull off. Each month is slightly different, and I'm never consistent with S/M. Weirdly, I'm 2 for 2 on the long form (Sep/Oct), probably because I have two friends holding me accountable.
Interesting! In addition to what's easier to put out between the S/M/L pieces, do you have a sense of which actually resonate? Speaking anecdotally, I'm surprised to find that those pieces that I write in one sitting can often resonate more than those I pour 20+ hours of writing and editing into.
As for q1, I am trying to get better about organization and I've started a Trello board where I can drop links and inspiration throughout the week so that when I sit down to write I have some good stuff to pull from. That just feels less stressful, like I have to sit down and capital W Write and come up with something genius out of nowhere.
As for q2, I'm curious to see the response on that one ๐
Any fresh ideas about how to move subscribers to paid subcribers or sustainers? I've been publishing my newsletter regularly for two years and my blog for four. I've been in publishing and journalism for 30+ years and am baffled as to how to move beyond one paid subscriber (who is a sister). Not looking for story ideas, rather monetization strategies. Danke.
I don't even think my sister is a free subscriber ๐ฅฒ
To add onto what Kimberly said, I'd make your Chuck Eats KC your main newsletter on your profile, and make it SUPER obvious what people are going to get for subscribing. Your "Why Subscribe" is pretty generic. I know I'm getting access to a newsletter, but what are the highlights of yours?
You could also make unique perks for paid subscribers, like they get to pick what you eat at a location or you print out a picture of them to "join you" during a meal. Have fun with it!
Hi Chuck! I had a peek at your Substack, looks like you write authoritative food reviews. I can see how thatโs a challenging niche to be paid for as there are many websites where people rate and review for free (Tripadvisor, Google maps, yelp etc). If your goal is to get paid subscribers then you have to offer a unique value that they appreciate and want to support. Iโd make sure youโre very clear on what your existing subscribers like/want/arenโt getting (ask them in polls, live chats etc) and make very clear what your unique value contribution is throughout your publication (for example update your About page to convey your expertise/special perspective). Good luck!
Thanks, Kimberly. Yes, one of the primary goals of my project is to be an independent alternative to corporate walled review websites where the reviewers are uncompensated.
Got it! I think you could make mission a lot more explicit throughout the publication, like in your About Me (tell your reader about your unique expertise/qualifications as a food expert, and a KC expert. What can you point/link to (your journalism clips?), to demonstrate the value you bring? Also would you want to host other reviewers for guest posts/Q&A, if you're trying to build up a new model? Good luck!
Chuck, I can imagine that to attract paid subscribers when most food reviews are free, as noted, you may have to get into the business of organizing subscriber-only dinners, tastings, etc., at restaurants that offer you discounts. What can you offer a paid subscriber they cannot get elsewhere? Of course, that's more work for you!
Amy, thanks for bringing those services up, as I've recently started considering that kind of thing. I have friends in other cities who do food tours. I've even done KC barbecue tours for friends before I started the blog/newsletter.
I imagine you could start small, with, say, a beverage tasting at a bar. Take photos of the event, post them on your Substack and other social media, and be sure to let folks know that these fun times are only available to paid subscribers. And voila!
I sent a note to all my family and friends with a request to subscribe, but didn't directly ask for paid subscribers, and six of them went ahead and did so anyway. I then keep a gratitude section with their names at the end of every post; someone else did this when I became paid, and I thought it was smart. Since then I've offered to donate any paid subscriptions to an organization I believe in, and I got four more paid subscribers because of that. So, 1/3 of my subscribers are paid (I only have 32 right now as I'm not in a "niche" quite yet...). Maybe something in what I'm sharing sparks something for you!
Hey, getting subscriptions from siblings is a big confidence booster. They also get more invested in the project, sharing their thoughts, their recent experiences, and news they have heard.
Shake it up! I often have more reactions/thoughts posted to such. My Thanksgiving posts for e.g. (which comes out of nowhere for my poor USA readers, as ours is early October!) really elicit response.
I publish occasional short humor/satire stories that are on topic but definitely a different style than my other posts. I do think it helps to add just a little context in the beginning, acknowledging that this is a little different and perhaps explaining what inspired you to write the post. Just my two cents!
Perhaps a different type of writing deserves a different home? Perhaps you could try to throw it at a magazine or writing contest? If you write about locations, you may want to consider if your essay would be a fit for the nonfiction essay contest I am promoting?
The prompt is 'A Sense of Place.' Your piece should assert or discuss the signifcance of a place. There is a lot of leeway about how you choose to approach the contest outside of the prompt.
I recently published a humorous (hopefully ๐คฃ) piece, definitely not my norm, about a triathlon in a bikini. This story typically has people rolling. Iโm not sure the written version is as funny. But it was a much quieter response from readers than normal. Wondered if I should have prefaced.
My latest approach is to open an essay with an image, and then use the caption of that image to share context. It's small and skippable in case you want to get right into the action, but maybe it could help orient a new reader. Are you convinced by this?
Another approach would be to update your email header. You could have it consistent for each email, or update it each time. I notice that it renders in a slightly different style than the body of the essay, which helps (it indicates it's skippable). It's just not ideal to me since in-app readers won't see it.
Haha. Thanks for reading closely enough to notice! My Mathew Perry Essay and whenever I post about sports. I think it catches people by surprise who subscribe for the news.
Iโm putting together a Holiday Gift Guide for Creatives and would love to promote your art, business, newsletter, or service/offering.
My goal is to help indie artists and entrepreneurs (basically everyone here, right?) have a successful holiday season while putting together a gift guide with meaning that supports this community.
All the details are in the post below but let me know if you have a comment or question!
๐ง Hello Substack! First of all, you guys are awesome.
Second, in the last few days, the shareable images no longer have just the title and subtitle with a picture in the background, but have the beginning of the subtitle and the text of the article itself, which often doesโt make much sense.
Any way to go back to the old way? Those images are soooo important for posting on other websites and even on WhatsApp.
I'd like to share my approach to writing on Substack in case it resonates with others. These are my basic guidelines.
Ask if you want subscribers or readers? Theyโre not necessarily the same. For me the answer is readers.
Publish at your own pace. Thereโs no magic number of posts, but you do want to be consistent. If you donโt publish anything for months, itโs likely that folks are going to figure you gave up. Well, donโt give up, but donโt be pressured to post something just to meet a timetable.
Strive for perfection. You wonโt reach it because weโre all imperfect beings, but disregard the popular advice that says just get it out there. Make each article / story / essay the absolute best you can. Read it aloud and pay attention to the flow. Take your time. Think about each word. But donโt take these steps to such an extreme that you never hit the publish button, either. Balance.
Ignore stats. Donโt announce your stats. Turn off all stats that youโre able. Stat motivation is antithetical to artistic motivation.
Results donโt come by repeatedly thinking about them or desiring them fiercely; they come through actions. And the more we let ourselves be carried away by the desired results, the less we tend to act in ways that contribute to achieving them. [these words not mine; they are from a (sort of) Zen YouTube channel I enjoy]
And (related to the previous paragraph) remember (I have to remind myself of this frequently) that I control what I write and when I put it out there, etc., but I have no control over what happens next such as subscribes, likes, comments, whatever. I enjoy the process, and the other stuff follows.
Maybe some of this resonates, I don't know. But that's what I try to keep in mind and it's been doing well.
Great info. Just an add on-- I find committing to posting every week letโs readers know what to expect. Readers need to trust you. Learned this from @sarahfay
I agree with all of this wholeheartedly. "Done is better than perfect" they say, I disagree. If the result is lacking in quality, it was a waste of time, for yourself and your audience. Instead, I accept imperfection through my inconsistent post schedule, but when I get the post out, I'm confident someone will benefit from it in some way and that's what comes first to me.
I'm by no means a popular Substacker that should be giving out advice on this, but as a consumer of writing, this is my view on it.
I'm pleased with how things are going, but frustrated with how little engagement there is, no matter how I ask/beg. I migrated to Substack from over-long over-shares on Facebook for a lot of reasons, but am missing that sweet, sweet hit of dopamine I got from the FB likes and comments.
Any tips for either encouraging engagement or encouraging me to get over it?
I do understand missing the dopamine of social media :) I have recently changed my views on social media. My main platform was Twitter, where I have 15k followers. After the changes a year ago, I get essentially zero engagement there. Recognising this fragility made me rethink my social media strategy. I now aim to use social as a place where I share original content Iโve created on platforms I own (mainly my Substack, also my website or any essays/guest on podcasts/talks Iโve gotten out). I donโt want to work for the tech billionaire platforms for free any more, so I donโt want to spend a lot of time creating original content for them.
Hey Lara! Your stats look great. My engagement is pretty solid but have been having trouble getting people to actually convert to being paid. Any strategies you used to get people to sign up to pledge?
That I can't help you with unforch. My pledges are all friends who have ponied up to support me out of the goodness of their heart. I'm not planning to go paid until 2024 (if at all) when I have demonstrated to my readers that it's a product worth paying for, and to myself that I can keep this up!
Oh, damnnnn, we joined at roughly the same time. I have like 22 subscribers-- and one of them is me and at least 17 of them are people I've blackmailed into joining. $0 in pledges. 74% open rate, but again... the blackmail helps with that.
Anywho, I just subscribed to you, and I'll engage-- for what it's worth!
Thank you so much for subscribing! I've been very active on FB for 15+ years so I had a good community to tap into to migrate with me to Substack - but I want MORE! ;)
A simple poll like: would you do X or Y in this situation? (If your content allows for something that straightforward). Not always or everytime but once in a while you'll get some uptake. And then your engagement and providing the results continue the conversation. Just riffin'. Keep or toss
Oh awesome! Yes, that sounds like a perfect way to engage folks - Maybe asking the questions right at the top of your post (above the fold) to catch reader's eye. Hope it helps!
Hey Lincoln, when updating a post and republishing, it is not automatically emailed to everyone. The default is that it will just update on the web when you click โupdate everyone now.โ If you have never emailed out the post you will have the option on the "scheduling" section to email the post out.
I've noticed that if I have tags in a post I edit, the publish button says, "Update everyone" which is annoying. I followed up with a tagged person on this but they said they aren't notified on it.
That said, I do get emails that say "X linked to your post!"... sometimes multiple times. My guess is that the only tagged users will get updates on edit, and they'll be in email, but not in-app.
Any chance of changing the Button that reads "Update everyone" Sounds like it creates lots of confusion (not just for newbies like me). As a former UX producer I get how tough it is to be responsive as you're growing and building app features. Thanks!!!
Are you looking for Neuro diverse writers in particular? @amandahinton has written about being an autistic writer. I intersperse my own journey through humor.
โ๏ธ๐ง Hi community! Iโm relatively new to Substack, and looking for ways beyond social media to grow my subscriber list. I saw growth initially when I launched, but Iโm starting to plateau and need tips to keep growing.
I don't know if you consider Substack's Notes feature to be social media, but I've found that regularly restacking articles from other newsletters I read and adding a substantial comment has effectively doubled my new subscriber rate. That wasn't why I started using Notes, but that seems to be the effect I see. And it encourages the other writers that I follow, which is a great bonus!
Use notes. Develop your own voice and presence in notes and engage regularly.
Make genuine connections with writers you like and enjoy.
In your newsletters create a line or two about asking your subscribers to recommend your work and share it (I have not done this yet but a couple of writers I admire have done this).
Outside of Substack - Post your work everywhere. Find Facebook groups and Reddits that deal with the topic you are writing about and be a community member there.
If you believe in your work, you should share it as much as possible. Be as aggressive with sharing your work as you are with the pen.
Yay aggression! ๐คช So true. I'm blindsided by the amount of work it takes to share, when I'm exhausted by effort of posting, learning SubStack, etc. I've let that stop me in the past. NO MORE! Share like you love it.
Itโs really a job. Iโm trying to manage this with a job and a newborn. I try to give myself grace. I canโt compete with someone who has any less than me. But I do my best with what I have.
Everything happens all at once or not at all. There will be times that your subscriber count is growing and times when it's stagnant. Keep your focus on what you're making. If you're in a slump with writing, take the time to explore Substack and find content that you like here to engage with.
Very true, Kerry. My subscriber growth stalled for a few weeks, and then suddenly shot up. It does seem to go in fits and starts. I try, not always successfully, to refrain from becoming obsessed with it. Except that I turned off unsubscriber notifications because I found them too depressing
I never turned those on as I didnโt see the purpose of it other than as a form of mental abuse ๐.
This is not what other people here want to hear, but for me, sharing my writing has also come with the acceptance that not everyone is going to like my work and thatโs okay. Itโs niche, and I knew that my writing wouldnโt be popular as it is adjacent to who I am fundamentally which has always been hard to translate in real life to others on this marketplace planet. But that doesnโt mean that a small group of people wouldnโt greatly benefit from what I have to say in some way. A small subscriber list is not a reason for me to be upset, only if it were a small list of people who werenโt getting anything from my writing.
That's how I try to look at it. I find other people's proclamations, no doubt well-meant, rather depressing in that they make me feel like I'm not doing well so to speak. But I have a decent-sized list and sometimes a lot of engagement, so I like to just produce stuff that (a) I like to write and (b) I think others will get something from. I don't know what metatonia is so I'm going to look at yours to find out.
You could cross-post on a site like Medium. It costs nothing to start your own blog space there and has a built in audience of millions. I often repurpose my Substack content over there with a link back to here.
My advice to writers on Substack is always the same: Follow 50 writers who have the same audience as you, read and comment on their work (and engage with their commenters), and pitch five of them a week on a collab!
โ๏ธ Can I publish work on Substack and still have it accepted by a major publishing house for a book deal?
Iโm going to write a memoir about my road trip to Alaska as I healed from the grief of infertility (which Iโve been writing about in shorter pieces on my Substack). Iโm wondering if it makes sense to serialize it on Substack, or if that would preclude getting a book deal.
Iโd appreciate advice from anyone who has experience in the publishing world!
It depends on whether the publisher thinks they can sell enough copies of their edition of your book even though it's already been released on Substack.
I don't know, but I'm running a series that I intend to turn into a book, but the book will have a lot that won't appear in my newsletter. I'm hoping that will work
Hi Liz, I saw a recent post where a Substack writer (Michael E., tagging doesnโt seem to work here?) said he was archiving old posts behind a paywall to make it easier to publish a book. Not sure of the details. I know Kate McKean of Agents and Books is publishing a book, based on her newsletter posts- you could ask her in a Q&A or look for old posts on details. Good luck!
โ๏ธI have almost 100k subscribers to my YouTube channel, but haven't made it to 100 subs on my Substack. Any good tips for turning YouTube subs into Substack readers?
Wow congrats on 100k on YouTube! On Substack just had a good post and podcast on converting from Instagram to Substack, some of those tips would be relevant.
I have a very small Youtube audience, and will be following this thread to know if anyone here has any advice on the matter. I have a feeling there isn't going to be a straightforward suggestion. I went onto Youtube after a while on Wordpress because I realized no one wanted to read. Audio, Video and images are the preferred format of media consumption for most people. So I made it to 100 subs here by looking for the people who want to read.
If I ever have the time, I might make shorts geared towards people who like to read, and on topics that I can use as a plug for my WIP that I'm publishing on here.
I hadn't considered serializing a book here on Substack. I might try that. I've had several best-sellers on Amazon and have an audience for books as well. Thanks for giving me an idea!
I'm serialising my novel, The Shetland Witch, and thanks to a single Recommendation my free subscribers have more than doubled. So Recomendations from others really help. Will be moving to open the paid subs soon, for which subscribers/pledgees will have access to a couple of novellas while the novel remains free to all. I'm happy with the way things are going; Substack is a good medium for what I'm publishing.
I have tried community tab, have seen one or two click the link from there. I aslo try to mention it in every video I upload. But I gotta say, they are very lazy on clicking that link and subscribe ๐คฃ
I have even now try to offer the ONE thing that they love about my channel to be first on my Newsletter. Time will tell if it works ๐
Assuming I found the correct channel, I don't see any hint of a Substack presence on your YouTube channel โ that's where I'd start! Add it in your header image next to your other social channels. Include links to Substack in your video descriptions (try it with your top ten highest-viewed and see what kind of traffic that drives). Start or end each video by pointing people to the Substack and encourage things like a shout-out in future videos. If people connect to your voice in these videos (I just listened to one, and you absolutely have a great sound), you could try experimenting with audio versions of your Substack, too. Good luck and keep rocking and rolling!
Do you think an "I'm back and this is what I'm doing now" type of video could work? There are some YouTube accounts I remember following wayyy back in the day who now just post a periodic update every few years and people are still so excited to hear from them.
That might not be a bad idea. We released something a few years ago and people were pretty excited. We've made three attempts at a podcast with varying degrees of minimal success.
1. The first time were jittering with nerves on camera.
2. The second time we set everything up, then got too drunk at dinner manage to pull it off.
3. The third time the camera ran out of batter, and we carried on for hours. Then the little footage we did have got taken out in a pingpong, beer & laptop incident.
๐ง Really appreciate this community! One of Substack's greatest potential benefits to writers is that the platform itself (Substack says) is able to attract readers to us. And yet, over the eight months since I've ported over my followers, a full 99% of my readers come from my email list, with only 1% coming from Substack. This means that I'm offering Substack 10% of the writing income that my work generates, but getting back far below what SS estimates writers will attract through the platform. Are there just too many writers for readers to differentiate? Something else? Thanks in advance.
I think what Substack offers is not necessarily readers but new subscribers. For example, if I post something, most of the reads come through email or social media. A few through Substack or the Substack app. But the majority of my new subscribers come through the Substack network. Those new subscribers then get the emails, and they read them through the email. So even if they originally found me through the Substack network, that wouldn't be reflected in the read stats.
Hm, this is surprising! If you donโt get an answer here I might email support with a screenshot of your stats. Maybe something in SEO or settings that can be tweaked? I agree with you this seems like something is wrong.
๐ง I would like to be able to use 'Sections' on my Substack website and as a way to allow subscribers (currently all free) to segment themselves to the content that I am offering -- fiction, non-fiction, more of blog style, my podcast, etc.
I had understood this was possible but would love to have this confirmed before I unleash all of my content to my free subscribers.
Can they pick and choose what they will receive and unsubscribe from the sections they are not interested in? Thank you.
Hey Linda. You can definitely do this. You can set the default options for new subscribers and direct them to the "manage subscription" page for your substack. There they can turn on and off notifications for different sections. This is what I do for my different book clubs.
You're very welcome to join us if you like. Next year I'm running one for War and Peace and one for Hilary Mantel's Cromwell trilogy. But I'm also creating a space for slow readers to meet each other and share the books they are savouring.
You can indeed - although the interface at the moment could be nicer for when people want to update their subscription preferences. I use sections for exactly what you're describing on my Substack.
Is there a dedicated URL for each Substack's manage subscription page? Or would they have to navigate there themselves. I'm looking to introduce a flash fiction section, but not sure how to implement. Ideally, I could include a button that works as a "Unsubscribe from Flash Fiction only" option.
Oh wow. This is outstanding. Thank you Theresa! Exactly what I was looking for. I plan to send a newsletter to my readers to explain how I've segmented my posts and help guide them to subscribe/ unsubscribe. This is awesome. Cheers.
๐ง Any updates on jump links? I traded emails with the support team a few weeks ago asking whether it would be possible to enable links in/to section headings. This was a common feature on blogging platforms in the early 2000s, and enables writers to cite not only previous articles, but specific sections where we might have made a particular point.
Rather than point readers back to the entire previous post, I'd ideally point them to the specific section that I'm referencing. I understand that's not possible yet but suspect that it would be a trival adjustment from an engineering standpoint since html already offers that functionality.
Most sites I'm aware of that have an editor like Substack's include this automatically. I don't really think it's a hard thing to implement, although there might be some issues around what it means in emails.
If this were a feature, I'd add TOCs to my longer posts. I'd also use links to sections of other posts, like you describe.
Just note that you can't do it until the post is published. That's too bad. My posts are also long, and I would really link to add jump/anchor links at the top so people can hop around. But you can't do it until after you've published.
I have added a TOC to a post before I published it. It's a little awkward to get it to work, but it's possible. But I think when you click on it, it takes the person to that spot on the website, not to that spot in the email.
Interesting.... I didn't think you could get the anchor link until it was live the first time. I'll have to test and see if I can get it from a preview. Thanks for the comment.
I have found that I have to click on the heading that I want to link, then move my mouse to the left of the text and scroll up until the link icon appears to copy the link. Usually it's way at the top even if the heading is toward the bottom of the post. It's weird. But it works. If you try it and can't figure it out, let me know and I'll try to describe it better.
Wow. You're right..... it's definitely not working as expected (or as it does when you grab the anchor link AFTER the post is live). But I just tried it with a draft, and I see that you're right..... the icon to copy the link appears top left no matter where the header is. But it works! Thank you so much for taking time to describe where you were seeing it.
I guess that makes sense, because internal links don't work consistently in emails. There are uses where it wouldn't make much difference, like a simple TOC. But if you wrote in a way that referenced links, ie "To read more about __ go here." That would not work in an email, and it would be frustrating to readers.
๐ง I'd like to be able to let free subscribers comment on previews of paywalled posts. I've asked for this before, but asking again because it would make a big difference to my substack. I would like all my subscribers to be able to contribute to discussion on a post, while keeping bonus content behind the paywall. Many thanks!
As someone who can't become a paid subscriber to every Substack I am a subscriber for, but who *has* tried commenting on paywalled posts, I would really love to see this feature!
Yes! It bugs me that the authors want the subscribers to comment and the subscribers want to comment, but the system won't let us! And if I can help it I don't want to separate readers into two posts. I want everyone to be able to talk to each other!
I also think allowing non-paying subscribers in on the convo will make them feel more invested in the publication and may sway them into going paid eventually.
Just wanted to second Simon's suggestion (which author Amy Cowen also made at https://on.substack.com/p/office-hours-92/comment/43364527). I understand the theory that requiring people to pay for a subscription in order to comment creates an incentive. Allowing authors to let free subscribers comment on the content they can access, however, seems like it could help build discourse and community around our ideas, and at least indirectly encourage paid subscriptions by driving more traffic to our posts.
Cheers Shahid. Yes, my goal is to create a community of readers, and the current settings make it harder for free and paid subscribers to talk to each other.
Our team is working on these images as quite a few writers have said they didn't like the update. I've shared your feedback with them directly. Thank you!
I just wanted to shout again to anyone writing about TV and/or streaming, especially outside the U.S. I'm always looking for new Substacks and pieces to highlight. I have a decent percentage of my subscribers who live somewhere globally, and as far as I can tell, there's no way to search for Substacks that specifically over television or streaming.
Howdy, Rick. I don't write exclusively about TV but I've covered shows and films in my newsletter (here's a recent one: https://funfactfriyay.com/p/wait-is-someone-in-my-bed). I'd love to do a cross-promo if you're up for it!
Joey--that's a fun piece, I am going to link to it in today's newsletter (I have an odds and sods section that works perfect for this).
Yes, let's figure out some other ways to self promote. My newsletter has a pretty wide focus. For instance, it's recently been dominated by strike coverage. But it's typically a bit more focused on nuts-and-bolts TV and streaming stuff.
Thanks, Rick โ odds and sods is a terrific section name.
I think there could be some good ways to promote each other's stuff here. I'll dig into your past newsletters too and do a bit more noodling on what might work best. Looking forward to it!
1 - Currently, you can't allow comments from free subscribers on a post with a paywall. I would love to be able to insert a paywall on a post for a portion of it, but still allow my free readers the ability to comment.
2 - I have a "section" of my substack that contains weekly prompts. I had set those to not display on my main page to reduce clutter. But I noticed just last week that in the APP, the "sections" aren't available. (Am I overlooking them?) I went back and set the section posts to show on main because otherwise, they are totally inaccessible from the app. I prefer being able to use sections to organize content, but it the sections aren't available in the app.....
Big +1 to your first suggestion! I would also like to allow free subscribers to comment on what they can read while maintaining a paywall as an invitation to bonus content
I also find it frustrating that sections seem to not function in the app. The organization of my page and the ease in finding content is highly dependent on my section organization, and that is completely eliminated in the app.
Any of my readers can comment on my free newsletters. For paid posts, the Substack setting only allows comments by paid subscribers (or no one). Iโd love for them to change that though so all subscribers can comment even on pay-walked pieces!
โ๏ธ I'm a multipotentialite (aka multipod, Renaissance woman, etc.) and have many different interests, so my Substack covers creative living and the arts as a whole. I'd love to see examples of other Substacks that cover a broad range of topics or feature an array of types of posts. I sometimes wish that I could be more niche and I understand that may be better for ~growth~, but I'd really like to stay true to who I am. So, basically, looking for inspo!
My Substack is about personal growth and transformation for people who lead systemic change. So in some ways it's quite niche, but in others not at all! Check it out here: https://systemchangers.substack.com/
I am 75 autistic and addicted to writing it keeps me high along with cannabis from the government catalogue delivered to my front door. I type on a keyboard designed for four year olds with autism and I am rich beyond my wildest dreams. The last thing I want is fame and fortune. All I want is a white wall to scribble graffiti and tell myself jokes. The Most important book I ever read was Orwell's Why I Write. I taught myself to read in infancy and I learned how to write because my wife is PhD in education and I had a whole faculty of PhDs to teach me how to write. I don't think in straight lines I make logical assumptions and humans can't normally understand logic. They inhabit either Wonderland or the other side of the Looking glass as Professor Dodgson surmised.
It is Snark Hunting Season in America and I am the beaver.
I still can't program a toaster but I can pilot Star Ships and trip over my shoelaces.๐คฃ
My editor is 85 and retired. We spend more on books than we do on food and we eat like kings because I love the kitchen and we are what we eat. I just can't follow recipes and can't follow threads I travel in circles to get from A to B. Getting there is all the fun. How about a cartoon video on negotiating the web. I am not an arachnophobe I just need a map. When I was seven my favourite tv show was Fighting Words here is the show about Gaza in 1960 The Perils of independence from the CBC archives. I was 12 and I remembered every word my whole life. We are everybody's skeleton in the closet: weird grandparents that are still breathing.๐คฃ
I am an absolute novice and need some guidance about starting to write for a wider audience. My experience in writing has been limited to academia (master's thesis and doctoral dissertation) and professional communication...40+ years as a neuropsychologist at a Level II trauma center.
I wonder if there's some work you could do to imagine your new audience. Can you paint a picture of what they like/need/want... what their media diet looks like, what kind of writing they enjoy, what kind of writing they don't... You could also divide a page of A4 with a line down the middle, 'Old Audience' on one side 'New Audience' on the other and write lists of characteristics and styles under each to flesh out the changes you want to make. Use the old audience side to help you think of the opposite to that or improvements to it on the other side :)
What do you mean by wider audience? Do you have a particular niche? Do you want to write about your experience as a neuropsych at a trauma center? That sounds fascinating.
๐งโ๏ธ Help! Iโm trying to make some of my posts permanently free, but thereโs a bug that causes them to reset to paid every day. I have an automatic paywall at one month, but follow the instructions here (support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/โฆ) to remove it for specific posts. It seems to be a bug in the system. Does anyone have experience with this?
YES I'm doing that too, and I also printed the posts to pdf and put links to those pdfs (hosted in my Google Drive) at the tops of the posts, so people can get them before hitting the paywall. But it's not sustainable - very frustrating to have to keep redoing it, and in the times when they're paywalled, the comments are not available.
I noticed a lot of my FREE posts had a paywall applied to it recently, looking in the settings Iโve unchecked the paywall your archives which I think has resolved the issue, as it seems like the default setting is for all posts to be archived after a period of time, which also means FREE posts are then only available to paid subscribers.
My archives are supposed to be paywalled, except for these posts, which I want to make permanently free. But even when I remove the paywall for these posts specifically, it is reapplied each day.
Oh no idea sorry, maybe send a message to the help desk for some support, Iโve found them very helpful in the couple of occasions Iโve had to get in touch with them.
Does anyone have advice about how to start a blog? I really want to get my thoughts out there and get better as writer + I would love to build an audience. But i'm gun shy about putting something bad out into the world of the internet. Anybody have words of wisdom?
Fuck the fear of being bad. Go! Be! BAD! I say write what you want to write, self-criticism be damned, and see where it all goes. Better to be bad on the internet and to have tried than to be someone who was scared to start. That's what I'm doing: first drafts only. No revision, no overthinking, and if people want to read it... cool. If not, it's for me. And that's gotta be enough.
Take advantage of the fact that you have a small audience to start so you can find your voice and figure out what works for you. Commit to a schedule that works for you--taking on too much is a sure path to overwhelming yourself and giving up. Be kind to yourself as you start and recognize that you'll learn as you go.
Hi Eliot. I was in the same place when I started my newsletter a year ago. I am pretty shy and definitely private, and it took months of overthinking before I first published. Something that helped me over the hump: I reached out to a Substacker whose work I admire and asked her a few questions. She gave me some amazing advice on how to get started--and I am still so grateful. The best thing for me was to start slowly until I built more confidence. I committed to two posts per month and felt like that was manageable. I would like to grow more, but I am definitely a "baby steps" kind of gal;). And that's ok! Hope this helps.
If it's any consolation, there is a very small audience, especially in the beginning. For posts with a lot of revealing material, you can hide it behind a paywall. Your audience is also a lot of strangers (unless you have a lot of people close to you who want to read your writing, which is kind of lucky in my opinion). We are publishing to people who don't know us intimately, and so their thoughts and opinions of you shouldn't matter anyway. Also, what is "bad"? It's an honest question. There are a few things that could be implied with that.
My section On Writing might be of use to you, where I share some tips and what I've struggled with.
๐ง - Is it just me, or is it confusing to have two home pages? One called 'home' and one called 'Substack Home'? I would like to see their name a bit more different so when I see them in my tabs I know which one it is.
Yes and the main section is also a home page. For example, When I write my novel I designate that to the "Metanoia" section where it belongs, but it's also the homepage where it showcases all of my posts. Confusing. I wish the homepage was it's own thing, and when you designate a section it's not the landing page.
๐ง - When Substack provides me with shareable media now, it has the first paragraph of my story written across the image and I really do not like that. Is there some way to get the old shareable images with just the headline and subheadline?
Canva has a free version that will let you do what you want. I think Substack is getting a lot of the same feedback as yours, so they may change the way these look again.
Our team is working on these images as quite a few writers have said they didn't like the update. I've shared your feedback with them directly. Thank you!
The workaround I have found is that you can highlight text and then share that so at least the image has the specific quote you want and not just the random first few lines. Perhaps that is already common knowledge but I didn't know so maybe this can help someone else.
I'm NEW here with Heart, Soul & Monkeys, sharing playful practices to deal with Monkey Mind crap that stops us from creating and living fully. Would anyone want to exchange feedback on our SubStack presence and effectiveness? I moved my subscribers from Mailchimp, mostly folks who know me. I'm a former Big Media creative director, but I often can't see the forest through the trees of my own work. Could use a fresh perspective. So grateful for learning Substack!
๐ง I have two suggestions to share with other writers.
First, I recently signed up for a paid subscription with a prolific author on Substack whose work has long inspired me. (For the record, that's Chris Hedges, a dissident former bureau chief from the NY Times whose poignant post this week moved me & many others to tears: https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/letter-to-the-children-of-gaza?r=97w99) Getting a paid subscription gave me the opportunity to share a comment on his post reflecting on his writing, as well as shared themes that emerge in my own. I can't tell exactly how many subscriptions it drove to my newsletter, but the comment got some attention and seemed to draw at least some new readers to my work.
Second, I enjoyed a brilliant recap from a fellow writer tracking last night's GOP presidential debate for second place, and took a moment to both reply to her post and also share it on Notes. (Here it is, for others' reference: https://laurajedeed.substack.com/p/the-third-republican-debate-doesnt?) That led to a thoughtful exchange illuminating some points of constructive tension between our respective perspectives, as well as mutual subscriptions to each other's Substack newsletters.
Something about sharing a discourse based on reason, free of ad hominem barbs, felt inspiring. I'm not sure whether that's because I've been trained by social media to expect mendacity, or instead because the character assassination I survived after winning a congressional primary in 2020 forced me to confront bias & Islamophobia that I had previously chosen to ignoreโbut either way, it's nice to build community with people who share an inclination to write and sincerely debate ideas in good faith.
๐ง I'd encourage everyone to experiment more often, discover what you and your readers like (equally important), and not be afraid to pivot and change.
I initially started my Substack to share book reviews, with occasional posts about sharing personal stories about leaving home and finding another one. I then discovered that my subscribers are way more interested in reading personal essays, than my book reviews. So I've decided to flip my strategy to share personal essays, which I enjoy writing more anyways, as the main focus with occasional book reviews. I think my Subtack journey is equal-part sharing stories with others and equal-part self-discovery.
โ๏ธ I recently topped 500 subscribers (finally!) and it's been a long haul. I think it's mainly due to the nature of my work. The humor and comics are personal and sometimes off-kilter. I tend to use Substack as a sandbox to experiment and build up content for book publishing. Anyhow, as for gaining subscribers via social media outlets, I've noticed that Twitter is basically dead. Same with Instragram. But Reddit brings in some traffic. Any other artists had any luck with other social media to bring in subscribers?
To help organize the conversation, please use one of the following emojis when you start a new comment.
๐ง - when sharing strategy or advice for fellow writers
โ๏ธ - when asking questions or seeking feedback from fellow writers
๐ง - when asking a question you hope the Substack team can help answer
Use your emoji keyboard or simply copy and paste the emoji at the beginning of your comment.
๐งโ๏ธ Does anyone else have a problem of readers coming on to your site and 'Liking' your posts but not then also pressing the 'Subscribe' button?
I do that! I read so, so many Substacks but am also easily overwhelmed by emails. I often (like, at least several times daily) show support by liking, commenting, and sharing people's writing even if I'm not interested in becoming a subscriber at that time.
As a writer, I sure do love when folks subscribe. But I also love when they like, comment, or share (even without subscribing). There's just SO much great writing here, and if I subscribed to everything I liked or even love, reading would be a full-time job. (I read the entirety of every post when I do subscribe, so never subscribe to tons of pubs at once.)
A comment from a busy reader who was glad to stop by is still meaningful.
Agreed
Yes to this! Inbox overwhelm is real!
I'd love to be able to remain subscribed but free up my email and just see my subscriptions on the app....
I enjoy reading on the app vs. my Inbox, so I created a filter where every Substack subscription is automatically marked as "Read" and then moved to a folder called "Newsletters" so I can visit it later if I want to. That helps me keep my Inbox more organized.
I do the same, Clint! It keeps newsletter reading & email processing separate which I love. I also use Reader (Readwise's save now, read later tool) to consolidate non-Substack newsletters and will sometimes save my favorite Substack essays to Reader so I can highlight lines to revisit later
Yes, this is my approach too. Like a lot, subscribe to a manageable number that I can sensibly read and engage with.
I completely feel that way. Email/newsletters can be overwhelming so I have to pace myself in subscribing. Great response.
Agreed
Same! I follow notes instead of subscribing too.
Agree :)
I do the same Dana. There are so many articles I want to read and I can't subscribe to them all. If I appreciate the writing I want to comment on it and contribute to the author's community in some small way. I appreciate it when others do the same even if they don't subscribe.
How do you get readers?I have written 13 articles but very few readers even though Substack account is written on my twitter bio and email address. Thanks Dave
Hi Dave. You might try looking through the guides and other resources here: https://on.substack.com/ Especially the guides: https://on.substack.com/t/guides
I also interact on Notes quite a bit and engage with other peoples' posts there and on their publications. Hope that helps! Hang in there!
Doctor, I've read a couple of your pieces and I'm going to assume your comparative lack of response is commensurate with the relative narrowness of your market. I don't consider myself an idiot (at least not in every subject area) but I can tell you your stuff (though well written and interesting) is at least slightly above my pay grade. Either dumb it down (for people like me), broaden the subject or tailor an email list to academics and professionals in your field. I would assume the latter would be the most effective strategy in the short term. If you reached a critical mass of 50 enthusiasts, word of mouth could take you where you want to go.
I can like a piece without feeling the need to subscribe, and I understand it when others do it on my site, as well. We can't subscribe to everything, but we can 'like' a lot of them.
Oh, I really like your dance metaphor, Graham! Maybe a like is a wave or a wink from across the room. Maybe a follow is a joyful watching of your dope grooves. Maybe a comment is a turn toward you to momentarily jam in sync. A share is a nod to others to circle up and watch you rock in the center for a moment. Any may lead to a subscribe. I dig em all. ;)
excellent! My disco ball is spinning over here (and wondering how/when we get to heavy petting??!) ๐คช
Oh my. Fans face with hand. :)
I read that as they are not ready to subscribe or they want you to notice them and subscribe to theirs (if they are a writer here).
Yes, I've thought that second one too. Writer-to-Writer can be a bit of a funny kind of you-go-first dance can't it.
I see that as the old "follow for follow".
Meaning they follow you until you follow them and then unfollow you days later.
(Have come across those here already)
I just experienced that and found it really odd.
You said that so beautifully. I think I owe you an email. Sorry I got behind but will follow up this weekend.
I think there are many different reason why people don't subscribe. I like a number of posts, but I just can't subscribe to everyone's substack. My inbox is just too full, and I am an inbox zero person so I am very selective. However, if I see something in Notes and I like something then I press the little heart button. I think for me personally that being seen at all is a gift. There is a huge sea of writers out there.
Some people cannot afford it.
For sure. I am a mother with five children, two of whom are disabled. I am a part-time student and for work I do child care. I wish I could support the many great writers out there, but I really can't. I hope the people who have written the great things I have commented on or liked understand that not paying is not a matter of not thinking their writing is not of value. It is a matter of feeding my own family and being able to sustain myself and my studies. And I would also like to note that just spending the time to read posts takes away from time when I could be writing to make money. So it isn't like there isn't some type of literal monetary sacrifice already being made.
I wonder as Substack grows how it will meet this challenge- especially since it specializes in long-form. You can only really meaningfully engage with so many newsletters. How to discern from the noise and find your people and help them find you?
I'm also a zero inbox person so I get it!
That is very true. That's why I'm looking to do most of my growth offline, hopefully drawing in new Substack users so that they can go through these same trials and tribulations. There are still plenty of readers out there, we just need to get them here.
I'm not sure if it will work, but I'm going to try drawing subscribers with my card game, and vise versa.
Very cool! Thanks for sharing your perspective.
Yes, this happens to me, but I don't think of it as a problem. I do the same thing. I can enjoy an article and hit the like button, but not be ready to subscribe.
As I mentioned in another comment here, I use the bookmark (save) feature to easily find a publication again where I read (some say lurk :) ) sometimes for weeks before I decide to sub. Like many, I like to manage my email so I don't get overwhelmed.
I feel the same way, and I do that on YouTube as well. I won't subscribe unless I feel confident that I will enjoy a creator's body of work, which is not the same as liking a single post.
I have the funny problem of people following me but not subscribing. I'm like-- Don't do that! Save yourself! I'm an unhinged person in the notes section!
Are you a funny gal? I started a Funny AF Women interview feature on my Substack.
I'd like to believe I'm funny. My sister tells me I'm funny. But then again, she's like 3/4 of my subscriber base, and I routinely send her texts at 2:00 AM saying: "WAKE UP, MY ONLY READER, I NEED YOUR AFFIRMATION. LIE TO MEEEE."
Does that make me a funny gal? Or a gal whose raging insecurities are occasionally kinda funny? I wish I fuckin' knew, CK.
I. Wish. I. Fuckin'. Knew.
If youโre self proclaimed funny then you are. You donโt need funny-approval. You can make yourself laugh when at the market or alone at home.
The follow thing is very confusing ๐ซ
I take it to mean: Alexandra, it's fun to watch you skid around on black ice in notes, but we don't want to read all your earnest lil pieces on mental health crisis. I'm like a court jester!
I wish they'd put a counter up on your page so you know how many followers you have. Sometimes I send special blurbs out to my subscribers and it goes into their inboxes, and only remember half an hour later that I should tell my followers as well. If there was a number, maybe it would remind you that they're there. I just counted them yesterday and found out I have 102!
How would you tell your followers something?
I tell my Followers by putting it in Notes. That's where they get my feed. They're not on my email list, so I guess it's just sort of hit and miss.
How can you even count them? Where you found that info?
It takes a little work. You have to go to your own home page and when you find the part that says SUBSCRIBERS, click it. You'll see a list of subscribers, and then two other beside it, Followers, and the for the ones YOU follow. It's hard to find because it's not something we look at every day. But it's there. And you literally have to scroll through from top to bottom in order to count them.
Made sure to follow because that cracked me up.
Fuck, I've tricked another one into thinking I'm funny. Now what?!
Well I just subscribed too, so I guess just be super offensive for awhile.
Oh, you're in for a treat... I constantly offend. My very *presence* offends.
I quite enjoy it when this happens. Happy if someone has swung by, had a read, Liked and then left. I get it that Subscribing is not always something someone wants to do.
Why is that a problem?
Do you automatically subscribe every time you stumble across a post that you like by an author whose work is otherwise unfamiliar to you? I don't know about you, but subscribing is not always a decision I make on the spur of discovery; it usually takes prolonged exposure to someone's work before I decide to subscribe. Don't dismiss readers who like, but don't subscribe right away. First of all, be glad you're getting that exposure beyond your existing subscriber base. Secondly, that person may be in the process of deciding whether or not to subscribe to you down the line. They just want to see more from you before they pull the trigger, and IMO that is not unreasonable.
I don't mind Likes, in fact, I welcome them, because it means someone actually consumed my content. And now I hope they come back for more It can take a while to become convinced to subscribe. I like try before you buy.
Yes. I find that the "likes" are still valuable.
I agree with Dana, there is so much subscription worthy writing in this community, that it could be a full-time job reading it all! Besides, I like browsing and sort of trying a new genre when I have spare time during the week.
I love it when people subscribe but know how overwhelming it is to be inundated with new posts. If I share my latest post in a note, people can decide to read it or keep scrolling. As a relative newcomer, I don't have hordes of subscribers, but I do have a high open rate that I'd lose by subscribing just to gain a subscriber. Those who choose to read me are keen, and I like it that way. A transactional approach can work on Instagram but I don't see a case for it on this reader-focused platform.
I subscribe to support others' work, but I don't open emails. I prefer to use the app or desktop version and read when I get a break from my responsibilities. Great stacks get lost amid the emails of "Get 30% this Black Friday". As a writer, I prefer when people like and engage rather than subscribe and never read my email.
Good rundown. abot oversad abut the democrats win.
The gun safety items was left out of the ananlysis,why?
We have constant news of killing people with machine guns kown as automatic rifels.
The third rail issue fails to bring this problem into focus,
We admit to havinf many "nuts" with a problem they will never address rationally, so why do we still have the perfect tool for mass murder readily avaailble to teenagers who are pist toff becaude they can't get a date. In Prison they will find themselves very popular with the guys doing life.
In NYC, mass kilings are not possible with the folks not tollerating this AR-15, 16 and soon the AR-17. We are not drunken hillbillies demanding their "rights" and NYC had not had this type of assult since 1998. (one guy lasted 3 miutes with a macine - gun at the Empire state bldg. He was quickly killed when he was shooting at tourists up in the observation deck. (4 minutes to respond by trained police officers)
๐ง Leaving this ebook for all new Substackers looking for some guidance to growing their subscribers list. I hope you will find it useful.
(Note: the strategy in this ebook can be applied on all social platforms)
https://open.substack.com/pub/raisini/p/from-zero-to-100000-subscribers-the?r=aegif&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
๐ฏ๐ฏ๐ฅ
Raisini and Raisini. Are y'all, like, twins? ๐
๐๐ฉท
Why are all of my questions erased?
Oh no! Could you please send the questions again so we can help you answer them?
Betty I would like to speak to someone from Substack about joining to see if itโs the right platform for me.
This now my 6th try- How do I build an audience when I am on no social media
I've just published a piece on this which you might find helpful! https://systemchangers.substack.com/p/how-i-got-started-as-a-writer-built
I'd recommend checking out some of the resources on our blog for building your audiences: https://on.substack.com/p/grow-4.
Phrango will like to know how to get bad writing on substack
โ๏ธ๐ง I've noticed a new, smaller link embed style with an action prompt that reads "Read full story" followed by an arrow. (You can find an example of what I'm talking about here: https://www.wonkette.com/p/joe-manchin-wont-seek-reelection)
Where do I find the option to use it?
How do I use a simplified subscription page?
Hi Henry! Can you tell me more about what kind of simplified subscription page you're looking for?
The default spreads across the whole page. I would like a simple centered list of free, monthly, annual, founder with very few comments
I'm seeing your subscribe page here: https://henrylewiswriter.substack.com/subscribe. It should list four plans there!
Yes it does. That is the default page format. I have seen other sites with a much simpler layout.
It works but just seems so wordy and the crossed off for free is ugly
๐ง Hi everyone! This is a tip I shared on a recent Office Hours, but I did it really late so hardly anyone saw it. In the hope itโs useful, here it is againโฆ
If youโre wondering what your social media strategy could be & how it could promote your newsletter, or youโre just looking for a way to write that can REALLY get your readers to lean in & engage, try this:
๐คฏ ** Share your enthusiastic response to learning about something amazingly interesting for the first time ** ๐คฏ
This was my social media strategy on Twitter before it became....erm, whatever it is now. I did it with excited-sounding threads, promoting a sciencey story I just learned about for the first time. The biggest of these totally blew up, reached 10 million people and sent 6,000 free subscribers to my newsletter. (Substack interviewed me about it here: https://on.substack.com/p/grow-series-7)
Now I'm trying it again on Threads, and - it kinda seems to be working? https://www.threads.net/@mikeachim/post/CyWjG7csfdw
I'm very far from the first to discover the power of this approach (and thereโs even some good science on the neurological mechanisms behind it: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364661322001346). For example, it's why "unboxing" videos work on YouTube, or why footage of audience reactions to big moments in films get millions of views. Itโs emotionally affecting and it triggers us in a *good* way for a change. So it's incredibly useful for newsletter writers wanting to reach new people, make them feel something, and get them intrigued enough by *your* reaction (and their reaction to your reaction! etc etc.) to want to click through and learn more.
Try it!
Mike - you said something in that interview that I've found to be the key to success in writing..."find something that excites you." I came from the world of software marketing, and over the years I had forgotten how much I actually like marketing. Marketing is super interesting. And I've found that if I share that excitement in my newsletter (which is about the language of marketing), people respond. Social media is often about generating a negative response from people. I love writing a newsletter because people seem to respond the most when something is positive, optimistic and - as you say - exciting to the writer.
I really love this. Thanks for saying that, Jared, and I totally agree - we're so easily triggered by negativity bias, but it often seems a pretty bad way to motivate anyone to do anything positive (and negativity and anger does a lot of damage to us along the way, no matter what the outcome is).
Absolutely. I always write better when I'm excited about the topic, too, so carrying that over to social media only makes sense. And the same thing happened to me. I'm in software design and I have to constantly rediscover my hunger for design so things don't get stale!
I love this perspective. I'm in marketing too but it confounds me. People should make good stuff and demonstrate why it's good vs. all the faux marketing. Once you cut through that then the product doesn't live up to the hype.
This feels like a good challenge to become an active reader on Substack.
As I read, I try to find one moment that genuinely excites me. I'll re-stack, and sometimes I'll rant on it. I've only done this for a few weeks so far, but it seems like I'm slowly growing my audience by being a better / more social reader (I dropped Readwise Reader since it's siloed). Maybe this is obvious to the people here, but the majority of writers I know still don't read in the app.
Thanks for this point Mike. While a "Restack with Note" doesn't have the visual hype of an unboxing video, it's a reminder for me to unpack my own perspective ("Hey writer, here's an unfiltered glimpse of what you're essay stirred up in me'").
I pride myself on engaging really thoughtfully with someone's work. I try to like, comment, and restack when I really like something I read. I know the feeling when someone does that for me so I put that back into the Substack space.
What's a restack? I just came on board Substack.
Welcome Peter!
It's explained ere:
https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/14671398684308-What-is-a-restack-on-Substack-Notes-
A restsack is the equivalent of reposting someone's work. But it's essentially the way to show appreciation and engage with other people's work. This is one of the ways to build community on the platform. Hope this helps a little!
You can also highlight a portion of someone's essay (a sentence, a paragraph), and then share your thoughts on the excerpt.
Restacking someone's work and leaving a comment is something like a two-way street. You put the writer's work out on your network of followers and subscribers, and you leave a comment that others can read and comment on as well. Another good way of helping a writer is CROSS-POSTING. When you cross-post an "article" it goes to your email list and goes into the inbox of all your subscribers. People do this when they want to bring a writer to their followers' attention. A lot of people don't do it for a variety of reasons, the first being they don't know what it is, so they won't try it. Another reason is they don't want to clutter up their readers' inboxes, thinking they might get unsubscribed. I've come to the realization that if someone unsubscribes, it's usually someone who doesn't read your stuff very often. You want the readers on your subscribe page who have stars beside their names. The more, the more they read you stuff.
Thatโs a good point. Sometimes I just restack something I love, but itโs valuable to contribute my perspective on it and what I think is worth understanding from it.
TERRIFIC thread Mike - I immediately Followed you: real wisdom and enthusiasm...gets us every time!
Mike you are so giving of your time and expertise. ๐ Thx for showing up here. Iโm just trying to figure out Threads. ๐ค
That's very kind, thank you so much - but I'm just making it up as I go! (Including on Threads.) :)
So tell me Mike, does THREADS really work, or is it a waste of time? I haven't bothered with it yet. If it does work, maybe we should ask the powers that be to replace the Twitter feed they offer when you POST, with a Threads feed instead.
Depends on your definition of "work", I guess!
I enjoy using it the way I was loving the best corners of Twitter and other social media platforms - as a focused way to connect with cool people I wouldn't otherwise be able to talk to, and make a few new friends. But the sciencey threads I'm doing are also designed to hook new free subscribers - and in that sense, it's starting to work in the way Twitter did: over the last few weeks it looks like I've had over 200 new subscribers come via Insta/Threads (and it's definitely Threads when it says "Instagram" as a source, because I'm doing nothing on Insta.)
But also, what I'm trying not to do with Threads, which I learned not to do with Twitter, is scroll and scroll and just react to stuff that triggers me in a really negative way. It's hard, it's so easy to fall for it, but it's worth the effort to fight it: not by avoiding the bad things going on in the world, because we all need to be aware, but making an effort NOT to respond to things actively designed to enrage me enough to reply, by people who are *pretending* to be providing discourse, but actually not doing it with even the tiniest shred of good faith on their part. They just want hate-clicks and anger and fury and shame-quotes and the rest of it, because, what better way to get attention (AND drag everyone down into hopeless rage)? So far, I've seen much less of that on Threads. I'm sure it'll arrive in force. But I'll be drawing my own line there!
Does Threads use hashtags? Is that how folks find you?
Nope! I just hope that enough people like it and share it that it gets noticed by yet more people and by the algorithm. At first, when I only had a couple of hundred people following me, it was mostly crickets. But the more you do it, the more people follow, and you grow (I'm now at 4,650) - and then you can circle back to that stuff you posted when you had a tiny following, and re-promote it to that new, bigger audience.
(This also works for newsletters!)
Yeah, I had to get off Twitter because there was so much shit. That's why I've stayed away from Threads. I don't want all that hate speech and the shit people throw at you. If you say one thing, everyone jumps all over you and drag you through the mud. I don't need that. I just want to put up a link to my stories and fuck off out of there. I've been hanging back on things like Instagram, and Facebook (still post links there and on LinkedIn) but I'm just letting Substack promote me. Get Recommendations and some Restacks, loving the comments, but just not pushing myself the way I should be.
It happens! But I tend to find that if you don't react to that stuff, and you show up with something from a place of good-natured self-mocking enthusiasm, you deter 99% of those folk just by tone alone. Or maybe I've just been lucky!
(I'm also not unaware that I have a lot of privilege on my side, being a middle-aged white bloke on the internet - and something of a thick skin from being a travel writer accustomed to seeing people slag off some of my articles in a passive-aggressive way. Not taking either of those for granted, and therefore, this advice always comes with a "Your Mileage May Vary" disclaimer.)
But also, I've tried the "posting a link in a single post" thing and it absolutely doesn't work for me - maybe because it's what most people do, but I think also it's asking too much, too quickly. It's saying to most people who see it "you don't know me yet, but hey, click through and read my thing!". Which is a lot to ask, so most folk go "nah". So instead, I stay on the platform for a bit and tell some or even most of the story on there, and eventually I've got to the point where I've proven I'm worth paying attention to - and THEN I ask, at the end of telling that story and having held their attention for a few minutes of scrolling through the thread. That usually works nicely for me.
Alas, I have completely run out of emotional energy for social media. But this sounds like an effective strategy. Thanks for sharing!
It's not going to work @Mike Sowden because I will never sound as convincing as you. But thank you for always sharing helpful advice.
My secret is my total ignorance. It's easy to sound convincingly amazed at things when there's nothing in your brain to start with! (And thank you!)
You have a way of being brilliantly ignorant that always makes me feel smarter. Maybe it's the humor ... I don't know ... I just know it works.
And humble too!
SHELL ๐ YES! Be not afraid to be dumb/curious/not an expert. That's the voice of great journalists like Bill Moyers (dating myself here.)
Ha I've been to Yorkshire and recognize the James Herriots of the world. I'll give credit where it's due even if you won't yourself.
The negativity bias is what gets me, that and the instant gratification people want on this platform. Yes, the beginning sucks, it's like your begging for subscribers. In the end, it'll be worth it. At least that's what I tell myself. *Stares into the ceiling in despair*
It can feel like that, yes. And if it does - either they way we're on these platforms could be done in a different way, or it's just not worth doing at all - because NONE of this stuff is worth it if we can't find a way to make it fun. If it just sucks 100% end to end, we can't show up with the kind of energy that will persuade other people into signing up to our work. We can't fake it enough to overcome that. Everyone can see it a mile off if we're faking it. Readers are too smart to fool, at least not for long.
So - yeah, the huge social media platforms can be a negative place to do things, and that can infect us with cynicism after a while. But it can also be an opportunity to provide a contrast: to be that rare person who is just doing stuff mainly because it's fun and trying to spread that sense of fun around a bit. It's possibly to stand out in this way. And I think it's a huge opportunity - as long as you can keep your brain safe from all that toxic stuff and not fall for the weaponised negativity other people are using to hijack attention for their own crappy purposes.
This is such great advice, thanks for the tip! I'm looking forward to trying it out :)
This is such an awesome idea, Mike. I just took to Twitter with a thread about an old post I wrote to see if it does anything -- I'm sure it won't, because my engagement on Twitter is abysmal, but I'll try it on Threads, too :)
twitter.com/notjameson/status/1722690107403124924
Great strategy, Mikeโthanks!. I am going to try this...but I do write about poverty issues, not exactly an upbeat topic:-) I get excited because I learn something new and fascinating every time I research a post, but I'm sure I will struggle to turn that into excitement for lots of people...?
Thanks Mike... I will definitely give your advice a shot. 6,000 free subscribers - Wow! What you posted on Twitter was obviously pure gold! Very cool!
What a cool tip! Thank you!
๐ง Writing opens doors. My Substack led to business opportunities, speaking engagements, and even an upcoming case study. So keep writing and have a long term view.
This is so encouraging to hear. The Site Formerly Known as Twitter did the same for me, and Iโm looking forward to growing more of a community of creatives on here.
Love it, thanks!
Yes! This week Iโm writing about having a long term view. Itโs been a totally game changer!
Indeed. Rock on.
I love that perspective! I have a small following but I've had the privilege of forming really genuine connections through Substack and meeting some incredible people. I think of it like a "currency of connection." You never know where those connections will lead or what doors will open through them.
I just changed my bio to state that I'm looking for an agent to represent my first novel, just as an experiment really but being on Substack has really made me believe anything is possible with genuine intent and an open mind!
This is awesome! Can you share a little more about how the speaking engagement came about? I hadn't considered that as a byproduct of writing, but it makes total sense.
Multiple people who were subscribers reached out to me to speak. This includes universities, podcasts, and more. You need to keep writing because you never know who will discover you.
Yes!
Nice!
Congrats!
Awesome, keep on rocking.
๐ง I'm finding the customizable shareable images to be good only in terms of choosing the text you want to feature, but not in terms of the artwork from the post. It's blurry and difficult to decipher the images. I miss the old shareable images that featured the full title and subhead onlyโNOT the first paragraph. Can you make those old shareable images an option again?
Hi Sari! We'll let our product team know you're missing the old format for shareable images and would like to see it come back.
Thanks!
Completely agree with Sari. The old format (title and subhead only) was exactly what I wanted for my social media strategy, but I havenโt been able to post in a week since the update. Please let us know what the product team says about bringing it back. ๐๐ป๐๐ป๐๐ป
Thanks, Betty. :)
Seconded. The new sharable images are a step backwards. We need the full title and subtitle.
100%
Agree :)
I don't understand why the link can't be embedded in either of those shareable images. They seem pretty useless, otherwise. If I'm going to share a post somewhere, adding the link automatically brings up the title and the main image. I like that so much better.
I like them because they are a nice visual for social. When I share to IG, I note "Link in Bio"
When I share to Stories, I include a link to the post, when I share on FB, I include my Substack link in the text. The context is still just a click away!
I guess I can understand why you would use it on Instagram, but I don't see how it's better for Facebook when you can simply paste the link onto your post and the title and main picture appear--and look good.
I'm sorry, I don't know what 'Stories' is.
The reasons I do it on FB rather than a link to the new post are 1) I like the visual of the jpeg better, and now that I've been using it people can instantly ID as a new Substack drop and 2) I like to link to my Substack home page so new visitors can see all of my content rather than the new post.
Stories is Instagram Stories
https://help.instagram.com/1660923094227526
Same, I like them for Instagram. We just need *more* options is what Iโm hearing from other people. Itโs a lovely feature I donโt have to worry about!
I do this too. I never use the shareable images, because - they're not really shareable....
No, they're not shareable. They can't be linked to the post, which pretty much defeats the purpose.
I really don't know what their purpose is.
Exactly so.
Agree with this!
I agree with this. I ended up creating my own copy of the old shareable image in Photoshop so I could customize the text that way, but it would be nice to get a choice that's built-in.
As a Newbie I don't know the old style. As a creative director, I agree that the images and display text are NOT enticing. I sort of tried to edit one, but I'd never share it. I do applaud your efforts to provide sharing images! ๐๐ฝ When you get it right, it will be awesome!
SAME. I sent an email to support yesterday about this very thing. The old assets looked so good! Please bring them back!
Agree. Please bring them back!
Yes please! I agree
Agreed! I was posting the shareable images every week when they only included the title and description. Now theyโre filled with extra text that I donโt want and canโt delete. Betty, please ask the Substack team to prioritise this!
I agree! I also think the text is hard to read, so I end up covering it with a screenshot of the actual piece when I share on IG stories.
Agree also! The older style was more of a tease to incite curiosity for people to read. The newer style gives it all away by including the first graph. Plus the blurry pic. Weird. I stopped sharing my posts on social media because they weren't showing what I wanted to show. This is a bummer because social sharing was bringing me new subscribers. Please give us the option of using the older, cleaner style. Thank you!
โ๏ธ I'm approaching 500 subscribers! Any ideas for ways to celebrate this milestone with my readers? I'm wondering if I can also tie this into some kind of holiday gift-giving ask, so ideas welcome there too!
When I hit milestones like that, I make sure that newsletter is about them. I thank them, & talk about where weโre at & where weโre going.
Milestone emails like this are a great way to pause and reflect in front of readers about all that you've built (together!) and often can get a reader who appreciates your work to consider upgrading to paid as well. We even have a guide on this: How to write a great milestone post https://on.substack.com/p/how-to-write-a-great-milestone-post
Well said bailey
That's such a thoughtful and subscriber focused way to respond.
Yes, that's a great reminder! Love it, thanks!
Congrats! Perhaps you pick a subscriber name out of a hat and gift a book you found transformational and is related to what you write about.
I've decided that all (9, so far) of my PAID subscribers will get a POD copy of one of my novellas when I collect enough PAID subscribers to afford it. I got hold of printer in town and he sent me a quote as to how much it would cost. I need a minimum of at least 65 paying readers to save enough money to print up copies and send out to readers -- with the promise of at least 3 books a year once things get rolling.
It sounds like you are going to do a *print* copy ... something I'd like to do also. How are you getting the addresses? And, what are you going to do about foreign postage?
I'm going to email everyone my address, and ask them to send me a postcard from where they live, with their return address on them. It sounds tedious, but I want a hard copy of their addies in case something happens (ie. the computer crashes and burns). Besides, all those postcards from all those cool places? Why not! As for the postage, it will be covered in the cost of the subscribers. If I get my 65, that's about $3500/year. The cost of printing varies, but for 150-170 pages, it's close to $2200. My short 'novellettes' (less than 20,000 words) would be about 100 pages. My novellas, closer to the 150-170 range.
Now, getting the PAID subscribers is the hard part, but it's just a matter of time.
Thanks for the ideas and hope you let us know how it works out.
Well, since I only have 333 subscribers, I think it's going to take a long time. I refuse to take money out from anywhere else except my "writing" account. I have to do this through what I earn. I can do whatever I want with the money I make (all $40/month).
Ooh, I love this! I can already think of about five books!
Love this idea!
That's amazing! I'm happy for you! If your Substack offers tips/advice, you could offer some kind of checklist/worksheet/best practices for them? Or what about soliciting questions your readers may have for you in Notes and then creating a post with answers? I also like the other Substacker's idea of a follow-up of the most read post. :D
A Q&A is a great idea! I recently sent an email to my top readers (4-5 activity stars) and offered them a 25% discount on a paid subscription. No takers yet but I'm also playing around with how to cultivate and nurture the relationship with my most engaged readers. I'd love to hear others' ideas!
That's great that you're experimenting with engagement... you'll never know unless you try, right? Speaking of which... I am going to turn on a paid version come January. We'll see what happens!
Go for it! I turned it on from the beginning with zero expectations and several of my friends/family became paid from the start! It was such a boost in confidence and humbling to have their support.
Love this idea!
Thatโs awesomeโcongratulations! Maybe you could engage with readers via a poll or short survey to find out what theyโre interested in? Or schedule some sort of live online event where they can meet you and you can get to know them better?
Congratulations. Looking briefly at the focus of your writing, what about ideas around interrupting notions of what 'gift giving' is about. What would make gift giving more meaningful? Opening a dialogue (chat) with your subscribers about the best non-commercial gift they ever received? Not sure that's a great idea for celebrating the 500 but it might give you engagement. Toss or keep. Just riffin' here.
I like this idea Linda!
That's a brilliant idea, I love it! And I really hate commercial gifts.
I love this :)
How about a round up of your best writing along with a discount?
Or a live celebratory session with everyone's fave reads?
Or a nice post-mail hand written thank you note to any new paid subscribers? (this could go a bit nuts, but I love the idea of hand writing and sending stuff to people to their actual mailbox.)
Congrats on your 500!
Thanks! Not there yet, but getting there :) I love the hand-written note idea if I could convince folks to share their mailing addresses.
Do you have any paywalled content you could remove the paywall on? A special post you could make public to everyone? Or you could make all the archives free for a week?
I was offering a free 8" x 12" giclee photograph, value $32.99 for founding members and got no takers. My gut instinct was people might not want to give out their mailing address.
Interesting! And have you had any other ideas on how you might be able to get around that? Or maybe you'd rather offer something different? I love how susbtack is such an experimenting space.
I just posted a question about attracting more subscribers, because I'm honestly feeling a little stuck on that.
Its tricky yeah. I'm sure you'll get a lot of input through these office hours. I've always found them interesting to read through everyone's comments and replies.
As for me, I have made a point for myself which is: just write. Just writing what I feel I want to write and making the best out of it, while staying consistent. I'm only 2 months in so I'm sure I haven't yet reached the real consistency barrier test somehow but I'm just focusing on this day in and day out, engaging where I feel and it all seems to eventually come back to you. Good work and good energy always come back, and I guess I've chosen to trust this regardless. There's so many ways to do things, so learn from everyone but do your very own creative thing, and the right people will follow. My five cents! ๐ฅฐ
Thanks! ๐ฅฐ
I like that too. They have some pretty cool writing paper and envelopes available at Amazon. I still like the idea of sending out PODs for the stories I write.
No advice, but wanted to say congrats!
Congrats on nearing 500, Kerala! thanks for kicking off a thread on gathering inspiration for celebrating milestones with readers :)
A few that I've seen:
- Q&A or advice column
- A virtual community call with the writer
- A CTA for topics that readers want to read about
- Reflections of writing journal / writing rituals
- A template or digital gift of some sorts
I just wrote a couple of pieces to celebrate this milestone myself!
Reflections on what I'm proud of and opportunities to grow: https://systemchangers.substack.com/p/celebrating-a-year-of-system-changers
How I got started as a writer, built a writing practice I love, and grew to 500 subscribers in a year: https://systemchangers.substack.com/p/how-i-got-started-as-a-writer-built
In a year! Wow! That's amazing!
Congratulations! I don't have experience of this but perhaps write a follow-up to your most read post because it's likely to be v popular with your readers too.
Besides a % off paid (if you do that), you could try to give away swag as a test of if anyone is interested in it.
Congrats! Yeah, as others have said, an actual milestone post seems like a lovely idea.
Congrats! ๐๐๐
Well, everyone loves a pizza party..... ๐คทโโ๏ธ
(But sincerely-- congrats!!)
Congrats! Great ideas here to celebrate milestones with readers :)
Congrats Kerala! This is huge. Love your work!
Thanks so much, Samyak!
๐ง Just wanted to point out that some weeks ago, I posted a comment in Office Hours to the effect that Substack really needs to implement a tip jar feature, so that readers can make a one-off contribution if they're feeling reluctant to subscribe. This comment is *still* getting Likes from people catching up on old Office Hours. Just saying, it seems to be a pretty popular idea.
I agree, Douglas, and have made that request previously. You can add a button or a page for that in the interim. Buy Me A Coffee is a Stripe product, so you already have an account with them if you set up for paid subscriptions. Others use Ko-Fi (and I'm sure you could link to whatever you want). I think the hesitancy from Substack is that they want to push for a paid sub (so they get their cut) rather than one-offs. But, they aren't getting anything from the current tips, so it sort of behooves them to do it. However, since I set up my tip jar, I haven't gotten any. LOL. I mean, people have clicked on it, but the minimum tip is still $5 (on BMAC). I'm hoping the folks who clicked are considering going full sub. xo
Oh really? I think I was able to make my tips $3 on Buy Me a Coffee, and itโs worked a bit in the past for me when I remember to use it.
If there was a tip jar, I could have tipped this comment cuz it is SMART.
I use a Buy Me A Coffee link in my footers.
The reason why Substack hasnโt done this so far is because micropayments have been proven to not work, and to discourage subscription. Theyโve talked about this in the past but I canโt find it now!
Elle is right!
Some day we could maybe offer a version of this to readers who already pay for a subscription, but other than options like that it damages the economics for writers of this model. We totally understand the impulse, but also want to defend the writersโ ability to make a living !
Then I would like to see the data and I would scrutinize it closely, because I find the argument entirely counterintuitive. From my own experience as a person of limited resources, I would offer a writer a one-time $5 tip for a piece that I really liked more easily than I would commit to a $5/month subscription, automatically renewed unless I choose to terminate it. A subscription is a commitment, a tip is a buck you toss into a street musician's case to reward their talent. Honestly, I see no point in offering a tip jar to people who are already paid subscribers. They are already paying you; why would they make an additional one-off payment?
This is a great idea! This would help folks that canโt afford to fully support still contribute. I find the set minimum subscription pricing frustrating for this reason. Sliding scales (that scale low enough) are important.
I think many of us (if not most) would make more money if readers had more flexible support options. Substack would make more money, too. Right now, the only way to allow readers to tip is to include a link to Buy Me a Coffee, Ko-fi, or PayPal, or some other service that enables tipping โ and they get the transaction fee, not Substack.
YES!!
That sounds like a good idea
This would be such a nice feature!
๐ง I recently crossed the 1,000 subscriber mark, nearly at the same time and after a similar tenure on Substack as my friend and fellow writer @Michael Mohr. The main suggestion that I think we'd both have in terms of "growth" is just to "Write what you want," as he put it, and to think of big-G Growth as "learning, evolution, expansion, creation, depth, fire, soul, and heart," and not let yourself be sidetracked too much by the pursuit of small-g subscriber growthโwhile, at the same time, owning the truth that as writers we probably all want everyone who might appreciate our work to discover it.
Here are our posts on big and small "g" growth.
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/what-is-the-point-of-substack-making
https://bowendwelle.substack.com/p/the-love-of-strangers-1000
๐ง - Substack team: is there a reason why we can't restack comments? There is some awesome advice in here from Bowen that I want to save, share with my readers, and riff on. I've found similar friction in the comment section of others essays. While I'm able to push my own comment as a note, I can't extend other comments or sub-replies to the feed.
Hi Michael! There's no way to restack sub-replies at this time. You can only restack the original comment. I can pass along this request to our product team for consideration!
Second. This. So many times Iโve wished to restack a comment or a thread!
Whew! Or save!!
Why don't you just hi-lite it, and then copy and paste it into Notes? Then you can write about it.
Cheers Michael! and, good idea, I've found myself wanting to do the same thing at times as well. You could deeplink to the comment https://on.substack.com/p/office-hours-92/comment/43361008... or just to my original post. Thanks for sharing.
If I click the "Share" button below the comment, it does come up with Notes as an option. Or does that not actually quote this sub-comment?
edit: just tested, it does work. It quotes your comment as a Note when I just tried it now.
Nice work! I had to write some notes to myself to stay away from the FOMO of lack of initial growth because of how easily it can become an obsession. But I do permit myself a few dedicated days per month where I get to deep dive into researching growth strategies and note which one's I might try out next.
Thanks for this tipโand congratulations to you both!
thanks Mary!
Great advice
๐ง - Hi, Team Substack - Can we please gain the ability to center text?
Oh gosh, this feature has been requested so many times! I believe it has a been a founder bias - one of our founders may have felt for some time that it would negatively affect design of articles - but now it's likely just not been prioritized as something to solve for. I can flag it to the team tho!
colored text would be nice too๐
Another classic request!
๐
With emojis and a cup of tea.
๐
Centered text would be lovely. I have often talked about this with other Substack folk
Tell your pals and keep asking for this.
Please please do!
All I want to do is centre a * (or any kind of dingbat) within my writing instead of having a left-aligned * or a full linebreak, which often doesn't look great when writing fiction.
Oh you mean like a divider? I make PNG graphics for that! Is that what others need center text for? For anyone looking for a divider I use Canva to create it (and sometimes Procreate to make a custom one).
Yes, exactly that.
That's a good idea. I've tried doing something before but the resolution looked rubbish, but I evidently did it badly.
Give Canva a shot sometime when you have a little downtime. I was in the middle of finding inspo for my own Substack rebrand and graphics changes and such, and I've seen some other Substackers with nifty dividers and either clicked on their image they use for the divider, or right-click, "inspect" (in Chrome) and found the dimensions there.
Then I'd make a new design in Canva with those custom dimensions and then place whatever in the center, download it as a png, and you're good to go!
(Truthfully though, I play around with it and may tweek it a bit as I place it in a draft to see if I *actually* like it, haha!)
Very smart. Thanks for the tips!
A founder's bias should not eclipse customers' needs in a situation like this. Hopefully they will come to understand that and add this feature. Thank you for flagging it for the team, Bailey.
I don't see anyone centering text for their entire newsletters, BTW. I have *one* section each week that would benefit from this, and it's such a basic feature that is incredibly frustrating to not have access to.
Have you tried the pull quote feature for small bits of text? It centers those segments !
I use that feature for block quotes but the very start of my newsletter, where I share the phrases for the week, would look really dumb with the pull quote feature. I have no intention of centering my entire newsletter or posting it all in Comic Sans. Though tbh that's not really a problem the founders should be trying to control. This is a really basic feature that should be available because their customers want it to create a specific experience for our own customers. It's incredibly frustrating as a customer to not have access to a very basic feature because one dude doesn't want us to have it.
โ๏ธ Hi! I just hit the 200 subscriber mark after 2 consistent months, with a few paid subscribers already and really good engagement...I'm mind-blown and grateful.
I'm mostly teaching health and doing courses along with Q&As, mostly on preventative health, integrative medicine, emotional education and burnout prevention. After being on other platforms, I'm loving how easy it feels here on Substack. I haven't seen however as many health substacks (I'm a MD) besides the amazing big, informative ones about medical updates on vaccines, public health policies, news and similar stuff, but none on practical health prevention. So I'm curious about this and here's my 2 questions:
1. Do you offer courses on your Substack? If yes, I'd love to hear your experience regarding engagement and marketing. I love what I'm creating here but I'd love to learn from other's experiences too.
2. Have you seen other prevention health / emotional education / integrative medicine substacks out there? If yes, I'd love to know. I'd be grateful if you can tag them here. Teamwork truly makes the dream work!
That's it! Thank you so much and have a lovely day/evening you all! :D
Hi Marianna, Congrats on your first two months and growing community of subscribers!
I'm a doctor of Chinese Medicine and offer online, self-guided courses in that medicine for students and licensed practitioners. While that's not the focus of my Substack (which is addiction recovery, sobriety, and soulful living), I weave it into essays and keep a tab on the home bar and link on the side bar that go to my courses (and my medical practice).
Sounds a bit different than what you're describing, but I do think I've gotten some course sales and remote consults that way. Sometimes, I'll add a CTA as a PS on essays as well.
I'm at Sober Soulful, here: https://danaleighlyons.substack.com/
Hi Dana! Oh wow that's fascinating. Eastern medicine has so much more integrative views to offer and I totally advocate for it. I've studied Ayurved in detail for the last 8 years and I use it in my practice every day. Bridging the best of both worlds seems the best way to me. So happy to learn about you!
It sounds interesting what you shared about, specially about the remote consults. Curious to know how you promote the consults, if I may ask? I'm going to start offering them from January onwards and I want to have a good think about it. I'm going to check yours out!
Thank you so much for this! :)
Congratulations Mariana, I am just a little behind you at 181 subscribers and good engagement. Hoping to hit 200 this weekend!
That's wonderful! ๐๐ผ๐๐ผ๐๐ผ
Hi Mariana! I don't do tons of promoting around it, but have a link that goes to my website (where, if folks look at Acupuncture & Herbs, they can book in person or remote). Really though, I think I should promote the remote consults more. I use Jane App for my charting and scheduling, and it has a great video feature built in for remotes (so it's all in one place, HIPPA compliant, etc.).
Oh! And Marlee Grace, who writes Monday Monday, often promotes their live offerings (courses, workshops, classes) on their Substack. I'm actually participating in a really cool one this very minute called Flexible Office. https://marleegrace.substack.com/p/the-effort-it-takes-to-begin
Congratulations! I donโt offer courses, but I do regularly offer free online workshops on specific topics. Theyโre always advertised first to Page by Page subscribers, and then opened up to the rest of the world via social media. And then I โwrite upโ the discussion later for a later PBP post. Iโd love to know more about how you offer your coursesโdo you run them on Substack?
Ah this is so great! Thank you Mary :) Yes! Im running them here. It's been the best place to put it all so far. A course a month with a Q&A. Except the first course is actually a big one I had created a while back and it's been refreshing to bring it here in its updated version. Best response ever! The engagement I'm getting is truly remarkable and I'm honestly pleased. I've been on Mailchimp, Thinkific, my own website and on health columns too, and nothing has felt so great like Substack so far.
It's not only courses that I'll be doing - there will be indeed workshops, and offline activities I had been doing for a while, which I want to reflect somehow in here as I bring the online version over Substack. As I said, big plans - step y by step. And I'm eager to learn from everyone and work like an ant, consistently, happily, day after day.
Congrats, that's awesome.
Thank you so much, Nathan!
I dont think I qualify on nr 2, but I do write about my journey to reach my dream job with neuro and mental health problems. Trying to write about what worked for me and so on.
And by the way CONGRATS on your milestone! ๐ฅณ
Thanks for subscribing btw! Just got the notification email just now :) I hope you find my shares useful. ๐
Thank you Jezz! It's a great journey here in susbtack no doubt. And thanks for your input. Definitely learning. ๐ฅฐ๐๐ผ
Congratulations, Mariana!! Thatโs amazing!
Iโve thought about offering courses but I know Sarah Fay of Writers at Work here on Substack does! You could check out her model and she also offers help herself to improve Substacks :)
So I actually have a question related to your work. I do a trivia/word game/other-such-things newsletter, and I'm wondering if you have a health issue in mind that you think people need more information on. I would love to work it into my next newsletter. I'd also be happy to give you a shout out in the newsletter in return for your time.
Thanks!
Thanks! This is so interesting! Can you give me some more detail so I can have a better idea of this? Happy to have a think. :)
So each week I create 11 'cards' and send them out newsletter style. Some weeks I have a theme. For example, for my Week 1 newsletter, I focused on the Amazon Rainforest and highlighted the work of Jungle Keepers, an organization trying to create a massive reserve in Peru.
But even during normal weeks, I like to add little informative notes. So for example... Your latest post is about stress. Which of your tips do you think is the most important one? #1? I can create a 'card' related to light. In the answer section, I can write a little informative note and/or leave my readers a link to your article.
I want my newsletter to be successful for my own selfish reasons, but I also think I can use it to connect my readers to good information, and even to Substack authors like you. Reading inspires a lot of my 'cards', and as long as I'm reading I might as show the authors a little love.
I haven't offered courses yet but my plan is to offer them once my subscriber list grows big enough, Mariana.
That's great, Heidi! Definitely go for it. I went straight in with putting my courses here (currently on the first one) and I've been nicely surprised to how well people are responding to it all. I know everyone's experience is different...but just a nudge for you, if I may: why not start trying regardless of your list number? I started sharing the course when I had like 20 people.
1.5 month later I have 200. I think the consistent sharing started precisely bringing people in. In my case it's been the course. But maybe you're being consistent with other stuff too. ๐ฅฐ
That's fantastic advice, Mariana. I hadn't even considered it but thank you for that nudge. I'm consistently posting once a week, but a course might be exactly the right thing for me to start. Thank you! ๐ฅฐ
Yay! All the best!!!๐๐ผ๐ฅฐ
This is amazing - congratulations Marianna! Iโm a life coach helping people bridge the gap between their inner and outer worlds to incorporate more authenticity into their lives - so the emotional education component of your work really speaks to me. (As do the other parts of your work, preventative health is so deeply important!)
Looking forward to following your work, and perhaps chatting about collaborating one day!
Aw thanks Alexa! So great to hear, and I totally hear you...prevention is truly everything, alongside awareness too. It's so great to know of others in the field, thank you for showing up here so I can read you too! And yes, let's keep that idea in mind, love it. :)
Absolutely! :)
๐ง Iโm sharing this piece of advice that seems to be working with me: to engage outsiders to pop on Substack and read, it works best to use Instagram as advertisement campaign and slap the link (to notes, posts and pages) often. But what really breaks it there is not to just post links to our own things but to diversify and highlight other writers. More visits! More views! The sneaky algorithm of IG loves new things, and probably our regular readers too.
Did yโall read/listen to the recent On Substack post about converting Insta followers to Substack? I thought it had a lot of good ideas.
One Iโve just tried (no data yet on how it works but I like it) is ditching a 3rd party app for insta linkinbio and using a hidden Substack post for this. Gets ppl straight to the Substack ecosystem. Hereโs my 1st draft for an example: https://wecanfixit.substack.com/p/linkinbio
Oh thatโs a cool idea!!
This is so brilliant, thank you! I canโt figure out how to make a hidden post, though -
Hi Helen! I just published without sending by email, and after pub unpinned/exclude from top posts. It is still visible in the archive but I am ok with that. Like 6 ppl have opened it so itโs not a big distraction. :) Hope this helps!
That is absolutely genius!! I canโt wait to read that post!
This is brilliant!
This is such a great tip, thanks for sharing it! Have you noticed a big difference in subscriptions or engagement?
Thanks for the tip! Just followed you on Insta to check out your strategy :)
Hope you can find it useful!
Thanks for this! Iโm an IG newbie, and am still figuring out how to optimize it to attract subscribers. I like the idea of highlighting other writers on thereโitโs such a great community here, and itโd be good to share that on IG.
I like the fact that by highlighting others, we can also expand our readership pool. It is like when a friend of a friend recommends something, we check it out and maybe we find something useful for us too!
Exactly! Iโve discovered so many cool things that way!
Coming on this page every Thursday is a great way of getting your name out there. When you make comments and people read them, they're more inclined to look at what you have to offer. I used to end every comment with a link to my ABOUT page, so people have a better idea of what I have to offer. It actually works: https://benwoestenburg.substack.com/about The thing you have to do is to keep going back to your ABOUT page and updating it. People forget to do that. It's one of the most important features you have on your 'Stack, because that's where everyone can see what you have to offer.
I like that! And thatโs definitely the spirit of Writer Office Hoursโthis is where you get to know the Substack community a bit better and see whatโs out there.
Very clever!
Wait. You can only link in bio on IG, right? Are you exchanging that link often swapping out other writers sometimes? Or something else entirely?
Following you on IG for tips.;)
Holly, you can link in Stories using stickers!
OMG. This is why I love Office Hours. I'm really pleased to know this. Thank you, Kimberly!
Haha Iโm so pleased to have offered a useful Instagram tip!! I am still pretty new there and I find that platform super un-intuitive which is all the more frustrating bc everything there is made to look so easy and pretty but it takes a ton of work!! So Iโm happy I could share a helpful tidbit. :) Good luck!
The thing that I'm finding with IG is that links aren't clickable unless you actually buy an ad. I can have one link to my Substack on my bio, but that's it (I think). How do you make your links be effective?
In posts, links are not clickable. But nowadays nobody sees posts, it is either reels or stories that attract visitors and in both cases, you can use links for free - still!
You can add a clickable link if you share your post to a story (rather than a regular post).
I'll have to play around with this. Can you only add the clickable link if you create the story/reel on the app on your phone? I almost always create on my computer (through a third party scheduling app).
I'm not sure about that.... I haven't posted stories from Instagram in a browser versus the app (or via a scheduling app). In the app, you add a link by choosing the link option from the menu where you can also add stickers, a hashtag, etc. It may be that isn't available in the browser-based version. (Please note that you can add up to 5, I think it's 5, urls in your bio now, too. It used to be one, but they increased it.)
Thanks for the info.
Instagram did recently change the one link in bio โ you can have a few now. People still have to click into the bio to view all of them, but it's something. I'd also be shameless and ask individual followers to share your newsletter on their stories to cast a wider net of potential subscribers.
Is your IG public (i.e. are you trying to attract people on IG outside your followers), or are you speaking more about engaging your existing network of followers?
It is public, but still I am interested in driving at least part of the followers there towards substance, as I am much more active and engaged here.
โ๏ธ๐ง I'm not quite clear on how/when to use Notes vs Chat. I've been using Notes quite a bit, but I can't figure out what Chat does that's different. I'm looking for strategy here.
๐ง Notes go to a broader Substack audience, a bit more like social media (but without the horrible algorithms). Chat tends to be conversations specifically among you and your subscribers (you can select whether all subscribers or just paid subscribers).
Ah, thanks, Bryan. That nuance had escaped my notice--about using Chat as an kind of internal mini-Slack channel to hold sidebar convos with subscribers. Now I get it!
What Bryan said!
But aren't you using algorithms now? I really liked it when Notes let you choose to see posts from everyone (in real time?) or just the people you followed. Now I'm only seeing Notes from the same 5 people over and over.
I think it requires a fairly massive audience for Chats to be worth the effort. Even some of the bigger accounts I subscribe to have very quiet Chats. I generally think Chats was an idea that didn't work.
I would tend to agree. Except that I want subscribers to be able to share photos. Since they canโt post images to comments, I end up adding a monthly chat thread to a photo prompt. Not that itโs working ๐คฃ. Or it is depending on how you define working. Letโs just say โsmatteringโ might be an exaggeration of how many photos the chat threads get (way less than the typical comment engagement). And I LOVE the photos that do come in.
I think weโre (or least Iโm) typically read in email, so itโs a button too far to get all the way to chat thread.
Do you know how you can tell if you're read more in email vs. the app? I'm looking in my dashboard but can't seem to find it.
I'm not 100 percent sure how to read the data. But you get a general idea of where views are coming from in stats and then traffic. For me, the top source is email. Not sure if this is the right read of that ...
The only Chat I am a part of that is vibrant is from a newsletter about running and people share their photos/stories from their daily jogs/races. But that's really it.
I think it didn't take off because so many writers find real-life chats annoying when they're trying to focus ๐
Or they get really weird really quickly.
โ๏ธ - When I become a world-famous celebrity Substack humor writer, how should I let Taylor Swift know that I'm very happily married, so please stop calling and writing songs about me?
Obvious: you have to release a series of barely-coded song lyrics that are all about some mysterious blond woman who just wonโt leave you alone.
Hahaha! Two can play at that game, Tay-Tay
(1) Stage a pap walk with your spouse. Post the photos everywhere.
(2) Pay someone to bring a sign that says "JOE (SIMMONS, NOT ALWYN) SAYS IT IS OKAY TO MOVE ON" to one of her concerts.
(3) Demand letter asking for percentage of royalties???
Um, I REALLY like #3
Okay, great, in which case I'm going to need a *percentage* of the percentage of the royalties you demand. Ya know, for coming up with this whole dastardly scheme in the first place...
Alexandra, you are going to go far in this business! I'd like to be your agent. Which means I'll need a percentage of your percentage of my percentage.
Joe (Can I call ya Joe? Taylor does...), you're gonna have to talk to my manager first... Her name is also Alexandra. She doesn't get out of bed for less than $5,000,000. If you want to just wire that over real quick, I can set a business lunch up between the two of you?? Alexandra's treat, of course.
Tay calls me "Joey-Boo" which really gets under my skin but yes you can call me Joe. I'll be happy to send Alexandra $5M, as long as she accepts checks and agrees not to deposit it until payday.
๐ง If anyone is on here to become a better writer and wants to measure up to the high bar of writing set on Substack, people found this Writers at Work workshop really helpful: "Write Personal Essays Substack Subscribers Will Pay to Read." Replay available: https://www.writersatwork.net/p/write-personal-essays-for-substack-subscribers
Highly recommend Sarah.
Always sharing the gems! Thank you!
๐ง Hey substack team, I have a question - Iโd there any way we can monitor the read times of our emails to know whose reading and whoโs just glancing?
That would be helpful. I often wonder if the open rate is inflated by programs like Gmail that automatically open emails (or so I've heard).
I've also been wishing that Substack could offer some kind of average for growth rate for folks who start at different stages? Realize it's all individual. But I still have little sense of whether the folks that are featured in Reads and such are realistic models or outliers, and whether I ought to feel good or frustrated about my own growth rate after starting at zero in March 2022. 1,600+ subscribers feels like good growth over 19 months with no preexisting following? It might be encouraging (or motivating) to know where I fit on the curve for people who started at a similar stage.
This sounds like great growth to me! Especially starting from zero, that's a tall mountain to climb. Nice work!
Ah, thanks so much!
I'd say that's excellent growth, to be honest.
I started at zero at the end of Jan and have only recently clicked over into the 400s.
I will say though that growth seems to have tapered a bit. I'm not sure if that's a generalisation across Substack, or just the nature of the (mostly) Fiction niche I find myself in.
Thanks, Nathan. My paid growth has definitely plateaued. Free subscribers are still steadily climbing, though. I think it's true that genre has some bearing (fiction is rumored to be a tough area for growth).
Maybe I need to also leave academia and label myself as recovering ๐
1,600 since March of 22? I started in Jun and only have 330. I think you've done an amazing job. I know how hard it is starting from zero, because that's where I started from.
Thanks Ben! Much appreciated.
I'd definitely be very happy with that! Congratulations
Thanks, Sam!
I've got about 3 hundy in 6 months so far, but it seems to have levelled about as dramatically as something can level out. How did you break the thousy barrier?
The company line on this is consistency and quality. And I'm sure that plays a role, both in attracting new subscribers and retaining existing readers. Substack's internal network continues to contribute to slow and steady growth.
But I think the main driver for a lot of people is getting amplified by someone with a bigger platform. My early growth was spurred by frequent posting in private FB groups (which nearly always got me banned eventually, so I've stopped that ๐คท๐ปโโ๏ธ). One of those groups had 20K+ members, which helped a post go viral. The Chronicle of Higher Ed requested to reprint it. That tripled my following in a week. I think consistency and quality have helped me avoid the churn and trolling that a lot of people describe as fallout from viral posts. But everyone needs some big gains once in a while, too.
That said, I have no secret sauce for converting folks to paid subscriptions. So I still feel very much a novice.
That is very helpful, I appreciate you taking the time to write such a thoughtful answer
Oh, hell no, you think I want to know how many people are actually casually ignoring me?! Let me cling to my sad little number of views, please, pleaseeee. ๐
Also here clinging ๐
Haha I hear you, Iโm clinging tragically on right along with ya
Sorry for assuming your clinging was tragic
There's no way to do that right now. It's not a Substack thing, it's just an email thing. The best proxy you have is link clicks. If you're getting a lot of clicks on something at the end of an email, odds are high people read through the whole thing. Trying to get read/open time based on people's inboxes is a huuuuuuge privacy issue. If they come directly to a site you own, it's possible through tools like Parsely and Chartbeat. But analytics beyond "Did someone open and/or click a link in this email" is essentially no man's land and with good reason.
Just to throw something else in the mix. I read almost exclusively in the app. So I delete emails. I open them first (thinking of peopleโs open rates, tbh). But my read times wouldnโt reflect my engagement level. (I mean I do think the reading in the app is rare on the other hand.)
I'm with you. I much prefer to read in the app. But I don't usually open them in my email. Just in the app. I still think they get open stats from those that are opened in the app, though.
There is no real way to monitor read or even open time. Unless they run a javascript timer that sends blips back to their server to timestamp how long a window is open. Whether in email or on the website, the best it can tell you would be if a window is open - not, of course, whether anything is being read.
With something like a YouTube video, it can track how long the video plays. But even that doesn't mean they don't have the audio turned down and are not truly paying attention.
Your best gauge of actual reading is some form of interaction (likes, comments, etc.).
That's a shame! Maybe it's better not to know how many are half glances anyhow.
๐ง I have another question - one of my users has opened every email, but they've only got a 3 star subscriber rating. Does anyone know why that might be?
In reading what the stars indicate, it could be that they open their email but do not ever click onto the site.
I have, for certain subscribers, emailed them directly.. sort of a message of thanks. I indicate that the Internet/Substack gods tell me they've engaged in X fashion and then I may ask them a question about my content, what they like the most and what they like the least, etc.
I've only done this a couple times for specific reasons. It has never been poorly received.
To your original question: I assume stars are a combination of opens and clicking through to the article.
Love this Sam even though it feels a bit like spying but I guess depends on how it's executed.
Harvest their data, I say!
Ha
๐ง The shareable assets were recently updated with new font and a longer text snippet. I miss the old font and the shorter snippet! Any chance of going back to how it was?
We've heard lots of feedback on this. Our product team is working on fixing this now, and we've nudged them to make sure it's prioritized.
agreed ! i can no longer use them it cuts the title
๐ง Is there a way to specify which newsletters we want to show up under the Recommendations heading on our home page? Only 5 newsletters appear, but I have more than 5 that I recommend. I'd like to be able to pick the 5 that I want to appear on my home page while also still recommending the others.
I think it's a random generator and changes every time.
I see. Would be nice if we could control it.
I agree!
Thanks for the feedback, Karen and Kerry! I am passing along to the team.
Really? No wonder I havenโt figured out how to do this! Iโve been wondering too, Karen.
I may be off here, but I believe the newest ones (as in the ones with the most recent start date) show up on the page.
โ๏ธ - I really want to keep my Substack free AND want to have people become paying subscribes. I know I can use paywalls to entice readers, but I rather not do that. I know the feeling of really wanting to read someone's work but the paywall becomes a factor. I really believe people would support if they can. Has anyone experimented with other ways of getting people to become paid subscribers without offering anything different? I really believe my work is worth paying for - interested in what other folks have had success with.
Context: I write letters to my newborn every week to process being a first time dad.
For me the paid subscribers happened organically.
Iโve personally paid to subscribe to Substacks because I either wanted to be a part of a paying community where the author offered other benefits (see @alexdobrenko and @donnamcarthur) or I just wanted to support that particular writerโs work or both.
Thanks for sharing CK. I am going to be patient. I am happy to know there are others out there who would just rather keep the work available to everyone. Organic is the way!
Hi Marc, I think Can We Read by Sarah Miller (for some reason I cannot link to her substack here?) has been doing an "experiment" to see if she can run on opt-in pledging/support, but offering all subscription for free (the NPR model, if you will). Might be worth checking her out to see how it's going.
PS - love your substack. My baby is a few weeks older than yours. Congratulations - what a lucky kid to have such a dedicated parent.
Christina, this is an amazing resource. Both as a parent and as a model I would like to follow! Thank you!
Thank you for checking out my letters! It's been fun and tiring. I am lucky to have him! Can't imagine what else I would be writing about!
Cafe Anne has kept all her stuff free and just given the option for readers to support her. They donโt receive any additional content - simple the satisfaction of supporting one of their favorite NY journalists !
I just heard about her from one of my favorite writers on here. I think that's going to be my approach. It says volumes about someone's work people just want to support just because. Thanks for sharing!
I have paid subs enabled but don't use any paywalls on my posts. I give the option to pay if they like. And several DO pay even though they don't have to.
โ๏ธ How do y'all find the balance between posting regularly (daily, weekly, etc) while also feeling like you have enough time to unpack your thoughts and generally maintain high-quality content? If anyone has the added struggle of trying to post regularly whilst they maintain a full-time job, even better :)
๐ง It can sometimes feel like it's up to every writer to figure out the best marketing/growth strategy for them. While that to some degree is inevitable, are there any channels or strategies that you think all Substack writers should follow or invest in, to grow their audience?
I struggle a lot with this. I have two kids and a full-time job and have been writing/posting one story a week for about three years (first on Medium and more recently on Substack). Mostly, I write about how hard it is for women to have kids and a full-time job!
My two cents:
1. Focus first and foremost on quality and consistency of your writing. Growth will definitely be slower if you don't have the time/emotional energy to invest in a ton of engagement, whether on Substack or social media, but don't prioritize that over the writing you're here to do.
2. Segment your engagement time (I try to read one other Substack story a day at lunch and respond to comments once a day instead of as they come in. This doesn't always happen, but I try!)
3. Find the time of day that works best for you for writing and be intentional about carving it out. I go for a run, walk my kids to school, and then eek out 30 minutes of writing before starting my workday. That time when the house is quiet and my brain isn't yet bogged down by work demands is golden for me. My partner also understands that, unless something dire comes up, writing one story a week is non-negotiable and he's gracious about giving me time to sneak off to a cafรฉ on the weekends if I've gotten behind.
4. If you're in a boring Zoom meeting for work, take some time to respond to other people's posts during Substack office hours! (Shhh... don't tell.)
Kerala, these insights are really helpful. This past year, I haven't had the time to invest in growing my readership, but I committed to writing twice per month. I was in the middle of a huge life change when I started my newsletter, and that seemed manageable to me. Now I feel like I can do a bit more, but it's been hard to determine what "more" means...
Also, I forgot to say: props to you for being a full-time employee, a writer, and a mother! That's inspiring :)
Thanks for such a thoughtful, detailed response :) Reading your comment is making me realize where I really struggle: I'm pretty good at sticking to a consistent writing schedule, but not to a consistent publishing schedule. I never want to publish until I really feel like I've fully unpacked an idea (which can take over a month!). So, to your first point about prioritizing writing over engagement, what about finding the balance between prioritizing the trade-off between quality of writing and frequency of publishing?
That's a great question, and in this day and age, I really appreciate that you want to take the time to unpack an idea. So many people just fire off posts for the sake of posting them. My instinct (based on nothing but gut) is that it's important to post at least twice a month so your readers don't forget about you. Sometimes if I have a PTO day or two to spare, I'll write rough drafts of a few different stories to build a small backlog so I at least have something started.
Also, quality is important but I can potentially revise a story forever, so sometimes best to just take the plunge and publish :)
So true: people are thirsty for depth, especially if they're taking the time to consume simple and plain prose over e.g. video content, but people also need to remember who you are. A twice-a-month goal seems like a good compromise :)
I made a no frills document - a table in Word called "editorial plan" which lives in a shared drive on Google because I collaborate with another writer. We we meet, I drop in ideas for posts. They could be as detailed as you want. But having lots of ideas and drafts "in the bank" is helpful in terms of managing the stress around having enough content to keep going.
I outline most of mine the same way, and either use my phone or old teletype sheets from the printer on my desk at work. That way I can chip away at it when I have a few minutes or as ideas strike.
I always set an input goal rather than an output goal. As in: I write for two hours every day. However many posts that gets me is however much is my output. That being said, I aim for 1,000 words per post, so if a topic expands to 2,000 words or more I split it into a series! Before I was doing this full time that resulted in 1x/week. Now 2-3x.
I like this a lot! I have a 2500 word draft ready to be published, and I've been thinking of breaking it up. Do you have any strategies or tips around how to frame the series-based posts, so you can still attract first-time readers to your blog, who may not want to go back and read the first post, if they just got to the second? Said differently, do you aim to keep each post, even when they are a series, evergreen?
Well, I always look for if I'm trying to make more than one point, because then I can split it up into two posts, each with their own point and longevity.
For example, a series I did on culture was originally one long post. But I split it up into two:
https://www.elysian.press/p/will-we-have-culture-in-the-future
https://www.elysian.press/p/we-dont-need-to-colonize-the-world
Hi Jeff, I post twice a week and I have a full time job and a part-time business. When I did not have time to unpack my thoughts as you say, I will write a short post sharing a piece of content I've enjoyed that week. It takes minutes to write and edit, and my subscribers appreciate the short content. It is also a great way to build relationships with other creators and become a curator that people will lookup to.
I've been thinking about this S,M,L strategy, but not sure if it's right.
(S = daily, M = weekly, L = monthly.)
The daily posting is part of my morning routine (15-30 minutes). The weekly post is a single-sit down once a week (2-4 hours). And for long-form, I meet with 2 friends once a week, and we publish on the 1st of every month (a 10+ hour effort). You could scope each pace so it fits with your current lifestyle.
It sounds good in theory, but it's been tricky for me to pull off. Each month is slightly different, and I'm never consistent with S/M. Weirdly, I'm 2 for 2 on the long form (Sep/Oct), probably because I have two friends holding me accountable.
Interesting! In addition to what's easier to put out between the S/M/L pieces, do you have a sense of which actually resonate? Speaking anecdotally, I'm surprised to find that those pieces that I write in one sitting can often resonate more than those I pour 20+ hours of writing and editing into.
As for q1, I am trying to get better about organization and I've started a Trello board where I can drop links and inspiration throughout the week so that when I sit down to write I have some good stuff to pull from. That just feels less stressful, like I have to sit down and capital W Write and come up with something genius out of nowhere.
As for q2, I'm curious to see the response on that one ๐
I like that strategy! I may adopt it for my own q1 plan :) Thanks so much for the response!!
Any fresh ideas about how to move subscribers to paid subcribers or sustainers? I've been publishing my newsletter regularly for two years and my blog for four. I've been in publishing and journalism for 30+ years and am baffled as to how to move beyond one paid subscriber (who is a sister). Not looking for story ideas, rather monetization strategies. Danke.
Hi Chuck, we rounded up all our best guidance on converting free subscribers to paid here https://on.substack.com/p/free-vs-paid/comments
I don't even think my sister is a free subscriber ๐ฅฒ
To add onto what Kimberly said, I'd make your Chuck Eats KC your main newsletter on your profile, and make it SUPER obvious what people are going to get for subscribing. Your "Why Subscribe" is pretty generic. I know I'm getting access to a newsletter, but what are the highlights of yours?
You could also make unique perks for paid subscribers, like they get to pick what you eat at a location or you print out a picture of them to "join you" during a meal. Have fun with it!
My main newsletter is Chuck Eats KC: https://chuckeatskc.substack.com/
Hi Chuck! I had a peek at your Substack, looks like you write authoritative food reviews. I can see how thatโs a challenging niche to be paid for as there are many websites where people rate and review for free (Tripadvisor, Google maps, yelp etc). If your goal is to get paid subscribers then you have to offer a unique value that they appreciate and want to support. Iโd make sure youโre very clear on what your existing subscribers like/want/arenโt getting (ask them in polls, live chats etc) and make very clear what your unique value contribution is throughout your publication (for example update your About page to convey your expertise/special perspective). Good luck!
Thanks, Kimberly. Yes, one of the primary goals of my project is to be an independent alternative to corporate walled review websites where the reviewers are uncompensated.
Got it! I think you could make mission a lot more explicit throughout the publication, like in your About Me (tell your reader about your unique expertise/qualifications as a food expert, and a KC expert. What can you point/link to (your journalism clips?), to demonstrate the value you bring? Also would you want to host other reviewers for guest posts/Q&A, if you're trying to build up a new model? Good luck!
Chuck, I can imagine that to attract paid subscribers when most food reviews are free, as noted, you may have to get into the business of organizing subscriber-only dinners, tastings, etc., at restaurants that offer you discounts. What can you offer a paid subscriber they cannot get elsewhere? Of course, that's more work for you!
Amy, thanks for bringing those services up, as I've recently started considering that kind of thing. I have friends in other cities who do food tours. I've even done KC barbecue tours for friends before I started the blog/newsletter.
I imagine you could start small, with, say, a beverage tasting at a bar. Take photos of the event, post them on your Substack and other social media, and be sure to let folks know that these fun times are only available to paid subscribers. And voila!
This is such a good idea Amy!
How fun! We just moved to Chattanooga from KC but I miss the foodie scene back home!
I love the name of your newsletter Chuck
I sent a note to all my family and friends with a request to subscribe, but didn't directly ask for paid subscribers, and six of them went ahead and did so anyway. I then keep a gratitude section with their names at the end of every post; someone else did this when I became paid, and I thought it was smart. Since then I've offered to donate any paid subscriptions to an organization I believe in, and I got four more paid subscribers because of that. So, 1/3 of my subscribers are paid (I only have 32 right now as I'm not in a "niche" quite yet...). Maybe something in what I'm sharing sparks something for you!
Sisters! I just turned on paid, and two of my five paid subscribers are sisters. โค๏ธ
Hey, getting subscriptions from siblings is a big confidence booster. They also get more invested in the project, sharing their thoughts, their recent experiences, and news they have heard.
If you find the secret sauce, please share haha. My paid subscribers are mostly close friends and family lol.
most of my paid subscribers are also friends and family.
Woot! haha.
How to people handle the occasional post that is "off topic?" Every now and then I like to write a "one for me" essay.
I just kind of publish it without warning, but maybe that is the wrong strategy?
Shake it up! I often have more reactions/thoughts posted to such. My Thanksgiving posts for e.g. (which comes out of nowhere for my poor USA readers, as ours is early October!) really elicit response.
I think people like to be surprised :)
It's kind of funny because those posts generate the most positive emails, but also lead to a few unsubscribes lol.
Yes, I have found that, too.
Catch-22 haha
I say just go for it! Itโs fine to say โthis has been on my mind latelyโ or โseeing this in the news made me want to write about Xโ.
Yeah and at least it's clear it's a bit more opinionated than my other posts, where I try hard to remove my opinion as much as possible.
I publish occasional short humor/satire stories that are on topic but definitely a different style than my other posts. I do think it helps to add just a little context in the beginning, acknowledging that this is a little different and perhaps explaining what inspired you to write the post. Just my two cents!
Yeah like two sentences in italics at the beginning could go a long way
Perhaps a different type of writing deserves a different home? Perhaps you could try to throw it at a magazine or writing contest? If you write about locations, you may want to consider if your essay would be a fit for the nonfiction essay contest I am promoting?
I don't particularly, but I have moved a lot in my life so I'm not against investigating this contest. Send a link?
Important Info:
The prompt is 'A Sense of Place.' Your piece should assert or discuss the signifcance of a place. There is a lot of leeway about how you choose to approach the contest outside of the prompt.
-The submission deadline is November 30, 2023.
-Hereโs our central hub of information about the essay contest: https://uppernew.org/essay-contest-a-sense-of-place/
-Hereโs a direct link to our submission portal, where you can submit your essay manuscript: https://uppernew.submittable.com/submit
Good question.
I recently published a humorous (hopefully ๐คฃ) piece, definitely not my norm, about a triathlon in a bikini. This story typically has people rolling. Iโm not sure the written version is as funny. But it was a much quieter response from readers than normal. Wondered if I should have prefaced.
My latest approach is to open an essay with an image, and then use the caption of that image to share context. It's small and skippable in case you want to get right into the action, but maybe it could help orient a new reader. Are you convinced by this?
https://www.michaeldean.site/p/lucy-in-the-sky-of-large-language-models
Another approach would be to update your email header. You could have it consistent for each email, or update it each time. I notice that it renders in a slightly different style than the body of the essay, which helps (it indicates it's skippable). It's just not ideal to me since in-app readers won't see it.
IMO, that just humanizes things and makes it more interesting. Which recent A6 was โoff topic?โ I mustโve missed it.
Haha. Thanks for reading closely enough to notice! My Mathew Perry Essay and whenever I post about sports. I think it catches people by surprise who subscribe for the news.
And sorry for just subscribing now! I didn't realize I had not subscribed back. My bad.
๐ง Open call for creatives + makers!
Iโm putting together a Holiday Gift Guide for Creatives and would love to promote your art, business, newsletter, or service/offering.
My goal is to help indie artists and entrepreneurs (basically everyone here, right?) have a successful holiday season while putting together a gift guide with meaning that supports this community.
All the details are in the post below but let me know if you have a comment or question!
https://open.substack.com/pub/thebarefootbeat/p/november-community-art-share?r=1tmjxe&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
lovely idea :)
Thank you! I hope it will be of benefit!
๐ง Hello Substack! First of all, you guys are awesome.
Second, in the last few days, the shareable images no longer have just the title and subtitle with a picture in the background, but have the beginning of the subtitle and the text of the article itself, which often doesโt make much sense.
Any way to go back to the old way? Those images are soooo important for posting on other websites and even on WhatsApp.
Thanks!
Thank you! Our team is working on this, and we've shared your feedback with them directly.
Great to hear that, thanks so much!
I'd like to share my approach to writing on Substack in case it resonates with others. These are my basic guidelines.
Ask if you want subscribers or readers? Theyโre not necessarily the same. For me the answer is readers.
Publish at your own pace. Thereโs no magic number of posts, but you do want to be consistent. If you donโt publish anything for months, itโs likely that folks are going to figure you gave up. Well, donโt give up, but donโt be pressured to post something just to meet a timetable.
Strive for perfection. You wonโt reach it because weโre all imperfect beings, but disregard the popular advice that says just get it out there. Make each article / story / essay the absolute best you can. Read it aloud and pay attention to the flow. Take your time. Think about each word. But donโt take these steps to such an extreme that you never hit the publish button, either. Balance.
Ignore stats. Donโt announce your stats. Turn off all stats that youโre able. Stat motivation is antithetical to artistic motivation.
Results donโt come by repeatedly thinking about them or desiring them fiercely; they come through actions. And the more we let ourselves be carried away by the desired results, the less we tend to act in ways that contribute to achieving them. [these words not mine; they are from a (sort of) Zen YouTube channel I enjoy]
And (related to the previous paragraph) remember (I have to remind myself of this frequently) that I control what I write and when I put it out there, etc., but I have no control over what happens next such as subscribes, likes, comments, whatever. I enjoy the process, and the other stuff follows.
Maybe some of this resonates, I don't know. But that's what I try to keep in mind and it's been doing well.
All the best to everyone.
Great info. Just an add on-- I find committing to posting every week letโs readers know what to expect. Readers need to trust you. Learned this from @sarahfay
Yes, I think this is important too. Reliable posting at a frequency that is manageable.
I agree with all of this wholeheartedly. "Done is better than perfect" they say, I disagree. If the result is lacking in quality, it was a waste of time, for yourself and your audience. Instead, I accept imperfection through my inconsistent post schedule, but when I get the post out, I'm confident someone will benefit from it in some way and that's what comes first to me.
I'm by no means a popular Substacker that should be giving out advice on this, but as a consumer of writing, this is my view on it.
Thank you Kerry Jane. As I mentioned, this works for me and maybe for others, too. I'm glad to hear that's what comes first for you.
โ๏ธ๐ง My current stats:
Substacking since October 3rd
270 subscribers (all free)
$700 in pledges
Average 73% open rate
Posting weekly
***
I'm pleased with how things are going, but frustrated with how little engagement there is, no matter how I ask/beg. I migrated to Substack from over-long over-shares on Facebook for a lot of reasons, but am missing that sweet, sweet hit of dopamine I got from the FB likes and comments.
Any tips for either encouraging engagement or encouraging me to get over it?
That looks like an amazing first month to me! For live interaction try hosting a chat!
Thank you! Fun idea!
I do understand missing the dopamine of social media :) I have recently changed my views on social media. My main platform was Twitter, where I have 15k followers. After the changes a year ago, I get essentially zero engagement there. Recognising this fragility made me rethink my social media strategy. I now aim to use social as a place where I share original content Iโve created on platforms I own (mainly my Substack, also my website or any essays/guest on podcasts/talks Iโve gotten out). I donโt want to work for the tech billionaire platforms for free any more, so I donโt want to spend a lot of time creating original content for them.
Thank you!
Hey Lara! Your stats look great. My engagement is pretty solid but have been having trouble getting people to actually convert to being paid. Any strategies you used to get people to sign up to pledge?
That I can't help you with unforch. My pledges are all friends who have ponied up to support me out of the goodness of their heart. I'm not planning to go paid until 2024 (if at all) when I have demonstrated to my readers that it's a product worth paying for, and to myself that I can keep this up!
You have some good friends! That's actually my plan too! But if I can offer everything free I will. Hope it works out well for us!
Thank you and good luck with all!
awesome! ๐๐ฝ You must be doing a great job serving your people.
Oh, damnnnn, we joined at roughly the same time. I have like 22 subscribers-- and one of them is me and at least 17 of them are people I've blackmailed into joining. $0 in pledges. 74% open rate, but again... the blackmail helps with that.
Anywho, I just subscribed to you, and I'll engage-- for what it's worth!
Thank you so much for subscribing! I've been very active on FB for 15+ years so I had a good community to tap into to migrate with me to Substack - but I want MORE! ;)
Add a couple of call to actions in. Leading questions encouraging people to share their thoughts work well.
Thank you! I have been doing CTAs at the end of my post, but I think moving them up to the intro is a good idea. Asking questions is a great idea!
A simple poll like: would you do X or Y in this situation? (If your content allows for something that straightforward). Not always or everytime but once in a while you'll get some uptake. And then your engagement and providing the results continue the conversation. Just riffin'. Keep or toss
Such a great idea and would have been VERY applicable in my last post.
"You see your exBF's ex GF going into a cafe. Do you go in and talk to her?"
Spoiler Alert! I did, and it put me right into the plot of a Lifetime movie!
Oh awesome! Yes, that sounds like a perfect way to engage folks - Maybe asking the questions right at the top of your post (above the fold) to catch reader's eye. Hope it helps!
Elementary question: If you edit a Substack after it's been posted, does it automatically get resent to all subscribers?
Hey Lincoln, when updating a post and republishing, it is not automatically emailed to everyone. The default is that it will just update on the web when you click โupdate everyone now.โ If you have never emailed out the post you will have the option on the "scheduling" section to email the post out.
No. Once it's been sent by email, subsequent edits only affect the web site version. The emails are not sent again.
Lol I definitely had a moment of panic the first time I edited a post after publishing. Thankfully it does not resend!
So happy this is the case!
oh God no. People would think I am insane if they knew how much I edit. I have said too much already.
I always proofread AFTER I've sent my newsletter out. I find that it's a highly effective strategy for spotting typos
So good. I want to know the psychology.
me too!
We'll have to ask @MikeSowden
No. It only updates on your Substack page. As far as I've been able to tell, once a post has been sent to subscribers, it cannot be sent again.
I worried about this, too. Because after I publish it I always find things I could have worded better (or little typos that I missed when I edited).
There is an option to publish a test email to yourself before you publish to subscribers ๐
Yes, thank you. I absolutely use it. But still somehow I find myself constantly wanting to revise things after the post is published.
All it does is, now, exist in its newly-edited form online, on your front page!
I've noticed that if I have tags in a post I edit, the publish button says, "Update everyone" which is annoying. I followed up with a tagged person on this but they said they aren't notified on it.
That said, I do get emails that say "X linked to your post!"... sometimes multiple times. My guess is that the only tagged users will get updates on edit, and they'll be in email, but not in-app.
๐ง - Substack, did I get that right?
When you update a post, it is just updated on web by default and no one will be notified.
Any chance of changing the Button that reads "Update everyone" Sounds like it creates lots of confusion (not just for newbies like me). As a former UX producer I get how tough it is to be responsive as you're growing and building app features. Thanks!!!
โ๏ธ Got two things:
1: I would love to find more aritsts who write about their journey here on substack.
2: I would love feedback to get my own writing to get better: https://jezz.substack.com/ What am I missing?
Hereโs a helpful link:
What is the Point of Substack? Making Money? Quality? Community?
A Substack Writerโs Thoughts on the Gameโฆ.
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/what-is-the-point-of-substack-making
Hej Jezz! Iโm in Lund and was thinking of hosting a meet up for local Substackers, are you close enough to join if I do? :)
Sadly not. Takes a day drive to reach it.
Ah ok! Enjoy the cold and dark up north :)
Are you looking for Neuro diverse writers in particular? @amandahinton has written about being an autistic writer. I intersperse my own journey through humor.
I dont mind finding more people with Neuropsychiatric ๐
Check out the Editing Spectrum with Amanda Hinton.
Thank you for the recommendation ๐
โ๏ธ๐ง Hi community! Iโm relatively new to Substack, and looking for ways beyond social media to grow my subscriber list. I saw growth initially when I launched, but Iโm starting to plateau and need tips to keep growing.
I don't know if you consider Substack's Notes feature to be social media, but I've found that regularly restacking articles from other newsletters I read and adding a substantial comment has effectively doubled my new subscriber rate. That wasn't why I started using Notes, but that seems to be the effect I see. And it encourages the other writers that I follow, which is a great bonus!
That is definitely a good strategy, Karen. I also sometime copy my comments to Notes in order to bring the article to a wider audience.
This is great, I haven't really utilized Notes but I will start. Thank you!
Use notes. Develop your own voice and presence in notes and engage regularly.
Make genuine connections with writers you like and enjoy.
In your newsletters create a line or two about asking your subscribers to recommend your work and share it (I have not done this yet but a couple of writers I admire have done this).
Outside of Substack - Post your work everywhere. Find Facebook groups and Reddits that deal with the topic you are writing about and be a community member there.
If you believe in your work, you should share it as much as possible. Be as aggressive with sharing your work as you are with the pen.
Yay aggression! ๐คช So true. I'm blindsided by the amount of work it takes to share, when I'm exhausted by effort of posting, learning SubStack, etc. I've let that stop me in the past. NO MORE! Share like you love it.
Itโs really a job. Iโm trying to manage this with a job and a newborn. I try to give myself grace. I canโt compete with someone who has any less than me. But I do my best with what I have.
Love this, thank you so much!
Good luck you got this!
Everything happens all at once or not at all. There will be times that your subscriber count is growing and times when it's stagnant. Keep your focus on what you're making. If you're in a slump with writing, take the time to explore Substack and find content that you like here to engage with.
Very true, Kerry. My subscriber growth stalled for a few weeks, and then suddenly shot up. It does seem to go in fits and starts. I try, not always successfully, to refrain from becoming obsessed with it. Except that I turned off unsubscriber notifications because I found them too depressing
I never turned those on as I didnโt see the purpose of it other than as a form of mental abuse ๐.
This is not what other people here want to hear, but for me, sharing my writing has also come with the acceptance that not everyone is going to like my work and thatโs okay. Itโs niche, and I knew that my writing wouldnโt be popular as it is adjacent to who I am fundamentally which has always been hard to translate in real life to others on this marketplace planet. But that doesnโt mean that a small group of people wouldnโt greatly benefit from what I have to say in some way. A small subscriber list is not a reason for me to be upset, only if it were a small list of people who werenโt getting anything from my writing.
That's how I try to look at it. I find other people's proclamations, no doubt well-meant, rather depressing in that they make me feel like I'm not doing well so to speak. But I have a decent-sized list and sometimes a lot of engagement, so I like to just produce stuff that (a) I like to write and (b) I think others will get something from. I don't know what metatonia is so I'm going to look at yours to find out.
Thanks for the insight, I appreciate it!
You could cross-post on a site like Medium. It costs nothing to start your own blog space there and has a built in audience of millions. I often repurpose my Substack content over there with a link back to here.
Great advice, thank you!
My advice to writers on Substack is always the same: Follow 50 writers who have the same audience as you, read and comment on their work (and engage with their commenters), and pitch five of them a week on a collab!
๐
โ๏ธ Can I publish work on Substack and still have it accepted by a major publishing house for a book deal?
Iโm going to write a memoir about my road trip to Alaska as I healed from the grief of infertility (which Iโve been writing about in shorter pieces on my Substack). Iโm wondering if it makes sense to serialize it on Substack, or if that would preclude getting a book deal.
Iโd appreciate advice from anyone who has experience in the publishing world!
It depends on whether the publisher thinks they can sell enough copies of their edition of your book even though it's already been released on Substack.
@sarahfay recommends serializing. Her publisher recommended she do this with her second book. Iโm serializing my novel. Publishers love it.
Thank you, CK! Does it matter if you serialize posts publicly or should they be behind a paywall?
I offer everything free. I believe @sarahfay does the same.
I don't know, but I'm running a series that I intend to turn into a book, but the book will have a lot that won't appear in my newsletter. I'm hoping that will work
Hi Liz, I saw a recent post where a Substack writer (Michael E., tagging doesnโt seem to work here?) said he was archiving old posts behind a paywall to make it easier to publish a book. Not sure of the details. I know Kate McKean of Agents and Books is publishing a book, based on her newsletter posts- you could ask her in a Q&A or look for old posts on details. Good luck!
โ๏ธI have almost 100k subscribers to my YouTube channel, but haven't made it to 100 subs on my Substack. Any good tips for turning YouTube subs into Substack readers?
Wow congrats on 100k on YouTube! On Substack just had a good post and podcast on converting from Instagram to Substack, some of those tips would be relevant.
Thank you!
I have a very small Youtube audience, and will be following this thread to know if anyone here has any advice on the matter. I have a feeling there isn't going to be a straightforward suggestion. I went onto Youtube after a while on Wordpress because I realized no one wanted to read. Audio, Video and images are the preferred format of media consumption for most people. So I made it to 100 subs here by looking for the people who want to read.
If I ever have the time, I might make shorts geared towards people who like to read, and on topics that I can use as a plug for my WIP that I'm publishing on here.
I hadn't considered serializing a book here on Substack. I might try that. I've had several best-sellers on Amazon and have an audience for books as well. Thanks for giving me an idea!
I'm serialising my novel, The Shetland Witch, and thanks to a single Recommendation my free subscribers have more than doubled. So Recomendations from others really help. Will be moving to open the paid subs soon, for which subscribers/pledgees will have access to a couple of novellas while the novel remains free to all. I'm happy with the way things are going; Substack is a good medium for what I'm publishing.
Gosh we are in teh same boat.
I have tried community tab, have seen one or two click the link from there. I aslo try to mention it in every video I upload. But I gotta say, they are very lazy on clicking that link and subscribe ๐คฃ
I have even now try to offer the ONE thing that they love about my channel to be first on my Newsletter. Time will tell if it works ๐
Assuming I found the correct channel, I don't see any hint of a Substack presence on your YouTube channel โ that's where I'd start! Add it in your header image next to your other social channels. Include links to Substack in your video descriptions (try it with your top ten highest-viewed and see what kind of traffic that drives). Start or end each video by pointing people to the Substack and encourage things like a shout-out in future videos. If people connect to your voice in these videos (I just listened to one, and you absolutely have a great sound), you could try experimenting with audio versions of your Substack, too. Good luck and keep rocking and rolling!
Hi Steve, I've wondered the same thing. I've got 15,000 people there, but from years ago. I would love to shepherd them across
Do you think an "I'm back and this is what I'm doing now" type of video could work? There are some YouTube accounts I remember following wayyy back in the day who now just post a periodic update every few years and people are still so excited to hear from them.
That might not be a bad idea. We released something a few years ago and people were pretty excited. We've made three attempts at a podcast with varying degrees of minimal success.
1. The first time were jittering with nerves on camera.
2. The second time we set everything up, then got too drunk at dinner manage to pull it off.
3. The third time the camera ran out of batter, and we carried on for hours. Then the little footage we did have got taken out in a pingpong, beer & laptop incident.
It really feels like its cursed!
I bet fourth time is the charm!
๐ง Really appreciate this community! One of Substack's greatest potential benefits to writers is that the platform itself (Substack says) is able to attract readers to us. And yet, over the eight months since I've ported over my followers, a full 99% of my readers come from my email list, with only 1% coming from Substack. This means that I'm offering Substack 10% of the writing income that my work generates, but getting back far below what SS estimates writers will attract through the platform. Are there just too many writers for readers to differentiate? Something else? Thanks in advance.
I think what Substack offers is not necessarily readers but new subscribers. For example, if I post something, most of the reads come through email or social media. A few through Substack or the Substack app. But the majority of my new subscribers come through the Substack network. Those new subscribers then get the emails, and they read them through the email. So even if they originally found me through the Substack network, that wouldn't be reflected in the read stats.
Hm, this is surprising! If you donโt get an answer here I might email support with a screenshot of your stats. Maybe something in SEO or settings that can be tweaked? I agree with you this seems like something is wrong.
๐ง I would like to be able to use 'Sections' on my Substack website and as a way to allow subscribers (currently all free) to segment themselves to the content that I am offering -- fiction, non-fiction, more of blog style, my podcast, etc.
I had understood this was possible but would love to have this confirmed before I unleash all of my content to my free subscribers.
Can they pick and choose what they will receive and unsubscribe from the sections they are not interested in? Thank you.
Hey Linda. You can definitely do this. You can set the default options for new subscribers and direct them to the "manage subscription" page for your substack. There they can turn on and off notifications for different sections. This is what I do for my different book clubs.
Wow I love the idea of slow reads!
You're very welcome to join us if you like. Next year I'm running one for War and Peace and one for Hilary Mantel's Cromwell trilogy. But I'm also creating a space for slow readers to meet each other and share the books they are savouring.
This is so helpful. Thank you!
You can indeed - although the interface at the moment could be nicer for when people want to update their subscription preferences. I use sections for exactly what you're describing on my Substack.
Is there a dedicated URL for each Substack's manage subscription page? Or would they have to navigate there themselves. I'm looking to introduce a flash fiction section, but not sure how to implement. Ideally, I could include a button that works as a "Unsubscribe from Flash Fiction only" option.
Great. Thanks Simon. Glad to hear it.
I offer this as well (a general creative living substack called Tremendous Times and then Theresa Christine Writes for my book-related stuff). It is possible to subscribe to different sections. This should answer some q's too! https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/8914938285204-How-do-I-subscribe-to-or-unsubscribe-from-a-section-on-Substack-
Oh wow. This is outstanding. Thank you Theresa! Exactly what I was looking for. I plan to send a newsletter to my readers to explain how I've segmented my posts and help guide them to subscribe/ unsubscribe. This is awesome. Cheers.
๐ง Any updates on jump links? I traded emails with the support team a few weeks ago asking whether it would be possible to enable links in/to section headings. This was a common feature on blogging platforms in the early 2000s, and enables writers to cite not only previous articles, but specific sections where we might have made a particular point.
For instance, I write about bipartisan corruption in Washington, and often link back to previous posts in which I've established discrete points relevant to a theme in a new post. As an example, I wrote this week about the House vote to censure Rashida Tlaib (https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/washingtons-chickens-come-home-to), and included a link to a recent post about the exposure of disinformation strategically planted by official sources in Tel Aviv and Washington (https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/the-first-casualty-of-war-is-the).
Rather than point readers back to the entire previous post, I'd ideally point them to the specific section that I'm referencing. I understand that's not possible yet but suspect that it would be a trival adjustment from an engineering standpoint since html already offers that functionality.
I thought this was available.... ? I want to be able to do this within a post (as I'm creating it), and you can't do that. But they have documentation showing you can add anchor links to any header on a published post. https://support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/6978646417300-How-do-I-add-anchor-links-in-my-Substack-post-
Maybe that's not what you were looking for?
Thank you so much, Amy! This helps a lot
That's great! This is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks!
Most sites I'm aware of that have an editor like Substack's include this automatically. I don't really think it's a hard thing to implement, although there might be some issues around what it means in emails.
If this were a feature, I'd add TOCs to my longer posts. I'd also use links to sections of other posts, like you describe.
Exactly the way I want to use them.
Just note that you can't do it until the post is published. That's too bad. My posts are also long, and I would really link to add jump/anchor links at the top so people can hop around. But you can't do it until after you've published.
I have added a TOC to a post before I published it. It's a little awkward to get it to work, but it's possible. But I think when you click on it, it takes the person to that spot on the website, not to that spot in the email.
Interesting.... I didn't think you could get the anchor link until it was live the first time. I'll have to test and see if I can get it from a preview. Thanks for the comment.
I have found that I have to click on the heading that I want to link, then move my mouse to the left of the text and scroll up until the link icon appears to copy the link. Usually it's way at the top even if the heading is toward the bottom of the post. It's weird. But it works. If you try it and can't figure it out, let me know and I'll try to describe it better.
Wow. You're right..... it's definitely not working as expected (or as it does when you grab the anchor link AFTER the post is live). But I just tried it with a draft, and I see that you're right..... the icon to copy the link appears top left no matter where the header is. But it works! Thank you so much for taking time to describe where you were seeing it.
I guess that makes sense, because internal links don't work consistently in emails. There are uses where it wouldn't make much difference, like a simple TOC. But if you wrote in a way that referenced links, ie "To read more about __ go here." That would not work in an email, and it would be frustrating to readers.
๐ง I'd like to be able to let free subscribers comment on previews of paywalled posts. I've asked for this before, but asking again because it would make a big difference to my substack. I would like all my subscribers to be able to contribute to discussion on a post, while keeping bonus content behind the paywall. Many thanks!
As someone who can't become a paid subscriber to every Substack I am a subscriber for, but who *has* tried commenting on paywalled posts, I would really love to see this feature!
Yes! It bugs me that the authors want the subscribers to comment and the subscribers want to comment, but the system won't let us! And if I can help it I don't want to separate readers into two posts. I want everyone to be able to talk to each other!
I also think allowing non-paying subscribers in on the convo will make them feel more invested in the publication and may sway them into going paid eventually.
Thank you for this feedback. It's a great point. I've made sure to share it with our relevant product team!
Just wanted to second Simon's suggestion (which author Amy Cowen also made at https://on.substack.com/p/office-hours-92/comment/43364527). I understand the theory that requiring people to pay for a subscription in order to comment creates an incentive. Allowing authors to let free subscribers comment on the content they can access, however, seems like it could help build discourse and community around our ideas, and at least indirectly encourage paid subscriptions by driving more traffic to our posts.
Cheers Shahid. Yes, my goal is to create a community of readers, and the current settings make it harder for free and paid subscribers to talk to each other.
Thanks Bailey!
Not a bad idea!
๐ง i have to raise the same as many here: new shareable images donโt work, truncate the title etc. Would love the old ones back. Thank you!!
Our team is working on these images as quite a few writers have said they didn't like the update. I've shared your feedback with them directly. Thank you!
Yes, I agree!
Same!
I just wanted to shout again to anyone writing about TV and/or streaming, especially outside the U.S. I'm always looking for new Substacks and pieces to highlight. I have a decent percentage of my subscribers who live somewhere globally, and as far as I can tell, there's no way to search for Substacks that specifically over television or streaming.
Howdy, Rick. I don't write exclusively about TV but I've covered shows and films in my newsletter (here's a recent one: https://funfactfriyay.com/p/wait-is-someone-in-my-bed). I'd love to do a cross-promo if you're up for it!
Joey--that's a fun piece, I am going to link to it in today's newsletter (I have an odds and sods section that works perfect for this).
Yes, let's figure out some other ways to self promote. My newsletter has a pretty wide focus. For instance, it's recently been dominated by strike coverage. But it's typically a bit more focused on nuts-and-bolts TV and streaming stuff.
Thanks, Rick โ odds and sods is a terrific section name.
I think there could be some good ways to promote each other's stuff here. I'll dig into your past newsletters too and do a bit more noodling on what might work best. Looking forward to it!
๐ง Two feature requests/questions...
1 - Currently, you can't allow comments from free subscribers on a post with a paywall. I would love to be able to insert a paywall on a post for a portion of it, but still allow my free readers the ability to comment.
2 - I have a "section" of my substack that contains weekly prompts. I had set those to not display on my main page to reduce clutter. But I noticed just last week that in the APP, the "sections" aren't available. (Am I overlooking them?) I went back and set the section posts to show on main because otherwise, they are totally inaccessible from the app. I prefer being able to use sections to organize content, but it the sections aren't available in the app.....
Thanks for any input!
Big +1 to your first suggestion! I would also like to allow free subscribers to comment on what they can read while maintaining a paywall as an invitation to bonus content
I also find it frustrating that sections seem to not function in the app. The organization of my page and the ease in finding content is highly dependent on my section organization, and that is completely eliminated in the app.
๐ง: Are there certain newsletters where I can comment for FREE instead of having to pay to comment?
Among the people I follow on Substack, I can only comment if I'm a paid subscriber.
My stack is also free, comments-and-all :)
I'll always allow free comments. If Substack ever takes it away you can send snail mail, I love hearing from folks ๐
Any of my readers can comment on my free newsletters. For paid posts, the Substack setting only allows comments by paid subscribers (or no one). Iโd love for them to change that though so all subscribers can comment even on pay-walked pieces!
โ๏ธ I'm a multipotentialite (aka multipod, Renaissance woman, etc.) and have many different interests, so my Substack covers creative living and the arts as a whole. I'd love to see examples of other Substacks that cover a broad range of topics or feature an array of types of posts. I sometimes wish that I could be more niche and I understand that may be better for ~growth~, but I'd really like to stay true to who I am. So, basically, looking for inspo!
My Substack is about personal growth and transformation for people who lead systemic change. So in some ways it's quite niche, but in others not at all! Check it out here: https://systemchangers.substack.com/
Hereโs a helpful link:
What is the Point of Substack? Making Money? Quality? Community?
A Substack Writerโs Thoughts on the Gameโฆ.
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/what-is-the-point-of-substack-making
I am 75 autistic and addicted to writing it keeps me high along with cannabis from the government catalogue delivered to my front door. I type on a keyboard designed for four year olds with autism and I am rich beyond my wildest dreams. The last thing I want is fame and fortune. All I want is a white wall to scribble graffiti and tell myself jokes. The Most important book I ever read was Orwell's Why I Write. I taught myself to read in infancy and I learned how to write because my wife is PhD in education and I had a whole faculty of PhDs to teach me how to write. I don't think in straight lines I make logical assumptions and humans can't normally understand logic. They inhabit either Wonderland or the other side of the Looking glass as Professor Dodgson surmised.
It is Snark Hunting Season in America and I am the beaver.
I still can't program a toaster but I can pilot Star Ships and trip over my shoelaces.๐คฃ
Glad to have you here, Moe, and congrats on being so rich!!!
My editor is 85 and retired. We spend more on books than we do on food and we eat like kings because I love the kitchen and we are what we eat. I just can't follow recipes and can't follow threads I travel in circles to get from A to B. Getting there is all the fun. How about a cartoon video on negotiating the web. I am not an arachnophobe I just need a map. When I was seven my favourite tv show was Fighting Words here is the show about Gaza in 1960 The Perils of independence from the CBC archives. I was 12 and I remembered every word my whole life. We are everybody's skeleton in the closet: weird grandparents that are still breathing.๐คฃ
https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1871003349
Awesome! โค๏ธ
I am an absolute novice and need some guidance about starting to write for a wider audience. My experience in writing has been limited to academia (master's thesis and doctoral dissertation) and professional communication...40+ years as a neuropsychologist at a Level II trauma center.
Hereโs a helpful link:
What is the Point of Substack? Making Money? Quality? Community?
A Substack Writerโs Thoughts on the Gameโฆ.
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/what-is-the-point-of-substack-making
I wonder if there's some work you could do to imagine your new audience. Can you paint a picture of what they like/need/want... what their media diet looks like, what kind of writing they enjoy, what kind of writing they don't... You could also divide a page of A4 with a line down the middle, 'Old Audience' on one side 'New Audience' on the other and write lists of characteristics and styles under each to flesh out the changes you want to make. Use the old audience side to help you think of the opposite to that or improvements to it on the other side :)
What do you mean by wider audience? Do you have a particular niche? Do you want to write about your experience as a neuropsych at a trauma center? That sounds fascinating.
Take a workshop with @Sarah Fay.
๐งโ๏ธ Help! Iโm trying to make some of my posts permanently free, but thereโs a bug that causes them to reset to paid every day. I have an automatic paywall at one month, but follow the instructions here (support.substack.com/hc/en-us/articles/โฆ) to remove it for specific posts. It seems to be a bug in the system. Does anyone have experience with this?
I've inquired about this same issue via the support email, but no luck on solutions. I have this directory of other Substacks that I keep free for everyone...but need to un-paywall every morning to get around my 3-week paywall: https://danaleighlyons.substack.com/p/sober-substack-addiction-recovery-sobriety
YES I'm doing that too, and I also printed the posts to pdf and put links to those pdfs (hosted in my Google Drive) at the tops of the posts, so people can get them before hitting the paywall. But it's not sustainable - very frustrating to have to keep redoing it, and in the times when they're paywalled, the comments are not available.
I noticed a lot of my FREE posts had a paywall applied to it recently, looking in the settings Iโve unchecked the paywall your archives which I think has resolved the issue, as it seems like the default setting is for all posts to be archived after a period of time, which also means FREE posts are then only available to paid subscribers.
Not sure if this might resolve your issue?
My archives are supposed to be paywalled, except for these posts, which I want to make permanently free. But even when I remove the paywall for these posts specifically, it is reapplied each day.
Oh no idea sorry, maybe send a message to the help desk for some support, Iโve found them very helpful in the couple of occasions Iโve had to get in touch with them.
Does anyone have advice about how to start a blog? I really want to get my thoughts out there and get better as writer + I would love to build an audience. But i'm gun shy about putting something bad out into the world of the internet. Anybody have words of wisdom?
Fuck the fear of being bad. Go! Be! BAD! I say write what you want to write, self-criticism be damned, and see where it all goes. Better to be bad on the internet and to have tried than to be someone who was scared to start. That's what I'm doing: first drafts only. No revision, no overthinking, and if people want to read it... cool. If not, it's for me. And that's gotta be enough.
If you are interested in writing:
- The Elements of Style (Strunk & White)
- On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (Stephen King)
Write something, read it out loud (to truly test how it reads), edit it, repeat, and then publish it.
Writing advice:
- Write shorter sentences
- Write shorter paragraphs
- Keep most things under 1,000 words (I break this rule often)
- Write plainly... don't try too hard to sound intelligent, it typically sounds contrived.
- Ask for feedback from people you trust and who know good writing
- Do not seek feedback from critics
- Draft things in Google Docs and try to write every day
- Don't worry too much about rules (including mine) but do worry about cadence and clarity.
- Try to have fun!
I just published a piece on exactly this topic! https://systemchangers.substack.com/p/how-i-got-started-as-a-writer-built
Take advantage of the fact that you have a small audience to start so you can find your voice and figure out what works for you. Commit to a schedule that works for you--taking on too much is a sure path to overwhelming yourself and giving up. Be kind to yourself as you start and recognize that you'll learn as you go.
Hi Eliot. I was in the same place when I started my newsletter a year ago. I am pretty shy and definitely private, and it took months of overthinking before I first published. Something that helped me over the hump: I reached out to a Substacker whose work I admire and asked her a few questions. She gave me some amazing advice on how to get started--and I am still so grateful. The best thing for me was to start slowly until I built more confidence. I committed to two posts per month and felt like that was manageable. I would like to grow more, but I am definitely a "baby steps" kind of gal;). And that's ok! Hope this helps.
Move fast and break things. Don't let perfection be the enemy of the good.
If it's any consolation, there is a very small audience, especially in the beginning. For posts with a lot of revealing material, you can hide it behind a paywall. Your audience is also a lot of strangers (unless you have a lot of people close to you who want to read your writing, which is kind of lucky in my opinion). We are publishing to people who don't know us intimately, and so their thoughts and opinions of you shouldn't matter anyway. Also, what is "bad"? It's an honest question. There are a few things that could be implied with that.
My section On Writing might be of use to you, where I share some tips and what I've struggled with.
https://kerryjane.substack.com/s/on-writing/archive?sort=new
๐ง - Is it just me, or is it confusing to have two home pages? One called 'home' and one called 'Substack Home'? I would like to see their name a bit more different so when I see them in my tabs I know which one it is.
Hey Von, I am not sure I am totally following. Can you tell me more about the different homes you are seeing?
When I am acting as a 'reader' I have a page called 'home': https://substack.com/home
When I am acting as a 'writer' I have a page called 'Substack Home': https://vonwriting.substack.com/publish/home
When they appear in tabs I get confused as to which one does what.
Yes and the main section is also a home page. For example, When I write my novel I designate that to the "Metanoia" section where it belongs, but it's also the homepage where it showcases all of my posts. Confusing. I wish the homepage was it's own thing, and when you designate a section it's not the landing page.
๐ง - When Substack provides me with shareable media now, it has the first paragraph of my story written across the image and I really do not like that. Is there some way to get the old shareable images with just the headline and subheadline?
Canva has a free version that will let you do what you want. I think Substack is getting a lot of the same feedback as yours, so they may change the way these look again.
same! loved the old ones
Our team is working on these images as quite a few writers have said they didn't like the update. I've shared your feedback with them directly. Thank you!
That is good to hear, thank you!
The workaround I have found is that you can highlight text and then share that so at least the image has the specific quote you want and not just the random first few lines. Perhaps that is already common knowledge but I didn't know so maybe this can help someone else.
I'm NEW here with Heart, Soul & Monkeys, sharing playful practices to deal with Monkey Mind crap that stops us from creating and living fully. Would anyone want to exchange feedback on our SubStack presence and effectiveness? I moved my subscribers from Mailchimp, mostly folks who know me. I'm a former Big Media creative director, but I often can't see the forest through the trees of my own work. Could use a fresh perspective. So grateful for learning Substack!
Hereโs a helpful link:
What is the Point of Substack? Making Money? Quality? Community?
A Substack Writerโs Thoughts on the Gameโฆ.
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/p/what-is-the-point-of-substack-making
๐ง - are there specific substacks which talk about growing an audience? thanks
there's a whole series called Grow in the On Substack publication :)
I do. But I also talk about all parts of creating a media org including design and tech. There's also:
https://sparkleon.substack.com/
https://www.writersatwork.net/
and a whole host of others tbh.
โ๏ธ gosh so many of you have so may subscribers, I am still stuck in trying to get noticed (harder I know as I am not on the social media circuit).
Glenn
I just wrote about this after a year on the platform :) https://systemchangers.substack.com/p/how-i-got-started-as-a-writer-built
๐ง I have two suggestions to share with other writers.
First, I recently signed up for a paid subscription with a prolific author on Substack whose work has long inspired me. (For the record, that's Chris Hedges, a dissident former bureau chief from the NY Times whose poignant post this week moved me & many others to tears: https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/letter-to-the-children-of-gaza?r=97w99) Getting a paid subscription gave me the opportunity to share a comment on his post reflecting on his writing, as well as shared themes that emerge in my own. I can't tell exactly how many subscriptions it drove to my newsletter, but the comment got some attention and seemed to draw at least some new readers to my work.
Second, I enjoyed a brilliant recap from a fellow writer tracking last night's GOP presidential debate for second place, and took a moment to both reply to her post and also share it on Notes. (Here it is, for others' reference: https://laurajedeed.substack.com/p/the-third-republican-debate-doesnt?) That led to a thoughtful exchange illuminating some points of constructive tension between our respective perspectives, as well as mutual subscriptions to each other's Substack newsletters.
Something about sharing a discourse based on reason, free of ad hominem barbs, felt inspiring. I'm not sure whether that's because I've been trained by social media to expect mendacity, or instead because the character assassination I survived after winning a congressional primary in 2020 forced me to confront bias & Islamophobia that I had previously chosen to ignoreโbut either way, it's nice to build community with people who share an inclination to write and sincerely debate ideas in good faith.
๐ง I'd encourage everyone to experiment more often, discover what you and your readers like (equally important), and not be afraid to pivot and change.
I initially started my Substack to share book reviews, with occasional posts about sharing personal stories about leaving home and finding another one. I then discovered that my subscribers are way more interested in reading personal essays, than my book reviews. So I've decided to flip my strategy to share personal essays, which I enjoy writing more anyways, as the main focus with occasional book reviews. I think my Subtack journey is equal-part sharing stories with others and equal-part self-discovery.
โ๏ธ I recently topped 500 subscribers (finally!) and it's been a long haul. I think it's mainly due to the nature of my work. The humor and comics are personal and sometimes off-kilter. I tend to use Substack as a sandbox to experiment and build up content for book publishing. Anyhow, as for gaining subscribers via social media outlets, I've noticed that Twitter is basically dead. Same with Instragram. But Reddit brings in some traffic. Any other artists had any luck with other social media to bring in subscribers?