This is inspiring :) I’m new to Substack and trying to find my way with little engagement as it’s early days. Would you have any advice on how to successfully promote a Substack when it seems that Twitter and Insta aren’t keen on allowing reach for posts with ‘Substack’ in the URL? Thanks :)
This is inspiring :) I’m new to Substack and trying to find my way with little engagement as it’s early days. Would you have any advice on how to successfully promote a Substack when it seems that Twitter and Insta aren’t keen on allowing reach for posts with ‘Substack’ in the URL? Thanks :)
Thanks Nat! My best advice is probably two-fold. The first part, the hard part, is that a large online audience almost never happens overnight. It grows gradually, but gains momentum the larger it gets. The people with the biggest Substack audiences are almost all people who had large, highly engaged audiences elsewhere before they signed up. I started using Twitter a lot about TEN years ago (good god, the horror), and was a regular user for about three years before I gained any kind of following. I don't really know how the social media landscape works these days, to be honest. TikTok? It is a foreign land to me. So in terms of "promoting" one's Substack outside of Substack in 2023, I don't really know. I have seen Anne Helen Petersen of Culture Study have a lot of success on Twitter with the way she presents her Substacks posts, putting them in a thread with the link in each one. I should really do that more myself, but it lends itself best to topical essays or articles. On Instagram you can create a gallery of images related to your post. And I don't know about TikTok, alas. I was lucky enough to have a decent online platform, such as it is, by about 2017, 18 months after my first book came out. However, what I have seen over and over again online is that it takes persistence. Find what you really want to be doing in terms of your writing, do it as well as you can, and do it consistently. Then keep on doing it, for longer than you think you need to, without anyone seeming to notice. It's hard to keep posting when no one is reading you. I started posting on Substack in December of 2020. One of my earliest posts still has just 20 views! It went out to one subscriber—me. Even with a large Twitter following, it took a long time for me to find my readers here. A year later, a post in December 2021 had about 2K views. Now it's more like 15K. With Substack, I think each writer learns what works best for them. You write and find out what resonates with readers. You engage with other writers on points of genuine interest and build community. You find out what works, and what doesn't. You find your voice and your topic or topics. Most of all, you find out what is sustainable for YOU in the given format. So I guess my advice is sort of boring, but honest: have patience, work hard, stick with it. Find genuine points of connection with others doing what you're doing. That is the basis. If you want to look at your Substack writing as a business, then we have to adhere to the rules of business: make it, sell it, build awareness. The "it" that you're making is a newsletter people enjoy and rely on. It's hard to convince people to "buy" it if your brand is unknown and you don't have a lot of posts yet. With few posts, there isn't much to "sell," even if the selling in question is a free sign up. But over time, that will change. It's good to ask yourself, what stage am I in? Am I still at the "making it" stage? Am I ready to sell? Are we ready for the awareness part? The making it can feel grueling at first, but it's also where the magic happens. Your Substack looks rally interesting, I subscribed!
Goodness: "Find what you really want to be doing in terms of your writing, do it as well as you can, and do it consistently. Then keep on doing it, for longer than you think you need to, without anyone seeming to notice." Best advice I've read in a long, long time!
This is amazing. Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a thorough and thought-out piece. I appreciate it.
I probably do want results faster than is possible :) I guess it's because I have spent so much time avoiding putting my writing out in public, so now I'm reading into the relative silence. I agree, it's taking time and being consistent that matters.
Thank you for following -- I appreciate it. There's a level of 'feeling my way' at the moment. I haven't settled on a theme but it is early days!
Thanks again, Summer. I'll revisit your reply and digest the great advice.
This is inspiring :) I’m new to Substack and trying to find my way with little engagement as it’s early days. Would you have any advice on how to successfully promote a Substack when it seems that Twitter and Insta aren’t keen on allowing reach for posts with ‘Substack’ in the URL? Thanks :)
Thanks Nat! My best advice is probably two-fold. The first part, the hard part, is that a large online audience almost never happens overnight. It grows gradually, but gains momentum the larger it gets. The people with the biggest Substack audiences are almost all people who had large, highly engaged audiences elsewhere before they signed up. I started using Twitter a lot about TEN years ago (good god, the horror), and was a regular user for about three years before I gained any kind of following. I don't really know how the social media landscape works these days, to be honest. TikTok? It is a foreign land to me. So in terms of "promoting" one's Substack outside of Substack in 2023, I don't really know. I have seen Anne Helen Petersen of Culture Study have a lot of success on Twitter with the way she presents her Substacks posts, putting them in a thread with the link in each one. I should really do that more myself, but it lends itself best to topical essays or articles. On Instagram you can create a gallery of images related to your post. And I don't know about TikTok, alas. I was lucky enough to have a decent online platform, such as it is, by about 2017, 18 months after my first book came out. However, what I have seen over and over again online is that it takes persistence. Find what you really want to be doing in terms of your writing, do it as well as you can, and do it consistently. Then keep on doing it, for longer than you think you need to, without anyone seeming to notice. It's hard to keep posting when no one is reading you. I started posting on Substack in December of 2020. One of my earliest posts still has just 20 views! It went out to one subscriber—me. Even with a large Twitter following, it took a long time for me to find my readers here. A year later, a post in December 2021 had about 2K views. Now it's more like 15K. With Substack, I think each writer learns what works best for them. You write and find out what resonates with readers. You engage with other writers on points of genuine interest and build community. You find out what works, and what doesn't. You find your voice and your topic or topics. Most of all, you find out what is sustainable for YOU in the given format. So I guess my advice is sort of boring, but honest: have patience, work hard, stick with it. Find genuine points of connection with others doing what you're doing. That is the basis. If you want to look at your Substack writing as a business, then we have to adhere to the rules of business: make it, sell it, build awareness. The "it" that you're making is a newsletter people enjoy and rely on. It's hard to convince people to "buy" it if your brand is unknown and you don't have a lot of posts yet. With few posts, there isn't much to "sell," even if the selling in question is a free sign up. But over time, that will change. It's good to ask yourself, what stage am I in? Am I still at the "making it" stage? Am I ready to sell? Are we ready for the awareness part? The making it can feel grueling at first, but it's also where the magic happens. Your Substack looks rally interesting, I subscribed!
Goodness: "Find what you really want to be doing in terms of your writing, do it as well as you can, and do it consistently. Then keep on doing it, for longer than you think you need to, without anyone seeming to notice." Best advice I've read in a long, long time!
I concur :)
What a wonderful answer. I’m in for a year, Summer.
This is amazing. Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a thorough and thought-out piece. I appreciate it.
I probably do want results faster than is possible :) I guess it's because I have spent so much time avoiding putting my writing out in public, so now I'm reading into the relative silence. I agree, it's taking time and being consistent that matters.
Thank you for following -- I appreciate it. There's a level of 'feeling my way' at the moment. I haven't settled on a theme but it is early days!
Thanks again, Summer. I'll revisit your reply and digest the great advice.