I grew my Substack from 439 to 451 free subscribers in just 11 months

[matt_s]

> So, considering that you’re likely going to fail, at least pick something you’re going to enjoy failing at!

This is the golden nugget that got me subscribed. I love satire (and am pumped Jon Stewart is back on TDS) and this is a good perspective to trying out side projects.

[klabb3]

This isn’t satire to me, that’s genuinely great life advice. I use it all the time. For instance, a difficult stressful tech interview was passed with flying colors using that psychological method.

In general parlance (American in particular), a conditional negative (eg “if I got cancer”) is usually verboten, like you cause a side effect (=killing the vibe) even though the condition isn’t materialized. You have to look past that to get the golden nugget.

Assuming you’re gonna fail, you’ll have learnt a lot and enjoyed it. You don’t confuse external opportunity and expectation with your passions and interests. Psychologically it also reduces the stakes. It doesn’t really matter if the outcome is failure or success, the point is that it’s constant.

[chiefalchemist]

It's not limited to side projects. "Failure" is the norm. It's what happens nearly every time, all the time.

Once you embrace this then you're spitting distance from, "What do I have to lose?"

If you don't try, you end up in the same place. If you do try, you also likely end up in the same place. But oh the joy of pulling that slot machine handle and watching the wheels spin. There's simply no joy at all in not trying. So why not try?

[duxup]

And you’ll probably be a lot better at it too. Go the extra mile with less mental stress and so on.

[apwell23]

> Jon Stewart is back on TDS

I thought you meant Trump derangement syndrome. Which is also a totally valid statement.

[ryukoposting]

Darn, I've been doing it all wrong! Guess I need to migrate my entire blog to Substack so that I can have a concept of "subscribers" and the necessary analytics to give me a dopamine rush any time the number gets bigger.

[jasode]

>Guess I need to migrate my entire blog to Substack so that I can have a concept of "subscribers" and the necessary analytics to give me a dopamine rush any time the number gets bigger.

I get what your sarcasm is about but a friendly FYI if you didn't know... the purpose of Substack is writing for subscribers. Building subscribers (and hopefully paying subscribers) is why the founder of Substack created it. (My previous comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31083741)

Stratechery's writer Ben Thompson quit his 6-figure job at Microsoft and was able to make millions per year by writing for an audience of email newsletter subscribers. That's the type of financial success that many writers using the Substack platform are trying to replicate. (https://www.google.com/search?q=Stratechery+writer+subscribe...)

You're not "doing it wrong" because you're not the intended user of Substack. An analogy would be me saying "I guess I'm playing music wrong because I just sat around the campfire with my guitar and sang "99 Bottles Of Beers On The Wall". I guess I need to put my songs on Spotify to get a rush from watching the # listener streams go up."

My mockery of the musicians on Spotify by me playing dumb about not also not putting my music on it -- is irrelevant to those artists on that platform trying to make money.

The author of this thread's article is also trying to monetize his writing. He admitted he's not there yet so wanted to "blow off some steam" -- via some satire -- about the endless advice to "work harder" to grow his audience. His satirical piece doesn't change the fact that he still wants to grow his Substack audience to some success like Ben Thompson.

If people don't know what the Substack platform is actually about, then I can see where it looks like the writers are just there for unhealthy vanity gazing.

[gowld]

Journaling is great. It helps organize your thinking.

Why do you publish, if not to reach readers? If you want to reach readers, why not put some effort into that part too?

[jacquesm]

Why? My most enjoyable project doesn't have any tracking at all, I don't know if it has just 1 (me) user, 1,000 or a million. Every other week or so I get some confirmation that people actually use it and it always is a pleasant surprise, so much more worthwhile than just to see a number go up.

Maybe there is a businessmodel to be made with a platform that shows engagement metrics but they're not the real thing, just a bunch of counters that are incremented regardless of actual use. That way you get to feel good...

[rchaud]

The person writes for a living, so having analytics is necessary. Subscribers are the most direct possible audience for a book, which is usually part of how writers support themselves.

[prmoustache]

I never understood the appeal in platforms like Medium and Substack.

But then I am a pathological contrarian and have an allergic reaction to anything any kind of advertising signal to buy, force you to have an account for consultation, subscribe, send like and whatever and tend to avoid most of these platforms. You are free to add an rss xml file to your website though.

[tiborsaas]

You don't have to deal with any tech stuff, basically that's the appeal. No server management, no separate newsletter service, no nothing. Log in to your account, write and publish with built in monetisation.

[poisonborz]

The appeal is that you get exposure from their readerbase. They ship you a - minor, but still - audience with the chance that it grows larger. It's not about the money and getting subscribers, very few reach that, and every author hates ads (the downside of these platforms, Substack is much better there).

It's about you liking to write, and liking that people read what you write, not income.

[alberth]

They are the modern day "OpEd" of physical newspapers.

You publish there because they already have a large reader base, so that your voice can be heard.

[deely3]

For me its ok. It looks like this: I found the author that Im imterested in and copied blog url into my RSS reader. Works for Substack.

[wruza]

I remember watching a video from an LA real estate review youtuber where she shared how much money she makes on different platforms, including articles on medium. It ranged from $9k to $30k per month, medium alone. And her content overall wasn't even... sexualized (anticipating the obvious). Neither was she a "stellar" content creator, I mean there was no stupid "show" in each content piece.

She didn't show any sign of being able to set up her own blog.

[rchaud]

The appeal of Substack is akin to sharecropping on the land of a different feudal lord. Instead of fighting SEO optimizers on Google, you can now be a guinea pig for Substack as they figure out how to make money.

[marban]

My newsletter stalled at 5k subs, and writing every single day had a severe negative impact on my life, so I just stopped after 2 years. Life is too short to chase becoming another Morning Brew when you rely on WOM as your sole growth factor.

[taubek]

Content curation and creation is really full time job. Especially if you have a publishing cadence that you don’t want to break. Publishing every day must have been really exhausting.

[gowld]

Did you know your readers even wanted a letter ever single day, instead of once a week?

[klelatti]

I have a 'second' Substack set up five months ago. I've never sent an email or mentioned or promoted it anywhere. The main page just says coming soon. *

It has 26 subscribers from 123 all time page views, is read in six states and eight countries.

* It will eventually be used for a new project.

[zero-sharp]

Yea well I learned C++ in just 21 days

[gowld]

Sams taught myself C++ in 24 hours.

The time frame wasn't even the most impressive part. Sams merging with my ego was the real achievement.

[throwaway71271]

goddamnit this got me!

[Brajeshwar]

Haaa! Nice.

So, I have a Medium Account since its early beta when your Twitter account was used as your Medium ID. Somewhere down the line, I wrote/sync my articles and a few articles got picked up. It then began to grow and has about 4,500 Followers by the time I abandoned my account.

A few people have advised me on how to “spam” and “SEO” and “Affiliate” and others. I'm not keen on it. And no, I have absolutely no idea how it grew.

[keikobadthebad]

Well he has 900 now, time for the lambo.

[rob74]

11 months of posting 3 articles per month: 12 $ (subscribers)

being mentioned on HN: priceless

[garrickvanburen]

The installment #1 of my “For Starters” substack was about how failure is inevitable

https://forstarters.substack.com/p/for-starters-1-the-end-is...

[scrapcode]

To add to the humor of this post, the author with an engineering background miscalculates 451 - 439 to be 11 new subscribers.

[gowld]

It's an engineer's dozent.

[occsceo]

Awesome work here OP.

[kebman]

Hm, I've got almost 500 subs on YouTube since 2006. I'm equally amazed every time someone subs to my trash. xD

[allium]

There’s a bit of sour truth in this. I don’t think it’s Substack’s fault, but the era in which quality content could grow an audience through organic means is over. TikTok is more of a symptom than a driver, but the Internet in this Big Platform, enshittifed era is just as much a wasteland as TV was in the “idiot box” age.

Ten years ago, if the powers that be wanted to put you to the big sleep, they had to MOC you. Now, they don’t have to do anything because unless you have the funds and time to build a platform in today’s low-effort, low-attention world, they know you will be ignored.

[u32480932048]

MOC?

[benreesman]

Adult humor at one’s own expense or the expense of “public figures” was celebrated, not cancelled, in the halcyon days of yore like 5 years ago.

This used to fly: https://jesuschristsiliconvalley-blog.tumblr.com/ and the world was better for it.

Bravo, Swiftian sarcastic satirical Sir or Madame.

[Loughla]

God, I love that site.

[runamuck]

Taylor Swift writes satire? (Ducks object thrown at my head)

[pipeline_peak]

So, a +0.97% increase?

[hannes0]

It's a whooping 9.7‰ increase!

Some would say it's even a 27.3‰ increase, but I think that's a lie.

[cranberryturkey]

haha. nice. man i can't grow shit online like the old days.

[allium]

It was always hard, but it used to be possible. These days, though, you have to compete for visibility against people who are as good at manipulation as you are at actually doing stuff.

Platform capitalism has made the “idiot box” age of TV downright civilized in comparison—at least they didn’t eat Tide pods in the trash cable era.

[sirwhinesalot]

Pfff, I have like... 10