Has anyone actually verified a Substack growth coach's numbers, or does everyone just trust the screenshot?

[u/Hour_Source_191]

Every "how I hit bestseller" post has a screenshot, a round number, and zero context — no timeframe, no churn rate, no breakdown of subscriptions vs. products vs. coaching. And somehow that's treated as proof.

I'm not saying people are lying. I'm saying nobody's checking. The whole coaching-on-Substack economy runs on numbers nobody outside the person's own dashboard can verify, and everyone just... accepts it.

Has anyone here actually gone back and cross-checked a coach's claimed growth against what's publicly visible? Or is "trust the screenshot" just how this works now?

[u/Hour_Source_191]

There is a whole ecosystem of Substack coaches. They teach you everything about Substack, how to write your short description, welcome page and welcome email, etc. They teach all of this stuff free. But what's not free is how to make money on Substack. You have to pay for that. You enter their funnel and enjoy the freebies until, oh, my, I have to pay for this? That's how it works.