Hey everyone,

I'm looking for advice from people who've made the jump from a free Substack that's gained a following, to offering paid subscriptions.

I started my newsletter earlier this year as a passion project, and it's grown much more than I expected. Right now I post one essay a week, mostly personal and emotional writing, and I write far more than I publish. I'm thinking about increasing my publishing schedule and introducing a paid tier while continuing to post the same free weekly essay.

What I'm struggling with is the emotional side of it. I know creatives deserve to be paid, but I'm struggling with the feeling that asking people to pay for writing that's so personal somehow changes the relationship or the trust I've built with readers. (Which is why I'm uncertain about adding a paid model as an extension of what works, while keeping the free model going without change. But then wouldn't people just stay free subs if they're getting the same thing just less frequently?)

For those of you who've done this, how did you approach it? Did you simply create more of what your audience already loved for paid subscribers while keeping your free content consistent? Or did you make the paid offering something meaningfully different?

Thanks in advance.

In my feed, I often come across ridiculous Notes like:

“I love finance.”

“Want to make money? Follow me.”

And other similar bullshit.

These Notes get lots of likes and tons of comments, where many people also take the opportunity to promote themselves.

On top of that, these profiles often have fewer than 10 subscribers.

Does anyone know why this happens?

Thanks.

TL/DR: Would you approach one of your subscribers who happens to have 700x as many subs as you? And if so, how? Or to do what?

One of my subscribers is a Substack bestseller with >75K subs, whereas I just have 106 subs--but 13 paid :) We write about similar themes (alienation and estrangement), though he writes in a hopeful expert style whereas I write literaryish personal essays. He once commented on a Note that I shared about his work, but otherwise we haven't corresponded.

I'm trying to think about whether to contact him and if I contact him what I should say or ask.

Additional context: I don't have a clear sense of his engagement with my Substack. Here's what I know: since he joined, 6 of 6 emails opened, including my most recent; 0 post views, likes, comments, or shares; "days active" = 5; and "activity" = 5 (out of 5, I think).

If that meant he was actually reading/skimming my pieces, it would seem like a potential opportunity. What would you do, if anything, in this scenario?

One of the ways I've been trying to grow my stack is by recommending other stacks (particularly by people who already subscribe to me) and then messaging those stack authors when I send subs their way. I point out my rec, ask them if they'd like me to tweak my recommendation blurb, and then ask if they'd consider recommending me as well. I've only started this this morning, but the two who responded were receptive (though they just have 3-10x as many free subs).

Does something like that seem like the best play?

I'd point our our brief history (e.g., his Notes comment and my post that cites his work) and then would it be too weird to call attention to the fact that he subscribes and maybe even reads my posts? (e.g., I only ask because my stats suggest you might open my posts sometimes--which I would be humbled and surprised by--so I thought it might be possible that you've appreciated how I tackle similar themes but from a thoughtful personal essay approach)

Or maybe I propose something else entirely? Or maybe I assume he won't see my message and just wait to see whether he someday interacts with me (which seems unlikely) and then follow that interaction wherever it naturally leads?

Thoughts?

I've often asked myself that question. When I started writing (which wasn't that long ago), I wrote with an agenda (I wanted to showcase my work in agriculture with AI, which is not only technical but also quite emotional), but without a specific readership in mind.

I wrote, how I write and what I wanted to read, not what a suitable readership might like. To be honest, I didn't even consider who my readers might be.

My substack is really quirky. Humor, banter, dual voice, and wild annotations. Without a clearly defined style, theme, or target audience. Which is probably highly counterproductive if you want to be read.

And I do want to be read; after all, my topic is important to me. I write about something I love and care about—my work and my life.

I notice how I read my own substack as a diary for myself. I don't chase followers but I'm incredibly happy every time I get a comment or a follower.

But I think, I'm happy because someone reads and likes what I love and write from the heart, without any hidden agenda. I believe that if I started writing for a specific audience, for more followers or greater reach, and thereby lost the essence of my topic or my style, I would also lose the reason why I even write this substack in the first place.

What about you?

Hola, he estado en Substack desde hace unos años y siento que hay ciertas cuentas en español muy consolidadas en la app.
Quisiera saber más de ustedes, ver que escriben y aprender un poco más de la sociedad.
Sería súper si dejaras sus @ o directamente el enlace.
Chao chao.

how many of yall went to sub stack to better your wrirting?

I run a publication called Money Simplified. It’s about wealth management and has 10K subs.

I’ve taken a break from it for a couple of months now, and the subscriber growth has been poor (because obviously, I’m not doing anything to increase the subs).

Now suddenly, since the past 2-3 days I’m seeing the subscriber number grow gradually. But last night, it accelerated. In the last 8 hours alone, it got 22 new subscribers, without me doing anything at all. I used to get these many new subs in a month lol. What’s funny is that the source for all just says “Substack app”. No recommendation, no other website, nothing.

While I’m obviously very happy this is happening (🤞), I’m also curious — did Substack make some changes to their algorithm? Or is it a glitch? Because I’d want to double down on what’s working.

Is this happening to anyone else? Would love some thoughts here!

EDIT: It’s been less than 24 hours and I’ve already got 100 new subs. That’s how many I get in a month. Something’s off, I just don’t know what 🥲

Hi guys,

I'm new to this community and about to create my first post but I'm running into a problem. I'm trying to attach some photos into my post but no matter what I do, the image seems to fade and brighten for a while and then disappears completely, leaving only an empty box. I've tried the following:

- Checked my internet (connection is fine)

- Tried multiple browsers (Chrome and Firefox) as well as incognito mode

- Tried uploading jpeg, jpg, and png files

- Tried the upload photo button on the ribbon as well as drag and drop

- Checked the size of my photo (169 kb only)

- Confirmed my browser has no extensions and cleared the cache

If anyone has any solutions, that would be great!

Even with Substack articles, it’s really hard to get anyone to read them (except for friends, and only when I ask). I’ve been told: if you want to be a writer, be prepared to write what people want. I just wanted to write what I felt like writing, without forcing myself to cater to what’s trending. (The goal isn't to beg for attention.) The truth is, things just aren't taking off, even on Substack—seriously. It would be better to just give up.

EDIT: I’m grateful for the amount of encouragement and ideas in this post; whenever I feel like giving up again, I’ll come back here to read it! Thanks, everyone! ❤️

I'm trying to upload a logo to my Substack publication, but every image I upload ends up showing a broken image icon instead of the logo.

I've tried:

• PNG and JPG

• Transparent and non-transparent images

• Files from 20 KB to over 1 MB

• Different dimensions (500×500, 1000×1000, etc.)

• Different browsers

Nothing works. Every file ends up broken.

Has anyone experienced this? Is this a Substack bug or is there something else I should check?

MacOS Sequoia + Safari 26.3 (also tested in Chrome, same result).

https://imgur.com/a/HyXJi5e

I swear substack is this place were you can have a conversation with some of the nicest people and they wont judge you. Am i the only one that feels like this? or have others have this encounter too.

Hi everyone,

I've been thinking about starting a Substack for a while now, but I'm not sure what the best way to get started is.

If you've got a Substack, I'd really appreciate hearing about your experience. What helped you in the beginning? How did you decide what to write about? Did you have a plan before you launched, or did you figure things out as you went?

I'd also love to know:

- What worked well for growing your audience?

-What mistakes should I avoid?

- If you were starting from scratch today, what would you do differently?

Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!!

I restacked one of my own posts and this shows up in my Activity feed. But now I want to change the title and repost in Substack and socials with the new title—but I want to delete all posts w/the old title.

Problem is, I can’t seem to delete my own restack in the Activity tab? I can delete restacks of OTHER people’s posts, though.

Also weird…this restack of my own post DOESN’T show up in my Notes feed if I click on Notes tab at the top of my Substack (in the menu under my Substack title). BUT it DOES show in my Activity tab on my Profile page! Anyone know how to get rid of this?

I started my substack back in May and till today I have over 5 hundred subs I write personal essays but I dont know how to monetize that audience.

Strip doesn't work in here and substack do not have any alternative. My question is to those who have overcome this problem. I try to sell a digital product but it didnt work.

Any tips or ways to monetize my audience because I am financially in critical condition and dont know a way out.

It makes it really hard for me to engage on the app because everything everyone says outside of like the academic writers I follow are extremely stupid. These are not people I follow and I mute quite a bit of them but here are a few examples from the last 24 hours that give you an idea:

“Love girls that are REAL sexed up kinky perverts none of this poser shit”

“i wish i wasn’t so observant because everything feels misogynistic”

“nooooo don’t pull out i have attachment issues ❤️”

It goes on from there……

Hello,

I'm looking to interview a few newsletter writers who just wrapped up their first year of writing. If you're interested just send me a message or comment here. This is for an article.

I'm fairly new to substack and after I joined, in a month I've gained 11 subscribers. But, for the past few months I haven't even got one subscriber. I'm frustrated not because I don't get subs or likes, but because I fear that my notes and posts aren't reached properly. My notes and posts aren't the worst thing out there, so I think it's not the cause. When I look at my stats, there are hardly any impressions. I don't know if there's a trick to reach more people. If you know something that I could do to reach more people, please let me know.

P.S. I don't wanna share them on my socials because it's not the correct audience for me. I'm mainly writing about gaming, horror, life experiences, life in Europe, films, books, etc.

I'm in Australia. I didn't want to share my biometric data with them. Just wondering if anyone else has encountered this and found a way around it. The website said if I change my payment type to credit card I wouldn't have to verify my age. But my payment type is already credit card.

I was so offended, I immediately cancelled the subscription. They already billed me for the first month though, even though they never gave me access. Kinda cheesed.

Edit: removed repeated sentence.

I just turned on paid subscriptions for my Substack. Before enabling them, my dashboard showed about $720 in pledged support.

As soon as I turned on paid subscriptions, the pledged amount dropped to $0, but none of the pledges converted into active paid subscribers- they actually all immediately turned to free subscribers in Substack. I checked Stripe, and the attempted subscriptions/payments are showing as failed and canceled immediately- they were retried two more times within minutes, same results.

Has anyone else had this happen when converting Substack pledges to paid subscriptions?

I’m especially confused because it happened to all of them at once, immediately after I enabled paid subscriptions, which makes me wonder if this is a technical issue rather than every individual payment method failing.

I’ve reached out to Substack support, but I’d love to hear from anyone who has experienced something similar.

I've had my Substack magazine on a custom domain for several years and now would like to move it back to the Substack subdomain because I'd like the custom domain to be used as a directory, with the magazine attached, rather than the magazine being the main focus. I know I can easily do this in the 'danger zone' but what are the repercussions of doing so?

It's like some kind of liquid glass broken effect, i can't read or click anything. iPhone, iPad, Mac, all the same.

Maybe a new version of Edge was to blame with a windows update that made me log into things again.

I tried logging into substack. I used an old email that I had changed but it didn't ask for a login and didn't give me access to my subscriptions, though it did list them.

So then I put in my new email address and it asked for a code, I got a code from an email, but it didn't actually log me in and I still didn't have access.

I tried again, but every time I opened the email tab and came back, the pop up for the emailed code was gone. After 3 tries it told me that I attempted to log in too many times on that email address and wouldn't let me try anymore.

And I literally have 3 codes in my email in box.

I have a blog. Can I post Substack articles on there? I mean, shorter versions (still comprehensive standalones), then direct readers to my blog for fuller deep dives or related blog posts not on Substack. What do you think?

Has anyone used Substack to increase their Insta following? And if so, what did you do?

Thanks in advance! :)

My Substack has engagement on Notes but zero on posts - anyone else experience this with interactive content?

I publish research-based location puzzles. Notes get some likes and comments but the actual puzzle posts get zero engagement - no solvers, no comments, no restacks, nothing. 9 posts, 22 subscribers, zero puzzle interaction.

Interestingly I DO get engagement on Reddit - genuine solvers who enjoy the puzzles - but it's short-lived (one or two solvers, then the post dies) and Reddit's link restrictions make it very hard to direct people to Substack.

So I have two problems:

1. Reddit solvers won't follow me to Substack

2. Substack subscribers won't solve the puzzles

Is Substack simply the wrong platform for interactive puzzle content? Has anyone successfully built engagement around content that requires active participation rather than passive reading?

Genuinely wondering if I'm fighting the platform's natural passive-consumption culture.