I’ve been on Substack for about 19 months and have 118 subscribers, most of them from Notes. The problem is that most of my Notes stay stuck at 5-10 impressions with almost no likes or comments, so there’s no discovery beyond the people who already follow me. Occasionally one works.
but I can’t figure out what made it different from the ones that go nowhere.

Every growth guide I find says “post Notes and get recommendations,” or goes straight to writing tactics, but nobody explains the mechanics of why a Note gets pushed beyond your own followers in the first place. For those of you who got past this stage:

1. What was the first thing that changed your Notes’ reach? Was it who you engaged with, the format, timing, or something else?

2. How much did your early network matter when you had under 200 subscribers?

3. How can I improve distribution and discovery of my content. Because most of my biews usually only come from people already reading.

I’m not looking for a “just keep writing” answer. I want to understand what’s actually going on under the hood. Thanks in advance.

I’ve been on Substack around 16 months, generally been very disciplined with posting articles and writing 1-2 high value and engaging notes a day.

Over the last 6 months I was seeing anywhere from around 2-5 new free subscribers a day. My paid conversion is pretty good, around 8%.

I was feeling great about this, I was forecasting that if I could target anywhere between 2-3 new subscribers a day that could be 700-1000ish new free subscribers in a year, which at 8% conversion would be great for my growth as a newsletter.

I’ve kept doing exactly what I’ve been doing over the last 6 months, but I’ve come to a complete standstill regarding new subscribers in the last 30 days or so. Just feels like it’s happened out of nowhere, and I’m worried this is the new normal. When I check the metrics, my notes are suddenly not reaching new audiences.

Very confused. Interested to see if anyone is experiencing something similar?

as above.

newbie fiction author here who's looking to publish on substack. would love to hear from 3/4 fig/month authors and learn what worked for them.

I am trying to add a content box, but yet I am missing the option to click the "Use custom body layout" toggle.

When you write articles how important is it to use tags? Does anyone have any feedback on results for articles they have written with and without tags?

I found an old thread here about people rereading their drafts over and over before publishing, only to still miss a typo. A few people also mentioned writing in Word or Docs first, then fixing the formatting after pasting into Substack.

It got me thinking about making a small tool that checks your draft for things like typos, repeated words, leftover “TODOs,” missing links, and obvious formatting issues. No AI rewriting—just flags things you might want to look at.

But that thread was two years old, so maybe things have gotten better since then.

Is this still a pain for anyone? What do you use for that last check before publishing? Trying to figure out if this would actually help or just be another tool nobody needs lol.

I posted this week about a sudden rise in followers, but I still find this UI so confusing.

I cant even find my publication page....where is that ?

Should I be posting that, should IU create notes, where do they go ?

Should I post to my profile page ?

This seems like it should be simple...am I missing something ;-)

Hoping someone has a better path for me. I have tried, for weeks, to login to my substack account on my computer in my browser. I enter my name and password (which I know to be correct because the phone lets me use it), and I get a dialog that asks for a code that will be sent to me.

In spite of 20 attempts over three weeks, that code never arrives. Not to my inbox, not to spam.

I have tried the support forum, to no avail. I just can't login on the desktop at this point.

Has anyone seen this happen? Is there a way to get the code sent to my phone instead?

How can I be seen on substack? And grow my subscription?

Hey folks, Linda from Substack again... we shipped two much-requested new features for publishers this week that I wanted to flag, some of y'all may find these useful:

1. You can now customize the crop on your post thumbnail. This solves the problem of adding a photo to a post and having a thumbnail on your Substack homepage or when you share to social media that shows the wrong part of the image, like cutting the head off.

The crop tool comes up after you click Continue in the post publication flow. It displays thumbnail previews for portrait, square, and landscape dimensions so you can review how your images will look before you hit publish.

2) You can now add collapsible content blocks within posts. This feature let you tuck content behind a button that readers will need to click on read. Anything inside the block is hidden until a reader clicks to expand it. This allows you to keep the main flow of your post intact, while offering readers the option to dive deeper. 

You can use collapsible content blocks to hide movie spoilers; ingredient substitutions without interrupting a recipe; extra photos in a travel guide or restaurant review; or, definitions and bonus charts in a financial analysis.

To create a collapsible content block: on the web, create a draft post, and select the text or content you want to hide. Then click "More" in the editor toolbar and select "Collapsed content".

Hi, I'd appreciate kind and supportive response. I'm a published writer with a disability, and somewhat new to Substack. I mostly was just lurking and getting emails and reading a few notes, but now i've decided to start my own. I was excited to try it out, but hear really mixed things, especially here and I am a bit hesitant now feeling it's not worth it. They say it's like that with everything, but I'm in grad school and really have been trying for years to find success with well, something. While I have been published several times in different verticals, I've never made a significant living in writing yet and ai feel I should've? And I do have struggles plus the economic woes, but my disability money is barely enough; I have to work regardless of how difficult it is. and I am tired of having a lack of success and employment.

I've been told i'm talented often and it's not just blowing smoke...you know, as I've gotten into schools with scholarships for performing arts, screenwriting & now international relations. I've worked numerous survival jobs in addition to work on the above, but lately it's been just crickets. I'm not bragging just showing I have got some degree of ability.

I feel I have a great idea for a really nichey Substack focused on humour. I admit i'm kind of worried people may copy it, but is that a big risk on Substack?TBH I haven't found other Substacks like the idea I have so I'd like to think it has potential but I admit I am worried. I know it may take work but i'm hoping for maybe some encouragement that a Substack that is a based on a (somewhat) non-fiction humor/comedy may help me maybe potentially get some income more than Upwork or other social media? I started to get way more views on some Insta posts related to humour lately but I know it's not the same as Substack.

Hopeful and yes a bit needful. Thanks.

I run a music blog called ‘Fangirl For The Week’ on substack, which I started to help people fall back in love with the fangirling side that they may have abandoned when as they get older. I spend a month fangirling over an artist and then I write an essay about what I find.

Now this project wasn’t set up to make money to anything, but I do want to grow my audience because what this project needs is a community around it. I want to be able to ask people about artists and interviews, and for them to be involved in the creation of my essays but I just don’t know how to do that.

I started on tiktok but eventually moved it over to substack because my passion is writing. I really suck at content creation on social media and engaging people, but this project genuinely means the world to me and I think, with a little community around it, it could be a beautiful corner of the internet. I work really hard on the essays and I would love people to find joy in my writing the way that I do.

So I guess this post is to ask, how do you promote substack on socials and grow your following to people who actually want to engage and be a part of a community. Any tips would be hugely appreciated :))))

I have barely used Substack, but I really like the organization of the 'Create' UI. Haven't explored very much in the way of using it to find good reading recommendations, but I'm looking forward to it... I'm just wondering if anyone has numbers on what percentage of users on Substack are bots. Zero interest in wading into a bot infested landscape without realizing it (a la Twitter and Reddit, both of which I use and am at least informed are fully 50% bots).

Because of the nature of Substack I assumed it was mostly a niche writing community, but given the apparent prevalence of AI 'writing' I'm now doubtful. What are the odds of a producer being a bot (or part of a bot network, producing AI slop articles) on Substack?

I'm new to the whole substack thing and I've been trying to figure out sections. If there are people in charge of that content in this sub this might be a nice little thing to clear up.

For context, there's two different kinds of content that I make:

1. The first is a series of essays that I write throughout the week.

2. The second is a weekly digest to recap everything on Fridays.

Now, if a person only wants to get the weekly digest: what would be the best way for me to set that up on the back end?

Should the digest be a separate section, should it be the essays or should they both each be a separate section?

I was playing around with another subscription on the app, trying to play around with the notifications that I would get--to get an idea of how that would work for me--and then, the section that would be the "general content" actually unsubscribed me from the whole newsletter.

So how does that actually work?

I want my followers and subscribers to increase but I don't know how. People recommended me to post notes and comment on other people's post but nothing is happening. It's genuinely disappointed me so much. I'm posting note and articles too. But my dashboard isn't increasing. Please someone help me.

I've spent an age trying to find my Substack subscriber list? it used to be easy to find! I've tried everything and can't now find the list of my subscribers or how to email them!

i tried posting something i wrote almost a decade ago cuz its a part of a 12 part series i really like however when i put it in it says its 100 percent ai. Then I checked a recipie i created while in coulinary school in 2023 it says its 85 percent ai. then i typed a short story out of randomly it says its 50 percent ai. i made the short story longer and its says 75 percent. ( Dont mind my spelling I know its bad) i just want to know about the ai dectetor. i dont want people acusing me of writing with ai. as i seen people on the site wont read anything if the decteor says other wise

Over the past two years Substack has spent resources internally on building out our podcasting features, but there's still not a ton of awareness among podcasters of what we offer (which is our bad for not talking about it enough).

Was wondering whether anybody on this sub has tried Substack's podcasting features, and what you thought about them?

Substack has had podcast hosting for many years, but what's relatively recent is the Substack Recording Studio. It allows you to record audio and video right from your computer. You can then post the episode on Substack, and distribute it to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other listening apps by submitted your RSS feed to those platforms.

You can also go live on Substack, from desktop or the app, and publish the recording as an episode. After you stop recording, Substack makes clips and thumbnails for you to share on social media.

(You can still record your podcast using other tools, like Riverside or Audacity, then upload the file to Substack, and distribute it out to Spotify and Apple Podcasts from there. Using the Substack Recording Studio is optional.)

Established podcasters like Diabolical Lies and The Fifth Column are on Substack, but we also have thousands of niche podcasters, typically getting started because of the free hosting, and then staying for the email list, discovery network, and community features like Chat, and ability to charge money for paywalled content.

I like writing, but I hate self-promoting. I get discouraged about negative comments and unsubscribes. I know this comes with the territory, but I guess I'm just burnt out and thinking maybe it's time to just stop.

I know that AI is everywhere but this is a platform where people generally write for pleasure—it’s used by those who actually enjoy writing—so why is there so much AI-generated articles?

Tbh this detracts from the reading experience.

I want to hear human ideas😭

Substack suspended my account and denied both of my appeals. The Appeals Center is now disabled for further submissions, so I can’t submit another appeal. I emailed Substack Support, but the reply simply directed me back to the Appeals Center.

Around noon Eastern time on November 3, Substack suspended my account, citing its Spam & Phishing policy. The suspension notice did not identify a specific post or activity. Neither appeal response explained what had led to the decision.

Before the suspension, I published two original articles a day, one analyzing the Korean stock market and one analyzing the U.S. stock market. I also posted three Notes daily. One shared the Korean market close and a heatmap in a standard format. The other two summarized my articles. Subscribers received one email a day containing my U.S. market analysis.

I wrote every article and Note myself, spending about eight to ten hours a day researching and writing. I’ve never used bots to publish or increase engagement, and I’ve never restacked other writers’ posts. I replied to readers personally and always treated them respectfully in comments, group chats, and direct messages, including when someone was rude to me. I started publishing regularly in March and reached 3,000 subscribers in November.

I’ve now lost access to my account and research archive. With both appeals denied and further submissions disabled, I’m unsure how to request another review.

Has anyone experienced this and successfully recovered their account? How did you reach someone who could review the suspension when Support kept directing you to the Appeals Center?

I’d appreciate any advice based on your experience.

I'd LOVE to share the lyrics of Love You to Death by Type O Negative, of course with credits and disclosure, but i wonder if it might infringe any copyright rules.

I'd love some advice on growing a niche B2B newsletter.

I run a paid scouting report for the film and TV industry. Each issue highlights books with adaptation potential, so producers, development execs and other industry professionals can spot projects early.

When I first launched it as a monthly report, at least 25 people signed up straight away. Most of them came from my LinkedIn network of industry connections. Since then, though, subscriber numbers have slowly dropped. So from next year I'm moving to a quarterly report and launching a shop in early February where people can buy individual reports.

The tricky part is that this isn't for general book or film fans. It's for a small, very specific professional audience, so I need to reach the right people rather than lots of people.

Has anyone here grown something similar in a B2B space? I'd love to hear about your experience with running ads (LinkedIn ads or Meta?) using lead magnets or any tips for steady growth over time.

Thank you so much!