With a regular email list, you send your email and that is it. It’s only in the inbox. But, with Substack, you send your email, but it is also a post that can be like a newsletter archive. Then, in future emails, you can backlink to older emails which are also Substack posts. It’s like what you might do on a blog, adding links to older posts, but you have direct access to someone’s inbox and you aren’t dependent upon SEO.
Thank you, I understand now. I’ve been a ConvertKit user for years and am now exploring Substack to do an irl comparison and see if I should dump one in favor of the other. CK allows you to do this too and it’s nice to know the emails live somewhere that’s not a blog that includes all the caveats you just listed.
JR, thanks for your post. Your argument is like a modernized version of Guy Kawasaki's APE, guykawasaki.com/books/ape-author-publisher-entrepreneur. His book made a big impression on me and I find myself quoting it often to aspiring writers.
The one twist I'd add is the power of media. Just after my launch of Projectkin.Substack.com, in November 2023, Substack introduced their media post features (audio and video) only to add to the functionality with transcripts and more in the months that followed. I've leveraged those features to not only build an audience, but enhance it with a sense of community.
At some future point, I anticipate writing a non-fiction book to encourage family historians in their projects (and as a Projectkin.org fundraiser). In the meantime, everything I'm doing in Substack has helped to build not only my relationship with my readers, but also my readers' relationships with each other — hence a community.
I love your tip about rethinking notes as social media. It feels a little painful in that I'm here to get away from social media, but I get the point and the opportunity to reshare from here is compelling. Thank you!
I don’t understand this part: Send emails regularly to your subscribers, who are then available to review on Substack so you can create backlinks.
Review what? Backlinks to your blog posts? I’m genuinely curious, can you explain this a bit?
With a regular email list, you send your email and that is it. It’s only in the inbox. But, with Substack, you send your email, but it is also a post that can be like a newsletter archive. Then, in future emails, you can backlink to older emails which are also Substack posts. It’s like what you might do on a blog, adding links to older posts, but you have direct access to someone’s inbox and you aren’t dependent upon SEO.
Thank you, I understand now. I’ve been a ConvertKit user for years and am now exploring Substack to do an irl comparison and see if I should dump one in favor of the other. CK allows you to do this too and it’s nice to know the emails live somewhere that’s not a blog that includes all the caveats you just listed.
I appreciate the clarification!
Thanks for this. I started a few days ago to share stories, and now I'm trying to learn how to use the app. Appreciate the words of encouragement!
How? Seriously…I mean I’m a university researcher/administrator and I’m struggling to understand. 🤷🏻♂️
JR, thanks for your post. Your argument is like a modernized version of Guy Kawasaki's APE, guykawasaki.com/books/ape-author-publisher-entrepreneur. His book made a big impression on me and I find myself quoting it often to aspiring writers.
The one twist I'd add is the power of media. Just after my launch of Projectkin.Substack.com, in November 2023, Substack introduced their media post features (audio and video) only to add to the functionality with transcripts and more in the months that followed. I've leveraged those features to not only build an audience, but enhance it with a sense of community.
At some future point, I anticipate writing a non-fiction book to encourage family historians in their projects (and as a Projectkin.org fundraiser). In the meantime, everything I'm doing in Substack has helped to build not only my relationship with my readers, but also my readers' relationships with each other — hence a community.
I love your tip about rethinking notes as social media. It feels a little painful in that I'm here to get away from social media, but I get the point and the opportunity to reshare from here is compelling. Thank you!
I’m finding Substack an interesting platform. I’ve brought my email list here. I’ve sent out 2 so far.
But please tell me how to do a blog post compared to a newsletter. Thx.
Working on figuring out podcasts.