I joined Substack 8 months ago. Here's the one thing that helped me grow my email list

My writing teacher asked me last week how people find Memoir Junkie Wannabe Author. A valid question. I decided to dedicate today’s newsletter to answering her question in detail.

How do potential subscribers find me and how do I grow my list? It’s probably something a lot of people wonder when they first join Substack or if they’re thinking about signing up. 

The way I always thought of it was like this: If I create great content, it’ll kind of just happen. That mindset was both right and wrong. Let me explain.

There’s no easy route

Like other folks on this platform, I want to build an audience. But if my source of getting discovered isn’t through Google, how do I gain traction to build emails? 

(Side note: If you want your Substack to be indexed or searchable from Google, you have to verify your Substack URL in Google’s search console. Here’s how to do that. I tried to do it the other day but it kept saying “Verification failed” so I gave up. Despite this, I notice a small amount of traffic coming from Google when I check my dashboard, so maybe it doesn’t matter?) 

Like WordPress or Squarespace, there’s no magic solution to help you suddenly gain a ton of subscribers. Still, I used to wonder why I wasn’t gaining more, faster faster! what’s that ONE post that will be a hit and get me a bunch of subscribers?

I know, I know. I should know better… I’ve been in marketing for over a decade and I know in my brain this isn’t how it works, but my heart was like, yes, it can. 

Over the last eight months, whenever I did notice a bunch of new followers, I realized I had the wrong mindset. Great content is obviously a must, and while I did grow my list slowly by posting solid content regularly (I post every single week), I lacked something important—engaging in the Substack community. I’m convinced that ever since I started being more involved, Substack’s internal algorithm started to reward me. 

A community of Substackers

The main thing that’s worked for me is communicating with other Substackers. 

Here I thought, all I have to do is create some great posts and they will come. Nope. This isn’t a “Field of Dreams” situation. (That reference is old and I’m dating myself. High five to anyone who gets that.)

Here are things I started doing that have helped create more “little spikes” of subscribers.

Commenting

I first realized the power of commenting after joining a few Office Hours (more on that below). 

In general, whenever I leave comments, I try to be as genuine and as uplifting as possible—it’s how other people are too. I think it’s Substack’s culture. I haven’t seen anyone comment in a promotional way where they leave links to their own Substacks posts. 

After commenting and liking, I started noticing something—a small stream of new subscribers. 

I do this for both Substacks I follow and ones I don’t. Liking is great too, but commenting shows you’re actually reading and thinking about what was shared. You’re validating the writer’s thoughts and feelings. I love when people comment on my posts. 

Not only that, it’s so satisfying to be a part of a bigger conversation of writing, sharing, learning, and, of course, reading what other memoirists and authors are doing. So now, I set aside time to do this. I read other people’s posts and I comment and like regularly.

Office Hours

Substack offers something called Office Hours. I had no idea what these meetings were about, but I signed up and joined. A Substack moderator asks a question and then hundreds of Substackers respond in a really long-ass comment. It’s messy and chaotic and confusing, but it somehow works? 

Here’s one about “growing your free list” with over 1,000 comments from other Substackers about how they did this. Office hours take place every week.

Substack’s Notes

Notes is Substack’s version of Twitter and it made Elon mad. (There was an article on The Verge about a day in April when Twitter’s connection was turned off on Substack. I actually tried to post something that day and wondered where the Twitter button went!) 

You can create a setting that allows you to share Notes with your subscribers, but I haven’t done this. I use it more to connect with others about what they’re working on. I recently started reposting my newsletters on Notes though. 🙂

Posting on LinkedIn and Facebook groups

I wish I never had to promote my posts on LinkedIn. I’m lazy when it comes to promoting my stuff and they never seem to get a lot of traction in terms of engagement. I post on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook groups mostly to get out of my comfort zone. 

Before I joined Substack, I never shared my personal work on LinkedIn for fear of… well… everything—from no comments and likes to trolls. After doing it for eight months, I’m learning it’s okay to put my stuff out there, and I stopped focusing on the lack of likes and comments because that wasn’t my goal anyway. I just wanted to get into the habit of sharing. 

I noticed I get traffic from both LinkedIn and Twitter—not a ton, but some, so I keep posting. 

The largest source of social media traffic and engagement (and sometimes new subscribers) comes from the Facebook writing groups I’m a part of. I post only what’s relevant to the group. 

I’m involved as a creator and a reader

Each week, this has been my process. It’s rinse and repeat. 

I’m finding that being engaged in the community of Substack matters and helps me grow my email list. It’s what Substack is all about. It’s why you don’t see spammy comments but instead, a group of supportive folks all kind of doing the same thing—being creative, sharing their voice, and writing about something that matters to them.

The other thing I will mention is the Recommendation tool. I recommend 22 other Substacks. Maybe I will revisit this tool and recommend different publications or maybe swap recommendations out from time to time. 

I know other Substackers have experienced tremendous success from this tool, so while I’m not there yet, I thought it was worth mentioning.

In terms of who is recommending me, it’s not nearly as many as I’d like, but that’s okay. I appreciate these recommendations so much.

So, I’m sending gratitude and a warm shout-out to

Amanda B. Hinton

…

Rebecca Gummere

… 

and

George Geder

!

What’s your experience of growing an audience been like?

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