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Substack writers, you need a website

elizabethtai.com

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Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#91

Post by 6510 »

wofo wrote: post #76
zahlman wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if I want people to read me without needing a subscription or email disclosure? What's the email for anyway? So that you can get sent notifications of new posts? ... People read those kinds of emails? I always curse myself for finding a way to get them sent to myself, and file them away somewhere until I can figure out how to turn them off.

My blog used to be RSS only, because I thought email subscriptions were a plot of "content creators" and not something readers actually wanted... until one of my readers told me he really recommended adding email as an option. I did, and a surprising number of people subscribed since then.

For a decade or~so I subscribe to newsletters and had skip inbox rules that archived them in a folder about the subject. Eventually I never really looked at the folders but it never bothered me as I don't really see them. Not sure if that means it works or not.

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#93

Post by wofo »

6510 wrote: post #91
wofo wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My blog used to be RSS only, because I thought email subscriptions were a plot of "content creators" and not something readers actually wanted... until one of my readers told me he really recommended adding email as an option. I did, and a surprising number of people subscribed since then.

For a decade or~so I subscribe to newsletters and had skip inbox rules that archived them in a folder about the subject. Eventually I never really looked at the folders but it never bothered me as I don't really see them. Not sure if that means it works or not.

Hahaha it could well be that people are merely hoarding newsletter emails. I hope readers derive _some_ value from the emails, but since I'm not doing it to drive up "engagement metrics" I don't really mind.

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#94

Post by coldtea »

ImJamal wrote: post #40
Bratmon wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire pitch of Substack is "You can export the email addresses of your current subscribers at any time" So if they stop doing the "email my subscribers whenever I post" step, another service will fill the gap pretty quick.

If Substack stops supporting that feature you would end up losing all of your subscribers when you move to the alternative unless you happen to have an up to date export.

Which is trivial. Even once a month is enough.

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#95

Post by rafaquintanilha »

I debated this for longer than I would like, and in the end regretted not joining Substack soon enough. I keep a personal blog since 2012 [1] which, in its last iteration, is hosted in Ghost. There is something really reassuring in knowing that you own a space in the internet, that nobody can shut you down, and that ceteris paribus it will survive till eternity.

However, discoverability is indeed a problem. If in the past we had to play the SEO game in order to get some traffic (I would crosspost in Reddit but the amount of uncalled hate I would get from an unqualified audience hardly pays off – I manage to make to the top of HN once though), now it's even worse with AI.

I agree with those who say that as much as we like to say we write for ourselves (and I do think this is true), it's as important to have contact with the public. In Le vie intellectuele Fr. Sertillanges would argue that critics help you shape the argument and make it clearer and more correct. Therefore, having a distribution channel is important. After all, if all you want is to brain dump or write as an exercise, write it in Obsidian or similar software, connect it to Git and be done with it.

Now, after I started my Substack [2] I was able to attract over ~2.3k subs to date. It's true that a lot of that came from other channels (like my YouTube channel), but in the past it was always slow and Ghost newsletter never really worked well for me. In Substack I often get recommendations from other writers, and you can also refer to people you respect as well.

If Substack ever ceases to allow you to export your posts or subscribers, then I agree the network effect won't be as decisive. Currently, I write my drafts in Obsidian so I always have a local copy, then copy, paste and refine in the Substack editor (so it looks optimized there), and press publish.

[1] https://rafaelquintanilha.com [2] https://codecapital.substack.com

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#96

Post by coldtea »

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #83
carlosjobim wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How do we know they won't start limiting your reach in the future? You can never know anything about what anybody will do in the future? You can't. Why do hackers always use this argument against everything?

Hackers always use this argument against everything because you can in fact know some things about what one person, yourself, will do in the future. Thus they argue that you should not trust your things to other people but do it yourself, because, barring major illness, you can reasonably assume that you will try to do what is best for yourself in the future.

>because you can in fact know some things about what one person, yourself, will do in the future.

Nope. At best you merely know what your current self intends to do in the future. Whether you'll do them then, or whether you'll even still want to do them then, or be able to do them then, or have regretted ever wanting to do them, and many other such things, we don't know.

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#97

Post by coldtea »

game_the0ry wrote: post #28
skippyfish wrote: post #6

Counterpoint from someone who's been publishing on the internet for decades: no one will visit your website. It's as simple as that. You need a push mechanism to reach readers. RSS could be it, but it's too niche. Social media is kinda it, but algorithmic feeds reward political clickbait and just because someone clicks "follow" or "subscribe" is not a guarantee that they will ever see your posts. Substack gives you a…

> You need a push mechanism to reach readers. Ghost blog includes newsletter for push.

Push as in a newsletter alone isn't doing anything. It's the "show ocassional posts of you on an already captive audience of millions and especially readers with similar interests" (the whole Substack base) that does it.

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#98

Post by coldtea »

brunoarueira wrote: post #82
cosmicgadget wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I miss the days when I'd regularly get forwards from friends about stuff they found on the internet.

One of my first jobs after graduate, I used to share a lot of posts with my coworkers until a certain point where one of them said "I don't know how you read so much content", worthless to say him was a Master's student, so I'm expecting him to be able to consume more content than myself, although different more towards academic stuff.

>"I don't know how you read so much content"

And then they spend hours every day doomscrolling and binge watching shit

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#99

Post by coldtea »

dmitrygr wrote: post #90
skippyfish wrote: post #6

Counterpoint from someone who's been publishing on the internet for decades: no one will visit your website. It's as simple as that. You need a push mechanism to reach readers. RSS could be it, but it's too niche. Social media is kinda it, but algorithmic feeds reward political clickbait and just because someone clicks "follow" or "subscribe" is not a guarantee that they will ever see your posts. Substack gives you a…

> no one will visit your website. It's as simple as that. I am not convinced. My traffic counter spins quite rapidly, and I only publish on http://dmitry.gr

That's because it's a tech vlog with posts that also serve as technical reference and tutorials and such like: https://dmitry.gr/?r=05.Projects&proj=27.%20rePalm

There's a big audience for that that's actively search for such keywords.

Not the same with essays or fiction writing

Re: Substack writers, you need a website

#100

Post by ImJamal »

coldtea wrote: post #94
ImJamal wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Substack stops supporting that feature you would end up losing all of your subscribers when you move to the alternative unless you happen to have an up to date export.

Which is trivial. Even once a month is enough.

How many writers are even thinking about that though? If they shut it off tomorrow, how many would have a list within the last year?
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