For writers with no audience, Substack may work. But several folks left after the Nazi business and did an analysis of their new platform vs the old platform and they found that Substack’s discoverability features didn’t generate enough paying subscribers to make the 10% fee worth it. I think both Garbage Day and Platformer had this experience.
My point being I’m not sure they have figured out the model or the UI to counter the pattern of everything on the internet is free.
Great input! I was wondering where exactly Substack gets those extra subscribers - all it can do is build a great app (which creators could do for themselves) and then just toss around those same readers that creators themselves already attracted. Unless they do paid marketing, which I bet creators could do better if they wanted to.
I talked to a journalist yesterday who said they were going to Substack bc it was easy. When I mentioned Ghost they said it required too much technical knowledge to figure out. I haven’t played with Ghost so I’m not sure. They also perceive that Substack will help them gain an audience. It will help with unpaid subscribers but I’m not sure it will help with paid. Based on the other’s experience the paid usually come through shares from other subscribers or the writer’s own social media efforts elsewhere
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