5 Rules for Substack Writers

Lessons From a Subscription Purge

This past week, I went through my personal Substack subscriptions and filtered out things that were no longer sparking interest. I simply had too many to divide my attention amongst. In that process, I found some very clear likeness between those I was letting go and those I was keeping. It became clear that there are at least some minimal guidelines to abide by if you want to be successful on this platform.

Writing for Substack is not one of our normal topics of discussion here at Conquer Books, but the lessons I learned from this act were too good not to share. They’ll go along way for the writer who wants to be seen, regardless of platform, subject, or credibility.

First

You must be clear on what you’re writing about. This is rule number one. Rule. Number. One.

So many times, did I click into an account and not be able to parse through vague words and convoluted meanings. They tend to write their descriptions like this:

“Musings on literature, travel, parenthood, and other notes.”

That tells me nothing. Those are three very different subjects, and that addition of “other notes” implies there will be other topics involved on top of that. Which means the newsletter will be all over the place and have no cohesive impact. Likely, these are the lived-in thoughts of the writer, versus something they’re personally an expert on.

I don’t even mean “expert” in that they have a degree and work in the field. You can be an expert on parenting when you’re a parent, or on travel when that’s your lifestyle. Don’t overthink it. Whatever you know a lot about, there are people out there willing to listen. But they have to be able to find you and get an idea of what to expect before they hit the “subscribe” button.

I really can’t stress this rule enough because it was very obvious to me that most people did not have a clear idea of what they were about. If you don’t know, then your reader doesn’t know, and there won’t be anything to spike their interest.

Second

The title and image are part of the communication. When I look at the spread of an author’s work, what I see are images, titles, and subtitles. Those are the three items you have to convince someone to click. Use them wisely.

This falls in line with the first point, as I again saw a trend with people who seemed unclear about what they wanted to do with their newsletters. There were titles that told me nothing about what the article was about, such as “The Carpet of Sin that Eats the Soul” or “Mad Worries in a Cybernetic Wonderland.” They’re artful, to be sure. Lovely expression of words. But they are communication outward from the writer. As the reader, I need a communication that draws me inward.

Similarly, the subtitle and image should be chosen with care. All three of these should work in sync to tell me immediately what it’s about and why I should click on it. Otherwise, I won’t.

Third