Things I've learnt from 1 year on Substack
That can be applied to any new creative venture
Hi! This is Leyla from A Day Well Spent, a newsletter seeking pathways to more purposeful living.
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I started this newsletter on Substack one year ago
‘In a year from now you’ll wish you had started today’ is one of my five favourite life mantras that I largely attribute to my “success”. It’s about 1) starting the thing and 2) understanding anything worth doing takes time.
And it was almost exactly a year ago (1st June 2023) that I started this reader supported newsletter I named A Day Well Spent, on Substack. I did so without any existing mailing list and by mid-July, found myself writing a piece about how I had grown my Substack from zero to ‘bestseller’ in just 5 weeks.
Twelve months on and just shy of 5000 readers, I really do regard my Substack as a success. It hasn’t earnt me fame, status or mega bucks (although it does afford me an additional income stream which is always welcome in the freelance world). But then those aren’t my personal interpretations of success.
What success means to me is something I’ve written about before and it can neatly be summed up by this Bob Dylan quote, which I came across in Tom Hodgkinson’s excellent book How To Be Free:
“A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night and in between, does what he wants to do.”
That’s why my Substack is a success to me.
Because a year in, it has become my most cherished creative outlet that needs not answer to anyone other than myself and my readers, I still want to do it, and I am still enjoying it.
My readers paying me directly for my writing is the kind of direct, personal and reciprocal relationship I value hugely.
It is this financial support that not only allows me to keep this newsletter going for members to continue enjoying, but for it to get better, as spending more of my time writing here very gradually, little by little, becomes more viable.
To each and everyone of my members — thank you.
There were bumps along the way
Particularly early on where – as a data lead person – I got a bit obsessed with the Substack dashboard (I wrote about this in Substack can be cruel but here’s why I love it).
I mean, I’m still obsessed with the dashboard. I look at it as frequently as a crypto investor monitoring their asset performance, except the monies involved are universes apart.
But I’m much more indifferent to the numbers I see these days. If someone asks me how many of those who read my work actually pay for it, I no longer know the exact number without checking. I’m chalking this up as progress.
My relationship with the Substack platform and the creative work I do on here has evolved over the past year, settling into something that now slots neatly into my work life. It took a good few months to get to this point along with much trial and error, but it’s now an integral part of what I do.
The key for me has been making it sustainable so I can be in it for the long game.
Things I’ve learnt from 1 year on Substack
Over the past 12 months I’ve been scrawling random learnings and thoughts about writing this newsletter and being on Substack in the back of my notebook, whenever they have come up.
They are learnings that can be applied to any new creative venture, be that on Substack or beyond. These are things I would have found useful to read during my first year, I hope you find them useful too.
Here are my learnings from the past year.
Writing is work
For me, this means writing must slot into my work life and not my personal life. As a freelancer with autonomy over my days, this might be easier for me to do than for others. But if Substack (or any other creative money making outlet) creeps into your downtime, double down on safeguarding your ‘being’ time. Failure to do so may quickly render it unsustainable and you at risk of burning out. You cannot work all the time, even if you love the work.
Comparison is the thief of joy
I compared the “progress” of my newsletter with others, a lot. Then realised it was a pointless endeavour because there are too many variables for it to mean anything. Some might have started with existing mailing lists, others might have been slogging away for years on other platforms before Substack. As Baz Lurman said, ‘in the end the race is only with yourself’.
Set goals but don’t be militant
If the race is only with yourself, it’s good to set goals. A bit like how people like to beat their personal bests in a sport, striving for goals and targets propels you forwards. But be flexible; I’ve had to bring my goals down by a peg or several a number of times. My initial ones were wildly unrealistic and influenced by a lot of pointless comparison.
Free trials and unlocking posts
I have free trials and the ability to unlock one paywalled post turned off. Some people use them to consume as much as they can for little in return and that doesn’t sit well with me – half of my weekly essays are already available for all to read. The community elements – the comments section under all pieces and our ace Sunday Reflections discussions – always remain behind the paywall.
There’s more to life than Substack
It seems to me quite a few people spend quite a lot of time on Substack – be that on Notes (Substack’s version of Twitter) or the platform in general. It’s easy to spot and can smack a bit of please see me anguish. Substack is great, but don’t spend your life on it. If you don’t do or think about other stuff, you won’t have anything to write about.
Consider deleting the app
I speak of the above from experience. In how to create more ‘being’ time I shared that I deleted the Substack app two months ago because I was scrolling Notes too much – I didn’t come here to fill the Twitter void. I now focus my Substack energy on writing for and engaging with my treasured members in my columns themselves. I read newsletters old school style as emails in my inbox, it’s not exactly analogue but it’s at least not another app.
Substack gurus
There is a lot of good advice from Substack publications specializing in how to do well on Substack. But be weary of following this advice; there is a risk of lots of newsletters ending up looking and sounding very similar. Something I have already started to notice.
Do the opposite
In fact, if you notice a lot of people doing a particular thing in their newsletter (or even in life), consider being a contrarian and doing the opposite. Going against the grain can help you stand out from the crowd. For example, when many people were writing about becoming teetotal in January, I wrote In defense of alcohol – it became my 4th most viewed essay to date.
Work out the numbers
There is a romance to earning money from a creative outlet – Substack or elsewhere – but the practicalities of real life still means it has to make financial sense. Work out how much you are earning per hour to see if it’s worth your while. Take the total you earn in a month from the creative outlet and divide that number by the number of hours in a month you spend on the work. That’s how much you earn per hour.
You are not the centre of the universe
I’ll wager that pretty much none of the consumers of your creativity think about your work as soon as they wake up in the morning, they have their own lives. If you need a break from creating, just take one – few people will notice. A bit like when, four years ago, I first implemented this weekly practice I now do every Friday that helps me fulfil my potential — no one noticed.
Don’t feel bad about the unsubscriptions
It’s rarely about you (see above point). I recently read every unsubscription gets you closer to your ideal readership. I like that. Also, everyone tells you to turn off the unsubscription email notifications; I don’t. I don’t feel bad when I receive them but as an info geek, I like to look at the user history of the person. If it makes you feel bad, turn the notifications off.
Factor in pauses
Taking breaks is integral to ensuring the survival of your creative outlet and that it remains enjoyable for the long term. In February, I began to factor in Substack pauses: after every 8 weeks I take a one week break from publishing anything, to give both me and my members space to breathe. This gives me 6 weeks off across the year without impacting service. I think it’s the best Substack decision I’ve made so far.
If it feels like a chore, change something
The driver for creativity should be joy, pleasure and a desire to create. If it feels like a chore or becomes a tick box exercise, you will quickly grow to resent it. Experiment with changing a variable: create less, consume less, change the topic.
is a great example of this when she completely changed the topic of her newsletter 6 months in. It’s now one of my favourites.Less but better
I’ve heard new writers say, ’if my Substack goes well, I’ll start writing more posts each month’. Capitalism leads us to believe people always want more and ‘value for money’. But your writing is just another email or notification and no one needs more of those. People don’t want quantity, they want quality. Less but better is better. And more importantly, sustainable for the creator.
Write what you want to read
Not what you think you should write about. Especially write it if you get the vibe others are thinking it but no one has said it out loud. This happened with my piece Confession: I don’t consume any news. I was apprehensive about publishing but I knew in my gut I had to; that’s usually a good sign. It’s been my most viewed and shared essay to date.
Consume less without guilt
It isn’t humanly possible to stay on top of all the great work people you admire are creating – everyone’s in the same boat so don’t feel bad about it. A writer must read, but consuming too much of other people’s work can overly influence your own. Inspiration should also come from within. Which is why one of the exercises in Julia Cameron’s The Artists’s Way is ‘reading deprivation week’.
Don’t force yourself into a box
Niches are great but they can be creatively restrictive. We change as we grow and what you create now might not feel right in a few years. Allow yourself room to pivot in the future if you want. For example, the broader and more abstract the newsletter title, the more buffer space you give yourself. Some titles that do this brilliantly include
and .My best performing columns
The 3 columns that have resulted in the most upgrades:
Take from that what you will.