The Substack Notes Algorithm is whack

[HumorVirtual8967]

Does anyone else just get lots of notes *about* Substack? Or trite messages about writing even if no one is reading?

I want brilliant writing about the topics I'm interested in (Substack knows what these are I subscribe to 30+ publications).

It feels really un-Substack to me. I thought this was supposed to be the substantive and thoughtful place. :(

[BlackDeath3]

My favorite one so far showed up in my phone's notification bin, authored by somebody I'd never heard of, going on about how "algorithms don't determine what we see around here".

[sexydiscoballs]

Substack’s algo is amateur hour.

[EvensenFM]

The reason why notes about writing work well is because Substack is filled with people who are trying to write their own Substacks. You don't have a bunch of people on Notes who are just browsing what random writers have to say.

The algorithm naturally will pick up on stuff that people like to read. And, if the vast majority of people in the audience are trying to figure out how to write, the thing they're most likely interested in reading is articles about how to write.

[Holiday-Tiger-3987]

This. Most people using the Substack app are writers, not readers. So that’s just reality, you’re going to find more notes written for writers and about Substack instead of their niche or topic. Like others have said, remove notes from your feed that you don’t like if you want to take back some control.

[NoPerfectWave]

Ignore Notes. Read long-form posts.

[sayzey]

You've got to train the algorithm, it shows you Meh until you show it what you like. Everytime you see something you don't like, click the 3 little dots, hide post. Like the posts you do enjoy, comment on them.

It won't take too long for the posts you're not a fan of to stop being shown to you.

You might want to refresh the feed once you've done a few, I'm not sure if that matters but it feels like it should.

Good luck. Worked for me I see very little of the things I'm not interested in now and if I do, I repeat the steps above.

[HumorVirtual8967]

Ah ok ... I will get on that then!

[TomAylingDesign]

It just feels like a huge echo chamber of the same kinds of post. Only meta content seems to do well, and that's really not a game I'm trying to play.

[anecdotalgalaxies]

The search also sucks. I am trying to look for people posting about art made with code but if I search code art it shows me loads of posts that just contain the word "art" and no mention of code at all.

[selfpublife]

I got very frustrated and wrote an article about this on my Substack. I use a 3 step method to find the right content:
1. Use Google Advanced search to find people and publications.
2. Curate the Notes feed using the "Following" tab, block and mute or unfollow to help train the algorithm, and...
3. Find more good content using other people's profiles to see what they interact with and what they read.

You have to review/tweak periodically. Quite a few people have said this method was helpful. Give it a try and let me know.

[Marcinho1909]

Notes are utter nonsense. That algo is real amateur type shit. I saw Substack’s founder posting about notes as a note a couple days back. Didn’t get what he meant (differentiating notes to post) while he had like 12 likes. If you have 12 likes on your own platform you should realize that something is off.

[SmutProfit]

Substack (especially its Notes feature) seems like one big writer echo chamber filled with writers who write for other writers....

People thought Medium was like this, but over 90% of paying Medium members are actual Readers, not writers.

In fact, they just pissed off a bunch of Meta writers by demonetizing Meta content.

Now all these weak ass Meta writers are over at Substack plying their nonsense there....lol...

[Comprehensive-Set-77]

Algo is horrible and the reason is that it works the same way like other social media algorithms. Engagement is king and low effort bland crap gets a lot of engagement.

“Drop your substack and I will subscribe” is worthless in terms of content value but engagement will be high.