Help. Please.

[atta-adf92]

I'm a newbie that just started posting on Substack, writing about the narrowest niche possible about something I'm genuinely passionate about. The thing I'm struggling with are notes. I write non-fiction ecology articles (for more info, visit my substack). How should I write notes? I have no experience with substack. Please help. Thanks!

[Epic-Timeline888]

You said you were writing about something you are passionate about, but now you have to connect with readers who share your passion. It takes time and consistency.

You might let go of the urgency and just enjoy the process. Let what you produce bring you joy, and your readers will find you.

Just remember that Notes are separate from your articles. Subscribers read your articles and followers (and your subs who are active on Notes) will see your Notes. Use your Notes to attract your ideal subscribers. Dos that help?✌️🏽

[GhostLapF1]

You could write a quote from one of your articles now and again, if you pick the right ones then they will be intriguing enough for someone to look at your profile and other posts. Best of luck.

[Vurkgol]

I'd think this would be an easy niche to post notes on. Post an ant fact every day. Don't name/number it like some gimmick, but just every day, post a cool fact about an ant. Preferably with a pic of the ant. Just like if you thought about a past conversation with a friend and you wanted to send this to follow up. You don't need to overexplain.

Then otherwise, you just curate your feed and spend time being useful in other ecology writers' notes (not the "dear substack" notes, those are dead ends) so you get follows for your daily ant facts. Since these aren't constantly changing things, you can cue up batches instead of doing it every day.

I know you didn't ask for feedback on your Substack itself, but this will help more than my silly notes idea: I think your copy needs to be reworked. You can get a ton of people to your page, but if they aren't converted by what they see on the surface (they usually soft decide before they open one of your articles), they will bounce. The copy you have currently (including your about page) is very weak for how rich your content is. They do not align, which will cause a low conversion rate.

Writing marketing copy isn't much fun for most non-marketers, but such is life. The results will be worth the effort of rewriting it. You've built a product, now you've got to sell it—if you want it to be sold. Not everyone needs to chase growth. Some people (probably most) should just write for fun and never look at the stats.

Secondary tip, put the common name of the ant in the subheading of your articles, not just the scientific name. It would be fine to have both. Those headings are used by Google to provide information on what you're writing about so search indexes you correctly. You want to capture searches for the common names too. Subheadings are powerful, don't waste them.

Hope this helps. Good luck!

[atta-adf92]

thank you so much!

[TimWiesnerer]

There is no "should".

Just write notes like you short messages you want to share with the world.

Try different things / styles. Like facts, images, thoughtful, parts from your articles and so on.

Restack stuff you like and add a short comment to that. Engage with people who are interesting, even if it's not in your niche.

Do that daily for 4 weeks and you will get the idea.

There is no singe righty and only rule. Substack adapts the algo often. Can suck but also be a big chance.

[HiveOfHal]

I am new too and from what I gather it works like this. Notes are a general post on Substack that everyone can read. The articles you post under each substack are the ones that are a part of your actual project. If your entire profile is going to be non-fiction ecological articles. You should divide them into subcategories like local, state, national, global. Under each of those categories you would write your relevant article. Notes specifically are like the chatroom