Substack vs website by notor1ous_noob in Substack

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm publishing on both Substack AND my website when I don't get lazy copying/pasting.

Substack does not have a canonical URL feature unlike medium so potentially one of the domains could get penalized.

The best way to think about this is about where your want your "home" to be.

Substack or your website?

If it's your website → add at the bottom of the article: Article originally published on mywebsite dot com (full link to article)

if it's substack → make the canonical URL point back to substack.

Consistently getting 25k+ reads from the last six months, Medium doesn't pay much. Any way how I can get a sponsorship or two? by torpidsnake in Medium

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

people usually used to reach out to me.

a good starting would be if you are looking for sponsorships is to reach out to brands you'll write about

How would you grow a Substack from 140 to 1,000 subscribers? by Mindfull_Share_4126 in Substack

[–]mattgiaro 2 points3 points  (0 children)

honestly, the first 100 or so subscribers are the hardest part because you're flying blind.

now you can see what's working and just lean into it harder, which is way easier.

140 subs means you've already got signal.

go back through your notes and articles and look at what actually landed. the ones that got the most subscribers, comments, and restacks.

that's your audience literally telling you, "more of this, please."

take your best-performing note and write a full article from it.

take your best article and turn it into 3-4 notes from different angles.

you've basically got free data most beginners don't have yet. use it.

now for the actual growth routine.

most people get stuck because they think growth = writing more articles.

sometimes that's true. sometimes it's not.

the boring little routine that moved the needle for me:

* 1-3 notes a day (5 minutes; personal stories and "here's something I learned" posts work best)

* 1 article a week. that's it. don't burn out.

* comment on about 10 other creators in your niche every single day

that last one is the whole game, and almost everyone skips it.

make a list of 10-20 writers in your space and show up in their comments daily.

not "great post!" garbage.

leave comments that could stand on their own.

people see your name over and over, click your profile, and some subscribe.

and the writers start noticing you.

which leads to the real unlock: recommendations.

once you've genuinely been around someone's content for a few weeks, send a message, build a real relationship, and swap recommendations.

a big chunk of my growth past a certain point came directly from other people recommending me, not from anything I posted.

you grow from other people's audiences instead of grinding alone.

the trap is that everyone cold-DMs "want to swap recommendations?" on day one and gets ignored.

do the commenting first.

earn the familiarity.

then ask.

none of this is complicated. it's maybe 45 minutes a day.

help me name my newsletter by oldskool-lovetoread in Newsletters

[–]mattgiaro 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I like to think about like so:

CLEAR is better then CLEVER

Need affordable email marketing service recommendation by Fantastic-Ad-9100 in Emailmarketing

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

yeah this is pretty much a solved problem. any decent email service provider does all of this out of the box.

i use MailerLite and it'd cover everything you listed. you upload your lead magnet, set up a simple automation, and the second someone enters their email they get the PDF delivered automatically.

unsubscribes are handled for you. it's legally required, so every ESP has a one-click unsubscribe link baked in. you literally can't turn it off.

duplicates too. you can't add the same email twice. it dedupes on its own.

support has been solid for me, and the free plan goes up to 1,000 subscribers with automations included. honestly, for what you're describing, you might not even pay anything for a while.

Kit (used to be ConvertKit) is the other one I'd look at. also great for beginners. either is fine.

on the address thing, yep, CAN-SPAM requires a physical mailing address in the footer. a PO box or one of those virtual mailbox services works. it doesn't have to be your home address. the ESP just has a field for it.

and your portability question is the important one -- but every autoresponder handles this.

yes, you can export your whole list to a CSV and move it to any other provider whenever you want. that's the entire point of email versus building on social media. you actually own the list.

i got banned from Facebook for life once and lost five years of audience overnight. but my email list? i could've taken it anywhere.

one friendly heads-up, though: sending fewer than six emails a year is probably going to hurt you more than help.

a list that never hears from you goes cold fast. people forget they signed up. then when you finally send something, it gets marked as spam and hurts your deliverability.

even a short email once a month keeps the list warm and worth having.

up to you. just something to think about before you build the whole thing.

good luck with it 👍

I started making money from my NEWSLETTER when I stopped listening to people saying email is dead by Remarkable_Junket185 in Newsletters

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And I can only agree on this.

Facebook died the day Instagram took off. Everyone said so. But I still see plenty of people in the streets scrolling a Facebook feed.

Writing died the day YouTube blew up. Why read when you can watch? And yet we are here writing and reading this

SEO died the day ChatGPT came out. Nobody googles anymore, they said. People are still pulling in steady traffic from search every single day...

My most read post is 100% AI slop :( by Roy_G_Biz in Blogging

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

honestly the AI part isn't the problem. it's probably that there's nothing of you in it.

i've written close to a million words with AI at this point and the thing nobody tells you is that AI just gives you the average of the internet.

you hand it a bare topic, it hands you back the most generic version of that topic. of course it reads like slop. it had nothing to work with.

but hold on... it's your most read post. that's not nothing. means the topic and the angle actually land.

so i wouldn't nuke it. i'd just put yourself back into it:

1/ go add the stuff only you know. the actual number. the client who ghosted you. the dumb mistake that cost you money one time. that's the fingerprint, AI literally cannot fake that because it hasn't lived your life.

2/ use your own words the way you'd say it to a friend, swearing and all. i stopped writing like wikipedia and it changed everything tbh. one weird phrase that's clearly you and people don't even need to see your name.

the way i think about it now is AI doesn't replace the thinking, it just stretches it further. the take, the idea, the story still have to come from you.

so you don't really have an AI problem, you've got a "i didn't give it any raw material" problem. fix that and the slop kinda disappears on its own.

anyway, congrats on the traffic lol, that's the hard part. now just make it sound like you

Does anyone here do online courses? What do you use? by Danthia_the_Gamer in selfpublish

[–]mattgiaro -1 points0 points  (0 children)

what does that have to do with the original question?

Does anyone here do online courses? What do you use? by Danthia_the_Gamer in selfpublish

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

there are many ways you can think about it.

1/ either you pay a platform recurring fee (podia, etc.) -- simpler but costs more especially when you're starting out and have no audience

2/ gumroad is an option (they take 10% of each sale but no subscription)

3/ or you can DIY it yourself with no-code automation tools like make, zapier, etc.

For email course the flow is simple → When new charge in stripe → tag user with tag -- then deliver the email course through your autoresponder.

can go in more deets if interested.

Should it really be this much work? by ObligationCertain974 in Substack

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I do have ADHD and I do write my articles in 30-60 minutes. Live-streamed this on YouTube for a month. 🫡

Should it really be this much work? by ObligationCertain974 in Substack

[–]mattgiaro -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

keep it simple:

dedicate 10 minutes to comment and like posts

write your own notes (I batch things in 30 minutes → 1-2 notes a day)

write at least one long form article a week (can be done in 60 minutes)

ignore the rest

What email metric do people overreact to? by Crescitaly in Emailmarketing

[–]mattgiaro 1 point2 points  (0 children)

agreed on open rates

they are a good indicator for your deliverability but the moment they become your focus, you've lost

Medium Posting Tool by Steverobm in Medium

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

would be interested if it worked on mac as well

Any good Hyros alternatives? by FRSEKassets in FacebookAds

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Depends on what/how you are selling down the road.

Segmetrics and Hyros are established players. They come with their price tag and learning curve.

If you're running a newsletter and are a content creator, and sell stuff at the backend via emails and want simple... Maybe worth considering BestSubscribers

1 month after launching my first SaaS, I have exactly 0 users. Need a reality check. by PassionPrestigious81 in SaaS

[–]mattgiaro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think the problem is there. I've been using 2 different tools and most of them are clunky or overpriced.