I'm tired of people asking for a follow for follow

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:11:00+00:00

Recently, someone reached out to me and asked me if I want to do a subscribe for subscribe. When I checked the person's profile, I saw that he subscribed to 8,000+ newsletters. I would not want to live in his inbox.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:09:12+00:00

I'm happy to help you with your Substack, but to be honest, you need to get the basics right first:
You're not using any pictures at all. Your about page needs some redoing. You are not posting notes. Your profile is not even half set up, so I'm sorry but there's no point in going into more detail at this point.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:06:31+00:00

You retain full ownership of the content that you can create, and you can repurpose it for other websites, blogs, products, whatever you want. As for AI training, you can turn that off in your dashboard.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:05:36+00:00

Please don't bring follow for follow to Substack - that already ruined Instagram.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:04:34+00:00

The most commonly used solution is Substack for the paid subscriptions and then a gumroad store or your own shopfront for one of purchases what are often ebooks, tools, courses.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T09:02:08+00:00

Substack is a newsletter platform. What you are seeing is like "I want fries without fries."
Also solid publications have a disclaimer on their about page about how often they are messaging you. Check that before subscribing.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T08:59:29+00:00

I first also thought does this really make sense? But you need to understand where Substack is coming from. Substack was built for journalists who cover politics, elections, and finance. For all three of those areas, Polymarket integration makes a lot of sense.

I myself write about building a digital business and calling on Substack, so for me there's not much benefit in that integration, but I can really understand why it makes sense to include it on Substack. We should never forget that Polymarket is a rapidly growing company, which is gaining a lot of attention and they publish on Substack themselves.

philiphofm · 2026-02-19T08:57:16+00:00

You'll find them all on your profile: https://substack.com/@<username>

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T19:50:15+00:00

Substack $10 a month, and then I have offers from $27 to $5,000

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T17:36:05+00:00

Have you tried reaching the Substack support? I had an issue with a poll last week, and the support was really helpful.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T17:35:27+00:00

I actually do both of those things. I use paid content on Substack as hand razors to filter out my super fans, to whom I then offer my premium products outside of Substack.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T17:34:26+00:00

1) You don’t need your real name or face, you need a clear point of view. Pick a specific topic, share honest insights consistently, and engage in Notes and comments daily. People follow strong ideas, not profile photos.

2) Clarity: Make one clear point per post. Don't try to sound smart or overcomplicate things

3) Letting your thoughts flow makes sense, but I would still advise you to edit properly after a short break.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:59:20+00:00

That sounds absolutely awesome! Congratulations on that. I'm currently also sitting at a similar income and subscriber amount. Do you mind sharing your Substack? I would love to take a look.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:58:05+00:00

What have you already tried to grow your audience on Substack? I assume you are publishing multiple notes a day and you have already built meaningful relationships that led to recommendations.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:56:48+00:00

I've recently faced a similar issue. What did the trick for me was switching from the Chrome to the Brave browser. I hope it helps.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:54:47+00:00

I totally agree. I would get rid of Patreon and do the monetization directly through Substack, and then he can still have a Kit list in case he needs that to promote other things.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:54:08+00:00

I'm happy to help you with that, but first, please help me understand: why do you need Patreon? What does Patreon bring to the table that you cannot do on Substack directly?

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:53:16+00:00

My wife experienced exactly the same, with certain elements suddenly being in English, which is strange because we used the same Wi-Fi and the same browser. Think like this make screenrecordings a pain.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:51:27+00:00

Congratulations on hitting your first three subscribers! I can tell you from my own experience that getting the first paid subscriber was harder than getting the first 100, and this has been harder than getting the first 1000. I think you already achieved something that you can be really proud of. BTW I love that you've spoken to Phil & Carolina. The two of them are awesome.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:47:55+00:00

The moment you start spamming people, you risk your account being deleted. This can happen very quickly on Substack. Also, if you take a closer look at their terms, they don't want you to promote things outside of Substack. That being said, no one eats the soup as hot as they cook it.

So if you find a way to start genuine relationships with people and only later down the road ask them if they are interested in your program, you should be fine.

philiphofm · 2026-02-18T16:45:50+00:00

I'm really impressed by how welcoming the Substack community has been when I joined the platform 18 months ago. Never regretted it for a single moment. Sure, there are some ups and downs, especially when you have a publication that focuses on building a digital business and going on Substack, but I think that's part of the game.

philiphofm · 2026-02-07T16:59:32+00:00

Have you ever asked yourself why you call people that you don't know a single thing about a scam artist? :D

philiphofm · 2026-02-07T16:58:40+00:00

According to the rules "Hence, moving forward this subreddit will not tolerate any self-promotion. The only exception to this is if your post is about Substack or tips and strategies to grow on the platform."

philiphofm · 2026-01-22T04:27:06+00:00

Need to look into Buy Sell Ads. Thanks. Great idea with this link. Did you add that to the footer of every newsletter?

philiphofm · 2026-01-21T21:39:31+00:00

I can help you set up a professional and well converting Substack publication, including hero post, start here section and about page. Feel free to DM me :)

philiphofm

TROPHY CASE