Bad at Substack
Substack's summertime slowdown. No, we’re not bad at Substack. The dullening and the shortening. The best damn weeknight broccoli you’ll ever make.
Dearest Gentle Reader,
You know I just had to go smack the bees’ nest with a Louisville Slugger. I guess I’d better run.
Although my newbie status ended eons ago, I totally suck at leaving Substacky observations alone. I just can’t help myself.
After a whole bunch of forward momentum and shared excitement, the dreaded Substack slowdown has happened. I don’t know about you, but I’m hungover AF from the house party that was earlier this year. Summertime has made it worse.
I feel it. You feel it. My Road Feast posse feels it. It’s August, and everyone is OOO. Hell, my small subscriber numbers stalled out, and even shrank at one point. Meanwhile, whether it’s in the kitchen or in the garage, you know that I like to try and fix stuff. My overheated ADHD brain won’t STFU about such things.
Meanwhile, if you’re anything like me, you absolutely can’t stand another f&^%ing Substack gold rush shovel seller, who promises a quick fix for this in exchange for your cash. I’d like to take them all, stuff them in a rocket, and shoot them to the moon. But that phrase sounds as quaint as that stack of ancient yellow National Geographic magazines at your auntie’s beach house that nobody ever got around to recycling, because nobody was sure if it was intentional kitsch décor, or if they actually belonged to somebody.
Anyhow, I figured that you and I might enjoy a little chit-chat together because maybe, I might have some truth bomb theories to drop over some ice-cold sweet tea.
No, I’m not complaining. But I’m going to call some s^%$ as I see it. So, lean in and listen for a bit.
The Dullening
A bit over six months ago, I joined Substack. I went live after spending a solid month ensuring what I had put together was going to look wicked sharp, once I opened my doors to the public. This being said, that’s just a speck of time in the as compared to veterans who have been doing this for years. However, I’m confident that my initial arrival was during the height of the Substack craze that took off earlier this year. My “Exile in Newbieville” series felt like lightning in a bottle, but my numbers and my engagement generally and slowly dropped over time with subsequent posts.
The novelty and shiny newness of Substack has worn off for most, and the honeymoon phase is long over. From the outset, I seriously anticipated that this was going to happen, but the question was when. The first dip appeared around mid-April.
Frankly, part of my reluctance to do my 4K+ mile Road Feast trip this past spring, was that I was likely going to miss out on the remaining momentum still in play. I could see it coming. Between the three week long Floridian intermission that ended on May 5th and my arrival home nine days later, something drastically changed. This felt different than when neglects one’s Notes for a week, where one’s Substack dies like an un-watered plant while away on vacation. Something really felt horribly off, and I was scratching my head as to WTF happened. Ya’ feel me?
But it wasn’t just me. People were behaving strangely. So was I. Everyone seemed to be scrambling to do all sorts of crazy s^%@ to try and capture the attention of everybody else, while Substack was hot. Some people were cranking out content around the clock, some non-stop restacking, some incessantly tagging others of individuals in Notes, collabs, podcasts, starting multiple publications, creating alliances, gropus, and countless other experiments. I felt like a kid in a candy store. But like for everyone, any sugar rush will only last for so long. I felt kinda ill.
Meanwhile, I have few regrets because some of those direct connections that I’ve made have indeed blossomed into solid connections and some new IRL friendships, that have become the core of the Road Feast posse. But as someone who generally tends to take things quite personally, I figured I was doing something really wrong. All those icky feelings, such as insecurity, jealousy, anxiety, multiple fears (failure, alienation, unintentionally alienating others), fatigue, and beyond were beginning to rear their ugly heads.
As a person with a panoply of brain bugaboos who regularly overthinks things, I was swimming in dangerous waters.
But the elephant in the room is that many people out there continue to write without long term focus, and there’s a saturation point. Sure, if most of your audience are readers off of Substack, and aren’t from an imported email list, you’re doing great. But most people I see here are trying to connect with other Substackers. That’s fine, but recognize that they may only tune in for so long. More on this in a bit.
Sure, one can chalk this slowdown to everyone being outside in the summertime sunshine, and thankfully away from their computers.
But ultimately, Substack was likely losing its lovely carnauba wax shine after just a few months.
The dullening had begun.
Algorithmic F&^%ery
The next thing that quickly comes to mind, is that Substack had been growing too fast. Surely, many of you had noticed over a period in April, when Substack was repeatedly acting glitchy. Thankfully, much of that has appeared to calm down by now.
But I couldn’t help but wonder (in a very Carrie Bradshaw kind of way), if Substack’s servers were overloaded by the rapid influx of the gold rush. Hell, if Charlie XCX started her own Substack and had only posted four articles, clearly everyone wanted in earlier this year. But things seem to be dropping off.
In order to slow things down, while building at scale, Substack must have intentionally hit the brakes on growth algorithms – especially in Notes.
Substack was simply too hot, to the point that surely their servers were becoming overloaded. I bet they dialed that s&^% down. Let me be the one to publicly voice this here.
Nobody will ever reveal how that all functions. But in addition to all the other things that I’ve done in my multimedia career, I’ve also been an IT consultant for over two decades. (Yeah, I’ve done a lot of disparate stuff over the years.) But it definitely smelled like there was plenty of tinkering going on behind the scenes.
My thinking is this: If you’re new, you’ll likely get plenty of exposure to get you started and hooked. If you’re not taking off, you’ll likely be throttled down in favor of those more popular than you. If you’re not explosively popular or don’t have a lot of paying subscribers, the algorithm will throttle your visibility. Trust me – It’s not too difficult to write code to manipulate metrics. In fact, surely it’s even easier to do so with the help of AI.
Algorithms don’t care about how good your content is. Algorithms exist in order to promote growth, particularly for anything that will drive a profit for the parent company and its investors.
I’m sure you’ve read it a million times before, but the people or companies who will ultimately generate income for Substack’s business (paid subscribers, huge celebs with monster-size audiences), those are going to be the ones that are going to do well. You can read a whole bunch about this in a million other places, so I’m not going to dwell on such things here.
Again, surely someone in Substack’s IT team intentionally hit the brakes in Notes to throttle activity down.
Substack was simply expanding too fast.
The Shortening
No, not Crisco™. But in a trans-fat free and happy EVOO way, let me thank a few of you of my thoughtful Road Feast posse, who have sat me down, and shared your Substack love, and reminding me that I write way too long for our modern digital age.
I generally take those long empty roads, and write super-long pieces that people don’t have time for. Fine. I’m trying to shorten things a bit. But my recent 2-part piece about Fried Hot Apple Pie? Part 1 did just dynamite. Part 2? Well, not so much, which was a real shame given that I had saved the best for last. (So go back and read it if you haven’t, okay?)
Anyhow, call me the Gustav Mahler of Substack, while I Tolstoy the s&^% out of my prose. My encouraging people to read longer content and work on rebuilding their attention span levels, feels like trying to get people to eat their goddamn broccoli.
Meanwhile, if I admitted to you that I slice up my broccoli (stems and all), toss it all on a sheet pan, slather the f&^% out of it in EVOO, season with S&P and garlic powder, toss it in the oven for about 15-20 minutes at 475ºF (ideally convection bake at 450ºF), stirring it a few times so it gets slightly burnt, and squeeze some lemon juice and freshly grated parm on it once it comes out of the oven, you’d stick around for culinary tidbits like this.
Hell, you’ve suffered through the Marvel credits for MCU Easter eggs, so why not now?
So yes, a few people have been clamoring for recipes. That’s cool, but that’s an entirely different story. But if you pay attention closely enough, maybe you’ll learn a few things I put together. Like my roasted broccoli. You’ll look like a goddamn champ if you do it right and I guarantee you’ll put it on regular rotation.
But people are tired and attention currency is real. Unless you’re a f&^%ing writing deity, you’re not going to hold everyone’s attention. In turn, you can’t pay attention to everyone else either. It’s simple reality.
Keep reading longer content to
regularly exercise your attention span.
Eat your f^%#ing literary broccoli.
Will I keep this just under 2500 words, the length of the average The Atlantic article? Not this time. As The New Yorker is 3,000, I don’t feel too badly when I’ll land much closer to such, especially given my long captions. You can finish reading this. You can do it!
Keep reading longer content to regularly exercise your attention span. Eat your f^%#ing literary broccoli. If made well, it’s delicious and will feel better afterwards.
The Third Date
Another reality of Substack, is that it can feel a lot like a first date. It starts with all that bright, shiny energy. But by the third date, you realize that it is make or break time. There is a certain transactionality here that feels off if one looks too closely. Everyone is hungry for that sweet, sweet readership. It has become a frantic dance of “if you read my stuff, I will read yours back,” which is not quite the same as building a real connection. Substack shouldn’t be about trading subscriptions, like the way we traded baseball cards as kids. But often, it is.
When you find genuine community, it is a different flavor entirely. It is rich, complex, and deeply satisfying. You know I’ve found new friends and made contacts across the globe. Fine, my Road Feast posse might be a smaller crew than others, but the engagement is superb and elegant.
Yet, I have watched the chaos unfold. I have seen people try too hard, scraping the bottom of the pan with unethical tactics. There has been plagiarism, harassment, and people being tossed into Substack jail, only to be freed after just a few days. Recently, I’ve seen people emotionally manipulate writers, by stuffing articles into AI (thereby training the AI on the author’s work without consent), and then posting supposedly deep comments on the author’s piece. Then, there’s the recent Pangram garbage. It has been a total maelstrom. I’m just trying to navigate this mess with as much kindness and integrity as a chef can muster in a crowded, screaming kitchen.
As a sensitive guy, I hate seeing the friction. Deep down, we all just want to be seen. We want our work to matter. But sometimes, the truth is as sharp and bitter as grapefruit pith.
Sometimes, people just aren’t that into you anymore. They get bored. They signed up for a seasonal special, and the season ended. They now want something else. It is a quiet, unvarnished realism. Don’t take it personally. Just keep the stove running. The people behind the work are what matter, not just the output. Other people will show up to your stall at the farmer’s market. Show up. Hopefully the whiners will shut up.
The Metric System
As a GenXer, I remember when the metric system was being debated in the States. It now feels like a historical footnote. But now, between the culinary arts and my wrenching, I appreciate the precision. But here on Substack, everyone is obsessed with their own Substack metrics. It’s a separate and complicated system unto itself.
Don’t lie and say the subscriber count doesn’t matter. It does. (Don’t get me all riled up again about weak follows.) We’re all working to expand our reach, hoping the algorithm picks up our content. Many seem far more obsessed with their own personal metrics than either the quality of their content, or making genuine connections with others. Unfortunately, many others remain self-absorbed, with the thought that their work are one of the pillars of civilization. Regardless, many chase subscribers and metrics as potential tickets to the big leagues: the speaking gigs, the book deals, the professional validation. In our day and age, that’s for real.
Don’t think I don’t watch my numbers; I’m not lying to myself. We are all working to expand that reach, because more subscribers ideally mean more algorithmic visibility. For a solopreneur or a business, those numbers are the difference between a steady flame and a cold stove.
Dear Reader, you know I’ve had my moments of despair. I have almost crashed out a few times myself. Have you never felt that sudden, sharp pang of self-doubt? I’ve stood in the shower and felt a dissonant, screeching voice in my head telling me that I am simply bad at this. My subscriber count, barely bumping along in the 200s, feels like a sign of failure as compared to the giants of this platform.
What a load of s^%$#.
I’m not “Bad at Substack.”
But there are realities here that I can’t tune out. I’ve looked at my data and realized I face a massive gender gap. My subscribers are roughly 90% women. Unless I start posting nothing but pretty pictures, men aren’t going to subscribe. Women read. Men like to look. This is a known trend and a future article topic.
Personally, I’m currently working full-time on this. Seeing others grow in massive leaps while I’m still idling here in the driveway is enough to cause a smidge of jealousy. I say that with total objectivity and without complaint. I know my own quality is there. The flavor is authentic. But growth doesn’t give a s&^% how good your ingredients are. Growth and algorithms remain indifferent to how much butter or soul you put into a dish.
Maybe my themes are too niche, or if I need some rebranding clarity to expand the Road Feast posse. Something is clearly not clicking perfectly, but I am not pulling over just yet. I do see everyone else pushing and shoving to improve their metrics, driven by their ulterior motives. To ignore such is folly. It is a crowded, noisy, and frustrating road. But we keep driving anyway.
Thankfully, I’ve pulled back into the driveway just under my self-imposed The New Yorker 3,000 word limit.
But let me wrap up by saying this:
Things are a bit off right now.
No, it’s not just you.
I personally don’t have all the answers, but I will suggest the following:
Do all your Substacky things with integrity and responsibility, especially if you’re playing with that brand-new flamethrower called AI.
If you need help, ask your close Substack peeps for visibility support.
Recognize that their time and help is usually more valuable than money.
Try to give much more than you take.
Stop giving a damn whether or not people like you or your content.
Most importantly: Have fun.
Because, we’re not bad at Substack.
- Seth ✦
Share. Comment. Restack.
Don’t be wack. I’ve got your back.
Seth, like you , I started 7 months ago. I have a small sub count that’s growing in small increments. I think the problem is a lot of us that mutually subbed each other, no longer read and more importantly like each other’s stories/essays like we did when we started. This affects how the story is pushed into the Substack environment. Views are someone looked at the title. Opens are when they opened the story and at least skimmed it. Likes are what drive the story to new readers. Looking at the analytics deeper, it seems that once writers have over 500 subs , their participation in this part of the Substack reduces. So we all just need to be diligent helping each other’s writing, all of us. I pledge to continue to read & like. Keep writing & enjoy..
This felt refreshingly honest. I especially appreciated your reminder that genuine community is richer than chasing metrics. The "literary broccoli" metaphor made me smile, and your closing advice to create with integrity and have fun is something every writer on this platform could benefit from hearing. Well said. 🌿Monica