Online Substack Geek-Out Zoom:

Tuesday 11 March 16:00 GMT (London) / 11:00 EDT (New York)

Just a quick reminder about our next Substack Geek Out session, it is tomorrow at 4pm (London) time, when we will be discussing Substack strategies.

Agenda:

• Group back slapping…
  Let’s congratulate ourselves on how well RM2 is working!

• Targeting…
  I will share some methods for finding more of ‘your people’.

• General Substack chit chat and geekery! 🤓

The Geek Outs are only open to Paid subscribers, upgrade now so you don’t miss out:

Subscribe now

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly.

3. It’s very much a live discussion and forum to swap ideas and experiences.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat thread and I’ll repost it just before, so any newbies have it in time.

Don’t want to subscribe but love a good Substack Geek Out?

Buy a one-off ticket below, and I will email you the Zoom link for today’s meeting:

Grab yourself a ticket for £10

It’s the end of term

Wow those eight weeks steamed by so fast!

We will be off-air now for 8 weeks, returning with a bang on Monday 12 May which will give you a chance to implement all those juicy tactics you’ve learned and me a chance to literally go ‘Off on a Tangent’ with my other Substack.

For those of you not familiar, it’s where I ramble on about anything that takes my fancy, sometimes funny, slightly sweary and always straight talking. Enter at your own risk.

This week Meghan Markle’s new Lifestyle series gets a lambasting!

Off on a Tangent with Kate Darracott

Meghan & Netflix: a pre-production story

‘With Love, Meghan’ the new Netflix Series…

Read more

a year ago · 26 likes · 23 comments · Kate Darracott

See you tomorrow at the Geek Out or next term! 😘

K8x

PS: Please note I will be pausing payments at the end of this week so no payments will be taken during the holidays. Those on an annual will have the time added on to their subscription, so no one loses out.

Before we get into the meat and two veg of today’s post, can we take a moment to appreciate the image below and the text prompt used to achieve it.

This is another absolute belter from Gencraft AI, and once again gives us full confidence that the AI takeover is not even close.

The original idea for the image was to illustrate how double the amount of Notes was better than half of it. An easy brief you’d think, but then you have an actual brain.

The text prompt used:
A weighing scale with a stack of about 50 post-it notes on one side and about 100 post-it notes on the other side.

This was my 5th attempt, each one trying to get it off the concept of a ‘note’ being dollar bills, hence the seemingly pointless addition of the word ‘post-it’. 😳

Let’s observe:

• The 50 is on the larger stack and the 100 on the smaller.

• The scale is level and looks to be made from solid plastic, and therefore not designed to move at all.

• The units of measurement dial is a clock face.

• Except for the random ‘44’.

Have I missed any?

This could be a new competition format…

“Guess the 27 obvious flaws in this AI image!”

However, the crazy wallpaper and tablecloth combo are spot on, so I’m letting those trifling details slide. 😂

On to the post…

How to double your Notes audience

You’re going to absolutely love this one as, like most of my tricks, it requires very little effort from you and literally more than doubles the result! Strap in!

Just to give you a bit of background on my calculations…

When you post a Note, it can ‘potentially’ reach all of your Followers (not subscribers, but Followers, which your Subscribers also are).

However, because all of your Followers do not spend their time faithfully watching the Notes feed, just to catch the exact time when you post a Note, the chances are most of them won’t see it.

The actual figure is nearer 12% of your following. 😮

(At least that’s the average across all social media platforms, and there’s no logic to assume Substack is any different, in fact, it’s probably smaller as the scrollers aren’t as present on this platform.)

So let’s assume you have 1,000 followers and post a Note at 11:00 GMT.

That note will reach about 120 of your followers.

“What about the other 880?!” you exclaim, suddenly very invested in the outcome of this post!

Obviously depending on how many of those 120 people Restack it, you are hoping for a cascade effect, but let’s park that thought for a moment.

The trick

Restack it yourself the next day at a vastly different time, to hit a different time zone, and therefore hopefully some of the 880 will see it!

How to Restack your Note:

• Go to your profile page and locate the Note in your ‘Activity’ feed.

• Click on the Restack symbol and choose the top option ‘Restack’.

Important: Don’t choose the second option and add a note because Substack will then see it as a separate Note from the first one, and you’ll miss out on the added value.

12 Likes after 5 hours (above) is good, but not really catching the world on fire, but here it is again after a double outing:

As an experiment, please give it a ❤️, or Restack if you’re feeling beyond generous. I promise to share if it catches fire and will mention you in the thank you! 👏

The icing on the cake

The beautiful thing about this simple trick is that new eyes on this Note’s second outing will also immediately see the social proof (Likes & Comments) which have hopefully already started to accumulate on it from its first outing.

Whereas those early adopters had to scarily be one of the first to Like it and risk being deemed an outcast of society for their extreme views, the second batch can confidently just follow the herd.

Herd mentality in people is real, and is never more highly exercised than with social proof.

How many times have you read a Note and thought “Yeah, that’s quite funny.” only to then notice it already has 3.6k ❤️’s on it!!!

You then revised your opinion to “That’s bloody hilarious!” and felt an overwhelming urge to Restack it, so ‘everyone’ (or at least 12% of everyone) will know that you found it just as arse-clenchingly hysterical as the other 3,599 Likers!

We all just want to fit in.

Back to the point…

For those of you paying attention you will have calculated that not only has this plucky little Note been exposed to about 240 people by now (double the original number), but with the accumulated effect of social proof that figure will have grown with every Restack and be considerably more!

Added to that, all those extra ❤️’s will have alerted the Substack Algorithm to your new Poet Laureate status and it too will give it an extra push, in its relentless quest to serve the people with what they ‘like’.

Utter magic. 🥰

Date for your diary

If you’ve been on this mailing list for a while, you will hopefully have adopted some of these free tips and already be seeing great results!

These, my friend, are the tip of the iceberg, the real gold goes on behind the roped off section in the VIP area.

Why do I keep them hidden?

Like Jennifer Aniston in her L’Oreal campaign:

“Because I’m worth it!”

Or more specifically, I believe my advice, gained from years of leading people down digital breadcrumb trails, is worth at least a tenner a month.

In fact if you want to turbo charge your Substack growth, it’s an absolute bargain!

Do join us and have a peek behind the curtain.

Subscribe now

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: The next Geek Out Zoom will be at 16:00 GMT on 11 March 2025, put it in your diary and bring your notepad.

Join in the comments below:

How often do you post on Notes?

Do you struggle to think of the content for Notes?

What would your ideal time of day be for a Geek Out Zoom?

Click for a £10 ticket

Next Geek Out Zoom is at 16:00 GMT on 11 March 2025.

Let me introduce you to the Micro Goal

With each project that passes, we learn what we’d like to do differently on the next one, and one thing that I’ve always been rubbish at, is celebrating the wins.

My mum tells an unbelievably dull story about how I tried and tried and tried to get to the other side of some monkey bars a million times when I was about 6, and when I finally succeeded, I just calmly went on to the next obstacle.

I didn’t punch the air, look round for validation or do a one-girl-mexican-wave, nothing, I just moved on to the next thing.

To be honest not much has changed in the 40+ years that followed, but now I want to run up to that little girl, give her a high-five and force a brownie down her neck.

So this time we’re doing things differently.

We’re going to toast every milestone, cheer for every first, and usher in the era of the Micro Goal! Oooooohhhhh. Please reread that last ‘Oooooohhhhh’ in the voices of the little green men from Toy Story, if you didn’t instinctively do that the first time.

Be micro ambitious

This phrase is stolen from the awesome Tim Minchin’s UWA Address, who firmly believes that instead of setting long term goals, like ‘get 1,000 subscribers’, it’s a far happier way to live by setting Micro Goals, like ‘get 10’.

Not only do you then get to celebrate as each Micro Goal is hit, but it means that you will remain open to new opportunities appearing in your peripheral vision along the way, which can be added as new line items.

Which in turn, could land you on a far more enjoyable path than the original blinkered long-term goal.

And so this is the way I’m moving forward with my Substack projects. 🙌

Update for encouragement

It’s very easy to feel like you’re not making any progress when the ‘big number’ that you’re aiming for seems so distant, but if you pop into this little spreadsheet regularly and just spend some time updating the numbers, you will find little pockets of progress and they will give you a huge boost!

Here are the numbers I’m aiming for in the next year for Substack Type Club:

I have stuffed my office fridge with mini bottles of champagne in preparation for smashing through these Goals, and for the top three there’s a chocolate bar too!

I used the Micro Goal method last year for my other Substack ‘Off on a Tangent’ and it was really fun tracking the progress. 🎉

I just love having a look under the hood of other Substack’s, and so for my VIP Members, and those of you cheeky enough to action the ‘7-day free trial’ (which will only be open until Thursday 27 March), there is a downloadable file so you can populate it with your own Micro Goals and numbers, and also have a nosey at the current progress towards my goals, behind the paywall below.

The downloadable spreadsheet can be opened up in Excel or Numbers, so you can save time reconstructing the whole thing, and then play along with your own mini fridge contents. 👏 🏆

Read more

Give those early posts a second chance

As your Substack grows, the number of post views grow too, with every week that passes, do you feel slightly sorry for those early efforts?

Left to sit in the archives, unloved and unseen by all your shiny, new subscribers.

I’m sure you’re thinking that if you’d released one of your old favourites now, it would get way more views than it did back at the start.

A few more people would be entertained or educated by the thoughts within it.

I certainly do!

So let’s celebrate those plucky little posts which were the very foundation of your Substack, perhaps resulting from thoughts you’d been carrying around with you for months or years… before you had the courage to hit that first ‘publish’ button.

Now’s the time to show them off whilst revelling in how far you’ve grown by joining in the Call-to-Connect below.

Call-to-Connect: one from the archives

Showcase your Substack in the Comments below

Use the Comments section of this post (below) to showcase your own Substack and find others who you can help boost.

1. Enter the name of your Substack.

2. Enter the url link of the archive post you’d like to share.

3. Enter a brief description of what this post is about.

4. Enter the number of views it had when first released.

5. Enter the average number of views your last three posts received.

Then scroll down to find other interesting posts, and go check them out!

They will obviously notice you if you ‘❤️’ or subscribe to them and will hopefully check out your Substack in return! 🎉

Be early to join in with the Comments here as the first ones will get seen more than the latecomers.

Come back to this post over the next few days to check out the newbies who have joined in.

I will be pushing it out on Notes too, and tagging some of you who are taking part.

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

Click to Tip >>>

And breathe….. [exhales deeply]

Ok, you’re out of the woods now, there’s dappled white space, the rest of this piece isn’t going to be quite so arduous.

Are you feeling a bit light headed and slightly giddy with the freedom of it all now?

Think you might just hop and skip through these mini paragraphs now?

They look so cute and achievable!

Bravo! You’ll chew through the rest of this piece like a James Patterson novel, with its super short chapters, designed to make holidaying men feel intelligent when poolside.

He knows a thing or two about laying a breadcrumb trail.

With his 4-page, cliff hanging chapters.

Give that man a biscuit. 👏

Life is good.

The sun is out.

And you no longer feel overwhelmed with the enormity of this piece.

Aaaaaaahhhh…..

For those of you still here, you can probably guess what my top tip of the week is.

Or ‘hack’ as the young folk would say, to make it sound edgy, cool and slightly illegal.

Yes, you’ve guessed it, this week I’m going to encourage you to hit that <return> button with abandon, and extol the virtues of short paragraphs for digital reading.

Serve your post up in bite sized chunks

In the digital world it’s harder to maintain someone’s attention.

When reading a physical book you have a very limited choice of what to do next:

• Continue reading, potentially turning a page.

• Stop reading.

• Turn back a few pages to try and work out who the hell Miriam is!?

When reading digitally on a device, you literally have a whole world of options.

So online writers need to use formatting to keep the reader engaged.

Make sense?

Fabulous!

I knew you’d get it. 👏

K8x

Not ready to subscribe yet? A tiny tip like this will let me know you are enjoying these posts and give me a lovely gratitude buzz. Thank you. 🥰

Click to Tip >>>

Join in the comments below:

Do you love a chunky paragraph or prefer a three-worder?

Have you read a James Patterson novel in half a day to impress your other half?

Online Substack Geek-Out Zoom:

4 February 16:00 GMT (London) / 11:00 EDT (New York)

Just a quick reminder about our next Substack Geek Out session, it is tomorrow at 4pm (London) time, when we will be discussing Substack strategies.

Items up for discussion:

• Update on our No.1 growth hack…
  Version 2 is here and it will turbo charge your growth for no extra time spent!
  I cannot wait to share this, knowing how well Version 1 is working for you!

• General Substack chit chat and geekery! 🤓

The Geek Outs are only open to Paid subscribers, upgrade now so you don’t miss out:

Subscribe now

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly.

3. It’s very much a live discussion and forum to swap ideas and experiences.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat thread and I’ll repost it just before, so that any newbies have it in time.

Don’t want to subscribe but love a good Substack Geek Out?

Buy a one-off ticket below, and I will email you the Zoom link for today’s meeting:

Grab yourself a ticket for £10

That’s all for this week, see you tomorrow at the Geek Out! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below, so myself and others will notice you!

The benefits of a template

Once again, it was an IRL meet-up that inspired the subject of this week’s post.

The inspiration came at one of my Co-Working sessions with fellow Substacker and we were talking about how we create our draft posts.

I have seen a couple of…

“Shit! I’ve lost my Substack draft! It was here a minute ago and now it’s vanished!”

… Notes in the past, which is why I usually create the first draft in a Pages document, and then copy it over to Substack, as does Helen.

But that is where the similarities in our workflows end.

As Helen used to create a new document each time, rather than use a styled up Master!

This blew my mind!

“You start with a blank document each time!? But don’t you have to redefine the paragraph spacing each time in the body text?” I exclaimed.

“Oh I just put an extra return in for a line space.” Corrected Helen.

“But don’t you then have to take them out again once you’ve pasted it all over to Substack?” I enquired, somewhat incredulously.

“Yes, I do.” Agreed Helen.

“Well isn’t that just a giant pain in the arse?” I reasoned.

“Yes. It is.”

“Well why don’t you create a Master document that has the styles pre-defined so the first draft not only looks good, but also saves you a load of extra key strokes?” I implored, whilst spinning my laptop around to show her how much easier her life could be with a template like mine.

“It simply never occurred to me to do that, and I wouldn’t know how anyway.”

Oh, I see.

I then started to explain how the Paragraph Styles work, but then thought…

“Shall I just send you mine?”

“Oh, yes please, that would be great!”

Here’s what it looks like, I have created two versions, one using the UK’s standard sized page A4, and the other has been pre-defined as US-Letter, take your pick.

All the heading styles are pre-defined, as well as the ‘Normal text’ with built-in paragraph spacing, and two different styles for the quotes.

I’m not able to embed the Pages file here, but if you are a Paid Subscriber to any of my Substacks and would like this template, just send me a DM or Comment below and I’ll email it over to you.

I can also save it out as a Word doc (hopefully the styles will remain intact), if you prefer that format.

That should save you all a few keystrokes!

Special Offer – 24hrs only

If you’ve been thinking about joining our VIPs, but not yet taken the plunge, I’m offering a 20% discount for one day only:

You will enjoy 20% off for the duration of your subscription.

Be quick: offer ends Wednesday 29 January (GMT).

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: The next Geek Out Zoom will be at 16:00 GMT on 4 February 2025, put it in your diary and think of a fabulous question for me.

Join in the comments below:

What’s your process for composing a post?

Do you use your own template?

Or do you write your posts directly into Substack perhaps?

A very new posting schedule for 2025

I spent a lot of time over the Christmas break trying to figure out what to change in 2025, as far as my Substacks were concerned.

The thing is, true to my word of last year ‘create’, I went a bit overboard and started two additional Substacks as well as my beloved flight of fancy ‘Off on a Tangent’.

‘Co-Work Corner’ is easy breezy, as it’s just a weekly schedule letting all the Paid subscribers know where we’ll be this week, so no big drain on resources there.

But juggling ‘Substack Type Club’ and ‘Off on a Tangent’ at the same time was not sitting well with my head space.

It reminded me of about five years ago, when I wasn’t quite out of the Agency, but very much into the new start-up company.

I didn’t enjoy flitting from one to the other, as they required a totally different head space, from service industry to product business… and yet here I am again, totally of my own doing, in the exact same spot!

Doh!

When will I learn?

So I’ve been mulling over the options…

Should I combine them into one Substack, and then try and communicate to everyone to only have the sections that they are interested in turned-on?

Or should I just put ‘Substack Type Club’ on ice until I work out what to do?

Neither was very appealing to be honest, as I’m rather fond of both.

And just when I was at the point of making a decision, one of you lovely people would Restack or Like this brilliantly performing post and then I’d feel bad about clipping its wings.

You have to agree, 179 Likes and 47 Restacks are phenomenal numbers for a post from a Substack that only has 549 subscribers! 🎉

How could I put it on ice when it was doing rather well?

It was only when I was reflecting on a recent conversation I’d had with a fellow Co-Worker about her new podcast launch, that my inner monologue pointed out…

“I hope she organises it into Seasons and doesn’t just go for a relentless weekly schedule.”

… as apparently that’s the clever move, so it has a definite end date and you don’t get overwhelmed with producing a weekly episode on a never-ending hamster wheel.

Then it struck me, that’s what I should try out with my two Substacks!

I could then be fully immersed in one for 8 weeks, and then fully immersed in the other, instead of switching hats on a daily basis.

Genius!

So that’s what I’ve decided to do. 🤓

I’m going to test out running each one for an 8-week Season and then switching over to the other.

I will pause paid subscriptions when one is dormant, so monthly fees will stop for the duration of the pause, and annual subscribers will get more time added to them, so no one loses out.

Let’s see how it goes!

My word for 2025 is ‘focus’, and I think this new posting schedule really does support that.

Without sounding too much like a Kardashian… “I’m excited!”.

Season 1: week 1…

A big welcome to all the newbies here, there’s about 100 more of you since the last post went out, thanks to that post, which I’m thrilled about! 👏

Let’s get the ball rolling with a good ol’ Call-to-Connect, so you can show off your Substacks and net some new subscribers!

There’s nothing quite like a shiny new year to give you a fresh burst of optimism and energy!

Like me, you have no doubt, spent the last few weeks combing over your Substack numbers and wondering what you could possibly set as a realistic target for year-end 2025?

Forget realism, let’s dream big! 🎉

Call to Connect – tell us about your 2025 goals

Just by setting yourself an audacious goal, you are more likely to achieve it, or certainly be well on the path to achieving it, than if you didn’t.

So let’s kick things off with some high numbers for where you’d like your Substack to be by the end of 2025. Be bold!

Remember, by joining in with group activities like these, it really will accelerate your growth, make it more fun and nurture some new connections.

Showcase your Substack in the Comments below

Use the Comments section of this post (below) to showcase your own Substack and find others who you can help boost you… and therefore get noticed by you.

1. Enter the name of your Substack.

2. Enter the url link of your Substack.

3. Enter a brief description of what this Substack is about.

4. Enter your current Free Subscriber number.

5. Enter how many Free Subscribers you would like by the end of 2025.

6. Any other Substack goals you’d like to mention?

Then scroll down the list to find other Substacks that interest you, check them out, and if you like what you see, subscribe to them and help them reach their goal!

They will obviously notice you as a new subscriber and will hopefully check out your Substack in return! 🎉

Be early to join in with the Comments here as the first ones will get seen more than the latecomers.

Come back to this post over the next few days to check out the newbies who have joined in.

I will be pushing it out on Notes too, and tagging some of you who are taking part.

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: The next Geek Out Zoom will be at 16:00 GMT on 4 February 2025, put it in your diary and think of a fabulous question for me.

Here are my top Substack boosters of 2024:

An easy win for more ❤️’s

This post is inspired by a Note I saw from , which 941 of you, at the latest count, agreed with: 

I appreciate it is frustrating that most people will read your posts and think ‘I enjoyed that’, but won’t go that extra mile and actually click on the ❤️.

They don’t realise how important those Likes are to us.

As clever as the Substack Algorithm is, it’s not telepathic.

It can’t measure all those smiles, or chuckles or vigorous nods of the head, unless we communicate with it somehow and tell it we enjoyed the post.

It only has Likes, Restacks and Comments as a way of evaluating how good a post is.

So here are a couple of things you can do to increase your Likes.

Step 1

Like it yourself!

Ok, I realise this may look a little egotistical, but as soon as you’ve sent out a post or note, you should click on that heart button yourself to get the party started.

Realise what you thought to yourself, the last time you read a post to the bottom and noticed it had no Likes.

No one wants to be the first to show their opinion. By ‘Liking’ it yourself, you open the opportunity for people to just auto-click without having to ask themselves:

‘Why doesn’t anyone else like this?’

No one wants to be the crazed loner.

Step 2

Include this little one liner at the base of your posts, just above the feedback buttons:

This will just give people a little nudge in the right direction so they can help this post enjoy the success it deserves… if they liked it.

It’s as simple as that, I guarantee this will increase your average number of Likes.

And yes, you can thank me by ❤️ing or Restacking this post below. 😉

December break

I have decided to have a little break from Substack for December, and so have paused paid subscriptions, so no further payments will be taken until well into the New Year.

Those of you on an annual subscription will have extra time added to your account, so you won’t lose out.

I will be taking this time to fully enjoy the festive season!

Unlike my previous business, it’s such a huge luxury to be able to just hit ‘pause’, have a rest and reset, that I just can’t resist doing it! 🎉

I will return again in January, by which time I will be fully refreshed and bursting with new ideas!

I’ve really enjoyed sharing my hints and tips with you over the past few months and wish you a very Merry Christmas!

See you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

Subscribe now

Join in the comments below:

Are you a fan of the Christmas break or is it Bah-humbug all the way?

Read more from Substack Type Club

Substack contact cards

I’ve had quite a few business cards over the years and although in a business sense they have become pretty obsolete, as you usually already have contact info for anyone you meet for business these days.

BUT, the strange thing is when it comes to my Substack, I’ve never given out so many!

This is why…

I really enjoy the subject matter of both my Substacks and am very likely to be either chatting to other Substackers at a meet-up, or just chatting with friends about a subject that is my current flavour of the month, that I may have written a recent post about.

“Do you have an inner monologue?”

“Would you go for a walk after 9pm?”

Being able to just hand out a card that they can check out in their own sweet time has been the source of many new subscribers.

QR Code it up baby!

This is another great use for a QR code, so the recipient has all the convenience of being able to ingest it into their phone in one easy step…

… and all the clunky ‘what the hell is this in my pocket?’ inconvenience of cardboard to remind people who they were talking to last night.

You can create one straight out of your Substack dashboard, here’s where to find it:

You’ll notice that the default colourway is using your ‘accent colour’ for the QR code.

I didn’t want mine to be green on my card so I nipped into the Branding settings and changed it to black before exporting it.

Here’s where to find the Accent Colour setting in case you’ve forgotten since you last did your branding.

Always be carrying

I created my artwork in InDesign and had them printed via printed.com, because I’m old skool, but you can do them in Canva and even order the print direct from there too.

Always make sure you have a few in your bag, you will honestly be surprised how often the subject comes up naturally in conversation and people do seem to like receiving them, as they’re so easy.

Otherwise you need someone’s number first, in order to send the url link to them, and that can seem very intrusive if you don’t know them well.

So get a fresh batch printed for the Christmas party season!

Join me for the next Geek-Out Zoom tomorrow:

Wednesday 20 November 18:00 GMT (London)

It’s an informal discussion where we can swap notes about what’s working and what’s not for us on Substack at the moment.

Open to all Paid subscribers and if you just want to dip your toe in and check it out without subscribing, then grab yourself a one-off ticket below.

Grab yourself a ticket, only £5!

I will aim to raise these topics, but as you know, I’m very liable to go off on a tangent at the earliest opportunity:

• Is it snowing where you are?

• Why is everyone talking about the ‘New Notes’?

• Check-in with subscriber growth.

• General Substack chit chat and geekery! 🤓

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly, although ‘lurkers’ are welcome to attend.

3. It’s very much a live discussion and forum to swap ideas and experiences.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat and I’ll repost it just before, so that any newbies have it in time.

Don’t want to subscribe but love a good Substack Geek Out?

Buy a one-off ticket below, and I will email you the Zoom link for today’s meeting:

Grab yourself a ticket, only £5!

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack if you found this useful and want to support this Substack.

Simple is good

Sometimes it’s the simplest of things that can make a huge difference…

My favourite thing about the live Geek Out Zooms is that there’s only ever a few of us online and so the conversation is very fluid. 

In fact last time I think most people were too miserable about the US election result to even turn up, so Ann Richardson bagged herself a one-to-one with me. 👏

After a few attempts at trying to tease out what it is she ‘really’ wants from Type Club… (as she’s happy with her Subscriber growth and isn’t in it for the money, as she gives all proceeds to charity)… it turns out Ann still gets quite a buzz from selling the books she’s written, and would love to see them more widely read!

My reaction was:

“I didn’t realise you’d written any books!”

I’m just a casual observer over on ’s ‘The Granny Who Stands on her Head’ Substack. I have been aware of her head balancing antics for quite a while now, have read and enjoyed a few of her posts but hadn’t joined the dots on her having written several books!

Well I never, you think you know someone! 😮

Well here’s an easy win for all you fellow authors, complete with a step-by-step guide for how to achieve it.

I’m sure this will garner some extra click throughs, which in turn will result in some extra sales.

Why not introduce a graphic panel at the base of your posts that links directly to wherever it is that book is being sold?

The reason I am so sure of this, is that in my old agency days we used to use heat map software that would measure activity on a website.

Not just tell you which pages had the most views etc, but you could actually see mouse movements as people fumbled around trying to navigate what you thought was a perfectly fabulous design, until a few hapless punters turned out to be clicking in all the wrong places.

One thing that stands out amongst all of that analytical detail, was that if you give someone a mouse and put them anywhere near an image, they will try and click on it.

People love to click on images. Fact.

So if you want to move people along a certain digital path, give them some lovely things to click on and they’ll be skipping along your breadcrumb trail in no time.

People will often say “ but there’s a link to the book in the post” in their defence.

That’s all well and groovy, and text links work, but why not have the visual as well, it will increase the total number of click-throughs.

Particularly if the book jacket is doing its job and already helping the reader to like it!

Then when they click through they can delve into the detail of the book and often sample the first few pages!

It’s a modern miracle! 

Five fab reasons to use a footer panel to sell your books:

1. They add a lovely ‘on brand’ visual to the end of your posts, and if they don’t you need a new cover designer.

2. Unlike the italicised intro para at the start of many posts begging for a subscription, which we have all trained ourselves to ignore by now, we don’t yet blindside graphic panels. Because Ads aren’t a thing here on Substack (yet), it will get noticed and looked at.

3. It’s a subtle way of letting everyone know you’re a published author without banging on it about it the whole time.

4. As and when your audience get so familiar with your book as the standard post footer, don’t you think they might greet it like an old friend should they ever see it in a real life bookshop and maybe offer to take it home?

5. Already include an image, but don’t link it to your book sales page?
   Please go that extra mile, and you will no longer disappoint all those people who currently click on it hoping to be transported to the inside of your book… but instead are just served up a bigger version of the image. Sigh.

Convinced?

Here’s how:

1. Create a lovely image like the one above and import it into your post.

2. Select the image and click on the chain link icon from the toolbar (highlighted).

   

3. Paste in the url link of your book, wherever it is for sale online.

4. Test the link in the email before you deploy to make sure it’s going to the right place.

Want an image, but can’t create it yourself?

I’ll do it for you for just £25. 👏

All you need to provide is the following, which can be entered as you checkout:

1. Wording for banner Ad (200 characters maximum).

2. Url link to your book for sale.

3. Background colour reference (if you have a preference, otherwise I’ll pick one).

Just click through and checkout with this product and I’ll do the rest:

Buy a Book Banner for your book

Or contact me via email or Substack DM if you’d like to discuss it further.

Perhaps you’ve written more than one book and would like a collection of banners.

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack to help your fellow authors increase sales.

Online Substack Geek-Out Zoom:

6 November 15:00 GMT (London) / 10:00 EDT (New York)

Just a quick reminder about our next Substack Geek Out session, it is tomorrow at 3pm (London) time, when we will be discussing Substack strategies.

Items up for discussion:

• Update on our ‘relentless marketing’, let’s revel in those upward growth charts!

• Micro Goals for motivation and celebration.

• ‘Recommendation’ experiment strategy (how to get more).

• General Substack chit chat and geekery! 🤓

This is open to all Paid subscribers, and those who want to dip their toe in with the 7-day Free Trial below:

7-day Free Trial

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly, although ‘lurkers’ are welcome.

3. It’s very much a live discussion and forum to swap ideas and experiences.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat thread and I’ll repost it just before, so that any newbies have it in time.

Don’t want to subscribe but love a good Substack Geek Out?

Buy a one-off ticket below, and I will email you the Zoom link for today’s meeting:

Grab yourself a ticket, only £5!

Restack giveaway!

Another chance to win a 3 Month Membership for a random Restacker!

Simply Restack this post before Wednesday 6 November at 2pm (GMT London), when one of you will be selected at random to receive the three month upgrade to Paid.

If you are already a Paid or comped member and win, I will extend your membership by three months for free. 🎉

Last week’s winner…

Congratulations to who won last week’s giveaway! 👏

I will be comping you up to a full membership for the next 3 months, and hopefully meeting you in person at one of the Geek Outs! 😃

That’s all for this week, see you tomorrow at the Geek Out! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack to WIN a 3 Month Membership to Type Club.

Your greatest hits

This week I thought it would be fun to celebrate our greatest hits!

Sometimes a post’s performance can take you by surprise and become a big hit, when in fact you weren’t even convinced it was a great topic for a post when you initially started writing it.

If you’d like to extend its life, you can ‘Pin on homepage’ which will keep that post at the top of the archive list.

1. Navigate to the post you want to pin.

2. Click on the three dots under the post title.

3. Select "Pin on homepage."

You can pin multiple posts, so you can keep your ‘Welcome page’ front and centre and also your current favourite post, that may have dipped down on the Archive list.

‘Most Popular’

There is an automatically generated ‘Most Popular’ or ‘Top’ section on your home page too, but if you have your paywall turned on it will only include paywalled posts and not your actual most popular posts, which are probably free ones, or ones you have pinned in the past, which drive extra traffic to them given their presence on your home page.

I have run experiments with these by putting a paywall on some posts and then taking them off again, and the list updates within half an hour! Cheeky little algorithm. 😉

Call to Connect – tell us about your top post

For this week’s Call to Connect I’d like everyone to share their ‘Top Post’ measured by total number of views, and the reason you think it did so well.

Then not only can we enjoy some Top Picks, but we may also be able to spot some patterns of high performing topics. 🤓

By joining in with group activities like these it really will accelerate your growth, make it more fun and nurture some new connections.

Showcase your Substack in the Comments below

Use the Comments section of this post (below) to showcase your own Substack and find others who you can help boost… and therefore get noticed by.

1. Enter the name of your Substack.

2. Enter the link to your Top Post.

3. Enter a brief description of what this post is about.

4. Enter why you think it did so well.

5. Enter its current number of views.

6. Then scroll down the list to find other posts that interest you and check them out, safe in the knowledge that if it’s made it onto this list, they’re all absolute doozies!

All of our top hits in one place, it’s like a greatest hits album! Enjoy! 🎉

Be early to join in with the Comments here as the first ones will get seen more than the latecomers.

Come back to this post over the next few days, I will be pushing it out on Notes too, and tagging some of you who are taking part.

Here are some Top Posts from some of my VIP’s to get the party started…

The Hot Dog Cart

Conspiracies Theories, Capitalist Emails, and Mafia Ties To The Online Business Industry

Read more

2 years ago · 21 likes · 13 comments · Dre Beltrami

This post received a whopping 1850 views! says it’s because we're starting to realize what damage the capitalist system has done to our writing, emails, and inboxes.

My opinion: everyone loves a conspiracy theory.

The Orkney Outpost

Two years in Orkney

Today, Monday 19th August 2024, marks the the 2 year anniversary of our move to Orkney…

Read more

2 years ago · 31 likes · 49 comments · Han Swierstra

This post is about ’s first 2 years living on the remote Orkney Isles, north of Scotland, it’s still one of her best performing posts.

My opinion: Substackers do love a milestone! 👍

Coffee Break Newsletter

Issue #4: On reading more (and maybe achieving something, too)

Let's talk about that stack of books on your nightstand. You tell yourself you don’t have time to read. Every night, you look at it and think, "God, I really should read more." But then you remember you have x, y, z millions of other things to do…

Read more

2 years ago · 31 likes · 34 comments · Jana

says Threads seem to work better for her in terms of engagement, new subs and views! 467 views for this one.

My opinion: Hats off to you Jana, I’ve not had much success with Threads! 👍

Restack giveaway!

Another chance to win a 3 Month Membership for a random Restacker!

Simply Restack this post before Tuesday 5 November at 3pm (GMT London), when one of you will be selected at random to receive the three month upgrade to Paid.

If you are already a Paid or comped member and win, I will extend your membership by three months for free. 🎉

Last week’s winner…

Congratulations to who won last week’s giveaway! 👏

I will be comping you up to a full membership for the next 3 months, and hopefully meeting you in person at one of the Geek Outs! 😃

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack to WIN a 3 Month Membership to Type Club.

Grab yourself a ticket, only £5!

We all make mistakes

If you’re anything like me, you will at some point in your Substack journey post something that you later decide was not a good idea!

Most of the time a simple unpublish (if it’s a Post) or delete (if it’s a Note) will suffice.

However, in the event of you needing to not only get rid of the offending article, but also to issue a correction to the readers who received it, here’s my step by step guide.

1. Unpublish the post

You will know when this action is appropriate, as you will have a growing sense of dread and feel the need to knee-jerk your way out of trouble!

Luckily you can simply select ‘Unpublish’ from the Post’s drop down menu in the dashboard, while you decide what other actions you might want to take.

Panic not, this does not delete the post for all eternity, it simply moves it to the ‘Drafts’ section with a very obvious ‘[UNPUBLISHED]’ at the start of the title.

2. Only minor edits required?

You can take a breath at this point, the post is longer showing on Substack and any link going to it, will result in a dead end, so at least it can’t cause more offence and deepen the hole that you’re currently in.

Obviously the emails were sent out, and there’s nothing you can do to change them, so let’s focus on the Substack version for now, and circle back around to those later.

A lot of people (myself included) only view your posts in the Substack app, as they’ve changed their Notifications Settings to ‘Smart notifications’, so if you’ve realised your error quickly a lot of your readers will be blissfully unaware of your cock-up yet and so there is time to edit, save and republish before they even know what’s going on.

3. Major edits required?

If you need to rewrite a section of it, or rethink it entirely, then before you start editing make a copy, by selecting ‘Duplicate to drafts’ from the unpublished post’s menu, this one will be entitled [UNPUBLISHED COPY] to you can tell them apart.

Here’s the clever bit…

You might naturally think that the next step would be to start editing the new, shiny copy, but I think it’s better to leave that one as a record of what was emailed out, in case those readers kick-off at a later date and you want proof of what you actually wrote, and use the original unpublished post as the basis for the rewrite or apology, whatever you think is the appropriate response.

The reason for this is to preserve the url link and social proof (Likes & Comments) from the original, so any Restacks or Notes that it may have featured in will all point to the edited version (of the original) not just result in a dead end if anyone clicks through.

Here’s a snapshot from my own edited post, showing it still has the original Post URL (at the bottom), so when re-published it will have the same digital address.

You can find this info in the Post Settings, right down the bottom, just above the danger zone (as above).

Once you are happy with the new version of the post, then ‘Publish now’, and it will appear on your Substack, but it won’t give you an opportunity to email it out again, as it knows you have already emailed this one out previously.

As if by magic, all the Likes and Comments that the original post acquired before you unpublished it, will come back too. Delete as appropriate or just leave them in.

4. What about those email readers?

If you also feel the need to issue an apology to everyone who you emailed it to, or perhaps just need to make a fact correction or two, you can do this by creating a separate email, and sending it out via the Subscribers menu, without it being posted to your home page.

Here’s how… go to your Dashboard => Subscribers:

1. Click on the checkbox next to ‘Subscriber’, this will select the first 50 subs.

2. Click on ‘Select everyone’ to send to the entire list.

3. Click on ‘Email’, which will bring up an empty email, the likes of which you haven’t seen since you started your Substack… as surely these days you start each email with a duplicate of a previous one to preserve the header, footer and tags in Settings. No? You might want to start doing that to save a few keystrokes. 😉

Once you’re happy with the content, click on ‘Send email’ top right, and off it goes!

This method will also explain why you sometimes get actual emails from Substacks that you’re subscribed to, despite the fact that you thought you only receive them in the App, as this overrides that and delivers them to the email inboxes.

The email will show up differently to the post in your dashboard, so you can easily tell them apart, and you can still enjoy viewing the stats.

Fun fact: ‘Huge apologies, I f*cked up!’ is a winning headline, a whopping 58% opened it, versus the 43% who opened the original! 😂

5. Put the kettle on, crisis averted.

Feel your heart rate go back down to normal, and congratulate yourself on handling what could have been a sticky situation rather well.

Everyone makes mistakes, if we didn’t, we wouldn’t be moving forward and trying new things, so just own it when it’s your turn, and try and limit the damage.

Fun fact: I even acquired 2 new subscribers from the apology (see above)! 😃

Restack giveaway!

Another chance to win a 3 Month Membership for a random Restacker!

Simply Restack this post before Tuesday 29 October at 3pm (BST London), when one of you will be selected at random to receive the three month upgrade to Paid.

If you are already a Paid member and win, I will extend your membership by three months for free. 🎉

Last week’s winner…

Congratulations to who won last week’s giveaway! 👏

I will be comping you up to a full membership for the next 3 months, and hopefully meeting you in person at one of the Geek Outs! 😃

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments below! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack to WIN a 3 Month Membership to Type Club.

Grab yourself a ticket, only £5!

Online Substack Geek-Out Zoom:

17 October 18:00 BST (London) / 13:00 EDT (New York)

Just a quick reminder about our Substack Geek Out session, it is today at 6pm (London) time, when we will be discussing Substack strategies.

The content for this one, will be similar to the one earlier this month, in that I’ll be sharing with you my favourite daily growth hack, and we will be discussing all those payment issues that we’ve been talking about over the last few weeks, can’t wait! 🤓

This is open to all Paid subscribers, and those who want to dip their toe in with the 7-day Free Trial below:

7-day Free Trial

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly.

3. These meetings are not advised if you prefer to just observe or follow journal prompts, these will very much be about having a live discussion and making connections with each other.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat thread and I’ll repost it just before there so that any newbies have it in time.

I’m looking forward to seeing you there! 🤓

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below if you like the idea of a Substack Geek Out, it will help others find this post and join in.

PPS: Don’t want to subscribe but love a good Substack Geek Out? Buy a one-off ticket below, and I will email you the Zoom link for today’s meeting:

Buy a ticket for the next Geek Out

I have been chatting to the lovely people at Substack and I’d like to share with you what we can and can’t sell within our posts.

To give you a clear idea of what these items might look like I’ve set-up some examples.

What we can sell…

Here’s a list of my questions (1-7) to Substack, to which the answer is ‘Yes!’:

1. Can we offer items that are included in the Publication Paid Membership, as separate items on our posts for a one-off payment, i.e. a ticket to a Zoom call?
   Yes!

Live example:

Join us for the next Substack Geek Out.

Open to Paid Members of Substack Type Club, or as a one-off ticket.

Buy a ticket for the next Geek Out

2. Can we offer random items that are not included in the Paid Membership for a one-off charge within our posts, i.e. a pdf guide or training session?
   Yes!

Live example:

Purchase my 3-page ‘One-Off Stripe Payments Guide’ if you need help setting up these products and embedding the payment links in your posts, as below:

Price £5: scan QR or click to pay

3. Are we allowed to solicit one-off ‘Tip’ payments from our readers for a one-off payment within our posts?
   Yes!

Live example:

Click to tip £2. Thank you!

4. Are we allowed to link directly from the home page navigation menu to a 3rd party website to sell our products?
   Yes!

5. Are we allowed to link directly from our posts to a 3rd party website to sell our products?
   Yes!

Giveaways

6. Are we allowed to run giveaways for a Comp to our membership from our posts, i.e. Restack or Like for a chance to win a 3-month Comp?
   Yes!

7. Are we allowed to run giveaways from our posts for non-membership items, i.e. a book?
   Yes!

Last week’s winner…

With this in mind I’m happy to announce last week’s winner is who managed to Restack the original post before it was unpublished! 👏

Congratulations Sonya! 🎉

I will be comping you up to full membership for the next 3 months! 😃

Let’s do it again…

Restack giveaway!

This week I’d like to give away one 3 Month Membership to a random Restacker!

If you’d like to be in with a chance of winning, then Restack this post before Tuesday 22 October at 3pm (BST London), when one of you will be selected at random to receive the three month upgrade to Paid.

If you are already a Paid member and win, I will extend your membership by three months for free. 🎉

What we can’t sell…

I understand that we can't offer the same bundled benefits as our Publication (i.e. pay-walled posts, Zoom calls, paywalled Chat), but in different time chunks, i.e. 3 or 6 month bundles. Either in exchange for a one-off payment, or for a recurring payment.

I am still hoping that sometime soon Substack do decide to offer 3 and 6 month subscription options, and give us the option of turning off Annual. 🤞

No off ramp

The downside to selling Annual subscriptions is that you can’t get off the merry-go-round without stopping the Paid option altogether, 11 months in advance.

Let’s assume you’ve turned Paid on and are gathering at least one Annual membership each month. Their renewal dates will be spread over the 12 months in front of you, and if you decide at any point to stop, you will need to refund them the proportion that remains unused.

Think about that.

How much would you need to refund if you stopped tomorrow?

Do you collect the money for your annual subscriptions into a ‘holding bank account’ and then pay yourself each month, one twelfth of each initial annual fee?

Technically this is what you should do, so if you ever decided to stop, or were unable to continue due to illness or circumstances, the refund fees would all be nice and ring-fenced, ready for distribution.

Only want to encourage monthly subscriptions?

You can do this by pricing out the Annual option so no one chooses it.

I have changed my pricing to do exactly that, so the annual is £360 versus the monthly £10, while I decide whether I want to offer it or keep everyone on the monthly, which gives me more flexibility.

Thank you for bearing with me, while I liaised with Substack on these points, hopefully it’s crystal clear now.

That’s all for this week, see you in the Comments! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack to WIN a 3 Month Membership to Type Club.

Welcome to my old world…

As I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, we have a shiny new logo and branding!

I thought you’d like to know how we arrived there, in all the painstaking detail.

No?

Just skip down to the bottom for the Call to Connect, where there is another chance to show off your Substack. 😉

For those of you still here, it’s a long one, you might want to read it in the App… and have a little lie-down halfway through.

Here we go!

The original thinking was to take the essence of the original Fight Club logo and modify it to make it legible at the tiny, tiny size of 256x256 pixels and then somehow add in a ‘substack’ for the wordmark without mis-using their logotype.

The logos on the bottom right panel (above) are where I’ve ended up, and the pink colour was selected to sit nicely with my other two Substacks ‘Off on a Tangent’ and ‘Co-Work Corner’.

As you can see from my desktop screen grab above, it was created in Adobe Illustrator (my old stomping ground), as I needed to convert the type to outline and ‘hand comp’ the ‘U’ and ‘B’ together as a hat tip to the original logo.

This also meant I could manually slant it 10.5 degrees (my favourite italic angle) and then easily replicate the same angle on the substack ‘corporal stripes icon’ to match.

The Logo

For the Publication logo (256x256 pixels) the name of the game is legibility, as it only appears very, very small as a thumbnail.

I opted for white lettering so it contrasts the most with the background pink, and added an outer black glow to give the edges extra definition.

I realise some of you will be finding its position in the box above deeply distressing, as do I, because it doesn’t look centred.

To explain, that’s because I felt the need to nudge it to the right more, to allow for the round corners once it’s been imported, as below.

It’s a compromise between the space to the corner edge of the ‘C’ matching that of the ‘B’, without the top of the ‘B’ being too close to the right hand edge.

Its position within the round cornered box feels balanced now.

Yep, this is the stuff that could keep me up at night! 😂

Those of you who were foolish enough last time around to ask for my input, are probably still trying to work out the exact dimension of a ‘tadge’, which I requested you to move something over by.

I’m nothing if not pedantic.

Always be prepared to make a few tweaks once you see your creations in situ, no more so than with...

… the dreaded Wordmark

The Publication Wordmark needs to be 1344x256 pixels EXACTLY, which is a giant pain in the arse, given it doesn’t count white pixels as part of those dimensions, so you somehow have to design your way out of this nightmare situation!

This was a piece of cake with my first wordmark, as I could extend the aeroplane and its trail to fill the space.

But when you have text, it’s not so easy.

Like a lot of you, my first instinct was to put it in a box and be done with it.

Version 1

But I wasn’t a fan of this.

Putting it in a box always means the type size has to reduce to allow for the space margin around it, and it looks like a button.

Also if I put the ‘substack’ in any other colour than white, i.e. light pink or grey, it starts to get lost. Don’t even go there girlfriend!

And while we’re trying to make it a little less hideous should I try and match the corners to the round ones of the logo on the left? Dear god where will it all end?!

Version 2

I do prefer the grey and pink on a white background, but having to meet the exact requirement of 1344x256 pixels has resulted in an unwieldy baseline stagger.

Despite me spending a good 10 minutes bastardising the type to get the baseline of ‘substack’ to line-up with the base of the cross bar on the ‘T’, it still looks shit. Sigh.

Version 3

Ok, I’m greatly resisting the urge to say “and now with extra VIM” when introducing this one, because it does feel a bit like that, but do you know what?

Despite my initial misgivings as I approached this idea, I don’t not undislike the result.

Which, for me, as you’re beginning to realise, is high praise indeed! 🎉

Hang out the flags, let’s run with it!

We can always change it later if there’s a public outcry!

To the untrained eye, that underline may seem like, er well, an underline, but in fact it was created using Kyle’s Ulimate Pastel Palooza brushhead in Photoshop.

Who can resist a name like that, not me matey!

This underline ‘device’ also lends itself to be trotted out as handy page dividers:

It’s really worth taking the time to create some of these, as you will use them again and again, and they really help break up the blocks of type and therefore make it more approachable for the reader.

You increase the chances of your readers getting to the bottom of your articles if you allow them to stop off en route and have a bit of a breather.

Obviously you can use different colours and vary the depths and lengths, but never the latter within the same post.

I think we can all appreciate how uncomfortable this little chap below is making us feel now, when compared to those above.

The Welcome page logo

There is one place where the logo appears at a decent size to have some fun with, and that’s on the welcome page, which non-subscribers see when going into your Substack.

Wooo hooo, open the champagne, we have 600x600 pixels to play with here!

Bring back that tiny type that I told you not to include in the original logo, this is its chance to shine!

Give it some space to breathe, you’ll notice the top icon has moved away from the lettering, and the entire logo has more margin around it.

Email header

One last piece to the branding puzzle, and that’s the email header:

I realise you’re probably all reading this within the App, my dear Substackers, but most of your audience will be reading it in an email, so it’s worth creating a header.

You have 1100x220 pixels to run riot with, or maybe go into a creation frenzy with some seasonal ones bedecked with Autumn leaves or Christmas decorations.

To be honest, I wouldn’t even object to that, this is a good place to have some fun, but do put a reminder in your calendar to change them as their relevancy expires.

The Accent Colour

Nothing polarises people more than the highlight or accent colour.

There are two camps, the first who put it in the same colour as the rest of the branding, so it matches, in this case you would put it in the pink.

Then there are the digital marketers amongst us, who want to use it to lead people around our websites and entice them to click where we want them to click.

With the one exception of the ‘BIG RED BUTTON’ that clearly states ‘DON’T PUSH’, we humans are persuaded the most by the colour green.

We just can’t help ourselves, given a row of buttons, we are most likely to push the bright green one.

Which is why I will always use this colour as my ‘accent colour’, because it does exactly that, and highlights the path that I want you to follow.

Any guesses, as to what I might like you to do when you get to one of my homepages?

Yup. Subscribe.

The only time I wouldn’t use green is when one of the corporate colours is green, then I’d choose a contrasting, but not clashing colour like a bright pink or orange maybe.

This week’s Call to Connect:

Let’s see how you did with your brand designs and refreshes. Here’s an opportunity to subtly show us how banging your Substack is now looking:

1. Enter the Title of your Substack IN CAPS.

2. Enter a brief summary of what it’s about.

3. Describe your branding in no more than three words.

4. Enter your Subscriber number (so we can see any approaching a milestone and help you push it over).

5. Click through and take a look at those you like the sound of and ❤️ their Comment here so they can feel the love and rise to the top of this list.

As ever, the quicker you get your Substack into the Comments, the more people will see you and connect.

See you in the Comments! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack this post if you want to grow your Substack, as it will increase your visibility on Notes and help others find this post and join in the reciprocal boosting! 👏

Two things…

I have two things for you this week… and no homework so, like me, you have one more week to work on your branding, as per last week’s post:

1. Online Substack Geek Out:

Tuesday 1st October 15:00 BST (London) / 10:00 EDT (New York)

Our next Zoom call to Geek Out about Substack will start as above, estimated duration an hour… but I’m a chatterer, so if we’re in a good conversation after the hour has elapsed I’m not going anywhere if you’re not!

The last one was two hours!

Likely topics for the Geek Out:

• Growth strategies (I will be sharing my daily hack!)

• Micropayments (am desperate to discuss the possibilities here with you, I have some interesting ideas to bring to the table on this subject)

It’s very informal, more of a discussion just for the Type Club inner circle of Paid Members.

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly.

3. These meetings are not advised if you prefer to just observe or follow journal prompts, these will very much be about making connections with each other.

Paid Members also have access to our on-going Chat channel, where we have been discussing growth strategies and enjoying some reciprocal boosting there too. 😊

The Zoom link will be published on the Chat on 1 October, so you will have it in plenty of time.

I’m looking forward to meeting you there! 🤓

2. Call to Connect – Tell us about your latest post

I do find it interesting to look down the Archive list on someone’s Substack and see the wide and varied subject matter they have posted about.

You often can’t judge the personality of a Substack from the limited description text about it.

This week we will be focusing on your latest posts, so tell us all about them!

By joining in with group activities like these it really will accelerate your growth, make it more fun and nurture some new connections who may end up as friends.

Showcase your Substack in the Comments below

Use the Comments section of this post (below) to showcase your own Substack and find others who you can help boost… and therefore get noticed by.

1. Enter the name of your Substack.

2. Enter the link to your latest post.

3. Enter what this post is about.

4. Enter your Subscriber number.

5. Then scroll down the list to find other posts that interest you and check them out. This will hopefully result in an online ‘love in’ with lots of people shrieking ‘that’s unbelieveable, my favourite season is Autumn too!’ resulting in ❤️’s, comments and shiny new subscribers for you all!

Be early to join in with the Comments here as the first ones will get seen more than the latecomers.

Come back to this post over the next few days, I will be pushing it out on Notes too, and tagging some of you who are taking part.

See you in the Comments! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack this post if you want to grow your Substack, as it will increase your visibility on Notes and help others find this post and join in the reciprocal boosting!

It starts with a logo…

My intention with this Substack is to build it with you, so you can play along and add whatever features I’m talking about to your Substack, if you haven’t already, or perhaps refine them if they already exist.

The eagle-eyed amongst you will have noticed a glaring lack of logo and any kind of branding on the Substack Type Club so far, and you’d be right!

Good ol’ Arial Bold is providing the title visual, and we have no colours yet.

Why launch without these?

I would say it was my cunning plan all along to launch without a logo just so we could go through the creation process together, but that wasn’t the real reason.

I was using the lack of logo as a procrastination tool:

“I can’t possibly launch yet, because I haven’t even generated the logo!”

Sound familiar?

Having been in the design and digital marketing business for my entire working life, the thought of ‘going live’ without so much as a logo seemed ludicrous! 

This was a top notch excuse to faff around for a bit longer! 

In fact excuses for delay don’t really come better than this, particularly as this Substack is supposed to know what it’s doing in terms of presentation.

Then I leant heavily on my newly acquired mantra:

Done is better than perfect.

These five words will help you press that ‘publish’ button when you’re not 100% happy with a piece… you can always edit it later.

It will help you get your Substack out of the starting blocks!

It will help clear the ‘so called’ obstacles in your way, and just get on with it.

This is digital, it is not print, I’m not stuck with Arial Bold for all eternity and neither will you be, we can shape and mould and change and tweak for the rest of time, but we can’t change anything if there’s nothing there in the first place.

What happened?

I’m sure it will come as a shock to you, that when I launched this Substack without any branding, the world didn’t fall in, the style police didn’t bang down my door and arrest me, and literally no one mentioned it.

So if you’re using that as an excuse not to start, you’re going to have to think of another one. 😉

So let’s address that pesky white space and clunky title now, together.

Why bother with branding at all?

If I asked you “what’s the point of a logo?” most of you would say “recognition”, and you would be correct in that, but that’s not the only reason.

Here’s something I find fascinating… each time someone sees your logo they will ‘like’ you more.

Really?

Like you more?

Not just recognise you more?

Yup. That’s right.

Here’s the science bit…

In the 1960’s Robert Zajonc conducted a series of experiments which led to the development of the ‘Mere-exposure effect’. 

I first stumbled upon this theory in a book where there was a grid of about 6x9 Chinese symbols and it asked me to study them for a minute.

Then over the page, there was a similar grid of Chinese symbols and it asked me to choose the three I liked the best.

I don’t speak Chinese so had no clue what any of them meant, but chose three anyway, and it turns out that those three had also appeared on the previous page!

People are most likely to choose ones that they have seen before, than the new/unfamiliar ones.

Genius!

You can change someone’s opinion about something just by the frequency with which they see it!

Go on… test this theory… go to your Substack Chat section and have a scroll down the logos and icons, notice how you feel about ones you recognise, versus ones that are unfamiliar to you.

This phenomena also explains why sometimes there is an ‘outcry’ when a company changes its branding.

True fans of the brand scramble to justify why they ‘hate’ the new logo. 

They don’t really, they just genuinely miss the old one, like an old friend.

Nostalgia also brings good feelings, for instance when you are reminded of an old chocolate bar by looking at it’s dated logo and packaging.

Even if it wasn’t a particular favourite of yours at the time, your brain just by recognising it, will attribute affection to it.

Logo design

On Substack we have two opportunities to make our mark visually, the Publication logo (256x256 pixels) and the Publication wordmark (1344x256 pixels). 

When designing the logo, try and use the maximum amount of space allowed. Clarity is key, try not to put too much tiny detail in, it just gets lost.

Substack does keep changing how it uses the logo, so keep a close eye and change it to suit the latest use case. For example, using my other Substack’s logo for Off on a Tangent, here’s how the App home screen icons have changed, just in the 10 months that I’ve been here.

1. Original logo.

2. I felt the paper airplane was a bit too bold and clunky for this use, so reduced it and made it more airy.

3. Substack started not including the name of our Substacks on these thumbnails (see below the logo compared to the others), so I added it into the logo.
   Surely you want the name of your Substack to appear???

4. Ah yes, they then realised the error and put it back in.

5. Then they ditched the logos completely and changed it to the lead image, with colour way to match the image, not your branding.

6. I then updated the logo to a cross between 1 and 2, as it will only be viewed in a tiny size from this point.

Until they change it again. 

Once you have nailed your logo and wordmark you can generate some fun text  dividers and the email header (below), to give your Substack the full set.

What colour?

Go with a colour you like and which reflects the brand.

Imagine it on business cards, t-shirts, stickers, bags… do you still like it?

I decided to go for a purple for Off on a Tangent because I love purple and this one has a hidden joke inside.

The official Pantone colour reference is ‘Very Peri’ (in their case, short for periwinkle blue), but as a midlife woman I found it very much resonated with me for an entirely different reason! 😉 

 Upon discovering it’s name, I was 100% set on it.

When choosing a colour, make sure to reference the Pantone chart as you will then be able to communicate that colour to any printer or designer.

Going with something that looks ‘ok’ on your screen or home printer is very difficult to replicate and may well lead to mismatching in a print situation, so stick with a Pantone reference or Hex Colour Code, which makes the colour ‘portable’ across many platforms and mediums.

Branding challenge

My challenge for you this week is to look at your branding, whether it’s a case of creating a logo from scratch, like me, for Substack Type Club, or just looking at what you already have in context and then maybe tweaking it.

This is digital, unless you’re sitting on a stack of branded t-shirts it’s all a moveable feast so tweak away until you’re 100% satisfied with it.

Fun market research

A fun test of memorability to do with your shiny new logo is to position it in a grid of 9 other logos (3x3, not top left or middle), ask anyone who will give you the time to study them for 30 seconds and then ask them to describe the ones they can remember.

Obviously don’t use well known logos like MacDonalds or Starbucks for the other eight. 😉

If yours is not amongst the ones they can describe from memory, then go back to the drawing board.

A two week deadline

I will be working on the branding for Substack Type Club over the next two weeks, and then will do either the ‘big reveal’ or a poll where you can decide which one you prefer out of a few possibles.

Take this time to check in with your own branding and we can compare results then.

I will show you the development journey, so you can apply some of the rules to your own Substack’s branding as you deem necessary.

This week’s Call to Connect:

Let’s talk about colours and branding. If you have already settled on your logo and branding, please share the thinking behind it with us, so we can get a feel for how it’s done:

1. Enter the Title of your Substack IN CAPS.

2. Enter a brief summary of your branding.

3. What colour/s have you chosen and why?

4. Enter your Subscriber number, so we can see how established it is.

5. Are you happy with it, or would you like some feedback?

6. Have a look up and down the Comments to see how others were inspired, or need help to develop their logo with a second opinion.

7. Click through and take a look at those you like the sound of and ❤️ their Comment here, so they will rise to the top of this list.

As ever, the quicker you get your Substack into the Comments, the more people will see you and connect.

See you in the Comments! 😘

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below and Restack this post if you want to grow your Substack, as it will increase your visibility on Notes and help others find this post and join in the reciprocal boosting! 👏

Online Substack Geek-Out Zoom:

3 September 14:00 GMT / 15:00 BST (London) / 10:00 EDT (New York)

Just a quick reminder about our first Geek Out session, it is 3pm (London) time which is 14:00 GMT / 10: EDT.

This will be a monthly get together where we can swap Substack tips and strategies and generally brainstorm ideas.

I am already bursting to tell you about my latest idea and can’t wait for your feedback!

This is open to all Paid subscribers, and those who want to dip their toe in with the 7-day Free Trial below:

7-day Free Trial

Points to note:

1. It won’t be recorded so we can all speak freely without fear of a replay.

2. You will be encouraged to put your camera on so we can meet you properly.

3. These meetings are not advised if you prefer to just observe or follow journal prompts, these will very much be about making connections with each other.

The Zoom link is available on the Paid members Chat thread and I’ll repost it just before there so that any newbies have it in time.

I’m looking forward to meeting you there! 🤓

K8x

PS: Please ‘❤️’ below if you like the idea of a Substack Geek Out, it will help others find this post and join in.