How many paid subs is TOO many with Katie Chappell

Katiedraws, does maths, grows and is doing a beautiful job. ✨

My Diamond Membership is closing for GOOD on 1st November If you’d like to join me and the other 💎 Diamonds building their wonderful homes here on Substack with bespoke strategy and mentoring support JUMP IN with us before I turn it all off. (current members not affected) DM me to chat about if it’s a good fit for you.

Hi folks,

Yay - I’m back with another collab in our 2025 growth lab series. These have been slower to take off that I thought but there’s a few in the archive if you’re new here. They aim to bring you stories, strategy and the thoughts of creative humans growing on Substack! 🪩 💫

Meet

Katie Chappell

I wanted to share the journey of a beautiful pal who lives close to me here on the Northumberland coast.

Katie Chappell

is a WONDERFUL artist and online illustrator who started her journey on Substack a little over a year ago. She’s got a hilarious instagram account where she takes us behind the scenes of life and work.

When she first joined Substack, Katie did the beautiful thing I always encourage in using this platform like a playground, being an avid reader and making friends with it…she was here and writing but she wasn’t totally decided on how she’d use it.

🛝 ✨ 🎢

And then…

Katie came to one of my in person events (at Alnwick Story Fest), joined as a 💎Diamond Member here at

Sparkle on Substack

the next day and asked me two very specific questions about how an idea she had might work here.

It was about a ‘jobs board’ – she wanted my opinion on whether I thought it would work. I said

“yes!!”

and she asked about others who might do anything similar – I answered and sent her links to the two writing jobs boards I know of who are flying here - you probably already know

George ~ FWN

and

Amy Suto

? 💖

The next thing I knew the Illustrator Jobs board was born and what felt like two and a half minutes later Katie was closing the paid subs down as she was already at 400 paid subs.

Of course, ‘overnight success’ is never just that. I’ve known this wonderful gem of a human for probably 7 or so years now and she’s worked hard to shape her work, expand and mould her entrepreneurial spirit into a multi-income stream successful online business.

I caught up with her for a little chat about why she stopped her own growth on Substack and how it’s all feeling so I could bring you some gems and remind you staying creative on Substack is one of my most favourite ways to be.

Hi Katie – so I know you have paused new membership for

Katiedraws (and writes) - The Illustrator Jobs Board

– how did you do that technically and why was it important to you?

Hello. Thank you for having me! :) OK, so there were a few reasons why I paused new membership for the Illustrator Jobs Board.

Firstly, I didn’t want the jobs board to feel like playing the lottery. I genuinely want illustrators to get work from there. And for the event organisers who are looking for illustrators - I wanted to make sure they weren’t getting absolutely bombarded by applications. ¹

It’s early days but I get the feeling that the illustrators who are in there right now, are pleased to be in there and there’s less of a panicky energy around.

So interesting… how is the jobs board working for your members? Do you have any success stories?

So many! This is one of my favourite things about running the jobs board. One success story that stands out is an Illustrator Jobs Board subscriber who got a $13k job - the initial budget wasn’t as high as that but after discussions with the client that was the final take-home amount.

Every week I get messages from illustrators letting me know that they’ve got their first job, or that they’re doing their first international live event illustration job, or even just that they’ve overhauled their pricing strategy since reading my articles. 🥰

Love that – do they also chat amongst themselves or is it more like an individual voyage into the jobs world and out again? 🚣🏾

Illustrator Jobs Board subscribers do chat to each other a little bit, yes. I did try out running the chat function on Substack but I found it a bit stressful. That bit is still a work in progress! People sometimes make friends in the comments section on posts and notes. Honestly though, I think people are just busy and want to get a job then get on with their day, haha.

I know you like to work online as a graphic scribe and have had some really cool clients – did you do outreach to win those clients or did they find you through SEO?

I’m pretty sure all of my work has come through SEO.

Maybe a tiny tiny sprinkling of stuff via Instagram or word of mouth but organic search traffic is my main bread and butter. SEO is something I am a bit obsessed with and love telling other illustrators about. Don’t sleep on it!

Yes, it’s a slog at first but once it pays off it’s invaluable. I love knowing that I never *have* to post on social media to get work, and that articles I wrote years ago are still bringing in lovely clients who are ready to work with me.

Do you think you’ll do the illustrator jobs board long term?

I hope so! It started in January this year as a complete experiment but so far so good.

Curious - had ai interfered or enhanced anything you do?

AI stuff I’ve noticed:

- Clients using AI to write their briefs

- Illustrators using AI to write their jobs board applications (which can be a bit embarrassing when two different illustrators write almost identical words)

- Illustrators feeling (understandably!) very concerned and upset with how AI is going and the way it’s changing the illustration industry in terms of what work is available.

For now at least, it seems that AI isn’t really impacting live event stuff.

I think event organisers hire graphic recorders because they really want some more humanness in their event - but I’m always keeping my eyes peeled for new developments.

Right now I’m learning as much as I can about GEO / AI search results. AI is definitely having an impact on organic search, and I want to know how it all works so that I can tweak my own website and then share that information with Good Shippers who are inside the Illustration Business Club.

Lastly, tell us more about how to get involved in your world – what’s on the horizon for the next few months?

I tend to hibernate in the winter, so coming up I have mid-December to January booked off. My daughter is 3 and a half now so we’ll be doing lots of Christmassy stuff and going for walks.

In the meantime though I’ll still be working on the Illustrator Jobs Board, The Good Ship Illustration podcast and we have a fresh round of the Picture Book Course coming up too :) and people can always come and say hi on Instagram. I still love hanging around on there.

Aw thanks Katie for all the good and brilliance you are sharing in the world.

Thanks for having me Claire and for all of your support.

Follow and find

Katie Chappell

online…

IG -

katiedraws

A post shared by @katiedraws

Website -

https://www.katiechappell.com

Thanks for reading and if you’d like to be part of the 2025 growth lab series and you’re a member of

Sparkle on Substack

with something to say just drop me an email and we’ll sort you an interview.

Claire (and Katie)

✨

1. Do the maths on your limit for subscriptions - what would feel an expansive/ perfect amount - you can use my Substack calculator to work out how much you’ll get paid…