How to use 'Substack Notes'

Substack's inbuilt social media network ✨

Hamish is the co-founder of Substack, you heard it here!

Notes is Substack’s inbuilt social media feed.

• It’s a bit like twitter but kinder and less aggressive. There are no ads but writers/ creators do advertise their work. (In my opinion we should be supportive of our colleagues, it’s hard enough to advertise, throw a heart in?) ❤️

• Notes launched in April 2023 and is still being shaped by us, the creatives and writers (who also read) who use it for connection, building kinship and finding like minded colleagues AND subscribers.

• Notes help bring folks to your publication to subscribe, they may also follow you.

• You can write a Note on anything you like, you can share writing; yours or someone elses….

• You can share photo or snippets of video, you can share links.

• You can invite people to conversations, crowd source info, test ideas…

It’s a 24/7 party and EVERYONE’s invited…

Types of Notes

This post compiles some of the BEST posts and advice I’ve seen on using Notes plus my own take from the early days and for paid members a more recent video.

Feel free to restack this article and share with your colleagues on Notes? 🤓

Here’s an example of a text note… crowdsourcing info for you all, you can pop in and read the replies;

Here’s an example of a video note…

Here’s an example of a visual Note;

Here’s an example of a photo Note;

Here’s an example of a restack;

Here’s an example of a Notes that went ‘viral’ …

There are two other examples but unfortunately the writer took their notes down as the influx was too much to manage. One was someone who had over 1000 subs arrive in 12 hours and with that some jarring connects/ spam. One I don’t know, I never got to talk to him… he left Substack 🤷🏽‍♀️. My take is we would have to think through how to feel ready for the entire internet to land on our doorstep if we tried to make a Note go viral and honestly I don’t know if you want to aim for that?

Here’s another…I can relate, this is an easy ❤️

And here’s one from more recently. I chatted to Julie and she got 20k email subs from notes as she arrived…

Let’s get into it…

First up “following/ followers… “

As we’ve learnt on many a social media platform over the years…

You will see when you subscribe to a publication that Substack automatically checks the follow and subscribe boxes… they then ask you if you want to uncheck those boxes…

Drop down to explore, uncheck to manage the overwhelm or you’ll end up signed up to a TONNE of noise.

It could be (like me) that you uncheck them all… but given the influx of followers some of us have had, it could be that folks aren’t unchecking the subscribe box…

When you follow someone, you follow their Notes on Substack.

You don’t get their posts/ emails to your inbox. You can check their Notes ‘feed’ and see what they’ve posted by heading to the writer profile.

✨

Additional resources on Notes

Here’s an article from Substack on Substack Notes. And here’s one on the difference between Notes, chats and threads. And here’s an article from Forbes.

I loved this article from

Kristi Keller

on how Notes brought her new subs…

The Simplest Thing That Brought Me 480 Subscribers In One Month

Here’s Substack’s first ever post about Notes…

Introducing Substack Notes

This from

Mika

was a great and reassuring read…

Fav Five 🖐️ | How to joyfully thrive on Notes

Here’s an update from me on managing your nervous system with Notes

Live Replay - Substack Notes and a Calm Nervous System + q&a

Notes that do well and things to consider when composing a note…(not an exhaustive list)

There’s a secret algorithm on Notes here are the things it likes;

• GREAT writing

• joyful things

• funny things

• writer solidarity

• moments of magic

• moments of mundane that feel like magic

• controversy (sometimes)

• Long Notes

• Short Notes

• Easy to engage with Notes

• Writing / memes/ posts that build community…

• messy photos

• beautiful photos

• cheerleading words

• words that invite a reaction

• things that stop the scroll

• when you (@) tag a writer like this

  Russell Nohelty

• “Things that did well on facebook in 2012” -

  Russell Nohelty

  🧐

  “I think writers would have a better time if they considered Notes building their network instead of their fandom. It’s dynamite to find collaborators. Less so fans, unless you have a writer centric business. Though, that’s also true on what what formerly called Twitter”

  Russell Nohelty

Why to use Substack Notes…

Members video below to accompany Notes engagement threads which we do a few times a season to lean in and learn more about Notes and our ways of being social.

Let’s focus a creative practise that supports our publication to grow.

Come join us in the membership and let’s Sparkle on Substack! ✨