A new way to start monetizing on your content and make money from writing is publishing via Substack newsletter. This platform makes it easy to create an email newsletter, which writers send to readers. Writes make money on Subtstack by charging a subscription fee. Whenever you send a newsletter to your subscribers, it gets published on your Stubstack website. If some newsletters or articles don’t go out by email, you can also publish them on your Substack website.
You can start as you like at Stubstack. You have total control over what is free and what is for paid subscribers. Furthermore, you can start charging your subscribers whenever you want, for example right from the start when you’re importing an existing publication. Or you first build an audience. You can also decide to publish free newsletters once in a while, or simply all the time. You can use the newsletter to earn income from affiliate marketing. Or if the content has some real value for your subscribers, you can also charge for that. This is all built-in to the Stubstack application.
How much money can you make on substack? The top 10 authors on Substack collectively make more than $15 million a year. Currently, there are over 500,000 subscribers on Substack. 12 million people visit the Substack website every month. – Source
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How to Get Started On Substack
All you really need is to create an account, import your contact list and start sending your first newsletter. These simple steps are outlined hereafter in more detail.
Is there a Substack app? No, at the moment, there is no Substack app on Android or iOS. You can only the platform via Substack website.
Step 1: Create Substack Account
To create a Substack account, you can use your Twitter account or email. To complete the registration, set up your profile, create a publication, and then you can import your email contact list. You must fill in all the fields and update your profile picture. The other fields can be changed later, apart from your name and bio. Once you have done that, go ahead to create your publication. In the field, What’s it about?, add the header for the post.
Step 2: Import your Email Contact List
You have an option to import your entire contact list during the setup process. Alternatively, you can import your contact list to a CSV file in case you are using a marketing service. Finally, you can add your contact list manually if you are not able to use the above options.
The next step is to import content from other mediums, such as a website. Click on ‘Import’ and then enter the URL where your post is located. You must prove that you are the owner of the content. Once you are done, Substack will import the content. You can edit or delete any post if you so wish.
Substack podcast: In 2019, Substack introduced support for podcast, so podcasters can earn money on the platform.
Step 3: Send Your First Email
This is a simple step, especially if you are experienced in blogging. This step helps you to reach your subscribers and earn. To get started with your first article, go to your dashboard, then click on posts and then select New Post. Once you have done that, you can go ahead and start writing. When you are done with writing the article, you can opt to Publish & Send Email, or you can Publish. To earn an income, ensure that your content is private so that you can only publish it to paying subscribers.
Generating Income on Substack
There are a few different ways to make money on Substack. They are the following:
- Subscriptions: The most common way to make money on Substack is to charge readers a subscription fee for access to your newsletter. This can be a monthly or annual subscription, and the price is up to you to set.
- Memberships: Another way to make money on Substack is to offer paid memberships. This gives readers access to exclusive content, such as early access to new posts, behind-the-scenes content, or even a private community.
- Affiliate marketing: Affiliate marketing involves promoting other products or services in your newsletter and earning a commission on any sales that you generate.
- Selling your own products or services: You can also make money on Substack by selling your own products or services. This could include anything from e-books and courses to consulting services.
To get paid on Substack, you need to connect Substack to a Stripe account, Substack’s payment partner, to receive money in the bank account. Payments usually arrive in your bank account within 48 hours of each transaction.
Substack Pricing
Substack makes money by charging a 10% fee on all subscription revenue generated through its platform. This fee is deducted from your earnings before they are paid out to you.
In addition to the Substack fee, there are also credit card processing fees. Stripe, Substack’s payment processor, charges a 2.9% fee on all credit card transactions. This fee is also deducted from your earnings before they are paid out to you.
Substack grants and Substack Defender Program: Substack offers its writers various grants ranging from $500 to $5,000. The company also offers grants similar to book advances to its established writers. Substack Defender Program provides free legal advice to writers who are facing legal uncertainty. The legal support includes pre-publication legal review of individual stories and responses to cease-and-desist letters.
Substack Alternatives
Apart from Substack, there are other Substack competitors that allow you to make money from your content via subscription.
To make money from Substack newsletter, make sure you come up with a sizeable email list, create content that can attract a following and generate engagement, etc. Once you have a reasonable following, the next step is to enable payments. You have an option to set monthly or yearly subscriptions. To keep track of your Substack, you can go to the stats page to see the number of visitors for your subdomain daily. Also, there are the post stats which show the views for every post. It also shows how many emails were sent and the percentage of those that opened it. Follow this guide to learn more about how to increase your chances of getting paid on the Substack.
