But of course there are 667 people who clicked on a whiskey post in the middle of a market crash. Priorities and such! Good taste, most likely. Or just a coping mechanism because of the aforementioned crash? They all have their reasons, and those are all good ones. I know that, without any Bourbon experience to speak of, I now have Pappy 23 featuring on my shopping list, right alongside the Hibiki 30.
Charlie,I came over your here on The Lemon Tree Mindset this morning and are still kind of stunned. And I will study it again after posting this comment.
It is Saturday late evening and I am writing this comment right after a very nice family dinner, and after my wife left for work having the night watch at the hospital.
I joined Substack in 2024, and did nothing for a while except reading the occasional post.
Having tried my hands on blogging and affiliate marketing, being given a lot of bad advice along the way, I decided to take a quick look at Substack, but was very weary of the platform and of starting to write and publishing on it.
Veronica were one of the writers on Substack that first caught my eye and the first I subscribed to.
She has never disappointed in what she has promised in her writing and advice.
Have I followed her advice? No, not as much as I should.
But what she has done though, was to get me to take action and start publishing on Substack, but I really didn’t define my mission and intention of writing here.
I fell into the same trap as when I started blogging on my WordPress site and consumed way to much content instead of producing my own.
Last year I started to write with more clarity and intention, but still have not gone fully in.
I saw Veronica mention you through some of her posts, right after you started writing on Substack, checked your bio and thought: ok, this guy definitely has the credentials in order and has already a huge audience to go. No wonder he will make good on Substack.
Long story short; this post is awesome. I can’t find any other words as I write this to describe the sheer value in what you have written.
The post explain in a clear and understandable voice, what writing online (or offline) and creating income revenue from it is about, and very clearly how to do it.
I really haven’t seen anyone explaining it as you do.
At the same time you write about investments and politics that is understandable, and we get it in one publication.
Your post needs to studied and the lessons/advice in it applied/adapted/adjusted into our own frameworks and MO’s on Substack (I know I will).
It is like a curtain has been ripped away from my mind and my eyes, and I
have to re-structure a bit and adjust my writing and my publication.
Most of what anyone needs to learn about writing online on Substack and attract both audience and subscribers is covered in your post.
I will stop here by saying thank you to both of you!
Charlie already said it all, but I'll just add that the black belt in you shows up every day here. I've seen you keep publishing Notes and show up even if the room is empty. I've done that too and how you show up for yourself, even when no one is watching says a lot about your character and resilience.
I'm very grateful Charlie wrote this Post because as many have pointed out, it's a Masterclass not only in growing on Substack but how to build a real community. People think it's only about good writing but it's also about the space you create and how you make those people feel.
One thing (of the many) I've learned from him is how to use comments are an amplifier of your work because it's not a newsletter, it's a conversation that keeps evolving as people share, challenge and contribute.
Looking forward to seeing your next act!
PS: thank you for your kind words. They push me to keep working on mine :)
Your wife is working the night watch at a hospital and you're sitting at the kitchen table writing a comment on a Substack post instead of watching television.
That tells me everything I need to know about you.
You said you haven't gone fully in. I'd push back on that. A man who writes a comment this thoughtful after a family dinner on a Saturday night has already gone in. He just hasn't given himself credit for it yet.
The consuming trap is real. I lived in it for years. The cure isn't discipline. The cure is publishing something that scares you a little and realizing the world didn't end. Then doing it again Tuesday.
You said you saw my credentials and figured I had a huge audience to go. I had 822 subscribers in December. Eight hundred and twenty-two.
It took me two months publishing five times a week to get to 500. Every one of them earned one post at a time.
The credentials opened zero doors on Substack. The writing opened all of them.
You have the same door. It's not locked.
Veronica sent you here. That means she saw something in you worth sending. Trust her judgment. She's been right about everything else.
I very rarely save a Substack but this one is too valuable not to! I’ve been growing my Substack since July and you’ve given me so much to think about. I love to experiment and innovate but I’m not as strong on the analytics, so I know where to turn my attention now. Thank you Veronica, thank you Charlie!
Thank you, Tarra and I'm also using this as a sign and a stopper to pause, calibrate and strategize.
Sometimes it's easy to fall into tunnel-vision when we have been doing the same thing for a while, especially if the results are positive, but it's great to challenge ourselves and try things that push us from comfort to growth.
I don’t think I’ve ever read a post this long before but I loved every second of it - so much information and insight which quite rightly could’ve been an e-book 📕
Charlie is very generous with his knowledge as are you Veronica - thank you both for bringing this post to life 🧡
I totally agree with you and it embodies everything an abundance mindset is about. Same here, I don't usually read long Posts (I prefer books for that), but this one had me binge-reading. Pure gold!
I'm so happy to have the opportunity to share it with my community. All the credit goes to Charlie.
Charlie, just found your Substack. The intel is amazing and the writing…superb. As a physician, I am concerned about your frequent references to Buffalo Trace and cigars. I don’t need to tell you it’s bad for your health, but if it’s essential to your writing then I say: we all have to make sacrifices for the common good.
If the man needs his bourbon to produce this awesome mischief, we can give it a pass. It is for the common good, Jay. His accountant still doesn't agree though...
You are a physician. You went to school for approximately the same number of years it takes a sequoia to reach full height.
And you sat down in a coffee shop on a Sunday morning, found a Substack written by a man who advised six presidents, runs a Bitcoin node, received medals from intelligence agencies for classified activities, and produces 4,500 words of geopolitical intelligence per sitting.
And your contribution to the conversation is the cigar.
Jay. The cigar is fine. The cigar has been fine since Winston Churchill won a world war on approximately forty of them a day.
The cigar is not the variable.
You want to talk about health?
Let's talk about the health of the dollar. Let's talk about the health of the private credit market. Let's talk about what JPMorgan's markdowns are telling us about the health of the entire financial system.
That's the patient on the table, Jay. And it did not get there because of a Montecristo No. 2 on a balcony facing the beach in Florida.
Come back Monday. Bring the coffee. The intel will concern you considerably more than the bourbon.
It's the biggest success story I've ever seen on Substack so I could not not share it. The best part is that Charlie's strategy is out there in open source for anyone to replicate.
I took notes, lots of them! I will be categorizing my posts with more intention now - one to "acquire", one to "convert" & one to "retain". And, I'll continue to post with more regularity (I'm at 103, so far...)
I learned more about Substack in this one article than I have in the last 3 years.
Elizabeth, "learned more about Substack in one article than in the last 3 years" is either the nicest thing anyone's said to me this week or the most devastating indictment of Substack's own documentation. Probably both.
103 posts. Do you know what that means? You're standing exactly where I was standing five months ago. I had 107 posts before I turned on the Threshold. 107 free posts that most people told me were "leaving money on the table." I wasn't leaving money on the table. I was building the table.
You're building yours right now.
The categorizing instinct is right. Acquire, convert, retain. But here's what I'd add. Don't let those categories make the writing mechanical. The posts that acquired the most subscribers for me were never the ones I wrote thinking "this will acquire subscribers." They were the ones where I wrote something I couldn't not write. The strategy was underneath. The conviction was on top.
And the regularity matters more than people think. You said you'll post with more regularity. Good. Showing up is a trust exercise. Not for you. For the reader. Every time you publish on the day you said you'd publish, you're making a deposit in a bank account that doesn't show up on Stripe until one day it does. All at once.
Sharyph. There are no coincidences. A coincidence is God's way of staying anonymous in our lives.
That's how I found Veronica. I wasn't looking. She wasn't advertising.
Something lined up that had no business lining up, and five months later she's writing 3,000 words about a guy on a balcony with bourbon and a cigar who somehow built a publication that hit #1 in Finance.
How do you get hold of Garcia? You just did.
Subscribe. Show up in the comments. The doors are open five days a week. I read every comment and answer most of them personally, usually after the second pour.
But of course there are 667 people who clicked on a whiskey post in the middle of a market crash. Priorities and such! Good taste, most likely. Or just a coping mechanism because of the aforementioned crash? They all have their reasons, and those are all good ones. I know that, without any Bourbon experience to speak of, I now have Pappy 23 featuring on my shopping list, right alongside the Hibiki 30.
Charlie,I came over your here on The Lemon Tree Mindset this morning and are still kind of stunned. And I will study it again after posting this comment.
It is Saturday late evening and I am writing this comment right after a very nice family dinner, and after my wife left for work having the night watch at the hospital.
I joined Substack in 2024, and did nothing for a while except reading the occasional post.
Having tried my hands on blogging and affiliate marketing, being given a lot of bad advice along the way, I decided to take a quick look at Substack, but was very weary of the platform and of starting to write and publishing on it.
Veronica were one of the writers on Substack that first caught my eye and the first I subscribed to.
She has never disappointed in what she has promised in her writing and advice.
Have I followed her advice? No, not as much as I should.
But what she has done though, was to get me to take action and start publishing on Substack, but I really didn’t define my mission and intention of writing here.
I fell into the same trap as when I started blogging on my WordPress site and consumed way to much content instead of producing my own.
Last year I started to write with more clarity and intention, but still have not gone fully in.
I saw Veronica mention you through some of her posts, right after you started writing on Substack, checked your bio and thought: ok, this guy definitely has the credentials in order and has already a huge audience to go. No wonder he will make good on Substack.
Long story short; this post is awesome. I can’t find any other words as I write this to describe the sheer value in what you have written.
The post explain in a clear and understandable voice, what writing online (or offline) and creating income revenue from it is about, and very clearly how to do it.
I really haven’t seen anyone explaining it as you do.
At the same time you write about investments and politics that is understandable, and we get it in one publication.
Your post needs to studied and the lessons/advice in it applied/adapted/adjusted into our own frameworks and MO’s on Substack (I know I will).
It is like a curtain has been ripped away from my mind and my eyes, and I
have to re-structure a bit and adjust my writing and my publication.
Most of what anyone needs to learn about writing online on Substack and attract both audience and subscribers is covered in your post.
I will stop here by saying thank you to both of you!
Charlie already said it all, but I'll just add that the black belt in you shows up every day here. I've seen you keep publishing Notes and show up even if the room is empty. I've done that too and how you show up for yourself, even when no one is watching says a lot about your character and resilience.
I'm very grateful Charlie wrote this Post because as many have pointed out, it's a Masterclass not only in growing on Substack but how to build a real community. People think it's only about good writing but it's also about the space you create and how you make those people feel.
One thing (of the many) I've learned from him is how to use comments are an amplifier of your work because it's not a newsletter, it's a conversation that keeps evolving as people share, challenge and contribute.
Looking forward to seeing your next act!
PS: thank you for your kind words. They push me to keep working on mine :)
Roy.
Your wife is working the night watch at a hospital and you're sitting at the kitchen table writing a comment on a Substack post instead of watching television.
That tells me everything I need to know about you.
You said you haven't gone fully in. I'd push back on that. A man who writes a comment this thoughtful after a family dinner on a Saturday night has already gone in. He just hasn't given himself credit for it yet.
The consuming trap is real. I lived in it for years. The cure isn't discipline. The cure is publishing something that scares you a little and realizing the world didn't end. Then doing it again Tuesday.
You said you saw my credentials and figured I had a huge audience to go. I had 822 subscribers in December. Eight hundred and twenty-two.
It took me two months publishing five times a week to get to 500. Every one of them earned one post at a time.
The credentials opened zero doors on Substack. The writing opened all of them.
You have the same door. It's not locked.
Veronica sent you here. That means she saw something in you worth sending. Trust her judgment. She's been right about everything else.
Now stop studying my post and go write yours.
May the Mischief be with you.
Charlie
I very rarely save a Substack but this one is too valuable not to! I’ve been growing my Substack since July and you’ve given me so much to think about. I love to experiment and innovate but I’m not as strong on the analytics, so I know where to turn my attention now. Thank you Veronica, thank you Charlie!
Thank you, Tarra and I'm also using this as a sign and a stopper to pause, calibrate and strategize.
Sometimes it's easy to fall into tunnel-vision when we have been doing the same thing for a while, especially if the results are positive, but it's great to challenge ourselves and try things that push us from comfort to growth.
These are mind blowing results.
I don’t think I’ve ever read a post this long before but I loved every second of it - so much information and insight which quite rightly could’ve been an e-book 📕
Charlie is very generous with his knowledge as are you Veronica - thank you both for bringing this post to life 🧡
I totally agree with you and it embodies everything an abundance mindset is about. Same here, I don't usually read long Posts (I prefer books for that), but this one had me binge-reading. Pure gold!
I'm so happy to have the opportunity to share it with my community. All the credit goes to Charlie.
I had to stop half way to take a work call and was so annoyed 😅 went straight back after and finished it though.
Thanks again for always helping us grow 🌳🍋 💕
Charlie, just found your Substack. The intel is amazing and the writing…superb. As a physician, I am concerned about your frequent references to Buffalo Trace and cigars. I don’t need to tell you it’s bad for your health, but if it’s essential to your writing then I say: we all have to make sacrifices for the common good.
If the man needs his bourbon to produce this awesome mischief, we can give it a pass. It is for the common good, Jay. His accountant still doesn't agree though...
Hahaha love it!
Jay,
Let me get this straight.
You are a physician. You went to school for approximately the same number of years it takes a sequoia to reach full height.
And you sat down in a coffee shop on a Sunday morning, found a Substack written by a man who advised six presidents, runs a Bitcoin node, received medals from intelligence agencies for classified activities, and produces 4,500 words of geopolitical intelligence per sitting.
And your contribution to the conversation is the cigar.
Jay. The cigar is fine. The cigar has been fine since Winston Churchill won a world war on approximately forty of them a day.
The cigar is not the variable.
You want to talk about health?
Let's talk about the health of the dollar. Let's talk about the health of the private credit market. Let's talk about what JPMorgan's markdowns are telling us about the health of the entire financial system.
That's the patient on the table, Jay. And it did not get there because of a Montecristo No. 2 on a balcony facing the beach in Florida.
Come back Monday. Bring the coffee. The intel will concern you considerably more than the bourbon.
And it should.
May the Mischief be with you.
Charlie
I feel guilty NOT paying to read this. Great work Charlie as always. And thank you Veronica for sharing.
Hahaha, I feel guilty for sharing it for free too!
But I’m sure it will pay forward to Charlie in one way or another.
Exponential rocket lift-off! 🚀 fueled by L³ = M³🔥
It's the biggest success story I've ever seen on Substack so I could not not share it. The best part is that Charlie's strategy is out there in open source for anyone to replicate.
An exceptional piece. ✨
I took notes, lots of them! I will be categorizing my posts with more intention now - one to "acquire", one to "convert" & one to "retain". And, I'll continue to post with more regularity (I'm at 103, so far...)
I learned more about Substack in this one article than I have in the last 3 years.
Thanks for your insight & generosity!
Elizabeth, "learned more about Substack in one article than in the last 3 years" is either the nicest thing anyone's said to me this week or the most devastating indictment of Substack's own documentation. Probably both.
103 posts. Do you know what that means? You're standing exactly where I was standing five months ago. I had 107 posts before I turned on the Threshold. 107 free posts that most people told me were "leaving money on the table." I wasn't leaving money on the table. I was building the table.
You're building yours right now.
The categorizing instinct is right. Acquire, convert, retain. But here's what I'd add. Don't let those categories make the writing mechanical. The posts that acquired the most subscribers for me were never the ones I wrote thinking "this will acquire subscribers." They were the ones where I wrote something I couldn't not write. The strategy was underneath. The conviction was on top.
And the regularity matters more than people think. You said you'll post with more regularity. Good. Showing up is a trust exercise. Not for you. For the reader. Every time you publish on the day you said you'd publish, you're making a deposit in a bank account that doesn't show up on Stripe until one day it does. All at once.
103 posts. You're closer than you think.
May the Mischief be with you.
Charlie
Thank you for this amazing and thorough report and strategy.
I learned a lot from you and will implement some new things.
So happy for you!
Veronica - you are the best! Everyone I know that gets started on Substack I'm sending your way! Un fuerte abrazo, Charlie
the opportunities are for real... how do you get hold of Garcia? Amazing.
Sharyph. There are no coincidences. A coincidence is God's way of staying anonymous in our lives.
That's how I found Veronica. I wasn't looking. She wasn't advertising.
Something lined up that had no business lining up, and five months later she's writing 3,000 words about a guy on a balcony with bourbon and a cigar who somehow built a publication that hit #1 in Finance.
How do you get hold of Garcia? You just did.
Subscribe. Show up in the comments. The doors are open five days a week. I read every comment and answer most of them personally, usually after the second pour.
May the Mischief be with you.
Charlie
Honestly, ask any question here. He is amazing at replying to every single comment. Part of his success has been his engagement with his readers.