You Can Steal My Substack Strategy But You Can't Steal My Croissants 🥐

This article is for you if you:

a) Need guidance to launch your Substack newsletter

b) Are struggling to grow your Substack strategically

c) Like croissants

Last week I posted a Substack Note that escalated quickly.

It was a sunny morning in Hong Kong; I was having the ultimate decadent breakfast and decided to share a snapshot of my Substack strategy.

The likes and comments started to pile up, and I realized there was an opportunity to double-click and elaborate.

Apparently, people like croissants too, so here we are…

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My Substack strategy

I emphasize “my” because this is what works for me. Read it, steal it, tweak it and make it “your” strategy.

1. Organization

I worked at Apple for 7 years and visited dozens of stores across the globe, from New York to Tokyo, Shanghai, Singapore and Dubai.

People love visiting Apple stores not (only) because of the products but because of how beautiful they are. They are clean, neat, and intuitive: temples of technology.

That’s what you want your Substack to feel like.

How?

• Sections

Use sections to organize your content following your logic.

My logic is my content pillars. The Lemon Tree Mindset is about:

- Inspiration

- Building online

- Personal brand

Those are my 3 pillars and they’re reflected in my navigation toolbar (plus 1 section for my book chapters).

I want to make it stupidly easy to find what you need in just 1 click.

My landing page

Go to Settings > Sections and edit.

Tip: you can add a Thumbnail picture for each section.

• Hero Post

A Hero post is the first thing your readers will see when they visit your publication: your landing page.

Turn it into your elevator pitch: a one-time opportunity to turn browsers into subscribers. As you see above, my Hero Post is “The Crazy Story of How My Substack Was Born.”

Be creative and give us something that will make us want more: a cool story, a teaser, a wow moment…my newsletter is about inspiration and empowerment, so I chose an article and a picture that reflect exactly that.

Go to Settings > Website > Site Design > Hero > Feature. Then, pin your Hero post to the top.

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2. Cadence

I publish 2 newsletters a week:

• 1 FREE article related to 1 of my 3 pillars, like this one.

• 1 book chapter to my paid subscribers - currently of The Flight Home; once I finish that, I’ll send one exclusive article weekly with a free preview as a teaser.

• 1daily Note: I love Notes because they’re short and spontaneous and can generate huge engagement.

Substack Note

Some successful creators like Alexander Semenyukor David McIlroy post daily and have built a large audience of 1,000+ in just a few months, while others post once a week and have great traction too, likeKristina God.

Establish a cadence you can commit to. In almost a year, I’ve never missed my weekly newsletter because I know I have the bandwidth to deliver on that promise.

Tip: pre-schedule your posts to build predictability.

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3. Community

Substacks’ biggest competitive advantage is its native community: thousands of readers and creators. Instead of looking for subscribers, they can come to you!

To date, 23% of my subscribers come directly from Substack. Crazy number.

But how do you leverage the local community and build your tribe?

By supporting others:

• Recommendations

Recommend other Substacks you enjoy to your readers. It costs you ZERO and helps your buddies grow faster. The Lemon Tree Mindset has 36 Recommendations from other Substacks and this has led to 214 new subscriptions.

Some of my Recommendations show up in my profile such as Workmanshit , Jean Davis , Offbeat Chronicles and Any’s Substack.

Box Cutter Co. has a lot of synergies with my publication and has generated 36 new subscribers and vice-versa; mine has also sent a good chunk his way.

Win-win!

• Engage and restack

Build your tribe by engaging with other Substacks. You can like, comment, or even better, Restack and share the love.

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4. Promotion

• Social media

Use social media as your recruitment channel. I use both LinkedIn and Medium to promote this newsletter.

- Profile: you can add a link to direct followers to your Substack.

- Repurpose content:

I repurpose my free articles on Medium (with mixed success) but what works best is to add a CTA in your related articles.

I don’t repurpose my newsletter on Linkedin/ Twitter, but I turn it into a shorter post, like a snack, with a link in the comments.

Tip: don’t share the link in the post: Zuckerberg and Elon don’t like losing traffic to third-party platforms.

Tip: if you repurpose, add the canonical link in the SEO settings to indicate to search engines which article is the primary source.

• Clear benefits

Spill out the benefits of joining your newsletter.

At the bottom of all my articles (see below), I add a note of what my subscribers get so that you don’t have to guess. It’s crystal clear: take it or leave it.

• Special offers

Substack encourages discounts and special offers. To prove my point, you can now join my annual subscription with a 20% discount until 31 January and get 3 ebooks for free and a LinkedIn profile audit 😉

Check the “Substack Boost” option in Settings and create your own offer.

Don’t worry: you don’t need to do everything at once. Pick 1 thing and press the START button today.

PS: do you like croissants too? 🥐

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Ready to plant your lemon tree? 🌳🍋

I started my journey as a writer and content creator 1.5 years ago when I was unemployed in a new country.

I couldn’t find a job, so I created one myself.

Today, my little seed has turned into a growing lemon tree with 3 books, 4 ebooks, this newsletter, and a digital audience of 15,000.

There’s never been a better time to create something new!

Check out the framework I used to reinvent myself in The Lemon Tree Mindset.

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Here are some additional resources:

• 79 FREE Articles from The Lemon Tree Mindset

• “The Lemon Tree Mindset” to reinvent yourself

• “Conquering Your Burnout” to thrive out of burnout

• “From Zero to Amazon Bestseller” to self-publish and promote your book

Upgrade your subscription and get all of the above for FREE + a LinkedIn profile audit.