My First Year Anniversary On Substack - July 23, 2026

What Did I Learn About Writing and This Platform

I’ve been publishing articles on Substack for just over a year now.  I haven’t got everything figured out yet. My subscriber base is at 111 people and my follower count sits at 264, so 375 people have shown some interest in what I have to say.  It’s a start.  But, I publish articles every week, post Notes and Restack other writers’ articles on a regular basis, with the hope of reaching a broader audience. This article shares my journey so far, as a writer on Substack.  

My journey began over five years ago, when I had this epiphany that I might enjoy writing. I started by writing articles and publishing them on my own website, self-created on Wix.com.  After semi-regularly posting my writing there for four years, a friend of mine suggested I publish my articles on Substack.  Substack is a great platform for distributing various forms of content and reaching a large, broad audience, and for tracking the data related to how audiences engage with your content.  It’s much better than emailing my family and friends every time I create and post a new article, which is what I was doing before discovering Substack.  

 Over my career as an entrepreneur and business leader I had done a lot of business writing; writing emails, memos, reports and presentations to customers, staff, investors and  board members, among others.  Over three decades of writing for business purposes I had received lots of compliments on my writing, but never thought much more about it; I was happy that my work product was useful in advancing our companies’ missions.  In the Summer of 2021 there was a period of lull in my career and it occurred to me that perhaps I should try writing articles based on what I had learned over my career, to see if I enjoyed it and was any good at it.  And, I thought that could lead to writing a full length book.  

The first article I wrote was entitled “Bootstrapping A Startup” (which can be read here ), based on my experience with the consumer goods startup I was working on at that time. As the article title suggests, that company was bootstrapped.  The story I wanted to share was that despite the macho bravado the startup world has for bootstrapped business, not all startup ideas should be bootstrap financed; this was the lesson I learned from this startup.  That summer of 2021 I was like a machine, sometimes cranking out two articles in a day.  That energy and enthusiasm lasted until the early fall of 2021.  Then for some reason I only published one article in December 2022, and didn’t resume until October 2024.  Then, I found my rhythm again and published weekly until the end of January 2025, when I again took a break until June of that year.  

But, in the summer of 2025 I was committed to writing regularly and was publishing articles every week.  It was at this time that I discovered Substack and have published articles on the platform on regular weekly intervals, ever since.  

Writing articles for general consumption is a lot different than writing for business purposes. In business, being concise is valued.  State the problem/issue or good news. Briefly explain what happened and why, and then state clearly what actions are going to be taken.  In  a business setting the readers generally don’t have time for stories.  There is a time and place for telling stories in business, when you're selling your product or solution, or raising money; the customers/investors want to know the background and vision of the company and its  principles. But this story telling is usually done in-person or in videos, not in writing. People reading business writing don’t have the patience to read stories in-print.  This was the biggest transition I had to make as a writer; that when writing for people’s general interest, I had to expand my writing to tell a story that was going to keep the reader interested in my writing. There has to be  more context, more personal relatability.  The writing has to connect with the reader, and that connection has to occur right from the title and sub-title to first get the reader's attention.  Then the opening paragraphs have to have hooks that draw the reader in and keep them reading.  This is particularly important now, as we are inundated with content from social media and the internet.  Our attention spans have shortened with the proliferation of digital content, such that these hooks in the titles and in the opening paragraphs are crucial to get people to actually read what you have to say.  Check out the stats noted below.  Research shows that: 

• After only 140 words, 32% of readers have already left an article - Source - BDOW

• 60% of readers who landed on a Slate article page didn't scroll at all, meaning they read the headline and possibly the opening sentence before leaving. The median scroll length was only 700 pixels or approximately two paragraphs. Source - Slate

• At the end of a typical article, writers only retain about 11% of original readers, meaning roughly 89% of everyone who started reading never reached the end.  - Source - Dyske

• 68% of readers abandon content if sentences exceed 20 words. So even readers who stay, are scanning for digestible chunks rather than reading linearly. - Source - World Metrics 

Having now written and published articles on Substack for over a year, my writing has evolved and I do pay more attention to the titles and subtitles. And, I try to build some hooks into the opening two paragraphs to keep people reading.  Despite telling those that ask, that I don’t write for clicks and likes, I’d be lying if I said I’m not paying attention to the stats Substack provides on Views and Engagement Rates.  Of course I do.  I use those as motivations to improve my writing, as opposed to a form of validation.  Most readers on Substack, or online in general, don’t leave comments or “Like” a post.  That doesn’t mean they didn’t read what you had to say. It doesn’t mean the writing didn’t resonate with them in some way.  They just didn’t take the time to indicate as such.  There’s been enough anecdotal commentary received to know that my writing is hitting a mark somewhere with someone.  

My journey as a writer is just starting.  Producing an article each week gives me structure I’m used to as a business leader and entrepreneur.  Researching and writing about the topics I publish on, forces me to ensure my facts are correct and the articulation of my thoughts is clear, concise and interesting to my readers.  Writing in a regular rhythm helps me practice my craft, with the goal of one day publishing full-length books or mini-books.  

If anyone reading this has an interest in writing, I encourage you to get started, now.  Get to the starting line, your computer, or even grab a paper and pen if you want to go old school, and just do it.  Getting to the starting line is the hardest part of any task.