Email marketing
Substack - the practical guide.
Substack is a newsletter and paid subscription platform that bundles publishing, payments, a discovery network and increasingly a social layer (Notes, recommendations, podcasts and short video). It's become the default home for independent writers, journalists, analysts and creators who want to own a direct relationship with readers and turn writing into recurring revenue without running their own stack.
What Substack does
The core is a clean writing and publishing tool, a hosted email send engine and a Stripe-powered subscription system. Free and paid tiers, founding-member levels, group subscriptions and pause functionality are all built in, alongside reader comments, threads and a chat feature for direct subscriber engagement.
Around the publishing core sit Notes (a Twitter-style short-form feed), recommendations (other Substack writers can promote your publication on signup), the Substack app (push notifications, audio, video) and a podcast hosting and distribution module. Discovery through the Substack network has become a meaningful growth channel in its own right.
Who it's for
Independent writers, journalists, newsletter operators, analysts, podcasters and small media brands that want a frictionless way to publish, charge and grow without managing a CMS, ESP and payments stack. Also a credible launch platform for solo founders and consultants building a personal brand audience.
Pricing, in rough terms
Free to publish. Paid subscriptions cost a 10% platform fee plus standard Stripe processing (around 2.9% + 30c in the US). No monthly subscriber-based fee, which makes Substack uniquely cheap at small scale and uniquely expensive once paid revenue is large - 10% of a serious newsletter business adds up quickly.
When Substack is the right fit
The right call when writing is the product, you want a built-in audience and growth network, and you'd rather not run your own email and payments stack. A weaker fit when your business needs deep automation, segmentation or CRM, when you want full control over branding and design, or when the 10% platform fee starts to outweigh the convenience - at which point Beehiiv, Ghost or self-hosted alternatives become more attractive.
Watch-outs
Customisation is deliberately limited and your domain runs through Substack infrastructure - migrating away later is doable but loses some readers. The 10% revenue share is the real long-term cost; model it against a self-hosted alternative once paid revenue passes USD 50k a year. Editorial moderation and platform governance have been controversial in the past, so understand current policies before betting your brand on the platform.