ENTER: What if we planned every post as if it were a date with a friend … with our readers?
What could we do to make readers say those 5 magic words?
10,080 minutes and we Substack authors get 10 of them … if we’re lucky and readers aren’t in the middle of a life-crisis … or watching a re-run of “Ted Lasso.”
10 minutes (could be less) to make an impression, to make them laugh, cry or wonder why … 400 to 800 words (says our brilliant friend
) that will make them say to friends these five magic words … “You have to read this ….”If we think of each date as an excursion, an experience, what would we include in that precious ten minutes?
When I first began to think along these lines, I called this a template or a recipe and started thinking about ingredients … a graphic, a story, a quote, new facts, exercises, polls, and so on. The list kept getting longer and I could see posts growing way long … and boring, sacrificing flavor and experience for a hodge podge of misaligned bits.
That took me back to the 5 Es marketing process and thinking about each post as a mini-experience of the entire reader engagement process, designed specifically for the desired outcome of delighting, informing, or entertaining my “date,” my very short date.
By using the 5 Es marketing process as a “date plan,” each post can become a reconnection with our readers, a way to deepen our relationship while we deliver fresh, vital content/entertainment each week.
Overview of the elements of a Date Plan for your posts:
Before I share my own “date plan” with you, I’d like to pause for an imagination break.
For just a minute, look at your subscriber list. How many new subscribers have arrived to your Substack in the past couple of weeks? Imagine it’s just one and, apparently from his email address, his name is Selwyn. We’re not sure how he wandered into your Substack nor what attracted him, but this may be the first or second post he has seen.
He might be completely excited about reading your post … or he may have wandered into the wrong place and have zero interest in what you write about … or, even more likely, he signed up because of some fleeting impulse and has now completely forgotten who you are or why you’re in his email inbox.
This post, like every other post you will write, is “make or break” for your fledgling relationship with Selwyn. It deserves your best, most authentic work. It deserves a “date plan.” I have been working on mine for weeks and will probably continue to develop it forever, but here is what I will try to do with every post.
(Caveat: This is MY plan … it may not fit at all with what you want to do. However, the five phases of the reader engagement process and the Substack elements will always be the same.)
To stay focused, I first wrote an Intention Statement - Provide Substack Authors with an understanding of a simple marketing process linked to critical Substack elements for faster and more reliable subscriber growth.
ENTICE readers to open this post by reintroducing myself and what my newsletter offers.
*Use the Header Space to reconnect with a blend of profile and brief description, make a personal connection, include a teaser for what’s to come and remind them of what they will receive and when.
Invite readers to ENTER by making a good first impression.
*Use the Post Title & Subtitle to focus on reader value, being creative but not cute, incorporating SEO words when possible, asking a question, offering a surprise or controversy. Promise tips, insights, or new information.
*Include Graphics which enhance the look, deepen the understanding of the content.
*Create an inviting gestalt through readable fonts, generous white space, increase skim ability with headlines, quote offsets, line breaks, and numbered items.
ENGAGE readers with an experience
*Graphics and models telegraph content meaning while meaningful stories connect to readers own world and issues.
*Questions, polls, exercises, and examples stimulate thinking about the content and how it relates to readers.
*Extend sensory connection through videos, podcasts, photography, and art.
“Your opening sentence is second only to your closing sentence.”
— , from Unschool for Writers
EXIT … wait, there’s more …
*Close on a memorable note. Tell a powerful story, and if at all possible, summarize the entire post into a line that the reader will walk away with.
*Create a sense of abundance through links to other articles (your own or others), and outside resources.
*Give them an opportunity to share with a call to action: upgrade, restack, share.
Extend … give readers a reason to talk about you.
*Readers love to share memorable experiences and stories. Customize a share button. Offer a gift of some sort … maybe a free trial for their friends.
*Community. When I used to plan innovation conferences, we always said, “People come for the headliners but stay for the people.” And, that’s probably true for any group activity that turns into a community. When a Substack becomes a community, an occasional misstep or bad post will just be brushed aside. We will be talking a lot more about building community on our Field Guide journey.
Community. Interesting that we wound up there, because that’s on my mind a lot these days. When I wandered into Substack a bit over a year ago, I had few expectations. I definitely didn’t expect to find a “generous community of writers,” or a hang out place (Notes) that would begin to edge out my other social media, or that I would find writers here who would transform my life, or make new friends. All of that has happened and is happening.
So that’s it … a plan for every post. Do you think it would make Selwyn happy? Do you think designing your own “date plan” would help build a better relationship with your readers? Do you think better reader relationships will help you achieve your own objectives for a successful newsletter business?
A bit of backstory: My career background, which I’ve always thought of as a motley basket of fruit, turns out to have the makings of a nourishing fruit salad for writers … skills such as copywriting, entrepreneurship, marketing, finance, graphic design, creativity and innovation, as well as community building, made me think I might be able to help writers succeed at this newsletter business creation process.
So, focusing on entrepreneurial writers, I jumped into the deep end of the pool and, so far, have created two issues of the Substack Field Guide focused on using Substack elements in conjunction with a simple marketing plan, and learning by studying Beautiful Examples from the thousands of writers here on this amazing platform.
Now, after a lot of rethinking and some serious feedback, there is a major revamp coming for Field Guide #3, with the goal of making it simpler and more useful to help you succeed. Pub date is still 9/27/2023 with focus on ENGAGE, one of the biggest challenges of this two dimensional newsletter world.
One thing that has started already is a weekly discussion thread where we can ask questions and celebrate wins. The next one, immediately following this post, will engage us all in looking at one Substack through our marketing eyes.
If this is as fun as I think it might be, we might turn it into a regular feature and you can volunteer to have the whole community give you feedback … brave souls that you are. Let’s use a quick poll (ENGAGE) to see what you think about the idea of receiving feedback from the community.
In case you haven’t seen them yet, here are the pdfs for the first two Field Guide issues:
If you know of anyone else who is trying to build a newsletter business, please feel free to share this with them.
And, in the meantime …
When Bryce Courtenay (author of The Power of One) was asked the secret to finishing his 600+ page magnum opus, he said two words ... "Bum glue!"
For those of you who would like to have your Substacks studied, would you drop your address in a comment here? Would love to get started soon.
I love where you are planning to go with Field Guide #3...simple and actionable.
For years I headed up the sales training for the largest privately owned university in the U.S. Our motto was 'Tell, Show, Do, Review'. It's a wonderful way to increase engagement, improve competency, and help people love what they do.
When #3 comes out, I'd love to hear your thought process behind its creation!