One year of my indie journey on Substack

65 posts and 366 subscribers later...

Right around this time last year I started this Substack newsletter jasonleow.substack.com documenting my indie hacking journey.

One year of newsletters later:

• Total 65 posts published.

• Started as a monthly newsletter in Nov 2022.

• Quickly switched to weekly in Dec 2022 – every time I post there’s a peak.
  

• Slow but steady climb to 366 subscribers at the 1 year mark.
  

• 40% open rate.

• 1300 views / month.

• 1 pledge by @benparry with $96 pledged annualised revenue.
  

• Email and Twitter are the top 2 sources of views. Surprised by Twitter as I assumed more would come from Substack, but come to think of it, it makes sense that views from Twitter is high due to my following (~9k) there.

• But surprise surprise the main source of new subscribers are actually the 13 other publications recommending me. Together they brought 216 new subscribers - two thirds of my total followers!
  

• Read read across 26 US states and 66 countries – USA (21%), India (12%), UK (6%), France (5%), Canada (4%). Surprised by India being the 2nd! But it is similar to the mix as my Twitter following, which is USA (27%), India (11%), UK (10%). I do interact with quite a few indie hackers from India but was surprised India is 2nd in place!
  

• Highest open rate of 41% for this post about my very first business, which was surprising because I thought no one read it.

In summary:

• Recommendation partnerships are a killer for gaining new subscribers. Best way to gain subscribers it seems (if subscription growth is what you’re after, not me).

• Posting more often really helps with keeping the momentum going. Before Substack, I was on Revue and only posted monthly. I don’t recall the growth being this much.

• What you think will not be popular is often wrong. We can’t predict what will do well.

• I often think I’m just publishing to the void. But I’ve gotten email replies pretty often, especially from friends on Twitter. So people do read! Just many lurkers.

To be honest, I still have zero plans for monetization, and have no clue about how I can leverage this newsletter (or if I even want to). I write daily anyway, and will continue to keep writing daily. That means, the weekly newsletter will keep going… till I figure out a way to do something with it. Or not.

I’m in no hurry.

I’m just super glad for your support, for your readership, and for journeying alongside me.

Thank you.

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