Most people spend over a year chasing the Bestseller badge on Substack and give up along the way because they approach the whole journey the wrong way.
When we launched the Write • Build • Scale publication in 2024, we had a simple goal: hit Bestseller status as fast as possible.
And we did it in less than 60 days.
Brand new publication.
Zero subscribers at the start.
No experience on Substack.
In this post, I’m sharing the five strategies that made it happen.
I’ll be honest about the advantages we had, give you a real case study of someone who did it without those advantages, and tell you straight up who this approach is actually for — because it’s not for everyone.
You Already Have More Leverage Than You Think
I want to be upfront about something before we go any further: If you are brand new to creating content, if you’ve never published anything, or if you have zero experience in writing or marketing, you need to do some groundwork before you can apply what I’m about to share.
This post is for people who’ve already been building their platforms for a while.
Maybe you have a YouTube channel, a podcast, an audience on Medium, LinkedIn, or X. Maybe you’re a coach or consultant with real expertise and a body of work.
If that’s you, Substack is a massive opportunity. And you don’t have to spend years figuring it out.
If you’re a complete beginner, I’ve written a full Substack for Beginners Guide that walks you through every single step — from setting up your publication to understanding the platform to building your first audience. Start there and come back to this post when you’re ready!
The Credibility Shortcut Nobody Talks About
On Substack, the Bestseller badge is instant credibility.
When someone lands on your publication and sees that you’re a Bestseller, it changes how they perceive you. They’re more likely to subscribe, more likely to trust you, and more likely to eventually pay you.
And to get the first Bestseller badge, you only need 100 paid members.
We’re offering a freeSubstack Bestseller Workbook to help you be set up correctly to achieve the first Bestseller badge asap. You can get instant access here.
The problem is that most Substackers treat paid subscriptions as something that happens passively. They turn on their paid tier, mention it occasionally, and hope that people will magically convert.
But that’s not a strategy. It’s wishful thinking.
When we launched Write • Build • Scale, we treated our paid tier as a product.
But I also need to be upfront about something else: we didn’t start from zero in the truest sense.
I’ve been writing online since 2018.
I had 80,000 followers on Medium and we had an email list of 30,000 subscribers on Kit.
We didn’t import those subscribers to Substack, but we did promote our new publication to our existing audience, and we did lean into the credibility that we brought to the table.
And that’s a key insight right there: if you’ve been creating content anywhere — if you have expertise, an audience, a body of work — you are not starting from scratch. You are starting with massive leverage.
#1. The Free Feature That Outperforms Every Growth Hack
Notes is Substack’s short-form feature. Think of it like Twitter or LinkedIn, but built directly into Substack.
And here’s what most people miss: Notes is how you learn the culture on Substack.
Every platform has its own language, its own rhythms, its own unwritten rules. And the fastest way to understand any platform is to immerse yourself in the conversations that are already happening there.
Notes is where those conversations happen on Substack.
My co-founders and I have each been posting Notes multiple times a day from the very beginning. And it’s not just random thoughts. It’s strategic content that showcases our expertise and sparks curiosity about our publication.
But Notes isn’t just about posting. It’s also about participating.
In the early days, we followed what we call The 10-5-1 Rule, and it’s still what we recommend to our students who are just getting started on Substack.
The idea is very simple. Every time you publish a Note, you also:
Like 10 Notes from other creators
Leave 5 meaningful comments
Start 1 genuine conversation — either in DMs or in the comments
This only takes a few minutes, but it compounds quickly.
When you like someone’s Notes regularly, they start to recognize your name.
When you leave a thoughtful comment, you become more memorable.
And when you start a real conversation, you build the foundation for a potential collaboration.
Within a month of doing this consistently, we had genuine relationships with dozens of creators in our space. And that’s how we built the network that became our collaboration pipeline.
Knowing the 10-5-1 Rule is the strategy. But having something to actually post every day is the execution.
We created 365 Substack Notes Templates so you never have to separate the two. Pick a template, customize it, publish — and then go engage.
Substack has a built-in feature called Recommendations. When someone subscribes to your publication, you can recommend other publications, and they can recommend you back.
Every new subscriber from a recommendation is already warmed up. They trust someone who trusts you.
A significant portion of our free subscribers discovered us this way.
But recommendations are just the beginning.
We’ve done dozens, maybe hundreds, of live streams at this point. We host live conversations with other creators on Substack, and the recordings become posts that continue working for us long after the live session ends.
It’s genuinely a 24/7 mindset for us. Whenever we see something interesting, we try to team up.
And here’s what makes this compound: there are creators we collaborate with multiple times per year. This is not some growth hack we applied once in the early days and then ditched. It’s what we truly believe in and what we still do.
The key is that we didn’t start by asking for anything.
We engaged with other people’s content first. We commented on their posts, restacked their Notes, showed up in their communities — often for weeks before we ever mentioned a potential collaboration.
And when we eventually asked about swapping recommendations or doing a live stream together, it wasn’t a cold pitch. It was a natural next step in a relationship that already existed.
This is the strategy that most creators completely miss. And it’s probably the single biggest reason we were able to grow our paid subscribers so quickly.
We’ve run multiple sprint launches over our first 18 months on the platform. It’s our #1 strategy for rapidly growing paid tiers.
A sprint launch is a focused promotional campaign, typically 5-7 days, with urgency, bonuses, and social proof, all designed to convert free readers into paid subscribers.
Our first major sprint launch was called Substack September. It was a boot camp we ran in 2024, and everyone who upgraded during that period got access to live workshops, expert interviews, and recordings they could watch later.
There was a clear start date, a clear deadline, and a clear reason to act right now instead of at some point in the future.
That single campaign is what got us to Bestseller status in less than 60 days.
The first tier offered the biggest discount. When those spots filled up, the next tier kicked in with a smaller discount. People could see the best deals selling out in real time, which compelled them to act.
That single campaign added another 100 new paid subscribers to our publication and moved us closer to the second Bestseller badge, which you receive with 1,000 paid members.
We’ve also run smaller sprint launches in between these major campaigns. Every few months, we create an event around upgrading to the paid tier.
But here’s the key insight that makes sprint launches work: you have to treat your paid tier like an actual offer.
You can’t expect people to pay for a newsletter. Content alone isn’t valuable anymore.
What people are willing to pay for is access to you, deeper knowledge, faster solutions to their problems, and connection.
Your paid tier needs to feel like a product — something with a clear value, a clear transformation, something worth launching and promoting.
If you’re not proud of your paid tier, you won’t ever be able to consistently promote it.
#4. One Piece of Content, Five Platforms, Zero Extra Work
You don’t just want to say “you get posts behind the paywall,” because Substack isn’t just a newsletter platform anymore. It’s a full content ecosystem.
You can post articles, Notes, podcasts, video, live streams, and if you have existing content, you can bring it all to Substack.
We started by repurposing our long-form blog posts from Medium. That was content that had already resonated with audiences, and we adapted it for Substack and gave it a second life.
But as we grew, we took repurposing even further.
Now we have a podcast that goes out every Monday, and we upload those episodes to YouTube as well.
When we host a live stream with another creator, the recording automatically becomes a Substack post.
Every YouTube video I create on my personal channel gets embedded in a Substack article just like the one you’re reading right now. Some of them also get republished on Medium.
It’s one piece of content serving multiple formats, multiple audiences, and all feeding back into the same ecosystem and same goals.
If you have a YouTube channel, embed those videos in Substack posts.
If you have a podcast, upload it directly.
If you’ve written blog posts or articles on other platforms, adapt them for your Substack audience.
This way, you’re bringing your best work to an audience that actually wants to read, watch, and support creators!
Substack is still a relatively young platform compared to all the other major channels.
And right now, it’s attracting a specific kind of person: people who are sick of traditional social media.
They’re tired of algorithms that bury their content, tired of engagement bait and outrage farming, tired of platforms that feel fake and performative.
Substack is very different right now.
The conversations feel more human.
The community feels more real.
And people actually read what you write, and even respond thoughtfully.
That means you can actually be yourself.
You don’t need to be polished and perfect.
You can share your real thoughts, your real process, your real struggles, and people will connect with that.
Some of the Notes that performed best for us were the ones we almost didn’t publish. A quick thought, barely edited, that felt almost too simple to share. But those are often the ones that resonate most simply because they feel real.
Those "simple" Notes that blow up? They feel effortless, but there's usually a specific reason they worked: a hook that stopped the scroll, a structure that pulled people in, a CTA that made them engage.
Benjamin started a Substack called The Digital Citizen, a publication on global mobility to help people move abroad, navigate visas, and understand taxes in different countries.
He didn’t have 80,000 Medium followers.
He didn’t have a 30,000-person email list.
But he did have deep expertise. He’d actually done what he was teaching — moved to multiple countries, figured out the complex systems, learned what most people struggle with.
Through our 1-on-1 coaching program, Benjamin became a Substack Bestseller with a total of 2,000 subscribers. That’s over a 5% conversion rate from free to paid, which is exceptional, because most publications are lucky to hit 2-3%.
And here’s what he says made the biggest difference:
He wrote for his audience, not for himself. He focused on what they actually needed, not what he thought was interesting.
At the beginning, he emailed every subscriber (free and paid), asking what questions they had, what they were struggling with.
He looked at which posts got the most engagement.
He included polls in his articles to understand what his readers were thinking.
He let his audience guide his content strategy.
And now he’s building meaningful revenue, not just from paid subscriptions, but from a digital product priced at $47 and a higher-ticket coaching package starting at $5,000.
His Substack became the foundation for a solid business.
The same principles apply whether you’re starting with a huge existing audience or building from deep expertise alone. You’re leveraging something you already have.
🤝 Want this kind of support for your Substack?
Every month, we work with a handful of one-on-one clients who want to rapidly build and grow their Substack without wasting time figuring it out alone.
So, let me briefly share where we stand today, 18 months after launching:
Over 43,000 total subscribers.
More than 1,400 paid subscribers.
And we’re generating $50,000/month through our Substack publication.
Now, that $50K isn’t just from paid subscriptions. Paid subscriptions are the foundation — they bring people into our ecosystem and build trust over time.
But the real business is built on top of that: digital products, courses, coaching, VIP experiences, and more.
If you want to understand exactly how our income streams break down, here’s a complete behind-the-scenes breakdown explaining everything:
Your Next Steps
If you found this helpful, here are two things you can do right now:
If you’re ready to go deeper: Our free Substack Starter Kit gives you the templates, strategies, and step-by-step system to build your Substack the right way — whether you’re just getting started or looking to accelerate what you’ve already built. Download it here →
If you want hands-on support: We work with a small number of creators every month through our VIP coaching program. If you want a personalized roadmap, direct feedback on your publication, and someone in your corner who’s already done what you’re trying to do — apply here →
I was litening to this article while driving. That line alone "Nobody Wants to Pay for Your Newsletter "stayed with me, as I have 3 paid subscribers, yet I have not turned on 'paid'. I immediately began thinking of ideas to create products. The Mini Course has already provided me with some concepts. Thank you Sinem for this article, there was a lot in it.
very helpful thank you
I was litening to this article while driving. That line alone "Nobody Wants to Pay for Your Newsletter "stayed with me, as I have 3 paid subscribers, yet I have not turned on 'paid'. I immediately began thinking of ideas to create products. The Mini Course has already provided me with some concepts. Thank you Sinem for this article, there was a lot in it.