The Real Substack Growth Loop: What Starting From Zero Again Taught Me

A few years back, growing on Substack was relatively simple (I said simple, not easy!).

You wrote something good, hit “Publish” and somehow it found the right audience.

I came back recently expecting the same.

Spoiler: It is a completely different game now.

The Substack I remembered was writer’s dream. It was quiet, organic and merit-driven. The Substack of today feels more like social media, built around interactions, discovery feeds and Notes which mirror the same short form content you see in other social media like X or Tiktok.

It is not necessarily bad, it just means that you have to play it differently.

The new Substack game

Someone recently asked on Reddit what it is like to grow on Substack now, and it made me reflect on my journey here so far.

Here is what I told them, and what I have learned so far:

I had a Substack newsletter a few years ago. Back then, all I had to do is write and Substack handled the exposure. I had no social media following our audience built.
Now, it is different. It has been “social-medialized” if that’s even a word. Notes have become the center of attention, shorter posts for short attention spans. Substack prioritizes them the way TikTok or Instagram does with Reels.

People browse, scroll, react, and they don’t always commit to long form yet. The challenge is that when you post Notes with no audience, it is like talking into the void.

What actually works now is making it about others first. You have to give what you want to get. Comment thoughtfully on other writers’ Notes, please avoid the typical “thank you for these insights”, but comments that add insight or context. That is how people notice you.

The more you interact with writers in your niche, the more likely you are to attract the righr readers, the ones who actually care about wha you write.

At first, that felt kind of discouraging, like the only way to be seen was to constantly engage.

That is when I realized that Substack has shifted from publishing to participating.

It is no longer a blog, it is a network

The biggest shift is that Substack now rewards activity, not just quality.

You can post something brilliant, but if you never interact, it will likely sink.

Engage consistently, reply, react, and comment so the algorithm slowly starts pulling you upward. It is like building small bridges with every comment. Each one connects you to a new corner of the network.

I will bring up and example which is not directly related to Substack but I believe it is a similar concept that I am trying to convey through this post.

I spend time on Reddit communities tied to data and analytics, the same topics I write about. When I initially started my newsletter, I would shamelessly plug my newsletter into posts and ask people to check it out. I did not see any engagement honestly. For the most part people would consider it spam and completely avoid it.

Then I stopped doing that and I focused on helping people, answering their questions, or shared an insight that genuinely helped. So naturally people would click on my profile to see who I was, my newsletter link was there and they would subscribe on their own if they like what they saw. I have gotten more subscribers in that way.

It is the same principle here. People can tell when you are trying to help versus when you are trying to harvest.

What is actually working for me

I am still trying to figure it out, but here’s what has been effective so far:

1. Make it about the writers, not just the readers

   Engage deeply with others who writ about similar topics. Discovery here happens through people, not algorithms.

2. Mix short and long content

   Notes are the handshake, newsletters are the conversation. Both matter.

3. Be patient

   You might write for months, even a year before you see some traction. That’s fine. The writers who stay consistent end up building the strongest relationships.

The takeaway

If you joined Substack expecting to just write and grow, it can be really frustrating. But if you treat it like a network, a place to connect, contribute and compound, it will suddenly make more sense.

Substack today rewards curiosity, generosity and persistence. It is about earning attention through genuine interactions and less about hacking growth.

The people who will grow fastest are the ones who stop waiting to be discovered and start showing up for others first. That is how algorithm works.

But more importantly, that is how communities grow.

If you are new here

I write DataExec, a newsletter about data, AI and business decision-making, where I share practical lessons, frameworks, and reflections from real world data leadership. If you want to follow along as I test, learn, and build in public, you can subscribe below.