How Substack Transformed My Writing

Now I know why I see so much better quality on Substack than on Medium.

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Substack made me a better writer.

There.

I said it.

If there’s one thing I learned on about writing on Medium, it’s this: you need to write for your reader. Not:

• an audience

• a niche

• a topic

• a persona

Just one single reader.

It’s a 1 to 1 relationship.

But who’s that reader?

On Medium?

You never know…

You build followers, but they rarely see your story…

Much like any other social media.

You shoot in the dark.

All you’re left with is…consistency.

You stick to an imaginary reader and that’s it.

Not anymore!

Substack changed the game for me.

Substack taught me how to (really) write for a reader.

It’s one thing to write on a platform like Medium where you’re never sure who’s gonna read your story.

But it’s a completely different thing to send your story over email to people you actually know.

How do you know them?

No, it’s not because you’re “best friends” or something…But because you:

• Have their emails

• Can chat with them and get feedback

• Can build a meaningful relationship with each of them

The key difference:

When you write an article, you think of yourself or an “imaginary reader”. When you write an email, you don’t think.

You know who you’ll reach.

So every time I start writing, I stop.

I think about this first:

Is that something I’d send over the email to someone who pays me?

or even better:

Is that something people would pay me for?

Guess what?

I stopped writing about problems on the platform, my daily frustrations, and all of that. Who cares anyway?

People love to learn something.

I’ve been doing writing wrong.

Substack showed me this.

And I’m glad.

Because Substack made me a better writer.

Now I know why I see so much better quality on Substack than on Medium.

Thanks for reading!

Yana

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