My substack journey: 0-$30K in ARR in six months

The story of why I started and what I’ve learned.

Let’s get one thing straight: I’m not a writer. 

Or at least, that’s not how I think of myself. English is my second language, which I learned from scratch after moving to the US at 14 years old (yea, highschool was rough). My superpowers lie in the quantitative realm: interpreting data, creating actionable metrics, increasing core product distribution to lift business metrics, and finding/matching patterns across business problems.

Which is all to say: Writing is not my thing. But I do have a lot to say.

So here I am on Substack

It all started when I grew irritated and deflated with traditional Full-Time roles and decided to venture into Solopreneurship. I began to treat the growth of my career as if I were growing a product—with my brain being the product. And I realized that content creation is a necessary component of my personal growth loop. Here’s what I mean:

• Acquire & Retain: Grab and keep people’s attention with scalable free content derived from my personal experiences working in growth.

  • Content: Growth frameworks, opinions, memes, personal reflections.

  • Channel: Start with weekly short-form LinkedIn posts.

  • Website: In 2021, I created www.elenaverna.com on Softr with a ubiquitous ‘subscribe’ button, which led to about 1,000 kind souls trusting me with their contact information. 

• Monetize: Once people are acquainted with my content, I offer several ways to work with me:

  • Advising: Ongoing coaching to guide growth model implementation.

  • Interim Leadership: Year-long, full-time position to bring about significant changes in growth models.

  • Paid Workshops: One-off 90-min workshops to address specific growth challenges.

  • Paid Public Speaking: Custom presentations and Q&A sessions for conferences and internal teams.

  • Reforge Courses: Revenue share from courses I've helped create that delve deep into my insights. I began with creating the Experimentation course, then expanded with Monetization, Growth Leadership, and PLG courses.

Creating top-of-the-funnel

One of my biggest early obsessions was creating predictable and sustainable top-of-the-funnel for my solopreneur business, which begins with awareness. Previously, companies defined my 'brand,' but now that I'm no longer with any company on a full-time basis, I need to build awareness for 'Elena Verna'.

My initial channel for building brand awareness was LinkedIn (don't ask me why not Twitter; it was a random choice). I began investing in LinkedIn in January 2022 when I had 4K followers. My strategy was three-pronged:

1. Be Opinionated: Every post should present either a contrarian viewpoint or introduce a framework.

2. Be Focused: Start with one core content use case - B2B growth - that:

   1. I’m an expert in.

   2. I want to be recognized for.

   3. I can monetize.

3. Be Authentic: Share what truly matters, and don't get caught up in optimizing for algorithms or chasing followers. Most importantly, do everything possible to avoid ending up on Reddit's 'LinkedIn Lunatics' (although I did appear there once, which was a hard reality check).

As of September 2023, I've grown my LinkedIn following to approximately 80,000 of the most insightful people on the internet, garnering around 25 million annual impressions.

My LinkedIn impressions over last 365 days

But then I encountered a new challenge: I don't have ownership over that audience. LinkedIn giveth, and LinkedIn can taketh away. They can alter their algorithm at any time, downplay my content, and do so without any notice. And poof, my top of the funnel could disappear any minute. That’s not predictable nor sustainable.  

At the same time, many people approached me, inquiring when I'd launch my newsletter to consolidate and build out my insights—and they were even willing to pay!

"Listen to your customers," they say

Six months ago (with a final nudge from Leah Tharin), in March 2023, I dove in and launched my own blog on Substack. 

Here's a full transparency snapshot of my progress so far:

• ~20,000 subscribers - a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has subscribed! Your support means the world.

• A 51.39% open rate.

• Over 300 paid subscribers, translating to $33,000 USD in annual revenue.

And don’t let me get started on heartfelt messages (I read every.single.one):

♥️ "You always push out great content!"

♥️ "Love the content on LinkedIn and wanted to get access to your paid newsletter articles"

♥️ "Thank you! I enjoy learning from you and applying your knowledge and frameworks to my role. "

♥️ "Have followed you for a few years, and love your content, wisdom, and (most importantly ) LinkedIn memes :) It's awesome to have an amazing female leader writing in this space!”

And some specific data points and graphs, for my data-holics out there:

All Subscribers (Free and Paid)

Paid Subscribers

These numbers are small compared to juggernauts like Lenny, but this is my 6-month checkpoint, and I feel good about it. In fact, the traction has justified adding it as a SKU in my solopreneur portfolio and I now invest in it every week.

Here are my personal Substack learnings:

1. First, Find Content-Market-Fit: Before thinking about monetization, my aim was to create content that I enjoyed making and that others enjoyed reading. Content is a long game, so if you don’t enjoy any part of it, it’s going to be a struggle. The good news is that there are lots of formats and topics you can focus on, so find the ones that work for you. But also pay attention to which posts or topics lead to engagement from readers. This isn’t the only thing that matters, but it does matter. 

2. Ship it: My other initial priority was testing my ability to produce. For the first three months, I was primarily focusing on finding my rhythm. And that meant hitting that scary “Publish” button regularly.

3. Invest Time: Each post takes me 3-5 hours. It’s time consuming, but I enjoy it.

4. Leverage Existing Audiences: I use my LinkedIn following to convert people into both free and (hopefully) paid blog subscribers to justify my time investment. (LinkedIn has been lagging significantly when it comes to creator monetization potential. I wish they either had ad rev-share or allowed me to receive pledges/ paid subscriptions.)

5. Seek Assistance: A few months ago, Jonathan Yagel reached out, offering to help edit my posts. We tried one blog post together, and I was convinced. I write, he helps it sound cohesive. It's evident that writing is his superpower, and I've come to rely heavily on him. Plus, he aids in creating memes for these posts—a perfect partnership, in my view.

6. Explore New Monetization Avenues: After all, I do specialize in growth! I've recently started experimenting with blog sponsorships (checkout my first one here). My initial partnership with Sidebar was a success, and I already have a few more lined up. I'm also considering introducing premium blogs to boost my conversion rate (I’m currently at 2%, best in class is 5-10%)

7. Maintain Consistency: My goal is to post weekly to maintain weekly active users (WAU). While I currently lack the bandwidth to post more frequently, anything less would risk falling into the dreaded forgettable zone. 

8. Cater to Multiple Use Cases: Although B2B growth is my jam, I also share insights from my professional journey to assist others in discovering career optionality.

So what?

First of all, thank you for being my subscriber. From the bottom of my heart. 

Second of all, I hope this inspires you to start sharing your knowledge with the world - even if you’re not “a writer.” Find a channel, build an audience, experiment with monetization.

This is a path to career optionality.

This is a path to diversifying your income streams. 

And stay tuned for my one year Substack status check!