Substack Essentials for Tech Writers in 2025 ✍

Your Go-To Checklist for Building a Thriving Substack as a Tech Creator.

Hey There Tech Creator!

If you clicked on this, it means you are taking Substack seriously in 2025.

You have probably seen me crushing it on this platform in the past few months:

Or you might have even seen people crushing it a 100 times more than me, like my friend

Gregor Ojstersek

:

In any case, you know the potential Substack has to:

• Level up your career.

• Position you as an authority in your field.

• Make you an extra income and even become your full-time job.

Yes, you heard that right!

You can make money in your underwear and work from home full-time.

But it will take time and it will take effort.

This is not my first try at this:

Total views on my newsletter between 12/02/2023 and 18/02/2025.

See all the white space?

It’s called burnout.

I know it can get hard to try and make Substack work for you—which is why I created this resource.

To guide you through your journey.

To give you boxes that you can tick off.

To share my experience with you and spare you some pain.

And the best part is… it will keep evolving.

I will come back to it and add more strategies that you can implement, and more details that you can tweak.

And they will all come from my own experiences traveling the same path you are now, just a few months ahead.

This is how it’s going, by the way:

Overview stats of my newsletter.

And here are all the topics you’ll find below:

1. Publishing Schedule.

2. Notes.

3. Recommendations.

4. Guest-posting.

5. Monetizing.

6. Community Chat.

7. Notifications.

8. Main Page.

9. Branding.

I want to see you grow!

Now, dive in.

1. Publishing Schedule

I decided to go for 3 posts per week—Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays.

Eventually, you will find the pace that works best for you.

But, in the meantime, here are my general recommendations:

1. Before 300 subs:

1 or 2 Free Issues every week to gain new subscribers and build trust.

2. After 300 subs:

1 Free Issue, and 1 Paid Issue every week to provide value and remind your audience that there’s a paid tier.

3. Make it tangible:

Offer something that feels analog in the digital world (a framework, a case study, a prompt, a template).

My most popular post at some point offered a Deep Work Playbook:

Any publishing schedule works—but it depends on the amount of value provided per post (the more value, the less often you should publish).

2. Notes

At least 1 Note every day—but you can go up to 3 or 4 during the day.

I don’t think there’s a magical number.

But still, you should:

• Spark conversations.

• Don’t be pushy towards your newsletter.

• Let the reader be curious enough to find your newsletter after reading a note.

And people love celebration/motivational posts.

Note: 18% percent of the subscribers to this newsletter come from Substack Notes.

Distribution of subscription sources.

Here are a few other notes that got some engagement and brought new subscribers:

An introduction to Substack.

A call to action to all technical writers.

Hope you find some inspiration in these.

3. Recommendations

Exchange recommendations with creators who write about similar topics.