What if my product(s) are more materials? Documentary (sheets, documents) .. it is very challenging to put them similar to video content behind paywall. Because these materials are sharable (global), no?
Technically, yes. But, in most courses I've bought they provide Google doc links which technically can be shared. If it is a document and you want to implement this, I'd likely paywall the post that provides the link. You could still leverage a video as a walk through of the document kind of like a how-to. Personally, I wouldn't stress to much over someone sharing it. That stuff happens regardless of how hard we try. People share passwords to courses they've bought all the time.
Your post came just in time. I've been thinking about this for the past days. As much as I like to have one single CTA, I find that the perception of people can't be easily changed. Substack is a blog/newsletter platform. When I come accross mini courses inside of the substack subscription of other writers I immediately think that the student experience won't be as great as if the content was hosted at a course platform such as Kajabi.
I don't disagree. I don't think the experience is as good. But, if we look at it from a different context... A) Creating an "offer" around your paid subscription vs offering a paid subscription. And B) It's free. So the experience might not be as good but it can be a great stepping stone to making your first dollar especially if your audience is already on Substack.
I'd also add to that: if it's a 'low ticket' item, I think you might even benefit from keeping your potential buyer on Substack - the overall experience is likely to feel more seamless.
I am not familiar with payments for unsupported countries with Substack. I apologies I couldn't be of more support. My recommendation would be to review their knowledge base and see if its something they provide information on.
Preference and flexibility. For my tech abilities, and what I am building, I chose a different path. But in this article I provide Substack as an option. I am just here to help people see different perspectives and alternative ways of doing things that are aligned. I didn't have an interest in my business of "recurring payments" with what I am creating (at this time). And I always acknowledge that things can and will change.
Becoming a paid subscriber gives them access to all paid-only posts/courses? There's no way to limit their access in some way so that they don't get access to everything the moment they pay a single month's fee?
That is correct. That's why I think it would be cool for them to roll out tiered subscriptions. However, you are correct and for some it might not be a viable solution. The key premise of my post sits in selling solutions (creating offers) vs selling your content. A shift in mindset around increasing the value of the subscription. And for a beginner, launching a course in Substack could be super easy, while for someone else might not work for the nature of their business.
In another example, it "could" be treated like a "Membership". Many paid membership communities are where people pay and get access to everything. Courses, trainings, etc. This could be done here since they get access to everything that is paywalled. But there is less flexibility compared to a platform designed for these purposes.
I'm a huge fan of not gating regular posts, and also of solutions that don't require a learning curve, so I like this. I want SubStack to get their 10%, so linking out to another way to buy doesn't feel right. But if they required outgoing links to, say, Gumroad to have their affiliate code on it set to 10%, that would be a fairly simple solution for them until they decide to set up something of their own.
Ugh. I’m a WRITER. Why are people trying to convince writers to become salespeople? If I were interested in selling stuff, why wouldn’t I open a store or work at a used car lot?
I am not trying to convince anyone of anything. I am here to offer perspective. Many of the people on Substack aren't writers and don't wish to place content behind a paid subscription. As I outline in the article, that model works for some, and for others, we have other options. A used car salesman is a pretty "narrow" view on sales.
Please don't do this. Online courses are just gatekeeping access to information in a world when you can have a personal tutori with the knowledge of the entire human race.
Make them free and create actual value instead that you can monetize.
Hey David, thank you for sharing. Technically true, courses are gatekept info. There are many ways to monetize, what would your recommendations be? You outlined to create value to monetize, but if we keep content free, and make courses/programs free, what's left would be personalized help. Is that how you recommend? Or alternatives like sponsorship?
That's fair. I'm curious, you'd charge for a live workshop/training, but would you be open to selling the recording? Since it took time (Live) but the work is done, and that work now becomes evergreen and could be classified as a course.
I thought about this before but I'd rather just upload it to Youtube and generate more reach. Sponsorship is interesting. I tried patronage, generated ~2k in a few days from my followers but turned it off later.
One thing I'm thinking about is paid study groups which is sort of a hybrid between a monthly membership and a paid group coaching program. It's still just an idea, I need to look into it more, see other examples but essentially I's want to recreate how I used to study in small groups at uni
Thank you for sharing. I think we have similar values at the root of things. I am interested in the study group idea, I've never heard that language used which could offer a unique differentiation within the market.
How perfect I'm seeing this now - I really appreciate the prompt to create something beyond writing on Substack, and I think there is so much to be said for making much of your work free to access. It squares with my own ethos of generous communication. (more on this and my own adventures with monetization here: https://truthtakestime.substack.com/p/generous-communication)
I just joined Substack earlier this week and today this exact idea popped into my head. It would will be such an easy way to keep someone engaged without having to send them somewhere else.
I’ve been thinking about this angle (to make a course) for the last few weeks and it makes a lot of sense! Before, my paid posts were mostly just little journaling activities but with all the current features substack has I can see how I can make more of it. Thanks for getting my wheels turning a bit more! 🙏🏻
This posts gives so much insight and I appreciate the step-by-step!
Happy it helped!
Love it 🤞
What if my product(s) are more materials? Documentary (sheets, documents) .. it is very challenging to put them similar to video content behind paywall. Because these materials are sharable (global), no?
Technically, yes. But, in most courses I've bought they provide Google doc links which technically can be shared. If it is a document and you want to implement this, I'd likely paywall the post that provides the link. You could still leverage a video as a walk through of the document kind of like a how-to. Personally, I wouldn't stress to much over someone sharing it. That stuff happens regardless of how hard we try. People share passwords to courses they've bought all the time.
Even your paywalled articles and videos can be easily downloaded. You have to accept this.
I'm paywalling Notion templates. Everyone can just reshare them as their own products 😱
There's even walkthroughs on how to swipe Wistia embedded videos. It's the age we live in.
Yes, I may have used one of them to save a webinar replay. 😂
🤫
Yes many of materials are on notion or presentation frameworks, and not easy to create videos for each template
Thank you so much for this. I had been wondering how to do this as I have a lot of course on Insight Timer which I plan to share on paid Substack.
Your post came just in time. I've been thinking about this for the past days. As much as I like to have one single CTA, I find that the perception of people can't be easily changed. Substack is a blog/newsletter platform. When I come accross mini courses inside of the substack subscription of other writers I immediately think that the student experience won't be as great as if the content was hosted at a course platform such as Kajabi.
I don't disagree. I don't think the experience is as good. But, if we look at it from a different context... A) Creating an "offer" around your paid subscription vs offering a paid subscription. And B) It's free. So the experience might not be as good but it can be a great stepping stone to making your first dollar especially if your audience is already on Substack.
I'd also add to that: if it's a 'low ticket' item, I think you might even benefit from keeping your potential buyer on Substack - the overall experience is likely to feel more seamless.
What of those resident in countries that's not supported by stripe.
How would they replicate what you've just done?
I am not familiar with payments for unsupported countries with Substack. I apologies I couldn't be of more support. My recommendation would be to review their knowledge base and see if its something they provide information on.
Okay
Curious why you didn't sell your workshop on Substack? :) (Probably because you already had it on gumroad)
Preference and flexibility. For my tech abilities, and what I am building, I chose a different path. But in this article I provide Substack as an option. I am just here to help people see different perspectives and alternative ways of doing things that are aligned. I didn't have an interest in my business of "recurring payments" with what I am creating (at this time). And I always acknowledge that things can and will change.
Just one thing I'm not clear on-
Becoming a paid subscriber gives them access to all paid-only posts/courses? There's no way to limit their access in some way so that they don't get access to everything the moment they pay a single month's fee?
That is correct. That's why I think it would be cool for them to roll out tiered subscriptions. However, you are correct and for some it might not be a viable solution. The key premise of my post sits in selling solutions (creating offers) vs selling your content. A shift in mindset around increasing the value of the subscription. And for a beginner, launching a course in Substack could be super easy, while for someone else might not work for the nature of their business.
In another example, it "could" be treated like a "Membership". Many paid membership communities are where people pay and get access to everything. Courses, trainings, etc. This could be done here since they get access to everything that is paywalled. But there is less flexibility compared to a platform designed for these purposes.
I'm a huge fan of not gating regular posts, and also of solutions that don't require a learning curve, so I like this. I want SubStack to get their 10%, so linking out to another way to buy doesn't feel right. But if they required outgoing links to, say, Gumroad to have their affiliate code on it set to 10%, that would be a fairly simple solution for them until they decide to set up something of their own.
Curious idea! Keeping it in my back pocket until I get enough subscribers to create paid courses ✨️
Perfect :)
Ugh. I’m a WRITER. Why are people trying to convince writers to become salespeople? If I were interested in selling stuff, why wouldn’t I open a store or work at a used car lot?
I am not trying to convince anyone of anything. I am here to offer perspective. Many of the people on Substack aren't writers and don't wish to place content behind a paid subscription. As I outline in the article, that model works for some, and for others, we have other options. A used car salesman is a pretty "narrow" view on sales.
Brilliant and practical. I'm saving this to refer to ot later. Thanks, @Landon!
Awe thank you!
Please don't do this. Online courses are just gatekeeping access to information in a world when you can have a personal tutori with the knowledge of the entire human race.
Make them free and create actual value instead that you can monetize.
Hey David, thank you for sharing. Technically true, courses are gatekept info. There are many ways to monetize, what would your recommendations be? You outlined to create value to monetize, but if we keep content free, and make courses/programs free, what's left would be personalized help. Is that how you recommend? Or alternatives like sponsorship?
i live by a simple motto: knowledge is free, time is money.
if something needs my time or compute time i charge for it. workshops, consulting, study groups and software.
That's fair. I'm curious, you'd charge for a live workshop/training, but would you be open to selling the recording? Since it took time (Live) but the work is done, and that work now becomes evergreen and could be classified as a course.
I thought about this before but I'd rather just upload it to Youtube and generate more reach. Sponsorship is interesting. I tried patronage, generated ~2k in a few days from my followers but turned it off later.
One thing I'm thinking about is paid study groups which is sort of a hybrid between a monthly membership and a paid group coaching program. It's still just an idea, I need to look into it more, see other examples but essentially I's want to recreate how I used to study in small groups at uni
Thank you for sharing. I think we have similar values at the root of things. I am interested in the study group idea, I've never heard that language used which could offer a unique differentiation within the market.
do you want to talk about it? we could do a Substack Live
Stop it.
How perfect I'm seeing this now - I really appreciate the prompt to create something beyond writing on Substack, and I think there is so much to be said for making much of your work free to access. It squares with my own ethos of generous communication. (more on this and my own adventures with monetization here: https://truthtakestime.substack.com/p/generous-communication)
Thanks for the feedback Patrick.
Interesting concept. Would love to hear more.
I laid it all out friend
Awesome! Thanks for all the hard work you do!
I just joined Substack earlier this week and today this exact idea popped into my head. It would will be such an easy way to keep someone engaged without having to send them somewhere else.
Great minds think alike!
That’s a great idea- I’ve always resented the idea to paywall my entire content…
Me too. That's why I am always trying to find new/innovative ways to do things and present people with alternative ideas
I’ve been thinking about this angle (to make a course) for the last few weeks and it makes a lot of sense! Before, my paid posts were mostly just little journaling activities but with all the current features substack has I can see how I can make more of it. Thanks for getting my wheels turning a bit more! 🙏🏻
No problem. When we take the time to zoom out, get a little creative, we can see a lot of different ways to do things.