A Simple Guide to Who Deserves Your Support on Substack

That little check mark tells you more than you may realize

All screenshots of Substack taken by author

One of the features that distinguishes Substack from other writing platforms is the pay structure. Readers subscribe to writers they like, and if they value those writers’ work enough, they buy into subscription plans to support them directly. Sometimes these subscriptions come with additional perks, like access to exclusive articles or conversations, and sometimes they do not.

On Medium, by contrast, readers pay a flat fee to gain monthly or yearly access to an entire platform full of writers. It’s that money pool that’s then used to pay the writers whose work is read. The success of each article — how often it’s read and engaged with — is what dictates payout.

But what Medium boasts in efficiency it lacks in clarity. There, our relationship with the audience is less intimate, and an algorithm will be much of what determines who reads what on a given day. On Substack, there’s a more direct correlation between the number of people who follow us — or subscribe to receive our emails — and the amount of views we get on our work. People buy into memberships at whatever price writers or creators decide to set.

Both avenues have their merits and drawbacks, and are essentially equal and opposite approaches to the advertisement dilemma that both platforms have separately confronted. Because neither has opened the floodgates to advertisers, they’ve been forced to make financial concessions.

The most notable drawback of Substack’s subscription-based pay model is that there’s simply no guarantee even a million views will equate to a penny of income for authors.

It’s a far clearer system, but it’s less amenable to the success of legions of writers. On Medium, it’s true that most writers will lament how little rhyme or reason there is behind the pay of each article. On Substack, because we set the price of our work, we know exactly how our performance on the platform equates to our pay stub at the end of each month. It’s a simple measure of how many people we can persuade to “buy our product.”

It’s transparent, but it’s opened the door to a type of economy that makes it especially challenging for the people who’ve come to the platform exclusively to write. Because there are only so many paid subscriptions most readers are willing to commit to each month, we’re pitted in direct competition with other writers. It’s for that reason that the ecosystem favors those who have prior celebrity status or marketing skills, while many of the most talented writers that I’ve found on here have gone criminally undiscovered and underpaid.

On Medium, each dollar funneled into the platform is one that indirectly supports all of its writers, however marginally or indirectly. On Substack, a dollar paid to a celebrity writer is one that a creator who can barely afford to buy meals each day will never see a single cent of. Their success is at the expense of others.

Fortunately, unlike on Medium, Substack has given readers a simple way to see who needs their support the very most. Many reading this will have likely already noticed check marks on the accounts of certain writers here. But how these badges function is different than they traditionally have on other social media platforms. Rather than a guarantee that a person is who they claim to be, these check marks are direct indicators of our success, moreover, how well each of us are paid.

Unless we’ve reached a hundred paid subscribers or more, our accounts don’t get check marks at all. Sadly, this is still the camp that the vast majority of writers on Substack occupy — and will always occupy.

Once we hit 100 paid subscribers, users will get this transparent orange check mark beside their name. It remains there until they’ve hit 1,000.

These aren’t users who are making full time incomes off of their Substack by any means. They may be able to afford rent with their revenue, but they’re certainly not living in luxury through their newsletter alone. These people very likely could still use your support if they’re going to make this writing career work.

Once users hit 1,000 paid subscribers, the transparent orange fills in. And that filled-in orange appearance remains that way until writers have hit 10,000 paid subscribers. These are writers who’ve already made it. They can afford all of their bare necessities and won’t be affected by the loss of any one or ten subscribers. If you support an account with one of these check marks beside their name, it may be wise to consider putting that same money elsewhere. The difference it will make there will be far greater.

The writers in this echelon probably aren’t buying yachts with writing income, but many of them would happily agree that there are people toward the bottom of this pyramid who need that same money far more critically.

Unsubscribing won’t mean even one single percentage point taken away from their monthly income. Allocated toward a new writer instead, that subscription fee could be the bulk of the money that writer sees for their work that month.

This final tier of writers on Substack is reserved for those who aren’t only successful, but may well be able to afford mansions, boats, and luxury cars off of their writing salary alone. If you support any of the creators with purple check marks beside their name, you should probably unsubscribe immediately and put that money toward just about anyone else.

If you unsubscribe today, they’ll never know. They probably never knew you subscribed to begin with. I promise you they won’t be upset. That same money put toward another creator will almost invariably mean more.

The subscriptions supporting up-and-coming writers are what make a real difference in whether it’s possible for them to pursue their passion on here or not. They’re the difference between supporting a local mom and pop shop before it goes out of business or spending that same money at a multi-billion dollar food chain.

The truth is, I wouldn’t be writing this if my own future on here — and that of most of the writers I know — weren’t in a precarious state. I myself have no immediate plans to stop writing. But I’ve needed to come to terms with the fact that at this rate, Substack may not be a sustainable endeavor for me or almost anyone I know.

Our success is 100% at the hands of other readers. Without reader support, huge swaths of us won’t be able to afford to write at all. So often, the writers without check marks are the mom-and-pop shops that will be forced to shutter their doors if they can’t make ends meet.

Another analogy I think is useful for considering the lowest tiers of writers on here is to think of them as waiters. If an article an author has written meant something to you, consider taking the time to support them as you would your server. There may be no food or table involved, but the labor behind articles can be every bit as intensive and even more time-consuming. So when reading the work of undiscovered authors, consider how much more those tips mean to the average server than to a CEO.

As creators, our output is often considered superfluous. We’re both viewed and paid as less essential. While eating a meal without tipping is widely considered discourteous, it’s not often that the creative endeavor is viewed in that same light.

Having artists for parents, they warned me of some of these disparities going in. But they could have never properly primed me for the reality that one in less than 50,000 people who read my work would take the time to tip me afterward. And while it’s often exciting and humbling to be read by this growing audience of people, there are still those days when I can’t help but wonder what all of my time and energy is for if I’ll never be able to afford even an apartment in my own city.

So if you’re reading this and you support one of those most successful accounts, consider how much more of a difference that same money could make in a smaller writer’s pocket. You’d be keeping a local diner from closing instead of insuring that McDonald’s can continue to monopolize. And by supporting that lesser known writer, you’re not only making it possible for them to make a living, but you’re voting with your dollar for a platform with a greater diversity of voices. And that diversity benefits all of us.

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Your support — at any level — keeps this project alive and growing.

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