The Case For Substack

How a vocal Substack critic ended up here anyway

a pencil drawing a neural network

This post is for paid subscribers. In it you'll learn:

• why I chose to use Substack despite having criticized both their finances and their business model

• the best use cases for Substack, and when to choose a competitor

• why Substack cannot replace email marketing software

• how Substack's ecosystem shapes writer and subscriber incentives

• and more

A quick upgrade will get you full access, my gratitude, and the opportunity to submit questions for the Brain Trust business coaching and advice column!

When I announced that I was going to test Substack for Think Piece, a got a lot of questions:

Had I changed my mind about Substack's business model?

Was I going to keep using my email marketing software, ConvertKit?

Did I think insert your personal brand or company here should be on Substack, too?

I am also fully capable of building a custom paid newsletter solution, or using any of the number of prebuilt ones that don't take 10% of revenue.

Yet, I'm using Substack. Why?

I l…