I can’t believe it’s already been two years since I launched this newsletter.
730 days
104 weeks
24 months
17,520 hours
1,051,200 minutes
63,068,544 seconds
“Kristina God’s Online Writing Club” was born in autumn 2022 to help you start, grow, and monetize your writing - part-time.
I also can’t believe I created today’s video for you at about 11pm (before midnight, yay!).
It’s without any edits or cuts. It’s raw and I’m talking to you, a writer friend or bestie, about how much money I make with my Substack newsletter after two years in the Substack newsletter and list-building game.
Many of my tribe members asked me how much money I make with my Substack newsletter
In this video, I’m gonna to talk a lot about income and making money with Substack. I’ll go over the numbers for my October 2024 income report and talk about projects I’m currently working on and others I’m tabling for now.
Let’s go!
💸October 2024 Part-Time Income Report
The last 24 months have been a wild ride (especially the last 9 months when I started taking Substack seriously), and I thought I'd share what's been going on because so many of you have been asking me about it.
Over the last days, I've had a little time to think about what works and what doesn't in my little side job as a writer.
Attention please! This is the only place I publish my income report. If you have questions, feel free to shoot me a direct message, email, or hit reply and we can chat. If you want intense support, I’ll offer my “Write to 1K Substack Cohort - Write your Way to your First $1K” starting December 2024.
In today’s video are the numbers, in this newsletter I share further insights and context information as it was already pretty late when I recorded the video.
Taking the first step is always the hardest - but once you take it, the writing game is on
Most people think I'm a full-time writer and don't realize that I'm an award-winning marketing and brand manager. It's a fast-paced job that is exciting but can also be exhausting, especially when you have two children in the house.
When I gave birth to my son in 2020, I suddenly wanted to reconnect with my writing self. A part of me that was no longer important as a manager, apart from writing presentations, emails, mailings, and sales newsletters. As a manager, you have to zoom out, lead and collaborate with others. Agencies, employees, colleagues.
In the first few months after the birth of my first child, (as so many other successful writers I interviewed) I started to think about what I really wanted to do with my life.
I knew I had a passion for writing (I studied journalism and worked in media and agencies), but I didn't know how to turn that passion into a real part-time job.
So I started writing online in my spare time after putting my baby to bed in December 2020, hoping it would lead to something new and fulfilling.
Initially, I tried a Medium blog, thinking that if I shared my thoughts, people would find them. It went well and my following grew from zero to thousands of followers, I had 30-60,000 views a month and loved the immediate feedback in the form of claps and comments. I built a community around my writing that I loved.
Medium helped me realize that online writing doesn't have to be lonely. It can be a way to connect with other people and share ideas.
It can be a way to connect with people and share ideas. I needed a community, so I asked people if they would join a cohort where I help (new) writers get their online writing off the ground and support each other. That's how my “Kickstarter Bootcamps” were born.
The moment I decided not to put all my eggs in one basket
But with the algorithm changes and Medium's new Boost and human curation system, there were also times when I felt like I was screaming into the void.
Some of my articles have done well on Medium, earning over $100 and $1000, but the unpredictability of the publishing platform makes it hard to predict what will happen in the next month.
I'm a big fan of transparency and consistency. As a mom of two, I like recurring revenue and seeing my subscriber numbers (much better than follower numbers) grow...
…rather than experiencing a financial rollercoaster ride.
So in October 2022, I decided to start a Substack newsletter and YouTube channel.
Although I found out a few weeks ago that I was pregnant with my second child, I tried to write at least one newsletter issue a week and record a video.
The reality was that due to my pregnancy and my duties as a mother, it took me about 19/20 months to reach 52 newsletter issues and videos instead of 12 months.
Being a writer today is like being the CEO of your own writing business
Your writing is your product, and you need to figure out how to make it the best it can be. That means you need to test your ideas and see what works. Just as a corporate company tests its products before selling and marketing them, writers should share their work with others to see how it's received.
When you look at writing as a business, everything changes.
You start to see your words as a valuable asset. Every text is like a product that you put out into the world. And like any product, you need to make sure it's something that people want and need. That means you need to listen to your audience (your ideal reader) and be open to feedback.
In the corporate world, as a product manager, if you want to launch a new product, you don’t just create it in secret and hope for the best. You do market research, you test it with potential customers, and you make adjustments based on their feedback.
Writing is no different (with one exception).
You need to understand…
who your audience is
what they’re interested in
how you can provide value to them.
For me, writing became a way to share my journey, learn and iterate, and help others who were on a similar path.
Show your writing to the world even before it’s perfect
For me, building in public means showing your work and progress to the world even before it’s perfect. That's the difference to the corporate world, where you try to offer the best possible product based on market research which makes the whole process from idea to actual product expensive.
Writing on the internet isn’t expensive at all. On Substack, you can even start for free. Substack will only take a 10% cut if you make money which I think is a fair deal.
Sp I love this way of learning, growing and iterating in front of others. This mindset has been an important part of my part-time journey. When I offered my Bootcamps or started my paid newsletter on Substack in January 2024, I didn't know everything. But I was willing to share what I did know with others and learn in the process.
This openness helped me build a community of more than 220 paid members who support each other.
When you create in public, you're not just creating for yourself, you're creating for your audience. You let them see behind the scenes and share in your journey. This builds trust and makes people feel connected to you. Not only are they following your work, but they have a stake in your success and want to grow together with you.
One of the best things about the art of writing in public is that it creates a feedback loop. You share your work, get feedback, learn from it, iterate and improve. Then you share your work again, and the cycle continues.
This process helps you grow as a writer, author and as a person.
I love that you’re constantly learning and evolving, and your audience is there to support and cheer you on.
At least that’s how I see it.
Now let’s talk about my mind-blowing Substack milestones.
💸Wild Milestones of my Substack journey
I’d love to reflect on some wild Substack milestones with you:
They say your first 1,000 subscribers are the hardest. I reached this goal after 5 months in March 2022.
I was approached by a huge network and will work with them in fall 2024
My views went from zero to up to 134,000 monthly views.
💸I offered a paid newsletter and paid membership in January 2024.
Some stories were trending on Substack in the category #Education.
💸I became a “Substack Bestseller” with hundreds of paid subscribers in March 2024.
I offered my Substack School and Medium School course plus community to paid members
💸I was offered freelance gigs to help people like you and me, writers and authors get on the platform and earn money with their newsletter.
💸I started offering a handful of 1-on-1 sessions for members of my tribe and the Substack School.
💸I offered my first Substack Bootcamp in July 2024 to over 30 members of my tribe.
