Why It’s Hard to Read Your Substack. It’s Not the Subject Matter. You’ve poured your soul into your blog post. You resisted the temptation to use AI.

Your mom and two friends read it, but no one else does; and getting subscribers is hard.

You can’t figure out why.

I’ll tell you.

I’ve been reading a lot of Substacks lately. Some are good. Some are hard. The hard ones, the ones that no one is going to read unless they are afraid of disappointing you, have at least one of three problems.

1. Big paragraphs right away

1. Not reader-focused

1. Preachy

Big Paragraphs

The first one is simple. We are subscribing to a million Substacks. We’ve also trained ourselves the rest of the day to have short attention spans (scrolling). If I click on your post and the first paragraph is thirteen compound sentences, I just can’t.

“But, Jeff, you’re just being lazy.”

Yes! That’s what I’m trying to tell you!

I read for a living and I’m tired. I don’t want to try to figure out what your blog is about. I want to know right away, so I know I if should spend the precious time it takes to read.

If you’re still reading here now, it’s because I didn’t make you work too hard.

Yet.

You can write big paragraphs, but you first need to hook me in. Warm my brain up. You need to let me get interested and focused. Then I can start taking in bigger paragraphs.

That is, if big paragraphs are necessary, which they are not always.

Just try it. If you’re working on something now, set the first few lines apart. Then put two or three sentences together, followed by another one-liner. Then, if you’ve earned it, try a longer paragraph halfway down the first page.

After that, when they are likely getting tired, go back to two or three—even one, lines per paragraph.

Let them catch up.

Ask them a rhetorical question and give them time and room to consider it.

Have you tried that?

Reader-Focused

I used to do this webinar called the Kingdom Author Challenge where I tried to give a lot of insight for people who are trying to write Christian books.

The main message: Love the Reader.

What do I mean by that? Many of us use Substack to journal. We somehow think what we journal is profound. Maybe it is, but if you’re approaching it that way, you are probably not writing it for me. You didn’t start writing the piece with me (the reader) in mind. You didn’t think about what I might need to read about, and you didn’t think about how I might need to digest it.

You didn’t worry about whether all your stories were relevant, whether I felt seen by you, or whether you needed to build trust with me. We already said you didn’t write bite-sized paragraphs to give my brain a chance to warm up.

You have some message, some truth, some principle or idea that could maybe change my life, but I can’t get it unless you write in a way that considers me.

It’s interesting to see what happens when you start your post with the reader in mind.

What does he need? What has she been going through? Is there something in the message you feel called to share that she might understand better if you said it this way, and not that way?

We all (me included) think that we are profound; that if we are honest, and even a little messy, people will want to watch our minds wander around on paper (or screens).

But everyone is doing that.

It doesn’t set you apart.

Why are you writing? If it really is just for you, fine. Just don’t be concerned if people don’t read it. If you want to serve others, then you have to intentionally love the reader.

Even your title has to be reader-focused.

Make your title about me, not you.

You may be excited to write a post titled, “What God Showed Me.”

But unless you are already my guru, I do not care. I’m so sorry to say it that way. But it’s true. Why would I care, especially if you’re a stranger?

This is what I’m trying to say: no one wants to read about you. We only want to read about ourselves.

So…

If God showed you something that would be relevant to me, put the relevant thing in the title. Instead of, “What God Showed Me,” write, “Why You Looked at Porn this Morning and How to Stop.” Or “Why Your Teenagers Stopped Talking to You,” or “One Thing You Can Do to Get 1000 Subscribers.”

If any of those resonate with someone, you better believe they will click.

If you don’t have a long paragraph right away, they will read.

If you don’t preach at them, they will continue reading and try the things you’re suggesting.

You will have helped them.

Preachy

Um, yeah. Sorry. I’m breaking this one real bad today. I hope you know it’s because I love you, I love the truth, and I want to see you out there telling it to millions of people.

But ordinarily, you do need to earn the right to preach to people.

I happen to get to do that most Sundays, because I am a pastor. I remember when Facebook came out and everyone was starting to get on it. We had a lot of college kids in our church, and some of them couldn’t help themselves but to go on there and preach. I never felt tempted to do that.

As I pondered that one day, I realized, “Oh, this person yearns to tell people what they think, so they use this platform. Only, no one is asking.”

Me, I got to preach to people who showed up to hear it. It’s one of the reasons they came to church. If I had an itch to preach, it was scratched weekly.

And I’d earned the right by loving them and caring for them. By doing life with them.

But these Facebook preachers had done no such thing. That was the problem with their posts and why they fell on deaf ears and made eyes roll. “There goes Billy again with another long John Piper quote.”

It’s also why you have to earn the right to preach on Substack about anything — God, or otherwise. I don’t really know if I’ve earned the right to preach at you today in my preachy post, but if I haven’t, you probably aren’t still reading at this point.

However, I do care about helping you, because I do care about the truth you know, the story you’ve lived, and the transformation I might achieve by reading your stuff.

But I can’t get it if I can’t get past the first long paragraph and if I can see in the first sentences that you see me, get me, love me, and genuinely want to help me.

There you go. I hope that was helpful.

Love you,

Jeff B. Miller

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