The starting point
Six days ago, I opened this Substack.
Before publishing a single newsletter post, my dashboard showed:
26 subscribers
14 views in the last 7 days
0 newsletter posts
That is a strange place to start.
What I actually did
I wasn’t publishing articles, but I wasn’t inactive either.
I kept the process simple:
• Made my profile clearly about SaaS, AI and building products
• Followed people writing about topics I genuinely care about
• Joined relevant conversations
• Replied to one specific detail instead of posting generic comments
No automated following.
No automatic likes.
Every reply was reviewed and published manually.
What the numbers suggest
The first 17 subscribers all came through the Substack network:
• 14 through the Substack app;
• 3 from existing Substack accounts.
The total then climbed to 26 while I was drafting this article.
I can’t tell which exact interaction generated each subscriber. Twenty-six subscribers is not enough to call this a proven system.
But it suggests that Substack can start distributing your profile before you publish your first article.
Notes, replies and profile positioning aren’t just secondary features.
They are discovery surfaces.
If your profile is a discovery surface, it is worth knowing what it actually shows a visitor. That is why I later built a free Substack profile audit that scores it out of 100.
The next experiment
For the next 30 days, I’m testing a simple routine:
• One newsletter post each week
• One useful Note each weekday
• Up to 10 thoughtful replies on active days
• Tracking growth, views, sources and time spent.
I don’t only want to know whether the account grows.
I want to know which actions actually caused the growth.
The tool behind the experiment
The manual process quickly became repetitive.
Finding relevant conversations takes time. Remembering previous interactions is difficult. And writing a specific, natural reply is harder than generating another generic AI comment.
So I started building a small Chrome extension for myself.
It helps me discover relevant Notes, generate different reply angles and keep track of interactions.
It never publishes automatically.
The goal isn’t to create more noise.
It’s to spend less time searching and more time having worthwhile conversations.
Next milestone: 100
When this account reaches 100 subscribers, I’ll publish the complete breakdown:
• What generated growth
• What failed
• How much time I spent
• How the extension evolved
• Whether the process looks repeatable.
I’m not presenting a finished growth playbook. I’m testing one in public.
If you’re building a SaaS or growing an audience from scratch, subscribe to follow the experiment.
This was an interesting read. I’m also building my audience from scratch, so it’s encouraging to see someone documenting both the wins and the uncertainties instead of claiming instant success. Curious to see which actions end up having the biggest impact.✨