Hehehe Karen here, feeling a little embarrassed.
I’m sharing this failed live session because my mission with Pubstack Success is to share what I’ve learned while building my mini-Substack empire: the good and the bad. Today was bad.
Today I learned that,
recording a Substack live in landscape mode (phone on its side) results in a narrow, cropped view;
gambling on the weather for the sake of an interesting background is definitely for the brave of heart.
Earlier today I tried to record a one-hour live session from the beach. At sunrise. Risky!
Just as I started the session, an unexpected breeze appeared out of nowhere. Followed soon by quite heavy rain. Neither were on the weather forecast. I had an umbrella with me but the noise of the rain on the umbrella and the noise of the wind on the mic was affecting the audio quality too much for me to continue. I had to stop. Embarrassing.
Of course, both the rain and the wind had passed by the time I had found somewhere indoors from which to resume the session. Naturally.
It was a valuable learning exercise, but it hasn’t deterred me from doing future lives from the beach. Because I love to take risks. And because one of the reasons I’ve managed to build an audience for Pubstack Success is that I do things differently to other Substack experts.
Success is easier on Substack if your publication is clearly different from others in your space.
Learnings for you:
Keep your phone in portrait mode when doing a live. Landscape mode looks fine to the host during the session but the finished recording only includes a small centre strip of the view.
Be wary of wind on the mic if you want to go live outside.
Ask yourself what you can do for your audience that’s different from everyone else on Substack. Are you different enough? Can you be memorable in your own way?
Thank you
, , , , , and many others for tuning in and for your patience while I tried to read a soggy script and hold an umbrella.Here’s a link for the indoor session: Real talk about Substack tags with Kristina God from The Online Writing Club (+ my experimental tag strategy for you to copy)
Until next time,
Stay dry!
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