Substack Threads, Chats and Notes - a Primer

Substack’s community engagement tools explained

If you’re confused about threads, chats and notes, you’re not alone! Join the club of millions of creators and readers who are scratching their heads daily.

I’m here to break it down for you.

How did we get here?

When Substack was new, publication owners could create posts. Simple. Every post can have comments enabled, or not, and be open to all subscribers or only to paying subscribers. Also simple.

Then Substack made a new type of post, a ‘thread’. A thread is much like a normal Substack post, but comments are enabled by default and can’t be switched off. Substack writers use threads to foster discussions on single posts.

Threads can be seen on a publication’s home page and are displayed with a speech bubble icon

Then Substack launched chat. Chat is also about creating discussions between subscribers. Chat threads dwell in a different space to posts within the Substack environment. Because they are not tied to single posts, the conversations in Chat can continue over weeks or months.

So Substack’s engagement tools used to be comments, threads and chats: simple.

Then Substack launched Notes. Notes is also a place for conversations between writers and subscribers (yes, another one!). However, in Notes, users can interact with anyone, without having to be subscribed to individual publications.

So what’s the difference between threads, chats and notes, I hear you ask? Oh my. I’ll try to explain (deep breath)…

Thread, chat, notes, same same but different….

Differences between threads, chats and Notes

How they are created

Threads are created like ordinary posts by publication owners, from the publication dashboard.

Chats can be created by publication owners and by their subscribers (optionally). The publication owner first has to first enable chat from their publication settings.

Notes are like social media posts and can be posted by anyone with a Substack account.

Who can read and participate

Threads can be read by anyone (unless they have been locked for paying subscribers by the publication owner). However, only subscribers can post a comment on a thread.

Chats can only be seen by subscribers. Each chat thread can be limited to paying subscribers, if desired, or open to all subscribers.

Notes can be seen by anyone, but can only be created or interacted with by people who have a Substack account.

What does participation look like

Thread participation is limited to creating a new comment, or replying to an existing comment. Only text is supported in the comments of threads.

Chats belong within a single publication and can be created and joined by subscribers and owners of that publication. Images are supported.

Notes participation works like traditional social media; users can post new original content, including images; share links to content from other sites; share posts from Substack (‘re-stack’); comment and like.

How to use threads, chat and notes for newsletter growth

Just because a feature exists doesn’t mean you have to use it. If your publication has less than 50 subscribers I recommend that you don’t create threads or start chats. However, you should participate in other creators’ threads and chats and interact with other creators’ notes.

While community features like chats, threads and notes can be helpful for growth once you have some momentum, they pose two big risks for new creators:

1. The process of setting up threads and chats will distract you from more important things, like establishing a consistent routine and building an archive of high-quality work.

2. They can damage your confidence. Threads and chats that don’t get much engagement can amplify the feeling that you are ‘shouting into the void’, and that no one is listening to you. Bad feelings like this make it harder for you to persist with your newsletter efforts and can ultimately prevent you from succeeding.

Notes, like other social media environments, can be a huge time suck which will distract you from the important task of creating high-quality content.

For this reason, I recommend that your publication should not have threads and chats until it has a solid post archive and at least 50 followers (ideally more). It’s okay to create occasional notes, but be aware that if your subscriber list is small only a very small number of people will ever see them.

Get involved in other people’s spaces

If you are just starting out on Substack, the best way to use threads, comments, chats and notes is to participate in threads and chats hosted by other publications and interact with other peoples’ posts and notes.

Use threads, chats and notes started by other creators instead of creating your own

Getting involved with other writers and readers can help you to understand how threads, comments, chats and notes work as a subscriber and can help you to form relationships with other writers.

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