Publishing Plan for the Rest of 2024

Trying to make order and ensure a good share of different topics

Photo by Estée Janssens on Unsplash

Since I started this substack, I have published somewhat uneven - some weeks many posts, other weeks none. There has been days with several posts and a long while, about a month, with no posts at all.

This is not optimal, even though all subscribers will probably just read something else if there is nothing from me — most of us subscribe to many substacks, and we may not think too much about the schedule for each of them; we just read what pops up in our inbox, or?

Well, I have noticed that some people prefer to find the articles on the substack page rather than in their inbox. It makes perfectly sense when subscribing to many substacks, as it can be quite overwhelming on some days to see the flood of articles ticking in.

For me, personally, it also makes sense to try to divide my time a bit between the different areas, rather than just following a flow into doing a lot of one type, then feeling exhausted for days, until I throw myself into another.

Even if I do get excited about something, I can just write several articles and then schedule them for publishing over the next several weeks, which will then free up some time for writing about other topics.

All these considerations, of course, as a result of being interested in many subjects :)

Schedule

So, a rough schedule is going to look like this, at least for the rest of the year, with each week following the same template:

Mondays: The Social Game

Tuesdays: At Work

Wednesdays: Be Creative + open to guest posts, cross-posts, etc.

Thursdays: Book Stories + open to guest posts, cross-posts, etc.

Fridays: Fiction and poetry (The Neighbors, Fictitious Scripts, other stories when ready)

Saturdays: Rich Life

Sundays: Between Us

Please note that I may skip one or more of these subjects in a given week, depending on how much time I have for writing, and how many good ideas I have — and, of course, how much time each of the posts consumes before being good enough to publish.

Between Us is only published if there is something to tell - and this may also be needed during weekdays, in which case I will not wait until Sunday.

Short-term goals

I am experimenting a bit with the publishing times, currently settled on around 2:20 in the afternoon, Central European Time (this should be early morning on the US East Coast) – and two hours later during weekends.

But you may see me, now and then, publish at different times, because I want to find out what works best, measured by when the largest amount of reads and responses will appear shortly after publishing. I interpret this as being the most appropriate time for the most of the subscribers.

I try in general to avoid publishing on full and half hours, since most other substacks are published on such “clean” times — so, my post may drown in the flood of posts and not be read.

For the other substacks, Data Analytics, Technical Writing, and Technical Writing DK, I aim at getting into a rhythm of publishing one post on each per week before too long.

Long-term goals

I want to start bringing extra well-prepared contents to the premium subscribers as soon as I have something ready, and this may happen from the start of December, with a lot of luck, or perhaps more realistically from the beginning of next year.

I want to find out how I can make this substack a good experience for the subscribers, so there are chats, podcasts, perhaps videos, and other possibilities to play with, but I have no specific plans yet — only the goal to improve on the experience, so that around New Year and ahead, all people will be as happy as possible :)

In the longer run, working with the premium contents plus the good experience may take time from some of the now scheduled activities, so they will need to be reduced a bit. On the other hand, more topics may be introduced along the way, so you can expect some adjustments every now and then.

What do you think?

Does it look good to you — or would you prefer a different schedule?

I am always happy to hear about your thoughts and comments.

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Update: I have added a permanent page, accessible from the menu line of the substack page, for the Publishing Schedule — to be regularly adjusted and kept up to date.