We've observed affiliate conversions increasing on Substack while declining in all other areas of commerce media, which feels HUGE! We're also starting to see home and lifestyle brands invest in advertising and partnerships with individual newsletters. All this signals massive growth, and we want our clients to be on the ground floor.

We have been talking about how media seems to be trending in a direction where the focus is less about the publication and more about the writer. Content creators and writers are building their own publications around niche interests, and readers are following them for their particular point of view. For PR, that opens up new places to tell a client's story to an especially dedicated audience. 

The opportunities you might not think to look for

Here's an example from the research we have been doing: we don't currently represent food and beverage brands, but we do have clients with products that appeal to people who cook: Ahimsa, 4AP, Verloop, and Jenny Lemons, among them.

We’ve looked at well over 100 food and cooking Substacks and found that roughly a quarter to a third publish one holiday gift guide a year. Some of these newsletters have audiences of 50,000, 100,000, even 200,000 followers!

For most of the year, these writers are talking about recipes or food culture, not shopping. Then once a year they recommend products to an audience that already trusts them. For the right tabletop piece or food-related accessory, that's a terrific editorial opportunity. And it would be easy to miss if you were only looking for publications that regularly cover products.

We can't know exactly how powerful those placements will be. The research and outreach are still underway. But we've already found a massive set of opportunities our clients are benefiting from!

Building relationships before everyone else gets there

We've already developed dozens and dozens of contacts with Substack writers. We're learning how to evaluate these publications, too. Alongside subscriber counts we look at comments/reader engagement, past issues, the writer's interests, and whether our clients make sense for that audience. There isn't a neat formula for it yet. We’ve started describing it as using our pr-spidey sense.

We have also found that reaching out through Substack direct messages can get a better response than email. I love that we're adapting our outreach process without losing the white glove touch we always use.

Some of these writers may only publish one relevant gift guide a year. Building a relationship now means we're not introducing ourselves for the first time when the holiday season comes around.

We were early to incorporating affiliate marketing into our PR work, and that brought clients excellent product reviews, brand awareness, and yes, sales! Substack feels like another moment when paying attention early could make a real difference. The way the media works keeps changing. I want us to be learning the new landscape while we're still helping shape how our clients show up in it.

Read more about how we’re thinking about the future of PR and AI here.