How To Promote Your Substack Freebie To Get Subscribers On Autopilot

The exact link, delivery, and promotion setup that turns one free file into growth you never have to manage again

Howdy, Wealth Writers🤠

People mainly subscribe to you for your articles, but if you give them an additional reason, your visitor-to-subscriber rate will increase drastically…

Hand them a tangible resource like a PDF, Notion page, Claude Skill or a vibe-coded app on top for free (aka a freebie).

Anfernee , Katharine Gallagher, and David Roy already run this playbook👇

Today I’ll show you how to deliver and position your freebie so it maximizes subscriber growth, instead of playing hide-and-seek in a corner of your publication.

(If you don’t have any resource to give people yet, go read How I Turn Articles Into Money-Making Courses first, then come back here.)

What you’ll learn in this article:

✓ Why One Access Link Makes Everything Easier

✓ The 2 Ways To Deliver Your Freebie (Autopilot-Powered)

✓ The 3 Places To Promote Your Freebie (+ Promo Page Creation Prompt)

Let’s goo! 🤠

Why One Access Link Makes Everything Easier

First thing first, to make everything else easier. :)

Your freebie should always live at one stable URL.

A Notion link, or PDF link, whatever matches the format.

So you can swap out what’s behind that link later without touching a single thing in Substack. (and accidentally breaking the link)

Set it once, forget it, and update the content behind the curtain whenever you want.

The 2 Ways To Deliver Your Freebie (Autopilot-Powered)

1. Deliver It To Existing Subscribers

This happens in the Substack post editor. (where you write articles)

Use the new “Audience specific content” feature under “More” to display the freebie to the right readers.

We put the freebie inside the first box that is only accessible for subscribers, and let non-subscribers know in the lower box to subscribe to get access.👇

2. Deliver It To New Subscribers On Autopilot

Now that we delivered the resources to all current subs we want to make sure that all future subscribers get their hands on your freebie too. :)

We will make this an autopilot delivery by setting it up in the welcome mail.

Go to “Dashboard” → “Automations” and there you find the welcome mails.

Paste the freebie link straight into the mail and add one line telling them how to use it.

Now every new subscriber gets the link without you lifting a finger again.

The 3 Places To Promote Your Freebie

(Half of you are thinking: can’t I just drop the link in my bio so people stop asking?)

Don’t.

You want them to first subscribe, right? :)

So here’s where & how to promote your freebie without leaking its content.

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1. Promo Page On Your Substack Homepage

Create a custom Substack page like this to promote your freebie.

To create a custom page go to Dashboard → Settings → Website.

Click “Add” to get started on the page, and after the creation, click on the three dots, and then “Add to navigation bar” to have it displayed on your homepage.

Creating this promo page is the highest-leverage action you can take from this article.

It’s a “Build once, get subscribers on autopilot” kinda thing.

Writing this promo page from scratch is a pain in the ass, so here’s a prompt that saves you time and energy, cause it creates the page for you:

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2. Your Profile

Add it into your profile description to show people you have value to provide before they even check your publication.

Your script👇

Subscribe to get [YOUR FREEBIE NAME] FOR FREE 👉 [LINK TO YOUR PROMO PAGE]

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3. Your Article CTA

At the bottom of every article, add a CTA that mentions the freebie.

You can write a short transition from the article into the CTA, or keep it evergreen and simple, either works as long as you mention the freebie consistently.

I always go with:

“Subscribe to Write Your Way To Wealth and get the Substack Side-Hustle Sprint for free.”

And then (as you see) add a hyperlink to my subscribe page. :)

The 3 Freebie Rules To Tattoo On Your Forehead

1. Send the content link once to existing subscribers

2. Keep the link inside the welcome email for every new sub

3. Promote the freebie publicly without ever leaking the content link

P.S. Anybody that actually gets the forehead tattoo and sends me proof gets a lifetime Write Your Way To Wealth paid membership for free. :D

If you are not yet ready to get tattooed, that’s okay too. :)

Subscribe now for weekly value bombs like the one you just read + FREE access to the 5-Day Substack Side-Hustle Sprint

Anyway…

See ya soon

Timo Mason🤠

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