Olivia Wickstrom didn’t set out to build a Substack. She set out to make affiliate income from a cottagecore blog. What happened instead was a slow, sometimes frustrating, eventually life-changing discovery of what the platform could actually do for a writer willing to experiment. We covered a lot of ground in this one.
What we discussed:
- How Olivia’s Substack started as something completely different and gradually found its identity across three very distinct content pillars.
- The nine months where almost nothing happened, and the specific change in her Notes strategy that finally broke the plateau.
- Why she sometimes makes her best, most actionable content completely free, and what that counterintuitive decision does for her paid tier.
- How she’s driving major Pinterest views to her Substack and what she’s still trying to figure out about it.
- What romanticising your life actually looks like in practice.
- The cultural differences between American and French attitudes to work that have subtly started to change how she thinks about her own life.
- A brand new year-long series she’s announcing here for the first time, and why it might be her most personal project yet.
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