Building Substack

Sachin Monga is head of product at Substack, having joined through the acquisition of his startup Cocoon, and previously spent over seven years at Facebook on growth, ads, and sharing products. The conversation covers how Substack's product team is structured, how to work as a PM under a strongly opinionated founder, how Facebook-scale product work differs from startup work, the rollout and impact of the recommendations feature, and Substack's long-term vision for writers and readers.

01Key learnings

• Early on, act more as a facilitator than a decision maker: keep the CEO and teams aligned on problems and vision through a regular weekly check-in to build trust.
• Organize product teams around timeless customer problems (writers, readers, growth) rather than product surfaces, so structure stays stable as the company scales.
• Expect any process or planning system to become obsolete as the company grows; aim to keep getting better each week, month, and year rather than finding a perfect process.
• Use principles like giving writers and readers control to resolve prioritization trade-offs, favoring whichever option best preserves that control.
• Roll out significant changes with a small invite-only group of users first (e.g., a Product Lab), since early feedback often changes what ships on day one.
• Design network-driven growth features that keep the creator in control; the recommendations feature drove millions of subscriptions by letting writers pick other newsletters to recommend.
• For aspiring writers, start publishing cheaply and consistently, and remember that a thousand paying true fans can sustain a living, while many people underestimate their worth and optionality.
• Filter press and online chatter for signal; most of it is a distraction for a product team that should stay focused on executing its vision.

02Frameworks mentioned

Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.