StackSweller

Direction prototypes

From scheduling notes to growing an audience

StackSweller has led with scheduling Substack notes. Substack now schedules natively, so the product is shifting its focus to discovery, growth and audience building: finding writers to work with, learning what works at your stage, and drafting notes worth posting. Scheduling stays, as a secondary feature. The three prototypes below test different shapes for that shift.

Each prototype has the same five screens: Home, Discover writers, What works at your stage, Viral Notes, and Publish. Sample data uses Matt Giaro's Substack, Second Career.

Variant A

Growth Cockpit

A sidebar app whose home is a growth dashboard.

  • Subscriber trend front and centre
  • Where new subscribers came from
  • Benchmarks against writers at the same stage

Best if you want the smallest step from today's app. It is the closest layout, so the cheapest to migrate.

Open Growth Cockpit
Variant B

Opportunity Feed

A top-nav app whose home is one ranked feed of things to act on.

  • Writers to pitch, topics that work at your stage and ready-to-post viral notes in one list
  • Ranked, so the top item is the next thing to do
  • Act on each item without leaving the feed

Best if writers would rather be handed their next move and act on it in place than read charts.

Open Opportunity Feed
Variant C

Weekly Growth Plan

The home is this week's checklist, tied to a subscriber goal.

  • A short weekly list, e.g. 3 notes, 2 pitches, 1 recommendation swap
  • Progress toward a subscriber goal
  • Stage benchmarks set which tasks come first

Best if writers want a routine with a clear weekly finish line instead of an open-ended tool.

Open Weekly Growth Plan

Onboarding, step by step

All three variants share the same 3-step setup. Jump straight to any step in any variant. Steps 2 and 3 open with Substack already connected (simulated) and posts importing in the background.

  1. Connect Substack

    Install the browser extension and connect, or connect manually with your handle and session cookie. Includes the waiting, timed-out and connected states.

    Open step 1 in
    Step 1 in Growth Cockpit Step 1 in Opportunity Feed Step 1 in Weekly Growth Plan

  2. Who you write for

    A target audience drafted from the About page, then up to 3 publications to model for Viral Notes.

    Open step 2 in
    Step 2 in Growth Cockpit Step 2 in Opportunity Feed Step 2 in Weekly Growth Plan

  3. Publishing rhythm

    Timezone and two suggested posting slots. In Weekly Growth Plan this step also sets the subscriber goal.

    Open step 3 in
    Step 3 in Growth Cockpit Step 3 in Opportunity Feed Step 3 in Weekly Growth Plan