Like Ben Thompson, we here at Six Colors are cobblers. We have used Memberful, MailChimp, WordPress and Stripe to build a membership program that lets us post free stories as well as members-only content, and then bundle it all up into an end-of-week newsletter.
Cobble is exactly how I'd describe the way I build my platform, cherrypicking bits of tech and chaining them together to build a somewhat cohesive whole. My publishing stack includes:
- Ulysses – where I write everything
- Ghost – blog, memberships (with Stripe)
- MailerLite – newsletter*
- StoryOrigin – author newsletter swaps*
- Zapier – cross-posting to social media
- BookToReader – digital content delivery
NB: I'm planning to end my use of MailerLite and StoryOrigin in coming weeks. StoryOrigin is transitioning to a paid service, and I'll replace MailerLite with Ghost for my newsletter needs.
We’re cobblers
Ben Smith of the New York Times wrote an excellent piece about the rise of writers building their own businesses, most prominently newsletters based on the Substack platform. This part, about compe…
Jason Snell & Dan Moren