Uploaded September 2021 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago

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Welcome to The Quest Pod Season 1: Episode 30 with Chris Best: the CEO and founder of Substack riffs on social media, democratizing publishing, and how to own your audience.

Chris Best is the CEO and founder of Substack, an online publication platform that provides independent writers with distribution, payment, analytics, and design infrastructure. Substack represents an open challenge to both traditional media institutions and social media. I love the idea of empowering anyone to publish and monetize their ideas and own their audience.

In this episode, Chris and I explore the origin story behind Substack, discuss the effects of social media on writing and publishing, how to effectively distribute your content, media outlets, and the importance of surrounding yourself with the right people.

00:00 Intro
00:56 Social media is broken (Kik to Substack)
11:12 Why has Substack worked?
15:35 Y-Combinator and owning your audience
23:22 Mentorship
26:19 Tips on growing your Substack/podcast
33:07 What’s on Substack’s roadmap?
36:50 Chris’ favorite Substack content

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