TrustRadius: an HG Insights company

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Ghost

    Score8.5 out of 10
    N/AGhost is a CMS for new-media creators to publish, share, and grow a business around their content. Available open source and free (e.g. for blogging), it can also come with tools for business' content marketing.

    $0

    Substack

    Score9.2 out of 10
    N/ASubstack is a subscription-based newsletter publishing platform.N/A
    Pricing
    GhostSubstack
    Editions & Modules
    Ghost (community)
    $0
    Starter
    $11
    per month 1 staff user, 500 members
    Creator
    $31
    per month 2 staff users, 1000 members
    Team
    $63
    per month 5 staff users, 1000 members
    Business
    $249
    per month unlimited staff users, 10,000 members
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    GhostSubstack
    Free Trial
    YesYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    GhostSubstack
    Considered Both Products
    Ghost Foundation
    No answer on this topic
    Substack Inc.
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    83%
    Would buy again
    5 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    5 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    83%
    Happy with the feature set
    5 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    5 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    5 Answers
    Features
    GhostSubstack
    Web Content Creation
    Comparison of Web Content Creation features of Ghost and Substack
    Feature
    Ghost
    8.7
    1 Ratings
    10% above category average
    Substack
    -
    Ratings
    WYSIWYG editor9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Admin section8.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Publishing workflow9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Web Content Management
    Comparison of Web Content Management features of Ghost and Substack
    Feature
    Ghost
    8.5
    1 Ratings
    12% above category average
    Substack
    -
    Ratings
    Content taxonomy9.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    SEO support8.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    GhostSubstack
    Small Businesses
    Umbraco CMS
    Score7 out of 10
    Quora Blogs / Spaces (discontinued)
    Score8.7 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Square Online
    Score7.7 out of 10
    Blogger
    Score10 out of 10
    Enterprises
    RWS Tridion Sites
    Score9 out of 10
    Quora Blogs / Spaces (discontinued)
    Score8.7 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    GhostSubstack
    Likelihood to Recommend
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.7
    (6 ratings)
    Usability
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    GhostSubstack
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Ghost Foundation
    It is well suited for distributed writing and publishing with a subscription component.and well suited for simultaneous deployment to email and the web.
    Its pricing for a very small group (3 or more) tends to the expensive and login across multiple different devices can be aggravating.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    I think Substack is better for people who want to set up a personal-facing branded website vs people who just want to post random musings every so often. Monetization is better there than any other collective publishing platform as well as organic reach via email. Substack also allows you to build direct relationships with your readers via emails and own them 100% which is great long-term if you use it to pivot to another site or another form of writing/content creation. Substack would be less helpful for someone wanting to write as a part of a group, not individually, or someone who's unwilling to put their personal brand behind their content. It's less optimized for SEO (which other platforms allow you to do) and can be harder to curate content based on your interests (you really have to go in knowing what you want vs finding it on the fly).
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Ghost Foundation
    • Creating a newsletter for web and email simultaneously
    • Allowing for paid subscriptions
    • Allowing content to be segmented by subscription type
    • Allows content to be segmented by medium
    • Good analytics across various output medium
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    • Because it has a very high Domain Authority ranking relevant backlinks in a published article will help make my store more searchable.
    • Substack is very easy to work in. The toolset they provide may not be as extensive as other platforms but it is certainly enough to create a meaningful, interesting post.
    • Substack is very focused on creating a community of writers that support each other. They run an ongoing email campaign that reinforces their focus on building a community of writers.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Ghost Foundation
    • They wysiwig editor is missing critical functions like superscript and subscript
    • The markdown complement has those features but it doesn’t integrate well with the wysiwig editor
    • Footnoting is hard to do
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    • editor is on the primitive side - it's wysiwyg, but missing some embed options
    • integrate with google analytics
    • percentage cut that Substack takes can become a burden as your revenue grows. Problems scaling.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Ghost Foundation
    Flexible, competent and easy to use
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Ghost Foundation
    It is simpler, headless, faster than WordPress. The core functionality is focused on subscription membership which is a bloated add on for WordPress. The simplicity has a cost as WordPress, while complicated, offers more expansion opportunities.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    Medium is not so good for running newsletter. I find the mail that a user gets is very easily readable. Also as a creator it's very easy for me to track the analytics and monetise my blogs unlike Medium. Blogger is a very old technology. The kind of integrations and the support for Markdown / different media is very great in Substack.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Ghost Foundation
    • Our business is totally built around this product
    • It has allowed us to easily and quickly scale our free and our paywalled content experiments
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Substack Inc.
    • I haven’t made any money from it
    • Can be disheartening when you realise you’re putting in maximum effort for minimum audience
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    Ghost Screenshots

    Screenshot of the Ghost dashboardScreenshot of Ghost postsScreenshot of Ghost member managementScreenshot of Ghost member profile