The In Pursuit Annual Report
2024's Most AND Least Popular Posts
Last December, I did an informal analysis of In Pursuit’s annual hits and misses and found the process really useful. It was revelatory in some cases, a confirmation of my assumptions in others, and (as is the case with my “most popular post”) straightforwardly puzzling. While this newsletter was initially pretty exclusively about momfluencer culture, it’s expanded quite a bit to include analysis of gender, femininity, domesticity, and what all of these constructs have to do with the growing political power and cultural influence of the alt right.
When this newsletter isn’t about all of the above, it’s about my obsessions, which include but are certainly not limited to: raw milkmaids, viscous advertising, sweatpant uniforms, and the philosophical nature of effort (which Substack claims is my “most popular” post but I have no clue how they measure “popularity” so remain skeptical of the value of that particular metric).
Sometimes the stuff I enjoy writing about the most doesn’t strike a chord with you all, and sometimes, of course, it does. Which is the goal! I genuinely love diving into the stats at the year’s end not just to make sure I’m writing about topics my audience cares about, but also to try and figure out if a piece that fell flat was due to writing, timing, or just maybe poor judgement. Learning from my failures (and successes) helps me produce a newsletter people are excited to see in their inboxes. And that’s incredibly important to me.
So let’s get into it!
In Pursuit’s Best 🙌 and Worst 👎 of 2024
🏆The post that garnered the most comments🏆
This was was probably the most self-explanatory finding. It was a thread (written with the express intent to generate discussion), and it was an example of explicit crowd sourcing: Which Momfluencer Is Overdue For A Deep dive? Substack isn’t letting me embed it because they no longer offer the “thread” publishing option, but you can find it here. The post generated 145 comments, which is probably average for some newsletters, but decidedly above average for In Pursuit. I’m eternally curious about everyone’s thoughts about community vis a vis newsletters. Some of my favorite newsletters have ROBUST communities, where readers swap stories, experiences, links, tips, and recommendations. But some of my other beloved favorites don’t even allow comments (and this doesn’t remotely impact my enjoyment of said newsletters). I’m never entirely sure how important community is for In Pursuit readers. Do you guys like discussion threads? Do they bore you? Are you neutral? I am VERY open to feedback here because I don’t think of myself as like, a natural in terms of fostering online community (I also have ambivalent feelings about the limits of online communities). To complicate matters though, I love sharing and receiving recs (I found these sweatpants because of one of you!) and I love getting together (online) to emote about something niche that many of us find outrageous. But yeah, if you HAVE THOUGHTS about discussion threads, commenting in general, or online community, please let me know!
🏆 The post that brought in the most free subscribers (AND the most likes AND the most shares!!!) 🏆
This baby brought in 290 new readers, was shared 241 times, and was hearted 448 times. It’s an essay about the London Times profile of the Neelemans which confirmed many momfluencer watchers’ general feelings of ick re: Daniel. More broadly, the essay is about Christian patriarchy and the role of trad husbands in disseminating conservative ideologies online. I worked really hard on this one so I’m so gratified it found new readers! I also think the popularity of this piece might speak to the algorithmic importance of “likes,” which is sort of annoying to think about but important nonetheless. When newsletter writers yammer about sharing a little love via the heart button, we’re not doing it to feed our egos. Actually maybe some are. I don’t fucking know lol. But when I beg you for likes, I’m really just begging for you to help me get more eyeballs on a piece of writing I spent a lot of time, thought, and effort in creating. So thank you for those hearts! And shares! They matter.
🏆 The post that converted most readers to paid subscriptions 🏆
This essay converted 310 of you! First of all, THANK YOU to those of you who literally fund my work. I could not work on this newsletter full time without paid subscribers. Full stop. The reader-supported model also ensures that I can write about what feels most intellectually meaty to me and I think (hope!) that keeps this newsletter feeling fresh for readers.
I’m not super surprised this essay converted so many simply because Ballerina Farm has been and continues to be the Instagram account that consistently elicits the strongest emotions and opinions from my readers. I’m fascinated by BF’s stunning rise to power (and what that rise says about America culture), and so are you guys. I also think this particular piece did well because this essay (as the title indicates) really is about so much more than one Instagram account. It’s about bodies. It’s about surveillance. It’s about the power structures that shape women’s lives. It’s about women’s health. It’s about the cultural construct of “good” motherhood. It’s the type of cultural criticism that feels to me like an implicit argument for the existence of cultural criticism. Because it’s never been about Hannah Neeleman. It’s always been about the unique political currency of performing womanhood in a country at war with women.
Ok, now let’s discuss the stuff you guys were NOT super enthused about.
📉 The post that generated the least paid conversions 📉
So this one REALLY surprised me. And it still does. For several months prior to writing this deeply reported and researched feature, I had received several messages asking for exactly such a piece. I understand that several DMs isn’t the same as thousands of newsletter readers, but the profoundly meh reception to this essay was (is!) still hard for me to understand. I have a few guesses as to why In Pursuiters didn’t seem to care whether or not Nara Smith is a trad wife.
In Pursuiters might simply be more interested in reading about the type of trad wives who look like extras from Little House On The Prairie. I certainly understand why analysis of white gingham-clad mamas feels intellectually satisfying. Nostalgic Americana aesthetics do quite a bit to underscore the retrograde ideologies many such trad wives are peddling. Nara Smith has a VERY different aesthetic from the Ballerina Farms of the world, and importantly, she’s a woman of color. Critiques of white supremacy are baked into most analyses of trad culture (particularly when trad wives are white and particularly when trad wives are white and openly racist!) But, as I argue in this essay, whiteness still very much factors into the public reception of Nara Smith. So too do ideals of femininity, softness, and the privilege of rest and leisure, qualities and experiences that have been long reserved (in the US) for wealthy white women. Here’s a little snippet!
In this piece about Black trad wives for Refinery 29, Nylah Burton points out that historically, Angel of the House status (made popular through the 19th century Cult of Domesticity, in which women were valued for their maternal and homemaking qualities) was impossible to achieve for women of color. Women of color and working-class women have always worked outside the home, and their femininity, because it was not white, was not emphasized or protected. Rather, it was weaponized against them in racist stereotypes of Black women’s sexual deviancy, or exploited in racist stereotypes of the mammy figure, for example.
It’s an essay only partially about Nara Smith. It’s mostly about the complicated intersection of domesticity, race, and femininity.
📉 The least shared post 📉
I’m a little surprised about this one because In Pursuiters typically love Taylor content. See here, here, here, AND here! HOWEVER, this is a link roundup vs. an original essay. And it’s a link roundup published during a real saturation of Swiftian discourse. It’s entirely possibly readers had simply had enough Taylor Swift Takes. Even the ones your algorithm missed. (I will say this link round up still VERY MUCH holds up - many of the pieces included fundamentally shifted my understanding of Swift, whiteness, girlhood, and femininity). It’s also possible that you all are not super into link roundups. Let me know! I want to give you what you want!
📉 The post that brought in the least free subscribers 📉
Remember this shellacked Ken of a dude? He gave a commencement speech about good women only wanting to be wives and mothers. It was super cool. The dark humor piece that ensued from yours truly was incredibly satisfying and fun to write. I adore taking my feminist rage and turning it into lancing satire! Especially when the subject is THIS FUCKING GUY.
I’m not entirely sure why this piece didn’t hit (it brought in a whopping 11 new subscribers). Maybe the only man In Pursuit readers want to read about is a man that fathers hogs? Unsure! But listen, I reread this one and am comfortable admitting that I think it slaps lol. No regrets.
📉 The post that was the least hearted 📉
This discovery is curious to me! I used to write weekly WTF essays (they all live under the Weekly WTF category on my homepage that I really need to edit because they haven’t been weekly in over a year). And these weekly WTFs were almost exclusively ad critiques. You know, mom bags, mom facial fillers, mom water. I think the unpopularity of this piece (which I still think is funny!) is due to one or two factors. Maybe decreased audience familiarity with this type of writing (from me) caused a bunch of people to be a little WTF when this landed in their mailbox. Like, maybe they were expecting serious trad wive commentary and got snarky rants about vacuums. OR maybe you guys simply are no longer as interested in marketing analysis. OR maybe I’m not as funny as I think I am. Or maybe I am as funny as I think I am, but In Pursuit readers simply aren’t here for humor - they’re here for more straightforward cultural criticism. Which is completely fair! If you have thoughts, let me know!
📉 The post with the least comments 📉
This one is interesting because it wasn’t a total dud! It generated 75 likes which is def on the high end (again for me). It’s also about an experience shared by MANY mothers - the unmitigated hell of planning summer childcare. And often, such experiences generate lots of comments. It’s fun and validating to share horror stories! So I’m not sure why this one didn’t. My only guess is that my particular horror story made readers feel so vicariously stressed that they wanted to think about anything BUT summer camp after reading it. WHICH MAKES SENSE. Camp signup 2024 has made me seriously doubt my ability to survive camp signup 2025 without taking a beta blocker (or several) on mornings of sign-up openings. I’ll report back. IN ONLY A FEW SHORT MONTHS LEST YOU FORGOT SUMMER CAMP HELL STARTS IN THE DEAD OF WINTER.
I am sure my sister will report back soon since summer camp signup time is coming up soon (I am lucky because my daughter isn’t starting kindergarten until the fall so I will still have her with me at her current school this summer); she usually shares how it went. It’s always crazy how quickly it’s summer camp signup time again.
I love the weekly WTFs/marketing analysis! It was one of the things that initially drew me to your newsletter.