The Subthread

What’s your Brand Stack? How brands can show up on Substack

From generic thought leadership to thoughtful leadership: five rules for brands that actually belong on Substack.

Izzy Ashton

Dec 10, 2025 — 4 min read

What Happens to Culture When Brands Become Patrons

Traditionally artists rely on galleries, festivals, or cultural institutions for support and funding. These organisations don’t just distribute work, they also act as cultural gatekeepers, deciding what projects are worthy and what work should reach the public. But that model is being rewritten.

Culture

Hannah Bowler

Dec 17, 2025 — 5 min read

"Never Heard of Them"

Cultural relevance isn’t won by playing safe. It’s earned by backing the brilliantly strange before the boardroom catches up – seeing folk heroes in the niches, trusting intuition over sanitized “brand fit,” and moving while the magic’s still messy.

Culture Marketing

Chris Jarvis

Dec 16, 2025 — 4 min read

How to Earn, Spend, and Exchange Cultural Currency

In an era optimized for convenience, the brands that introduce deliberate, meaningful resistance become the ones people follow.

Culture Marketing

Alex Zeevalkink

Dec 15, 2025 — 4 min read

Tech as a Tool, Culture as a Compass

Micro‑scenes, meme logic, and IRL moments shape youth marketing. Tech and AI aren’t the headline for these audiences, it's just a tool. Usefulness and participation, those are the areas to win. Louise Millar of Seed champions collaborative, human‑led designed experiences with results that travel.

Culture Creativity

Alex Zeevalkink

Dec 9, 2025 — 5 min read

Productivity

Make time for meaningful work. Simple systems, tools, and habits for focused teams, from deep work and calendar hygiene to automations that reduce busywork and amplify your best hours.

The Productivity Playbook: CapCut

This week we’re looking at CapCut, which can turn messy clips into shareable social videos fast and is built for small teams and solo creators.

Productivity Productivity Playbook

Rich Hewes

Nov 27, 2025 — 5 min read

The Productivity Playbook: Descript

This week we focus on Descript; the all-in-one editing workspace that makes video creation feel easy for small teams.

Productivity Productivity Playbook

Rich Hewes

Nov 18, 2025 — 4 min read

The Productivity Playbook: Notebook LM

Google’s Notebook LM turns your trusted sources into a private thinking partner. It’s taking the stress away from a real deep dive by surfacing patterns and compressing a week’s reading into usable insight for marketing (or other) teams.

Productivity Playbook Productivity

Rich Hewes

Oct 22, 2025 — 3 min read

Explore our archive of articles, interviews, and creative projects

Micro‑Learning the Machines

As AI platforms iterate at breakneck speed, MSQ’s Steve Gatfield argues for task-based training, reusable prompt libraries, and interoperable stacks. He hopes teams stop using AI for search and encourages them to start shaping models that can turn into real working partners focused on outcomes.

Tech

Hannah Bowler

Dec 8, 2025 — 4 min read

The Algorithm Has No Feelings. Social Media Still Does

As automation creeps across every corner of social, the posts that actually move people still come from a very human place.

Marketing

Rich Hewes

Dec 3, 2025 — 7 min read

Creator-led Live Media Is Here, Many Brands Aren’t Ready

Streaming has shattered the old broadcast model. In a creator‑led era where attention lives in chats, clips, and memes, brands must rethink sponsorship measurement around participation, virality, and outcomes – or risk irrelevance.

Marketing Culture

Contributor

Dec 3, 2025 — 3 min read

Creative R&D Sprints: Turn Experiments Into Shippable Ideas

A 7‑day sprint for marketing teams to stress‑test creative directions fast, so the strong ideas move forward and the weak ones don’t eat your days or budget.

Marketing