Ask HN: Substack for Product People?
I'm a co-founder of Roundups.ai
Just wanted to gauge the temperature for a "Substack for Products." We initially launched as a content play for bloggers trying to stay relevant in the age of AI with high value content and easy monetization, but with Google killing SEO, unless you have an existing blog and audience, you would have a mountain to climb to realize value from Roundups.
-- What does it do now? What could it do? ---
AI analyzes products and generates guides that influence buying decisions. Creators generate revenue when an audience gains insight and makes purchases.
So, our thinking is that if creators are embracing platforms like Substack and Behiiv where they can own their subscribers and remove SEO as a dependency for growth and engagement, there is market opportunity for a Substack for Product People.
---Why?---
Platforms like Mailchimp and Kit are for marketing funnels, and Substack and Beehiiv are for monetizing "prose" (people who want to monetize writing). Roundups would just hyper focus on product insights and curated recommendations. While you can copy and paste a Roundup into those platforms for distribution right now, those platforms have no content API's. Roundups could facilitate email distribution directly.
It wouldn't have all of the bells and whistles that those other email platforms have, but it doesn't need to. It would serve "Tastemakers" rather than writers. Here are some example use-case scenarios:
1. B2B software influencer -> "Three CRM tools you need right now!" -> broadcast to an email list. 2. Food influencer on instagram -> "My Top 5 Fav BBQ tools for summer 2025" -> broadcast to an email list 3 YouTuber toy reviewer -> "The 5 best plush toys for Christmas" -> broadcast to an email list
Obviously, with our existing product and marketplace integrations, it would be easy to facilitate "Sponsored Roundups" from brands, opening up additional monetization for creators beyond affiliate integrations we already have.
Curious to hear thoughts from the community on direction. Thx in advance.