The Profile

Hi, I'm Polina. In March, I left my job as the writer of the daily dealmaking newsletter Term Sheet at Fortune magazine to go full-time on The Profile. What is The Profile? It's a community of smart, curious individuals who study the world's most successful people and companies. The Profile currently has two products. The first is a free weekly email that curates and summarizes the most interesting profiles on the internet. The stories cover a wide spectrum — from business to sports to entertainment to media. (See last week's edition here: https://theprofile.substack.com/...) The second product is a premium offering which includes audio and video recommendations plus a weekly deep-dive on a prominent individual called The Profile Dossier. (Check out the Dossier on Sara Blakely here: https://theprofile.substack.com/...) I went all in on The Profile because I believe that smart, curious people crave longform, high-quality content. My sole priority has always been to ruthlessly protect readers’ time and improve their content diet. Since I launched The Profile in 2017, I have never missed a single week of making sure this newsletter lands in the reader's inbox. Most of all, The Profile has evolved into a community of diverse, smart, and curious people who are constantly seeking to improve both personally and professionally. I facilitate conversations between readers through (virtual) meetups, live Q&As, and a group chat. We share ideas, learn from each other, and debate interesting topics like the ethical ramifications of GPT-3. My mission is to make sure The Profile remains high-quality, continues to add value over time, and helps you learn at least one new thing a week. In fact, let me prove it to you. I’ve read thousands of profiles on people and companies. Give me a topic/idea you want to learn about in the comments, and I’ll reply with a profile to read.

Another example of a writer going independent on Substack. I recently chatted with @lennysan about this. He seems to be doing well, just crossed 1,000 paid subs. I'm curious what you've learned so far and if you have any advice for others considering doing the same, @polina_marinova.

This is my favorite newsletter. I may be biased but I open it and read every Sunday :) Thanks for spending the time to put this together every week!

Huge fan of The Profile! One of the few newsletters I pay for, and I look forward to it every week, twice a week!

The Profile is truly fantastic. I'm surprised it's not #1 today. Not only is the research and writing quality super high, but the approach is unique and engaging (profiling successful people and their stories), very different than more generalized industry or self-help type newsletters. Keep it up Polina! ps: great work on the product hunt banner image of profile shots! Really cool.

LOVE the Profile!! Both the newsletter and the community are world-class and Polina has an incredible knack of finding nuggets of wisdom and actionable tips that provide regular inspiration. Her content is of such quality that I am confident in a few years there will be a best-selling Dossiers coffee book, kids book series, relationship guide etc :)

This is an incredible piece of work from Polina! Been reading this for a while now and always manage to uncover some incredible useful nuggets :) Highly reccomended 10 pomps out of 10!