On our recent “Find Your People On Substack” call we talked about finding our people, which of course led to building an audience, getting more subscribers.

But what if we think beyond mere subscribers?

We dream of reaching a big audience, but what does it mean if we’ve got no one to lean on? On our lowest days, who are the people that we can text or get on a phone call with?

We don’t just need a big subscriber count, we need good people in our corner.

Come to our FINDING YOUR PEOPLE ON SUBSTACK – SATURDAY EDITION this weekend.

Forget algorithms, there’s a whole world of possibility right in front of you via people’s Substack profile (here’s mine).

ONE: Click on that subscribers link, and you can see who subscribes to their publicaiton, their followers, and who they follow (note: sometimes this is hidden per user).

TWO: Click that Likes & Replies link, and you’ll see everything they liked and replied to.

THREE: Finally, click Reads and find out what they’re reading.

This isn’t just on Substack of course… if I remember correctly you can see who people are following and liking on Twitter, or LinkedIn.

This is like a very public digital “thanks list” on the internet, like we used to read in CD and cassette booklets when we were younger.A band would thank a series of bands, publications, people, and then you would seek them out – it was divine, like a recommendation from the bigger sibling you never had, maybe.

This is just a fun and easy way to discover – FOR YOURSELF – some interesting people. Make use of your good taste, trust your gut, and find your people.

Saw this while walking around Portsmouth, NH, from the “Public Poetry Project.” This is run by the Portsmouth Poet Laureate Program, where they organize submissions from poets to be featured in businesses around town.

There are people who would love your work and they aren’t even on social media – they might just be out walking around town!

Don’t let the 0.02% of your recent unsubscribes influence what you send to the 99.98% subscribers who chose to stick around.

If you want to send more newsletters, but you’re afraid of upsetting your current subscribers, just do it. I bet most of your audience would love to hear from you more often, and for everyone else? Oh well.

Are you in this to please other people, or to serve your own deep inner desire for joy? Our best work comes when we are in alignment with ourselves, rather than trying to please a tiny fraction of our email list. Let ’em go.

We’re not for everybody, but the people who stick around are your people (for now).

This isn’t about growth hacks or audience building, it’s about finding your people on Substack (and beyond).

Step by step instructions are for putting together Ikea furniture, not building fanbases. We’re dealing with real people, with complex lives, not shelving units. Through the tension of talking with strangers about our work, we gain understanding, and see the possibilities through the eyes of other people, and their journeys traveled to get there.

Our Escape Pod Zoom calls provide the on ramp to such conversations. Finding our way with intention, because we’re done hoping or wishing for an algorithm to magically deliver us our biggest fans, right?

Thursday, May 28 from 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM EDT
Register here → https://luma.com/84g45pka

Saturday, May 30 from 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM EDT
Register here: https://luma.com/j33otsdz

Brye posted a video about making her song “Lemons” on an iPad issued from her high school:

“How crazy is it that a song that could be on Sirius XM Radio, streamed a hundred million times, literally chart on the global top like viral 50 or whatever… it was literally made on GarageBand. You do not need fancy equipment, you do not need a degree to make money and to do this is your job.”

The second part of the video hits on something I’m always talking about on our Zoom calls, which is talking to and learning from other people:

“Watch YouTube videos, ask the people in your life who also might do music, or people online for tips for advice. Most of the learning I have done has been watching other people produce, or asking questions, or like watching those interviews… like my favorite interview of all time I think, Ethan Groska, he’s my favorite producer, and I learned so much from like an interview called like Meet the Makers I think and he talks about his process.”

Watch the full clip here via TikTok. Link via Daring Fireball.

Scott Perry (who I met via Seth Godin’s Akimbo workshops years ago) and I love talking about escaping social media, something he’s achieved after my incessant nagging over the last few years during his Creative On Purpose membership calls! Hah!

Escaping social media requries leaveing behind the idea of trying to reach everyone. It’s not about volume, it’s about the right people coming into your orbit.

Before we worry about marketing or growth, Scott says we need to ask, “who are you, what are you good at, where do you belong?”

Do we belong on crowded apps, mashing our creative round pegs into algorithmic controlled square holes for the likes?

Or do we belong in places more suitable for the work we’re trying to make?

Kate Ellen talked to us about using a Light Phone. It can’t stream music, and adding your own is clunky. Sometimes friction can lead to real life possibilities:

“I just have been listening to the radio in my car. And the interesting outcome to that is that I’ve gotten to know the local radio stations in my town who are super supportive of local musicians. And through that… now I’m at the point where I’m getting booked for a show, and I’m like, okay, now I have the confidence to actually call this radio station so that I can go on the radio station and promote my music. Which, if I was just listening to Spotify… I just wouldn’t even have had the context of understanding my community.”

An artist can thrive locally; I know several who’ve stepped off the social media hamster wheel and are doing just fine.

When we stop making the phone the central part of our day we begin to realize that the real life possibilities never went away, we just stopped looking for them.