Recently, Joi Katskee missed a friend’s show. She asked about it afterwards, and they said they posted about it on Instagram, which we all know your social media followers miss almost everything you post.

She followed up with success story of her own art installation, and shared about the win on a recent Escape Pod Zoom call:

“I texted probably 15 people about the show rather than posting on Instagram, and maybe over half of them showed up. They were like, Yeah, I’ll be there. Thank you for the invite.”

Posting to the most amount of people always feels like the right move. But if no one sees it, what good does that do? Does it just let you off the hook?

Yes, sending an individual text to 15 different people takes work, but it also changes the dynamic doesn’t it? It’s not just a flyer someone saw on a social media platform – it was a personal invite. Someone took the time to write it, to send it, give you the heads up. That’s precious.

Does it scale? Fuck scale, do the work.

It’s easy to slag on the 1,000 True Fans idea, but this is how you inch closer to 25, then 100, then someday maybe 1,000. A better platform isn’t going to come along and make this work magically easier.

Brick by brick tiny interactions like this add up to something bigger, building a foundation that can help you sustain a career a decade down the road.