Category: sethwCategory: sethw

Social media can’t wait. It needs your posts now, several times per day.

Photographer Noah Kalina explains his belief that “it takes at least six years for a photograph to start getting interesting again after the day it was taken.”

As artist Tim McFarlane said in one of our recent Escape Pod Zoom calls:

“When I think about posting or blogging, I usually start visually. The photos come first, and that’s what gets the story going for me. I’ll remember where I was, what was happening around me, what I was thinking at the time — everything tends to spin out from the photograph. And it’s nice looking back now, having all this material that I can move into other things if I want to, because nobody’s seen it already. I also have a different way of talking about it now.“

Isn’t that magical? That nobody has seen the image yet? And our thinking of the image, the art, the photo – that you’re a different person today, different from when you made the image last week, or a year ago.

Social media begs us to share quick and often, but we’re allowed to distance ourselves from that urgency.

I’ve learned over two decades of writing online is that the half-way okay blog post becomes a foundation not just for better blog posts, but for better conversations.

The ideas keep coming so we must keep writing.
We become tuned to the frequencies that expand these ideas.

An example; I went out for a donut and iced coffee, and had a conversation with the shop owner which becomes a blog post.

I’ve written probably 100 posts since then, which led to more conversations, a cycle that adds seasoning and fresh ingredients to the next blog post or newsletter, which can’t help but bubble up in conversation because I’m living and breathing this subject matter.

Then, what I’ve found, is taking these conversations into new spaces of varying discomfort bolsters the ideas.

Talking with a friend is safe, but things feel different on a group Zoom call with people you don’t know, or on a podcast, or on a panel in front of 30 people.

I’ve been writing about ditching social media for years. Then I started hosting weekly Zoom calls with readers back in 2023, joined other online community calls, did live stream interviews, and appeared on a handful of podcasts.

Then I did something even more uncomfortable by setting up at punk rock flea market and talking with people face to face about leaving social media.

These conversations, in varying “live” settings, sharpened my ideas and my ability to express them.

This is how Cory Doctorow can riff about horrible corporations for over an hour and make it look easy.

We can all do this if we stop spending five hours a day on our phones.

We lose in followers, but we gain by honing our craft, finding our unique ways to express the ideas and concepts that will resonate with the right people.

Booking gigs in 2025 isn’t rocket science. You don’t need to outrun a bear, you just need to run faster than you friends.

Bookers get buried under a gajillion emails a day, and they’re not wading through your 10 links to find your music. If you want better shows, you need to make their life stupidly easy.

1. ONE LINK
   Your job is to get your music in front of a booker fast. One link. your site. Your best stuff at the top. No scavenger hunt across Instagram, Dropbox, WeTransfer, whatever. Don’t send them to a platform that forces them to scroll — they won’t.
2. REMEMBER THE BASICS ON YOUTUBE
   YouTube is the biggest music discovery engine on the planet. Bigger than every social platform combined. If someone finds you there and actually likes your work, don’t make them guess how to reach you. Put your damn email in your About section. Baseline professionalism.
3. JUST BE COOL
   This game runs on relationships. If you’re a pain, it doesn’t matter how good you are, nobody wants you on the gig. But if you’re solid, kind, and easy to work with? You get invited back.
   Don’t be a punisher. Show up in your local scene. Talk to people. Support other artists. Build real friendships.

Before you get to 1,000 true fans, try getting to 100. This from Mariah Friend:

Shout out to Seth Werkheiser for constantly reminding me that real connection + relationships trump the social media algorithms time after time.

Last week, I published my debut novel, The Pattern Shop and personally reached out to 100+ people to celebrate and offer them gratitude for being a part of my journey.

Do you know what happened?

Over a third of those people bought books. That’s 30% compared to the average social media conversion rate of 3%.

She goes on to say that it’s not just about sale, but “it’s about the conversations I had with friends I hadn’t spoken to in years.”

Today I did an hour long “Office Hour”, and we got into doing Substack Lives, how to show up for the people who already read your work, why lives aren’t an audience-growth hack, building community, running Zoom calls, starting tiny email circles, ditching Instagram/TikTok, and creating offerings for your audience.

I warned that we shouldn’t think of Substack Lives as an audience builder, but rather a way to let your existing audience get closer to you.

“Use Substack Live to show up for the people who already know you — not to chase new subscribers. Don’t treat it like some growth hack or algorithm play. Think of it as getting closer to the folks who are already here, the ones who actually read your work. Show them your vibe, how you talk, how you think. That’s where the trust comes from — not trying to perform for a crowd that isn’t even watching.”

When setting up a Substack Live, you’ve given the option to send an email to your subscribers to let them know. Someone asked if I do that or not.

“Send the email. If people get pissy about it, bye. Hit the road. I’m doing things, and I’m going to tell people about them. You’re either along for the ride or you’re not.”

On building offers when you don’t really know what your audience wants:

“Stop overthinking your offers. Don’t send a giant survey asking people what they want — most won’t fill it out anyway. Just say, ‘Hey, I’m doing this. Come along if you want.’ If no one shows up, cool. You didn’t waste time building a whole thing no one needed. Show up, do the work, and let people join or not.”