Category: MarketingCategory: Marketing

Using comfortable tools is important if we want to make the work we’re destined to make.

Note I didn’t say the “right tools.”

There’s lots of opinions and made up rules about the right tools to use, especially in the marketing of our creative work. The Social Media Escape Club is based upon dismissing the idea that social media is the right way to get our work out into the world.

For many, social media is uncomfortable. Dashboard metrics are uncomfortable. The idea of “creating content” to talk about work is uncomfortable. Using certain software tools, or computer programs – they’re uncomfortable.

We’re allowed to not use social media platforms, or perform at noisy bars.

We’re allowed to turn down opportunities that don’t align with our values.

We’re allowed comfort and ease in how we work, and how we make our art.

Says Kening Zhu in “the joy of missing out on platforms:”

“The more I’m nourished by my work, the more that others have the possibility of being nourished by it too.”

This is why I moved my paid members from Substack to Memberful. I don’t like what I’m seeing on that platform, and right now I wanted to ensure I could protect my member and data by moving somewhere else.

Was their discomfort in the move? Of course. But that’s what platforms do – they make it easy to stay. Untangling ourselves from these platforms is difficult work, but if there is comfort on the other side of that, then it’s worth it.

During a recent Escape Pod Zoom call Jes Raymond told us how she got people to a show in a town she never played before.

“This past weekend, we had a little show up in a tiny town—St. Johnsbury. One of those places with a small newspaper. And I just decided that instead of making a bunch of social media posts about the show—especially to a town I don’t know—I’d do the human work.

I figured out who the journalist was at the local paper who writes the arts column. I wrote to them directly and sent them a press release. Then I found the local radio station—Vermont Public—and called them. I got our event on their calendar.

We ended up having about 150 people show up at this little church in a town I’d never played before.”

Yes! Doing the human work! As Jes said, “I’ve been trying this new practice of asking: Who could help me? And how?”

Posting on social media is like buying a lottery ticket, because maybe it’ll pay off. But contacting the people who can directly help you? They either write you back, or they don’t – those are 50/50 odds, much better than gambling with an algorithm and hoping it just “works out.”

And Jes hit the jackpot twice, adding 35 new people to her email list!

“Don’t leave the email list somewhere for people to come up to. Put it on a clipboard and pass it around the audience during the show. Tell them: ‘This is the email list, here’s what it’s for, we’re going to pass it around.’”

Building an email list online is great and all, but imagine the open rate for those 35 people who just joined that list? They were at a show, in the crowd, enjoying the event, laughing with friends – that’s an engaged audience!

“Creativity is not something to hustle or to use.

Creativity is something to tend to, like you tend to a garden, and it in turn uses you in ways you couldn’t imagine.”

This from “This Is Drastically Changing My Creativity,” a post by Blake Roberts.

I’ve told two people this week (via my Email Guidance offering) to not set up a website. To not set up a webstore. To not start a newsletter.

These two people were still very much in the “figuring it out phase,” to which I stressed that maybe you don’t need to figure it out in public.

Not everyone wants to document the journey. It’s okay to go off and do your thing for a few months, or a few years.

Because what if you fully tend to your creative garden, without the distraction of sending a newsletter, posting on socials, or the dreaded “figuring out” your website?

I believe that if we immerse ourselves in the art, the practice, the work, that in a years time (or whatever feels right) you’ll already know what the newsletter is about.

And you’ll know exactly what sort of website you need.

One of the biggest things I push is to backup your work on your own site, which means if you write on Substack, your work should be duplicated on your own site, which led to this question:

Q. Hi, I read something yesterday about search engines getting confused if you have the same article in two places. I’ve been copying my substack pieces across to an old blog but now am wondering… what do you think?

A. SEO advice is avoid duplicate content, as it upsets the algorithm. But I don’t work for the algorithm, I work for me, and serve my readers / subscribers first. If it means less random traffic from search engines im fine with that. My hope is that work is good enough that some of readers might tell a friend about it, which I find much more valuable.

I see this line come up quite often: “I came to Substack to find readers.”

Setting up shop on Substack to “find readers” can be a trap. I joined Substack in 2021 simply to start an email list, and inadvertently found an audience. I was going to write and send newsletters regardless, but I’m grateful for the audiance I was able to build (just over 6.300 subscribers as I write this).

But… there’s a whole world of readers out there!

There are people doing podcasts, running YouTube channels, hosting live events – all these people are their own “platforms,” and doing work with them (interviews, workshops, collaborative projects) can bring in not just new readers, but engaged readers.

Something you said in an interview resonated. Maybe an off the cuff remark offered a new perspective for someone, or the story behind your work struck a nerve.

We need to stop trying to find readers, like they’re hiding in a dark forest or under a table. We need to be doing work so good that people notice and want to come along with the ride.