Category: WorkCategory: Work

I loved this point from Michael Gilbride of MAD Records so much I made an audio clip from the What Am I Making Podcast, hosted by Matty C.

I’ve been saying this for a minute – use the same magic and creativity that you put into your music and your art and your videos, and use that same spirit in how you market your work. How you grow. How you shape the business, and how you want to operate in the world.

Hear the full episode here.

Erin Shetron of FREQUENT CRIERS CLUB (and marketing consultant) wrote about the messiness that sometimes comes with working as a “growth strategist,” and how there’s many ways to develop growth:

“I realize that i’m working with a grander definition of “growth.” growth in authenticity, in craft, in honesty, in nuance, in alignment. the question “how can I grow my newsletter?” becomes, “what happens when I work on my creativity so deeply and in such true alignment that my project naturally expands?”

I wrote something similar in Posting is a distraction:

“What if our practice became so deep and rich that the 100 people lucky enough to be on our email list started telling more people?

What if the magic isn’t about hitting an arbitrary subscriber count, but reaching the tipping point in our work where the magic can longer be contained, and it begins to spread without us needing to write messages on beaches?”

The “messages on beaches” part is how I think about posting on social media; constant posting, seeking growth, yet all that work washes away in minutes.

But the true work, as Erin explains – “growth in authenticity, in craft, in honesty, in nuance, in alignment” – that’s where the visible growth can come from. When the foundation is strong, and the motives pure, the work becomes a vibration, a wavelength for others to pick up on.

In middle school I always had the latest issue of BMX Plus, and wore Airwalk shoes that mom ordered for me from the JCPenny catalog. I grew my hair long and wore a Batman cycling cap.

I was sending signals, people! So were you. Even right now. Everything we do and how we operate is a secret nod to those who might “get it.”

The signals you send say, “this is the stuff I do, come say hello.” I was sending lots of “I’m into cool music and I want to be in a band” signals at that time.

The kid with the black jean jacket and a Bon Jovi shirt got my signal in 5th grade. Years later I’d join his band (which changed my life).

What signals are you putting out today?

How can you send better signals?

And how can you make sure your signal doesn’t get lost in the noise?

The below only really applies to the Substack platform, but I think the logic behind it can carry over into other places.

Stop begging the Substack Notes algorithm to “send you” cool people to follow.

Sending signals to social media algorithms is a poor use of time.

I bet you already subscribe to / follow at least one interesting person on Substack, right?

Go to their profile (here is mine) and check out all the posts they LIKE and the publications they subscribe to.

See? Now you’ve got tons of interesting people to discover via someone’s unique taste and cool vibe discernment.

It’s all about the “liner notes.” Find people involved with the cool videos you watch on YouTube, or the people who leave comments, or dig through the guests on your favorite podcasts. Find out who they’re following, who they’re writing about and sharing about.

No one discovered you because of your About page, or your well written bio.

You’re discovered from a piece you wrote, a story you crafted, a video you made, a song you wrote, a photo you posted.

Everything you post is your “About page.” Bake in your credentials, your wisdom, your unique viewpoint that only you can offer.

That’s why when I see people repost something, and their only commentary is “THIS,” I get sad.

Here’s a post, a “piece of content” that you shared with your followers, and an AI bot could have done it.

But an AI bot (or someone with 15 years less experience than you) can’t add to the reposted item like you can.

Every post is another opportunity to impress someone for the first time. And this is a big internet, so it might also be your last time.

I’m not saying everything you post has to be perfect, without typos, but don’t post without highlighting yourself in someway.

Not in a boisterous, ego-driven way, but in a way that you’ve earned, from your hard work and long hours you’ve devoted to your craft over the decades.

I’m running a Talking About “About Pages” Workshop this week, Thursday, February 13th from 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM EST. It’s free, and yes, a replay video will be available.

I read Hacker News because I have a geeky computer background (anyone remember the HotDog HTML editor?), though honestly these days I don’t understand 80% of anything on there.

That said, when I saw ‘The Debian Publicity Team will no longer post on X/Twitter’ I knew I had to check it out.

Turns out they made their own Twitter-like feed on their own website, where they can post all their bits and bops (they called it “micronews”).

You can should have a section on your own website, with your own domain name, where you can post your thoughts, and dreams, and links to cool things, and embed fun videos.

Don’t make your fans visit toxic platforms to find your regular updates, but instead invite them to your website, and keep them there. Give them something to dig into on your domain name, rather than shuffling them off for other companies to monetize your work.

Here are some examples of people who’ve added their own Twitter-like feeds to their sites:

• Sketch Book Niabi (and here’s a post talking about it)
• Pappas Bland’s Feed
• The Ripple Maker Daily Feed

If you’ve made a “feed” on your site, please let me know and I’ll add it here!