Category: WritingCategory: Writing

Rachel Karten speaks with the little joy coffee shop, focusing on their social media strategy, but I think the main point applies to how all of us talk about our work, despite which medium we use.

RK: What advice would you give to a local business that is trying to find success on social media?

CL: Social media is replacing television. And just like in television, there’s the shows you tune-in to watch and there’s the commercials you suffer through. Stop making commercials. Be the show.

Did you see it? “Stop making commercials. Be the show.”

One of the longest running TV shows isn’t about the contents of storage containers, it’s about the stories that weave around them.

Telling people that we have a show coming up is a commercial.

Planning, booking, the travels, the build up, talking to fans, borrowing gear, making the flyer for the show – that’s the story.

We don’t need to start making videos, we need to tell better stories.

Never forget that corporate vultures swooped in and wrecked blog culture with their SEO posts and 13 display ads, and said “wow, blogs suck now!”

Then those crooks rolled out their shiny social media platforms – “wow, so clean! Who even needs a website?!? LOL!”

Now everyone’s ideas and posts were readable, without pop ups or takeover ads. It was bliss!

But the pivot to video (which was based on a lie) got writers fired. Sites shuttered because social media sites throttled links.

We’re learning everyday that maybe centralized kingdoms of power maybe aren’t great.

The decentralized internet is already here in the form of domain names, websites, email lists, and RSS feeds. We don’t need to wait for anyone, we can just decide today where we spend out time and energy.

Veronique put out this wonderful zine, “full of tiny ways to share your zines without using social media.”

There are so many places for us to share our work outside of social media! They might not go “viral,” or be seen by thousands of people, but that’s okay! Social media sold us on the idea that vanity metrics mattered, but as we’re learning they really don’t. Just look at all those people with six-figure follower counts on Instagram with just 19 likes on their posts. It’s rigged!

See all Veronique’s zines here.

The deal with a blog is simple. You show up, and the author says “here’s where we’re starting today.”

You open Instagram, the algorithm says “here’s where we’re starting today.”

Many modern websites say “you decide.”

As Seth Godin recently wrote:

A disciplined menu structure doesn’t limit user choice, it increases it.

Where are we starting today?

Cody Cook Parrot said in their recent Witnessing Practice workshop that you can make a thing and share it with a few people.

You don’t need to launch your new website with a big press announcement. You probably don’t need to post it on social media, either, because 95% of your followers won’t see it anyways.

This is why we need a few people we can send snippets via email, get on a Zoom call, meet in person, even get on the phone.

MrBeast says that when he was starting out, him and a few friends would be on Skype all day and night, working together just trying to figure out YouTube.

Imagine if you spent just an hour a week doing that with your creative friends?

I’ve seen so much fear in people’s eyes over picking the right email marketing platform (Substack, Kit, Flodesk, Buttondown, Mailchimp).

People’s voices start to shake when choosing the right online store (Shopify, BigCartel), the right website builder (SquareSpace, Cargo, Wix, WordPress).

You’re not getting married. You can break up with these tools at any time.

Instead of spending the next few weeks bouncing between platforms or watching 24 hours of “Beehiiv vs Substack” comparison videos, talk to other creative folks in your orbit.

I host weekly virtual co-working sessions with musicians, writers, and artists.

You can ask me direct via my Email Guidance offering and I’ll get your going in the right direction.

I also host paid-community Zoom calls, where we talk about zines, IRL events, and make fun of social media (it feels great). Get a 30 day trial for $10.

Alex runs BATCAVE, “a place to help one another dive deep into the stuff.”

Cody runs Landscapes, “a writing group for all genres.”

Jes is a musician and hosting a “hands-on session exploring the four most powerful and underused practice tools.

Kate Ellen is hosting a “Go Dumb Meet Up” which is “a zoom meet up to chat about how to temporarily or permanently break up with your smartphone.”

Mansi has The Ripple Circle, a place for “authentic sharing, gentle witnessing, and the longer echo of our practice together.”

It’s not just about deleting an app, it’s about finding new places to inhabit, daring to believe in a world without Musk or Zuckerberg being central to our ability to earn a living.

This is how we escape social media, and we’re getting better at it every week.