I’ve tried to figure out why being on social media is suddenly important or relevant to me, and I think it’s because I want a platform where I can distribute my (yet-to-happen) writing. I might be fooling myself, but I think that if I know there is a potential audience to read what I write, no matter how small, I might write more. This motivation works remarkably well for my personal newsletter, Sneakers and Heels, which I have published for 75 weeks without fail: I write it because I know it gets opened, and it’s a pleasure to write stuff others willingly read. I want more of that motivation.
Although I don’t post much any more, I do consume1 social media and for the most part I find it to be a complete shitshow. People step over each other with increasingly cringy posts and AI slop, and taunt negative discourse. But I am not willing to give up easily, and am hopeful that there are some redeeming spaces or opportunities among the thorns. When I was active on social media (about a decade ago) I found it beneficial both for work and fun, and I’d like to think I can develop a personal system, or a methodology, where I gain some of that benefit back.
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It will take patience to build an audience who is willing to listen to me. The often cited rules to achieve this are to post consistently on a niche topic, and engage (a lot) with others through comments and reposts. (Fwiw, I’ve seen these rules broken often, with success). So: patience and dedication. No magic beans. I am prepared to do the work (fine!) but I am not going to allow myself to be pigeonholed into a niche. My approach to social media will be to treat it like a lunch date with my friends: the more diverse the topics the funner the time. Niche is boring and contrived. I’m sure it works for people who have a “strategy” but all I have is verbal diarrhea.2 (Sidenote: LinkedIn is an exception. There I’ll behave as if I’m going to lunch with colleagues, with no champagne in sight).
And, no guarantees. Just as I have my goals, the algorithm has its own goals for the platform. Those goals are usually a boring combination of maximising users’ time spent on app, maximising number of unique users and maximising revenue from ads. Until I show I can significantly contribute to any of those goals, the algorithm isn’t going to be very supportive of my goals. I’m going to have to work hard to overcome the chicken-or-egg inertia of a beginner with no audience, and accept that for a long time I will see little return for my efforts.
Case in point: I re-published an old Sneakers and Heels newsletter from the Beehiiv platform (where I have subscribers) onto my relatively new Substack account. The premise of Substack is that it comes with a built-in audience, but that’s false advertising. My Substack note got zero views. On Beehiiv, that same newsletter got a 62% open rate. I would have been very disheartened if I had written the 2,000 words on Substack, and no one even had the opportunity to read it. I know this isn’t a fair comparison: if I had zero Beehiiv subscribers, I’d also get zero views, but at least there is no false hope.
There’s a risk all the effort might never be worth it. In the “old days” of social media, most of our followers would see at least some of our posts. Today, it’s not unusual for established accounts to only reach 1-2% of their opt-in audience. Mark Zuckerberg testified that only 7% of your Instagram feed is content from your friends. The ROI of the effort taken to build an audience decreases continuously. I don’t want to fall into the trap of believing that even if managed to blood-and-sweat my way to 10,000 followers on a platform, my book launch announcement would be seen by all those 10,000 people. If I was lucky, it’d be seen by a couple of hundred, at best. (To verify this, spend some time on Twitter/X. It conveniently shows the reach of a post. Stalk some big accounts, and see their reach versus their following.)
It’s important to check expectations against goals, but also quite tempting to think that my experience will be different (quicker and easier). I look at my current feed on X or Threads or Substack and think…if they can do it, so can I. But that’s classic survivorship bias: I am not seeing all those people who thought the same thing, tried, failed and are now (by definition) not anywhere to be seen in my feed. I can’t see them, so I think they don’t exist. They do. By the bucketload.
So we know it’s not easy, takes a long time, and might not even be worth it. But it gets worse. That pesky algorithm that stands between us and our audience is also highly temperamental and inconsistent. Even if we crack the code, build an audience, encourage engagement and make money, all that can change overnight and leave us up a creek without a paddle. The algorithm can at any time shadow ban you, deprioritise your posts, change the algorithm, or even delete your account. It’s happened to others before, happens all the time now, and will continue to happen in the future. In other words: I am investing time and effort into building something on someone else’s land, and that land could end up being quicksand.
What else? A lot! Users are leaving the platforms, and even if they stay they hate it more and more. Audiences are split between so many platforms that it’s difficult to keep up, and tempting to think I must be active on all of them. Spending time on social media means I am not using that time to rest, parent, write or work. Feedback of my posts might be inaccurate, and in a bubble. People can be cruel and rude. I might equate reactions (comments) as a direct representation of the value of my work. I might get dejected if my content gets no engagement.
So, is there any upside? Sure! There’s a chance I will enjoy it, I will meet new people, I will get feedback and discussion, more people will read what I write, I can build stronger one-on-one relationships. I can share, and be heard, and vent, and get sympathy. I might help others, or make them smile. New friends, new opportunities, new skills, new info. I can become a cheerleader, and be cheered.
I think the rule here is: if you want to be on social media, do it. If you don’t, don’t. Keep expectations in check, stay authentic to yourself, and always make sure you are still having fun.