A couple of weeks ago, I had dinner with an aspiring content creator.
We’ll call him Mike.
He’s been creating content for three years, but has struggled to build an audience.
When I asked him about his distribution strategy, he told me he’s re-purposing his content for all the major social media platforms: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat. The plethora of options has paralyzed him.
He can’t commit to a single platform, and committing to all of them is too much work. He’s become discouraged at what feels like an impossible situation.
A lot of writing advice you find online says that you should focus on many distribution channels: Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Quora, Medium, LinkedIn, Tumblr. The more, the merrier.
But you can’t “focus” on many things at once.
That’s not how focus works.
Thousands of people, and maybe even you, are making the same mistake as Mike.
Do less. Concentrate your efforts.
Commit to one platform and own it.
Even if you write the best blog post in the world, if you don’t have a way to reach people, it won’t be seen. There are different strategies for succeeding on any given platform, but if you can build just one strong distribution channel, that’s all it takes to become a successful online writer.
Focus on one platform, and as you build an audience, redirect those visitors to your website so you can grow your email list.
Distribution is king.
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This came from David Perell’s ultimate guide to writing online: https://perell.com/essay/the-ultimate-guide-to-writing-online/