Social media is a strange wasteland of filtered, curated, and manicured content.
I signed up for Twitter in 2011. Instagram in 2012. Facebook somewhere before that.
I’ve used various platforms for various reasons. I’ve even been building an email list for the past 8 years.
In all the time of social media, I have felt two strong pulls when posting, creating, or sharing content – that I now see as false realities:
1. Filter Everything
I can’t just share what’s on my mind. I have to be cognizant of people’s feelings, of what a future potential employer would think, and work hard to not get canceled – especially now. People need to see that my life and my family are perfect – that what you see is what you get – a great leader and a strong family man. I’m a thought leader, so I need to be positioned in a place that shows me as the expert (whoops, my inner monologue is showing.
2. Everything has to make sense or fit your niche.
On paper, I’m a creative digital marketing expert with a strong career, and have a ministry background. Everything I produce should fit in that box, right?
What do I do with leadership principles I’m testing out? I’m not John Maxwell!
What about cooking? I love to cook, and I allowed to write about that?
I write books often, in various topics for various audiences. Who hears about that?
Do I divide my content by network? Gen Z’s on Insta, Millenials and Boomers on FB, and hope to catch all on my emails?
I sitll play with Lego, write about hot takes, wonder about pop culture…and much more that has felt like social media homelessness.
This is where substack comes in.
It will be home to all the content types that I want to write about – thought leadership, family life, marketing, ministry, cooking – it’s all here. I don’t have to make it make sense for one of my “perceived audiences”.
It also answers a third question:
3. You can’t overshare or create division online
I have a lot of stories that I’ve processed in my life and have learned a lot from.
There are approximately 1789 notes on my phone from ideas, stories, lessons, and more. Most of them remain on my phone because I lack time to articulate them properly.
However…some of them remain unpublished because public forums like Facebook or X are not a great place to dialogue about divisive or strongly opinionated topics.
The idea of paywalled content makes it easier to share ideas that remain for a select few who care – and not get caught up in those who want to make noise online with no real vested interest.
The free tier will get subjects similar to what I already write about, and I’ll reserve the paid tier for these more exclusive topics, like:
What I saw in AdvoCare 2012-2017
What types of people I’ll never work with again as a marketer and why
the time I pissed off the worship leader at our church
lack of financial integrity in many parachurch ministries and what we can do about it
hacks to write and publish your own books without paying thousands
things I hate about church culture
things I hate about corporate culture
…and more spicy takes to come