Where's the line?

This has been bothering me almost from the very beginning.

Why does it seem like some succeed whereas others fail when it comes to building a digital presence? I’ve watched so many come and go, some resurfacing multiple times.

It’s like whale watching, only without the spray and the blowhole and the frigid temperatures some endure for the experience.

The truth is that anything worth doing is going to take time, gurus be damned.

The “business”

Full disclosure: I fell for this message, too.

When life seems out of control and money is tight, your ability to discern the reality and practical implications of doing anything are going to take a backseat to the desperation creeping up.

I was lost, overwhelmed, and living in a country where I was the sole provider on every level because I was the one who could function in the culture and the language. Trying to provide for a wife and newborn in this environment is the challenge of every single immigrant family, and I confess that it did a number on me that has made me see my own parents in a very different light.

I needed an outlet, not to mention a potential means to bolster my income.

Every pitch from gurus is the same:

• no money down

• no experience needed

• make money while you sleep

Blech.

The boiler plate stuff from them is all the same everywhere you look on every platform on the internet.

If that’s all you see from someone on the internet, run.

The truth

You are the product that gurus reel in for advertisers.

The reality of it is that the big fish on every social media website benefit from being first movers, and after watching places like TwiX, Medium, LinkedIn, and now Substack, I’m seeing a weird pattern emerge.

You see the same names appear everywhere.

Sooner or later, these people have to move on from one watering hole to the next. When the hype dies down for one platform and the rules change as profits grow and critical mass is reached, that’s when you see the exodus.

• After TwiX became Elon’s personal platform, most of those guys moved to LinkedIn to start the whole process over again.

• When Medium first turned a profit last year, things started changing and drove many to move to Substack.

• YouTube is YouTube. There is no escaping to other video platforms. It’s the only game in town.

With AI being all the rage at the moment, it’s being leveraged like crazy as the biggest thing to help creators ever.

It is…and it isn’t. I’m still figuring out how to work with it in the right way because like any new technology, it takes time to understand it for what it is rather than for what it’s claimed to be.

Marketing is the means for attention, not the means for mastery.

No hate for the game

The big whales move to where the krill gather the most.

(Is it just me, or am I on a whale binge tonight?)

As of this writing, Dan Koe, Justin Welsh, and many other big names are now starting their own Substacks. Make no mistake, they will make an impact there and become the top players there soon. The message that they bring will be reinforced, but the fine points they make will be missed by most.

Too many conflate their marketing abilities with their real message.

None of what they’ve achieved has been easy. What they have now isn’t what they started with. Dan started out struggling with photo editing. Justin worked in a corporate environment. While they started at different points of the mountain, both came in with their own distinct advantages to carve out a niche for themselves.

So must we, and that is different for every single one of us.