I haven’t posted to social media since March. My last Instagram, Threads, and LinkedIn posts were in March, Facebook in December, and Twitter/X and TikTok in November. Why does this matter? Because:
- My entire life focuses on how writers/readers connect online
- I teach social media
- Being present online is a primary way that people find me, and how I support my family
So leaving social media can be seen as an enormous risk to my career. But not posting to social media doesn’t mean I haven’t been present on social media as an observer about 200 times per day — I have. I love seeing what writers and readers share, and engaging with those who inspire me.
And of course, I have doubled down on Substack, which is kinda like social media, but not fully branded that way.
In today’s post, I’m want to share the surprising lesson I learned in not posting to social media, the way I’m developing the strategy for my return, and how I’m focusing all of this on joy, fulfillment, and meaningful connections with writers and creators.
In the process, I want to encourage you to consider how you can begin — or begin again — if you are a writer or creator who wants to use social media, or do anything new (and scary) to connect your writing to readers. Let’s dig in…
I Left Social Media and My Life Didn’t Fall Apart
14 years ago I started this little business, working with writers to help them develop their voices, author platforms, marketing campaigns, and book launch strategies. I sit in this studio every day talking to writers and working with them via Zoom or phone.
This is the work I love and the only thing that supports my family, so it would be easy to assume that without promotion on social media, my life and business would quickly dissolve, right? Luckily, that isn’t the case. It’s been a super busy year, filled with wonderful work with writers.
So often people talk about the value of a writer’s author platform, saying something like, “A publisher told me that they like my book, but I need to work on growing my author platform.” Sometimes that is communicated as, “… they want to see 10,000 followers” on social media.
But social media is not what defines an author platform. And you don’t need 10,000 followers. I have always defined one’s author platform as relying on two things:
- Communication
- Trust
This is your ability to effectively communicate with your ideal readers, and to develop a sense of trust with them in the process. Can you do that through social media? Sure. Is social media required? Nope!
There is nothing you “have to do” in order to be a writer, except that is, write. Everything else is optional. That said, I would encourage you to consider the opportunities you want to pursue, the connections that matter most to you, the experiences you want to have — and how social media may help encourage these things.
Leaving social media wasn’t a “big decision” for me. I just… stopped posting. I didn’t announce it, and didn’t even think I would write a post about it until this week. For awhile now, I have known I will start posting again, and have spent a lot of time simply thinking about this, considering how my return will focus on joy and connection. I encourage you to ask yourself a similar question for anything you do to share your writing or creative work.
Focus on the Experiences That Matter Most to You
After weeks of thought, I created a new document titled “Social Media Reset 2024.” I kept it simple, using an empty Keynote template (similar to Powerpoint.) The goal here was to focus on the people who inspire me, how I hope to help writers, and the meaningful moments I want to fill my days with.
I made sure to focus on the positive instead of listing out anything negative. I know that social media can quickly trigger and overwhelm people, often in the most unexpected ways. I have friends who have large followings on social media, yet try to avoid the apps as much as possible because the more they scroll, the less good they feel.
I want to feel the opposite, and to do that I have to be clear about my intentions and how I connect with others. So I’m simplifying everything in order to focus. This may mean that I unfollow a large number of people. Now, this is not meant to sound negative, or imply that any of these people share things I don’t like. They are all wonderful. But I am considering questions such as: “What if I only followed 20 people who deeply inspired me? How would that feel when opening up Instagram?”
Or for crafting the moments that matter most to me: “Do I want to show up to deep conversation with 3 friends, or an auditorium of 800 people?” I don’t know the right answer, but I am giving myself permission to explore. And I’m also aware that regardless of what I choose, there will be a variety of voices in my feeds because of the algorithm, all the re-shares, and all of my subscriptions.
Sometimes going small is a wonderful way to reinvent your experience and expectations. The goal is meaningful connections with other people. You get to make of this what you want. You don’t “have to” do anything. All of those “rules” we hear about online are not rules at all. For instance, recommendations of: “Well, you have to post 3 Reels a day, and there should be a split of 80% generosity to 20% self promotion,” are all just suggestions of what may work for some people, some of the time.
I’ve been considering examples of this. For instance, I belong to a small private Facebook group of vintage toy enthusiast, run by one guy. He is an avid toy collector, and the gaps he has to fill in his collection are very specific hard-to-find items. Does he spend his days on eBay, Facebook Marketplace and other online venues to track down these rare toys in the worldwide marketplace? Nope. As a rule, he only buys items “in the wild” — at antique malls, toy stores, toy shows, or from other collectors. He has to happen upon it in a natural way in the real world, just as one would have done in the 1990s or prior.
This limitation is meant to focus on the experiences that matter to him: conversations around toys, and exploring new places. It also helps ward off the possible negative situations: staying up all night every night searching on eBay. He shares photos of his finds — all from real places, from a variety of people he meets face-to-face.
In another example, I was listening to an interview the other day from someone who used to have a platform on one of the largest media outlets in the world — with millions in the audience. But more recently, he left and has focused solely on developing his platform on his Substack newsletter, which has 174,000 subscribers. He described the problems that came up for him when he had a massive audience who didn’t fully understand his viewpoints or methodology. So he put everything behind his paywall, saying, “I want that self-selected audience that understands how I think.”
I talk to people about this all the time. Last night my wife and I took a walk and were reflecting on the craft stores we used to go to in New York City in the early 2000s. Back then every “find” seemed precious. I reminded her of this ribbon she found back in 2001 that had embroidered strawberries on it that she loved.
But since that time, artists have been inundated with cute “finds” on Instagram — a constant unending stream of them. It can easily desensitize you to the experience. Suddenly you are overwhelmed by all the cute things, and they no longer feel precious.
You get to choose the experience you want — how you share and connect online, and how you do so offline as well.
How I’m Returning to Social Media
I am returning to social media in September, and I want to ensure it is meaningful to writers and creators. To do so, I have developed a Fall Curriculum for what I share, which I’ll announce soon. My focus is to create meaningful experiences for writers, and fill my days with learning, connection, and inspiration.
The fall seems like a natural time to do this, just as my kids get ready to start school again — 2nd grade and 9th grade. For them, there will be new classes, new schedules, new challenges, new opportunities, and perhaps some new outfits.
I’m trying to think of my autumn on social media the same way. My goal is to truly show up, truly see others, and focus on the moments that matter most. I’m 51 years old, and have been active on social media since 2007 or 2008, sharing tens of thousands of posts. It feels nice to give myself permission to begin again, with no assumptions or expectations, and focus on filling my days with joy and human connection.
It’s never too late to begin, or begin again.
Please let me know in the comments: how do you want social media to feel for you? What simple change can you make in order for it to feel more meaningful?
Thank you for being here with me.
-Dan