Yes, there is a dark side to social media.

It can definitely be used to generate more views and reads simply by repeating something that works over and over. But saying that it's done maliciously, is just malicious. Incompetent. Or ironically manipulative.

Yet in my own writing and experimentation online, it's become clear that the algos are looking to prioritize certain audience behaviors (like time on site or engagement).

As a writer, I can use certain formulas to make my words easier to:

• skim

• consume

• and grok.

that help people skim and pull them also work.

It's analagous to how copywriting relies on certain tropes and formulas for persuasion, or how good sonnets pack a punch with their last two lines.

While there is definitely luck is involved when trying to create content that goes viral, packaging your content matters too.

Social media conspiracy theorists are marketers too.

Ultimately, they're trying to peg a narrative onto a handful of rather dry statistical engines, that help prioritize what content you consume--by catering to human nature and natural drives our brains already have.

1. Reverse date sorted, i.e. blogs, podcasts. Focus on 'what's new', what's the latest, what's happening. This is the digital logic of why news and PR work.

2. Linkbacks: especially pagerank and variations used by search engine: collective voting machine that helps prioritize relevance around specific topics and words. It helps figure out 'what's good'. In fact, many consumers treat organic search as a credible source of information about everything, including products.

3. Social graph: who are your friends and what are they reading/liking/upvoting/following/sharing. At a simple level, this is about what's 'viral', what's easily consumable, what's pleasant. When it's too easy to share, it also becomes easy to sharing/resharing of inflammatory, in appropriate, or extremist content.

4. Recommendation engines: from spotify to tiktok, this is what consumers find most potentially objectionable when combined with paid acquistion. Companies collect their behavioral data, feed it into a statistical engine, and then spit out what's most relevant. In contrast, it has a lot of value to businesses of all sizes, especially when it's possible to 'buy attention' of highly targeted and similar interest groups.

   By mixing and matching, you can figure out which acquisition channel will work for your particular market segment.

Even after publishing a book on landing pages years ago, I still sometimes find it hard to design, articulate, and publish a new landing page.

To save you earning years of experience yourself, here’s 5 of the simple 'must-have' sections you have to get right in every LP:

1. The headline and lead is the most important part, in terms of where you match the product with an audience's needs. 90% of your readers won't go further.

2. clear and engaging language describing the product in a way that speaks to one person (that ideal person)

3. visually attractive layout that focusses on one clear call to action

4. credibility: social proof or other signs of relevant authority

5. connecting with the buyer's actual motivation, i.e. word count doesn’t matter, it’s whether you promise something that matters enough that they’d be willing to pay for it.

Also worth noting: using a landing page to sell a product is different than using a landing page to prove that market demand for the product exists. My book Launch Tomorrow describes the latter, if you’d like to find out more.

It’s important usually because external factors seem to imply that timing is really important, but it’s taking ‘too long’ to create the product. Too long, of course, being highly subjective.

For example, you don’t want a product to be:

1. too early market-wise: before there is significant demand, e.g. webvan as a dotcom

2. too late market-wise: startup entering a very mature market segment with a commodity product

3. too late relative to an important event: i.e. not launch a physical product before Christmas or more accurately black friday

4. too late relative to competitive response: if you know your competitors are working on something (or even the same thing) you don’t want to be behind them

5. too late relative to a technology shock: think releasing a BlackBerry-like phone right after the initial iPhones made a splash

The point here is that you can create exactly the same product but have a big difference in how much revenue it earns simply due to bad timing. Same product, same cost, same team--product flops.

In Jan 2000, I made a hard break.

I moved across the ocean after having grown up in Philadelphia, back to Poland where I was originally born. It was the tail-end of the dotcom hype cycle.

In a new city where I didn't know anyone, I had to build a professional network from scratch. While I discovered and attended networking events around dotcoms, I didn't have a clear story of who I am and why I was there. At best, I was a recent English major grad from the US with some interest in the stories unfolding before my eyes.

In my downtime, I jumped on my modem and scoured the local websites to find out what was going on. In retrospect, I had the benefit of time, which the more experienced businesspeople and professionals didn't. Many of them had years of business experience, but couldn't figure out this dotcom thing.

As a result, I:

1. pieced together a 30 page report on the state of the Internet in Poland,

2. got a handful of copies printed and bound,

3. and then started handing it out to selected local influencers in this space.

Based on the merit of what I'd written, I started getting consulting and advisory gigs. A lot of doors opened. When finished, I would get introduced further. Quite quickly I was fully plugged in...two years after graduating from college.

In retrospect, the content I created spoke for me. While I still had to distribute it, my readers appreciated the shortcut my research gave them. And in a context where relationships were really important, it created those relationships from scratch.

As a an author and recovering English major, I thought I knew a lot about writing, and that writing online was no different.

This month, I've been taking @ship30for30's flagship course, and had my "mind blown" as @nicolascole77 likes to say.

Here are 10 insights (or reminders) that I picked up that have been hugely helpful:

1. Think in % changes, not in absolute numbers.

2. Look for outliers you can double down on. An average of 2 likes doesn't tell you as much as the 2 posts that had a lot more than the average.

3. Focus on comments and shares more than views, especially if you're struggling to connect with your readers (seems obvious but I missed this one before).

4. Writing is best done in a writing group, where you get real people's feedback. Ask for that feedback. It makes your writing more relevant and easier to connect to.

5. Write with the reader's outcome in mind, i.e. "the for who-so that" framework. It's so easy to just do braindumps that are on-topic but actually don't help readers.

6. By adding a moment in time at the beginning of a post, i.e. in the summer of 1990, you signal that the following is a story, making it easier to pull in readers.

7. Great writing is repetitive. Once you identify a topic and audience, you will be repeating yourself many times over. And that's a feature, not a bug.

8. The point of short-form writing is to hone writing openers, headlines, and hooks. You get a lot more 'times at bat'. Use them.

9. ChatGPT is very helpful for writers, if used indirectly, as a source of ideas and a way to hone a message via editing. Using it to pump out content for you generates a lot of fluff that is no different from everyone else's fluff.

10. Finally, the program has made meeting new writers into a regular habit, which is a nice side benefit to honing my online writing chops. Part of that honing requires feedback from other people, so it's part-and-parcel of writing effectively online.

After sending out a bunch of tweets into the ether, I've found content-based networking to be a topic of interest that I want to continue writing on. It builds on my work around landing page MVPs, and helps provide an alternative source of traffic to them for my readers.

In 2010, they launched as “burbn”.

The founder loved photography. In fact, he discovered the Holga-a cheap vintage camera that produced hip, vintage looking photos when studying abroad in Florence. At the time, there were photo sharing apps coming out of Silicon Valley on a weekly basis.

He wanted to combine photo-sharing with the trend of the day: location check-ins.

Along with a few buddies, he learned to code over nights and weekends. In fact, the initial version of the product took 8 weeks to develop. They put up a waitlist landing page with the following copy: ”Burbn is a new way to communicate + share in the real world. Please leave your email if you're interested in receiving an invite.”

After posting it on the app store, it started getting downloads: 25k in the first day, crashing their servers. And even though most downloaders clicked around once or twice, there was a trickle of active users that kept coming back.

Money was running out.

Pressure was building to just cut their losses.

When the team managed to dig into the details, it turned out their loyal users were really keen on the filters feature-the ones inspired by the Holga. Filters made them look like photography rock stars. If you’re going to share photos, you want to make them look as attractive and unique as possible (without needing to learn and use photoshop each time). As few clicks as possible to get the same result.

So the product team did a zoom-in pivot: double down on filters and sharing. They cut out most of the features, like location check-ins, they had created—in order to focus the app on those two. And they renamed the company to Instagram.

Growth took off, piggy backing on the word of mouth generated by really amazing looking photos that users shared (and then talked about the app that let them do it).

Two years later, the company sold to Facebook for $1 bln.

As you can probably tell, Instagram is my favorite story about startup existential risk. Everything was roughly the same: the market, the team, the conditions, the tech. But using the prototype to figure out exactly what’s most valuable in the moment (and having the guts to cut everything else despite sunk cost bias) is often the best strategy possible.

Get out of your own way.

Kill your darlings.

If you are new to content-based networking (CBN), here's why I would recommend blocking a few hours per week to sit down and write.

CBN is different than 'content marketing'. It's not purely about generating attention (or eyeballs online via SEO for example). It's about sparking thoughtful discussion with an audience, which is an invitation to begin a new relationship.

Conversely, it's clearly different than traditional networking, i.e. handing out slightly sweaty business cards at business mixers. While it's good for people to be aware of you, if the work you do is a bit more conceptual, a business card definitely won't do it justice anyway.

It's also highly context sensitive, so it's a type of creating that is not at risk of being replaced by AI in the next few years.

As a beginner, I promise—this is a great way to start building relationships in a way that you find intuitive as a creator.

Over the past 20 years, I have read tens of books on the subject of networking.

Unfortunately, most of them were a waste of time. They could have easily been blog posts, or even newsletter emails.

Instead, I encourage you to give these 3 a read, if you are a startup founder who enjoys writing.

They're well worth the time.

Book #1: Content-Based Networking by James Carbary @jamescarbary

I first read this book in 2020.

And here's why you'll love it: Carbary describes how he creates a platform that helps attract an ideal prospects, by interviewing ideal prospects.

While he built a podcast network this way, it's obviously relevant for written media also.

Book #2: Brandscaping by Andrew Davis @drewdavishere

This book describes the thought process of many startups in the London-based accelerators I worked with in the past.

Create something valuable. And pitch it to someone who already has your audience. If it clicks, you get rapid access to scale in return for a bit of time spent creating.

Writing for example.

Book #3: Scaling Lean by Ash Maurya @ashmaurya

Finally, I think everyone should read this book.

And here's why I think you'll love it: It's a distillation of the key models needed to think about growth in a more structured way.

SaaS is maturing, but the thought process around growth via CLV via retention and referral is timeless.

And writing a good piece can still serve as a great engine of growth, if you can figure it out.

Should be enough to get you on the right path!

Out of curiosity, I asked chatGPT about how Launch Tomorrow compares to Lean Startup:

Overall, while both Launch Tomorrow and Lean Startup share similar principles and approaches, Launch Tomorrow places a greater emphasis on customer research and validation, and is designed to be a more streamlined and adaptable approach to product development.

To be honest, I am not sure I agree.

Launch Tomorrow build on Lean Startup's focus on customer discovery and development, focusing on the initial steps of using metrics to think quantitatively about opportunities.

Here's how I've built new personal networks from scratch multiple times:

1. When I change my context significantly, i.e. change countries,

2. I start researching the new place or common topic heavily,

3. I start writing

4. Then I emerge with a piece of content that people at the new place are excited to read.

5. This, in turn, sparks a handful of new relationships for me and is the beginning of my network at the new place.

6. As these are typically established 'players', it creates opportunities that would have been completely inaccessible to me before step 1, even at big companies.

This worked when I changed countries a few times, when the pandemic happened, and when I dove deep into startup subculture.

James Carbary of Sweetfish Media came up with the term content-based networking to describe this in the context of podcasting. The same approach applies to the written word in my experience. If you enjoy writing, use it to grow a new B2B business or product quickly.

Use the built in PR effect of your product to your advantage.

I've worked with hundreds of startup founders, including quite a few sharp as a needle DeepTech engineering founders. These founders commonly struggle to carry over their technical prowess into a thinking systematically about growth.

Instead of floating around in abstractions like markets, industries, or business models, arrange a demo with someone who you think will be excited to hear about your product's magic.

The #1 way to break out of this holding pattern is to:

1. pull up linkedin.com in a browser.

2. Identify 5 companies who might be interested in your product

3. within each company, identify one person who you think would be excited to learn about your product (remember that you aren't talking to an academic peer).

4. Contact them in order to show them your invention, prototype, or even product.

Within 5 minutes, by simply looking at LinkedIn search results in a browser, you start to challenge your preconceptions with what specific people have in their profiles. And then schedule some calls.

At the recommendation of a friend, I bought a waterproof notepad & pencil to hang in the shower.

Like many, I find the shower to be one of the best places to get unexpected insights on a regular basis.

I figured this might help with noting them down, just to be sure these great ideas don't evaporate.

But then the notepad hung there for months, unused.

Felt like it had the opposite effect of what was intended.

One day, I got in the shower, and noticed some scribblings.

Our maid had written, 'you can do it under the shower, too.'

A few years ago, I'd gotten into a routine which seemed productive on paper. I was writing blog posts regularly, tracking metrics in a spreadsheet, and editing a book manuscript that I want to be just right. But I felt little momentum.

In a smoky London pub, I met with a fellow entrepreneur. Over pints, I spilled my guts. He gave me a piece of advice I will never forget.

'If you feel stuck, and you aren't sure why, it's probably a case of fear. And fear is systemic. Once it appears somewhere in your head, it grows. It takes over."

Then he paused and asked,"what's your biggest fear?"

I sqiurmed in my seat, feeling the tension rise in my chest up to my shoulders.

"in terms of business?"

"no, in general."

"probably heights."

Three weeks later i did my first tandem skydive jump.

Two months later, I released that manuscript as my first book Launch Tomorrow, which went on to be a #1 Amazon bestseller.

Even though I'd already gathered data with pre-launches (following my own advice), I still had to get over the fear and perfection is that was holding me back.

So if you are ever in a creative funk, you now know you don't need all the answers.

If you're like me, you just need to jump.

I've worked with loads of deeptech founders as a mentor. Here's what I've found works well

Strategy 1: for B2B products, get on LinkedIn and send out InMail or connection requests. Then follow up and speak with them.

Strategy 2: clearly articulate why your product matters and who is's for, instead of talking about how it works

Strategy 3: consider revenue models other than selling the product directly

Strategy 4: if you are an academic, team up with someone with an industry operator. And vice-versa.

That's probably the most places to improve your startup journey quickly.

There is an argument for just going and building something quickly if you feel you can do it quickly and you’re willing to risk that amount of time. For me this would be something like 1–3 days, like over a long weekend. But everyone has their own level of risk tolerance around this.

Conversely, a landing page MVP is about market testing. To be precise:

1. your assumptions about your target audience

2. whether they have the need you think they have

3. and to a lesser extent how you can reach them

4. and how much effort or money it will cost you.

Datapoints around all of these buckets help inform what product increment it worth building, as opposed to relying on gut feel which can be easily biased based on not having enough info or seeing the full picture—at the moment that you are making the decision.

So if you already have a lot of insight directly from other sources, e.g. speaking with your target audience segment, then you might not need a landing page MVP. Just build your product, and set up a website with landing pages when you have it ready,

I've been on remote teams for over a decade now, including a good chunk of that as a lead.

1. Argue against yourself during discussions, especially workshops. Other than coming to better solutions together, you communicate that it's ok to disagree.

2. If there is a conflict of interests or misunderstanding, whiteboard it out with a tool like Miro or Mural. Get everyone looking at all data points, so you can 'see' each others' perspectives.

3. Use one-on-one meetings to get to know each other better. Play games or even explore hobbies. One of my team member has a hobby of winning games of online chess against me.

4. Explore if each person knows what is expected of them. The less they will be surprised by a changing expectations, the safer they will feel.

5. You need to be ok for people to make mistakes or fail. As long as they take responsibility and don't turn it into a pattern, consider it an investment in their internal motivation on the job.
   

As the author of a book on remote teams, ex-founder, and startup community activist I’d like to suggest that work location is much less important than it was before the pandemic.

Here's why:

1. Being together physically does matter, if it’s critical that you want a small team to go super fast.

2. If you want to scale, however, the ability to work asynchronously starts to matter a lot more.

3. You can have the best of both worlds by meeting together physically once a month or once a quarter,

4. Allow your team members the luxury of defining where and how they want to work, so that they can design a work environment that raises their personal productivity.

5. It's not only a cost thing. Look outside of San Fran, NYC and London, especially for great developers who don’t want to or can’t live in that kind of environment.

And scale quickly by creating internal worklows and using tools that are asynchronous (and therefore easy to scale up and down as needed).