I’m starting my second ship 30 for 30 cohort today, and the first cohort was awesome. I published more than I ever have, made new connections, landed customers and clients, and I’m proud of the body of work I created. For new shippers, here are 4 things you may not learn in class but helped me over the last month:

Growing on Twitter is hard

With everyone excited at the beginning of the cohort, your first few posts will get a decent amount of engagement. That will likely change. My engagement dropped due to what I assume is shipper fatigue.

Lots of people will tell you Twitter is easy. It isn’t. It’s slow to grow any audience, but tapping into communities outside the ship30 cohort will help you grow outside the echo chamber.

Crosspost to your existing networks

I experimented by sharing many of my posts with other networks, and the engagement was a lot better. I received feedback from people I actually know, many of whom care about the things I’m writing about. Even more interesting was how my writing worked its way into my real-life interactions. Don’t be afraid to share beyond the bird.

Don’t be afraid to go over 350 words (when appropriate)

I have a real love-hate relationship with an emphasis on short, focused posts. I understand the push to focus your ideas down to the bare minimum, but sometimes an idea needs room to breathe. I wrote a long-form post on how to buy a business. Cutting it up into individual 350-word posts didn’t make any sense…sometimes ideas need to breathe.

Make this month YOURS.

Publishing 30 short blog posts for 30 days is an arbitrary goal toward becoming a writer. It’s like saying jogging every morning will make you a marathoner. It won’t, but if you don’t run or write every day, marathons and book deals are never going to happen. Even the much-beloved Ryan Holiday doesn’t stick to some 30 for 30 format. He makes his own rules, like all great creators. Follow the format and the course as it serves you but make sure you’re paving your own path along the way.