Things on social media just gets tougher each day. What am I talking about? Back then, being a blogger means having a blog and writing things you like to read and sharing things you like to share and it doesn't really matter if your friends read them or if anyone even reads them. It doesn't matter what I share and it doesn't even matter if I'm just blogging something silly or stupid. (ok fine, I still do silly things.)
 |
| Because I want to prove my point that I am a international business man but at the same time a silly blogger. Yes, this will probably "dip my shares" or "make me look less professional" but this is the whole idea of this post. |
Things changed for me when Twitter and Facebook came along. I started getting some attention from more than just friends and family no thanks to the "viral" effect of sharing. I mean, sharing got way easier thanks to the amazing UI/UX of Facebook and Twitter isn't it? So what happened next? I slipped myself into the pool of over-glorified "commercial bloggers" where we do things not just for money and freebies but also applauses. Trust me, applauses are addictive. Way too addictive especially you get some attention here and there and some blog posts that got shared thousands of times. You love those applauses, you love those moments, you love it that friends are saying that your post are awesome, you love it that your cockego gets stroke, you want to live those moments again.
 |
| Sharing this in the middle of a post that doesn't fit in simply because I can. |
Very quickly I got into the whole business of social media not just as a hobby but also for monetary gain. That's right, I became a social media "guru". (Now where's my shotgun, can I shoot myself already?). Not only did I created content for myself but also for my clients. Not only did we create content but we also try our best to read stats, (which I realllly love) forecast results, read successful case studies trying to make sense of this "new media" platform. Like many other social media experts, we see and predict the trend. What content would become better? What kind of content is more engaging, what is the engagement rate, what is the best time to post, what do my client's community want, and what gives the best social media ROI *pukes.
 |
| Some people get it easier online because they look good and all but that's not me. I'm all |
What I didn't know was that all these "best practices" was eating myself up. I started curating my content, I started writing things that could get better clicks, I started taking better images, I started applying all these "best practices" on my own platforms. Of course, I start to get better returns as well in terms of being a better blog, having better engagement rates, getting more likes, more attention, getting laid and of course, getting more clients and partners who wants to advertise on this space. But what went wrong here?
 |
| I googled Cat on Unicorn and got this. NO clue who is the original created thou. Yes there's a water mark but no website to credit. |
When you start chasing stars, you tend to forget why you even started the journey to begin with. We want to listen to those applauses, we compare our blogs within the industry, we bench mark ourselves, wondering if we should be paid more than the other person, we go for "blogging workshop" and try to look expensive, creating content that are more SEO friendly, clickbait titles, creating what we call a personal branding where we show people 2% of our lives, we compare our alexa rankings, we start comparing stats as if it is as important as cup size. We start spitting venom about people buying likes or faking numbers. (Trust me, the only truth we need to know about faking or not is whether your partner is faking her Os.) We start to create an image of who we are to people, and trust me, personal branding is legit and it is thing that people do be it you are an online influencer or not and has shown very positive results. We start to let all these things get into our head and in front of us and as a result, we are killing ourselves. It became a job, it became a chore and the satisfaction of writing or sharing just fades away slowly each day. We always ask ourselves what our readers want, what would they share, what would make them engage my content or what our clients wants (conversion, every client just wants conversion generally because of ROI) but what do YOU want? Are we creating content that we love and we enjoy anymore?
I guess that's what happens when things get into your head. It is funny that I am bringing this up considering how many jobs I've been pushing away(okay lah, actually just no clients can? happy?) these days and how much silly content I pulling out of my ass now instead of answering to client's brief. I have no clue how some people runs a "blog" that has no original content but purely answering to client's brief. What's your motive of your platform? What happened to your voice that everyone started following? I mean no disrespect to anyone but if you are doing it for what you set out for and you are achieving it, good for you.
Anyway, I started this post because of Ryan's post. It's funny how you get inspiration at places you least expect isn't it? If you do not get my point, my point is simple. Stop chasing after the stars and just enjoy the ride. Do whoat you love and love whoat you do.
P.S. Yes, I am still posting this post at a more decent timing such as 11am on Tuesday where people are at their desk waiting for lunch and start to take a break and start surfing Facbook. #SocialMediaAddict #SeriouslyNeedsHelp #EveryoneHasDifferentUsers #FindYourOwnBestTiming #DontJustFollowSocialMediaGuru
0 comments:
Post a Comment