Social Media Destroys Entrepreneurs. Grow Your Business Without It.

[All_In52]

Great post!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[CarrieMatchmaker]

Let me reiterate it because I find it f*cking incredible: did you start your OWN business to spend more time building somebody else’s?

I agree, once I started my own business I was told to create social media accounts and make posts every day to attract clients. After I have spent 2 months of non stop posts and stories I have decided to check statistics and guess what? I did not get even 1 good client out of it!! not even 1!!! I have spent so much time on this and I felt disappointed. I had 1000+ followers and 10+ comments under each post but yet no use out of it. I am sure there are people who having good use out of their social media accounts but maybe its time to stop this? There should be another good way to make a new business popular!

 

[Andy Black]

Growing up as a kid, I spent most of my time on Social Media as an escape from reality. I was the middle child out of my 3 siblings.

My older sister got into the wrong crowd, never fully paid attention to me at all. She did bad stuff and got onto the wrong path.

My younger brother did the same. As for my mother, she barely paid attention to me, she was always on the phone with my sister listening to her complain all the time.

As for my dad, he would always be watching TV or downloading stuff from the internet on his PC.

I found virtual reality (video games) and social media as an escape from my problems. But now that I look at it, I wasted so much time on Facebook.

I could be wrong, but I always had this thought that people who use entertainment or get into other substances have issues of their past that they do not want to deal with. For me, my issues were with my family, one could say that my family basically neglected me as a child growing up. I didn't know this at the time really but learned all about this recently in my mid to late '20s.

I have several friends who are addicted to their phones when I hang out with them. It's kind of sad really because you don't get to establish a good friendship these days.

Social media at least for me in the past has created this instant gratification. With this instant gratification, we don't understand what it means to work hard to achieve things. And for the generations that come after me, I feel bad because I think they will have it much worse.

I have a friend whose little sister lives on her phone all the time, it has become the "parent" of her life so to speak. She doesn't know what discipline so to speak.

She did something very bad to me, that I won't say on this forum, but made me realize that if and when I have kids. I do not want to raise my kids this way.

I think social media is a scourge. I particularly dislike how they engineer their platforms to be addictive.

That aside, they’re still powerful tools for business owners to reach and help or serve people.

Some people make it work. If we don’t then I feel it’s likely down to our execution.

 

[Andy Black]

There should be another good way to make a new business popular!

Is your goal to make your business popular or get more clients?

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[ZackerySprague]

I agree. I think they can be useful tools to reach your targeted demographic as a business owner for sure.

In the recent days, I've been interested in seeing this privacy battle with Apple and Facebook on Advertising since the iOS 14.x release on Apple users opting out of sharing their identifier tags for advertisements.

I read in an article a few days ago that Facebook lost up to $10 billion dollars in revenue because of it.

I'm still wondering how powerful Facebook Ads are without accurately reporting who's made a purchase from your store.

I don't know enough about Advertising, but I would find it hard to offer it as a service to Ecommerce founders if I wasn't able to show any kind of results in terms of how much value we have brought to the table.

I'm sure theirs ways around this. I wonder how one person could get an Ecommerce client without having any results to show as well.

But I do think social media is definitely great to identify and reach your targeted audience.

It's actually one of the fastest ways to reach them as well.

 

[Andy Black]

I think most businesses approach social media platforms and forums wrong. They publish posts and try to get people to landing pages they own and email lists they own.

The power is in conversations and building relationships.

In this forum alone I’ve messaged over 3,000 people. Many of those conversations have even led to Zoom chats.

That’s how B2B works imo. Make friends, build relationships, create win-wins.

If those conversations reveal common problems that you can solve then you can try to automate some of that relationship building.

I feel people try to automate too soon.

So maybe approach social media platforms and forums as places you can have conversations with people and help them there and then, rather than as some content marketing lead-gen exercise?

 

[David Fitz]

Since reading this post and anytime I'm on social media I can see now it's sucking me in. It's best to use these tools for your business and to make money and other than that, you need to limit your time on them.

It's easy to get dragged into someone else's entertainment, arguments, opinions that do absolutely nothing for your life.

I went on Twitter to get some news about what's going on in Ukriane and before you know it, I'm looking at comments from Tyson Fury and Conor McGregor arguing. How does that help my life?

Avoid avoid avoid. Reminds of a book I need to read again called Deep Work!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Mathuin]

I can't remember who it was on here who mentioned about changing the location of your Twitter news but its great. Means I don't have to read the heading and subheading of BS mainstream articles. Allows me to more intentional on Twitter.

I've set my location to Kyrgyzstan.

I think most businesses approach social media platforms and forums wrong. They publish posts and try to get people to landing pages they own and email lists they own.

The power is in conversations and building relationships.

In this forum alone I’ve messaged over 3,000 people.

Many of those conversations have led to Zoom chats.

That’s how B2B works imo. Make friends, build relationships, create win-wins

Excellent point, thanks Andy

 

[Andy Black]

Excellent point, thanks Andy

These are similar:

• How to use forums (and Facebook groups)
• Content Marketing - Kinda
• Who have you helped?
• Make friends, build relationships, and create win-wins

 

[TheWinningForce]

For most entrepreneurs few things are worse than social media. You think it’s helpful while it’s a parasite that slowly kills you and your business.

Social media platforms have spent millions and millions to persuade us that they’re indispensable for business.

If you don’t exist on social media, you don’t exist at all.

What a joke.

We all know that social media can be bad for individuals. But it's poisonous for business, too, and you may be better off as an entrepreneur without it.

Not everyone will agree with this post and that’s okay. This thread is about showing a perspective counter to mainstream advice. It’s not the ultimate truth, though. I’m not saying EVERYONE has to avoid social media in business at all costs.

Note: by social media I refer to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. I don’t consider YouTube social media (because it’s more of a search engine) or Reddit (because it’s just a giant forum with various subforums, similar to the Fastlane forum).

Warning: I swear in this post and I share my opinion in a blunt way. If you don’t like it, don’t read it.

Here are ten reasons why social media destroys entrepreneurs and their businesses:

1. You’re Putting More Effort Building Somebody Else’s Business Than Yours

Post ten times a day on Facebook (don’t forget about Facebook stories). Twenty times a day on Instagram (but thirty stories and forty reels). Upload ten videos on TikTok and don’t forget to tweet thirty times a day (and retweet another twenty tweets). It almost seems as if marketing today equals social media marketing.

Do it all AGAIN over and over again because the next day nobody sees your posts from the day before anyway. And if you ever figure out a way to crack the algorithm, it will soon change and you’ll be left behind again.

When you add it all up, you spend more time donating your time to social media platforms than spending it on your business. How ridiculous is that?

Few entrepreneurs ever calculate how much time, money, and effort they invest on social media. They don’t even know if they get a positive return from their investment.

That’s insanity. Not only you’re dedicating most of your business life to tasks that may not even be worth it. You’re also putting more effort building other people’s companies rather than yours.

Let me reiterate it because I find it f*cking incredible: did you start your OWN business to spend more time building somebody else’s?

How much do you enjoy being an unpaid Meta, TikTok or Twitter employee?

Is this what entrepreneurship comes down to these days? Filling the pockets of big, censor-happy corporations who don’t give two shits about you just so you can brag about your follower count?

2. You’re Only Getting Scraps

Even if you do everything right, at most maybe a few percent of your followers will see your posts. Out of them, only a few percent will take any action. Out of them, a few percent will do what you want them to do—buy your stuff.

In other words, you’re only getting scraps thrown at you by the social media platforms. And the more the platform grows, the less you get. It’s a natural growth cycle of every social media company. You can always count on the fact that they will grow at your expense.

You’re like that poor dog begging for food underneath the table. Only as time goes by, there are even more hungry dogs and less food on the table. Most goes into the mouths of the obese owners.

Moreover, social media platforms have a short lifespan so all your efforts are eventually for nothing. Ask anyone who has built a big following on Facebook how useful it is today. Meanwhile, a high-quality article on your own site can provide value for years.

3. You’re on a Never-Ending Content Treadmill

Social media gurus get on my nerves because their solution to any marketing problem is to post more. More, more, more, until you can’t do it anymore but you can’t stop because you’re afraid that if you stop, your business will end.

You become trapped on a content treadmill, posting endless amounts of content, begging to get some attention like an old wrinkly prostitute in flashy clothes.

The more you post, the faster the treadmill is. Since you can’t stop, you never have time and energy to reconsider what you’re doing and whether it’s the best strategy for your business.

Strategic thinking drowns in the sea of content you’re forced to produce every day just to stay afloat. And the worst thing is that whatever you produce, it’s often unsearchable and irrelevant the next day.

4. You Fail to Build What’s Most Important

The ONLY valuable asset in every business is a customer list. Yet, if you focus on social media, you fool yourself that your follower count is what defines your business.

You either spend time building your own platform or you build time spending other people’s platforms.

This forum is a great example of a platform standing on its own. I didn’t join it because I saw MJ on social media. I joined it because I read MJ’s book. I stayed because it’s an independent platform owned by a person who cares. For all I care, MJ may never post anything on social media. I want to read his content HERE, on his OWN platform.

Would your clients say the same about your business? Would they still work with you if you had no presence on social media?

Would you rather have 100,000 followers on social media or 1,000 loyal customers? (If you chose the former, sorry but there’s no hope for you LOL.)

5. You Judge the Value of the Business by the Number of Followers

My girlfriend has a podcast. She had a call with a potential guest today. The woman told her that she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be featured in my girlfriend’s podcast because “nothing happens on her Instagram profile.”

My girlfriend only posts images with new episodes on her Instagram profile. But if you checked the podcast’s archives, you’d see over 75 episodes posted religiously every week, featuring dozens of recognized in her niche guests.

That poor guest is so brainwashed. She thinks that an Instagram profile counts more than your real-world track record. To make matters worse, she was SHOCKED how my girlfriend got podcast listeners through something else than Instagram.

My girlfriend is not an Instagrammer. She owns a podcast. That’s her business, not posting daily vlogs or other bullshit from her everyday life. She doesn’t even want Instagram followers who spend a tenth of a second liking her random images. She wants real listeners who invest hours listening to her episodes.

There are so many businesses that have few, if any, social media followers, yet kill it WAY, WAY more than brands that obsess about social media.

Do you help people through selling your products or do you chase status through posting meaningless social media posts?

6. You Waste Time and Mental Energy on Drama and Addiction

Social media thrives because it appeals to our most basic instincts.

Everything is designed in such a way to get you hooked and keep you there for as long as possible. Notifications, real-time updates, live stories. Then there’s inevitable drama and bullshit politics that’s impossible to opt out of.

Instagram will always pester you with profiles of plastic surgery enhanced half naked models of both genders.

Twitter will always pester you with annoying politics no matter who you follow.

Both Facebook and TikTok will always steal your attention through idiotic short clips designed to captivate your brain whether you want it or not.

Even if you’re strong-willed, there’s NO WAY you won’t waste your life each time you visit any of the social media platforms for “business” purposes.

Is this how you want to spend your valuable time?

7. You’re Contributing to Producing Mountains of Garbage

Most content on social media is f*cking garbage. I need to swear here because there’s no other way to describe it.

Twitter relies on bullshit, supposedly clever, one-liners that say nothing. Yet, our brains like these empty platitudes. So, like idiots, we retweet them. Long form, well though-out content is rare these days because it’s too hard for most people to read something longer than 280 characters.

Instagram relies on even more bullshit soft porn pictures or other depictions of a “perfect” life along with even more idiotic empty quotes. Yet, we fall for this, too. It’s in our genes. There’s no way a healthy male is able to look away from a perfect pair of photoshopped boobs.

TikTok relies on cringeworthy, self-absorbed, completely retarded videos of teenagers thinking they do something meaningful. Yet, in their stupidity, they’re so captivating you find yourself watching one video after another. Later, you feel disgusted with yourself only to do it again the next time you “work” on TikTok.

Can you find valuable content on social media? Yes, you can. Not everything is garbage.

It doesn’t change the fact that most of social media content is utter junk. These platforms don’t reward in-depth content. They reward simplistic, controversial or straight up idiotic posts and videos.

Since people are so addicted to social media today, their attention spans are so short you have to transmit your message in a few seconds. What valuable things can you say in a few seconds? By default, you’re forced to contribute to this mountain of garbage every single day.

8. You’re Building an Unsellable Asset

It’s rare for most small businesses to succeed on social media. So, instead, most founders post under their own names. Their business becomes them. Yes, a personal brand may be valuable but a personal brand, as the name implies, is unsellable.

If this doesn’t bother you, then this point doesn’t apply to you. Yet, I’d urge every entrepreneur to think about a potential exit strategy. If you’re building your business through promoting yourself, then most likely you won’t be able to sell it in the future.

9. You Fail to See Other Opportunities

People new to business, particularly those who don’t remember the world before social media, assume that EVERY business needs to be on social media. They focus only on those business ideas that have a social media presence, ignoring the wealth of other possible opportunities.

Boring, but essential B2B businesses? Nah, where will I get my followers?

Offline businesses without an online presence other than a simple website? No way, how will I brag about my biz?

Low-key business models that rely on joint ventures and deal-making rather than social media content? No thanks, I’m too busy building my “credibility” on social media.

10. You Do What Everyone Else Is Doing

Being an entrepreneur means full responsibility for your decisions but also complete freedom over how you want to run your business.

Unfortunately, most people let the prevailing narrative dictate how they’ll approach their ventures.

If the “only” way to succeed is through fifty social media posts a day, let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through showing your boobs to horny teenagers (who will not buy your products anyway), let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through being a complete idiot dancing like a drunk moose, let’s do it.

Don’t be a sheep. Use your brain. Create YOUR business on YOUR OWN terms rather than letting social media corporations bully you into using their toxic platforms.

There, I said it.

Thoughts, love, hate—all welcome.

This is a great article. Like it a lot and makes me overthink my strategy.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Sean Marshall]

Would you rather have 100,000 followers on social media or 1,000 loyal customers?

Amen!

Fantastic post! I got off social media a while back because I was tired of the manipulation.

And as far as forum's go, this is literally the only one I value. MJ has created a great community through quality content.

 

[RockinRA]

For most entrepreneurs few things are worse than social media. You think it’s helpful while it’s a parasite that slowly kills you and your business.

Social media platforms have spent millions and millions to persuade us that they’re indispensable for business.

If you don’t exist on social media, you don’t exist at all.

What a joke.

We all know that social media can be bad for individuals. But it's poisonous for business, too, and you may be better off as an entrepreneur without it.

Not everyone will agree with this post and that’s okay. This thread is about showing a perspective counter to mainstream advice. It’s not the ultimate truth, though. I’m not saying EVERYONE has to avoid social media in business at all costs.

Note: by social media I refer to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. I don’t consider YouTube social media (because it’s more of a search engine) or Reddit (because it’s just a giant forum with various subforums, similar to the Fastlane forum).

Warning: I swear in this post and I share my opinion in a blunt way. If you don’t like it, don’t read it.

Here are ten reasons why social media destroys entrepreneurs and their businesses:

1. You’re Putting More Effort Building Somebody Else’s Business Than Yours

Post ten times a day on Facebook (don’t forget about Facebook stories). Twenty times a day on Instagram (but thirty stories and forty reels). Upload ten videos on TikTok and don’t forget to tweet thirty times a day (and retweet another twenty tweets). It almost seems as if marketing today equals social media marketing.

Do it all AGAIN over and over again because the next day nobody sees your posts from the day before anyway. And if you ever figure out a way to crack the algorithm, it will soon change and you’ll be left behind again.

When you add it all up, you spend more time donating your time to social media platforms than spending it on your business. How ridiculous is that?

Few entrepreneurs ever calculate how much time, money, and effort they invest on social media. They don’t even know if they get a positive return from their investment.

That’s insanity. Not only you’re dedicating most of your business life to tasks that may not even be worth it. You’re also putting more effort building other people’s companies rather than yours.

Let me reiterate it because I find it f*cking incredible: did you start your OWN business to spend more time building somebody else’s?

How much do you enjoy being an unpaid Meta, TikTok or Twitter employee?

Is this what entrepreneurship comes down to these days? Filling the pockets of big, censor-happy corporations who don’t give two shits about you just so you can brag about your follower count?

2. You’re Only Getting Scraps

Even if you do everything right, at most maybe a few percent of your followers will see your posts. Out of them, only a few percent will take any action. Out of them, a few percent will do what you want them to do—buy your stuff.

In other words, you’re only getting scraps thrown at you by the social media platforms. And the more the platform grows, the less you get. It’s a natural growth cycle of every social media company. You can always count on the fact that they will grow at your expense.

You’re like that poor dog begging for food underneath the table. Only as time goes by, there are even more hungry dogs and less food on the table. Most goes into the mouths of the obese owners.

Moreover, social media platforms have a short lifespan so all your efforts are eventually for nothing. Ask anyone who has built a big following on Facebook how useful it is today. Meanwhile, a high-quality article on your own site can provide value for years.

3. You’re on a Never-Ending Content Treadmill

Social media gurus get on my nerves because their solution to any marketing problem is to post more. More, more, more, until you can’t do it anymore but you can’t stop because you’re afraid that if you stop, your business will end.

You become trapped on a content treadmill, posting endless amounts of content, begging to get some attention like an old wrinkly prostitute in flashy clothes.

The more you post, the faster the treadmill is. Since you can’t stop, you never have time and energy to reconsider what you’re doing and whether it’s the best strategy for your business.

Strategic thinking drowns in the sea of content you’re forced to produce every day just to stay afloat. And the worst thing is that whatever you produce, it’s often unsearchable and irrelevant the next day.

4. You Fail to Build What’s Most Important

The ONLY valuable asset in every business is a customer list. Yet, if you focus on social media, you fool yourself that your follower count is what defines your business.

You either spend time building your own platform or you build time spending other people’s platforms.

This forum is a great example of a platform standing on its own. I didn’t join it because I saw MJ on social media. I joined it because I read MJ’s book. I stayed because it’s an independent platform owned by a person who cares. For all I care, MJ may never post anything on social media. I want to read his content HERE, on his OWN platform.

Would your clients say the same about your business? Would they still work with you if you had no presence on social media?

Would you rather have 100,000 followers on social media or 1,000 loyal customers? (If you chose the former, sorry but there’s no hope for you LOL.)

5. You Judge the Value of the Business by the Number of Followers

My girlfriend has a podcast. She had a call with a potential guest today. The woman told her that she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be featured in my girlfriend’s podcast because “nothing happens on her Instagram profile.”

My girlfriend only posts images with new episodes on her Instagram profile. But if you checked the podcast’s archives, you’d see over 75 episodes posted religiously every week, featuring dozens of recognized in her niche guests.

That poor guest is so brainwashed. She thinks that an Instagram profile counts more than your real-world track record. To make matters worse, she was SHOCKED how my girlfriend got podcast listeners through something else than Instagram.

My girlfriend is not an Instagrammer. She owns a podcast. That’s her business, not posting daily vlogs or other bullshit from her everyday life. She doesn’t even want Instagram followers who spend a tenth of a second liking her random images. She wants real listeners who invest hours listening to her episodes.

There are so many businesses that have few, if any, social media followers, yet kill it WAY, WAY more than brands that obsess about social media.

Do you help people through selling your products or do you chase status through posting meaningless social media posts?

6. You Waste Time and Mental Energy on Drama and Addiction

Social media thrives because it appeals to our most basic instincts.

Everything is designed in such a way to get you hooked and keep you there for as long as possible. Notifications, real-time updates, live stories. Then there’s inevitable drama and bullshit politics that’s impossible to opt out of.

Instagram will always pester you with profiles of plastic surgery enhanced half naked models of both genders.

Twitter will always pester you with annoying politics no matter who you follow.

Both Facebook and TikTok will always steal your attention through idiotic short clips designed to captivate your brain whether you want it or not.

Even if you’re strong-willed, there’s NO WAY you won’t waste your life each time you visit any of the social media platforms for “business” purposes.

Is this how you want to spend your valuable time?

7. You’re Contributing to Producing Mountains of Garbage

Most content on social media is f*cking garbage. I need to swear here because there’s no other way to describe it.

Twitter relies on bullshit, supposedly clever, one-liners that say nothing. Yet, our brains like these empty platitudes. So, like idiots, we retweet them. Long form, well though-out content is rare these days because it’s too hard for most people to read something longer than 280 characters.

Instagram relies on even more bullshit soft porn pictures or other depictions of a “perfect” life along with even more idiotic empty quotes. Yet, we fall for this, too. It’s in our genes. There’s no way a healthy male is able to look away from a perfect pair of photoshopped boobs.

TikTok relies on cringeworthy, self-absorbed, completely retarded videos of teenagers thinking they do something meaningful. Yet, in their stupidity, they’re so captivating you find yourself watching one video after another. Later, you feel disgusted with yourself only to do it again the next time you “work” on TikTok.

Can you find valuable content on social media? Yes, you can. Not everything is garbage.

It doesn’t change the fact that most of social media content is utter junk. These platforms don’t reward in-depth content. They reward simplistic, controversial or straight up idiotic posts and videos.

Since people are so addicted to social media today, their attention spans are so short you have to transmit your message in a few seconds. What valuable things can you say in a few seconds? By default, you’re forced to contribute to this mountain of garbage every single day.

8. You’re Building an Unsellable Asset

It’s rare for most small businesses to succeed on social media. So, instead, most founders post under their own names. Their business becomes them. Yes, a personal brand may be valuable but a personal brand, as the name implies, is unsellable.

If this doesn’t bother you, then this point doesn’t apply to you. Yet, I’d urge every entrepreneur to think about a potential exit strategy. If you’re building your business through promoting yourself, then most likely you won’t be able to sell it in the future.

9. You Fail to See Other Opportunities

People new to business, particularly those who don’t remember the world before social media, assume that EVERY business needs to be on social media. They focus only on those business ideas that have a social media presence, ignoring the wealth of other possible opportunities.

Boring, but essential B2B businesses? Nah, where will I get my followers?

Offline businesses without an online presence other than a simple website? No way, how will I brag about my biz?

Low-key business models that rely on joint ventures and deal-making rather than social media content? No thanks, I’m too busy building my “credibility” on social media.

10. You Do What Everyone Else Is Doing

Being an entrepreneur means full responsibility for your decisions but also complete freedom over how you want to run your business.

Unfortunately, most people let the prevailing narrative dictate how they’ll approach their ventures.

If the “only” way to succeed is through fifty social media posts a day, let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through showing your boobs to horny teenagers (who will not buy your products anyway), let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through being a complete idiot dancing like a drunk moose, let’s do it.

Don’t be a sheep. Use your brain. Create YOUR business on YOUR OWN terms rather than letting social media corporations bully you into using their toxic platforms.

There, I said it.

Thoughts, love, hate—all welcome.

Right on - Thanks for adding clarity to "the other side" of the coin!
I will read this again I'm sure.
Cheers!

 

[Lee Ashby]

Great post and excellent replies.
One way I think about social media, such as instagram, is that it is an 'evidence library' for building trust with potential new clients.

So if they are in the 'consideration phase' before contacting you or buying from you, they can check out 'who' you are. Quickly browse your instagram from a link on your website or newsletter for example. See that you are a humble family man with 2 kids and like cycling, whatever. It builds trust, 'knowing' your doing business with someone you like. Or at least giving the customer No red flags / reasons NOT to call you...

The best part of this purpose. Is that it doesnt matter how many followers you have, or comments etc. Evidence library only.

The other purpose similar to this is for high value educational content. Again for your evidence library, so potential customers can see that you know your stuff, are going the extra mile, etc.

I hope that helps someone. Thanks.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Jennifer.h]

For most entrepreneurs few things are worse than social media. You think it’s helpful while it’s a parasite that slowly kills you and your business.

Social media platforms have spent millions and millions to persuade us that they’re indispensable for business.

If you don’t exist on social media, you don’t exist at all.

What a joke.

We all know that social media can be bad for individuals. But it's poisonous for business, too, and you may be better off as an entrepreneur without it.

Not everyone will agree with this post and that’s okay. This thread is about showing a perspective counter to mainstream advice. It’s not the ultimate truth, though. I’m not saying EVERYONE has to avoid social media in business at all costs.

Note: by social media I refer to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. I don’t consider YouTube social media (because it’s more of a search engine) or Reddit (because it’s just a giant forum with various subforums, similar to the Fastlane forum).

Warning: I swear in this post and I share my opinion in a blunt way. If you don’t like it, don’t read it.

Here are ten reasons why social media destroys entrepreneurs and their businesses:

1. You’re Putting More Effort Building Somebody Else’s Business Than Yours

Post ten times a day on Facebook (don’t forget about Facebook stories). Twenty times a day on Instagram (but thirty stories and forty reels). Upload ten videos on TikTok and don’t forget to tweet thirty times a day (and retweet another twenty tweets). It almost seems as if marketing today equals social media marketing.

Do it all AGAIN over and over again because the next day nobody sees your posts from the day before anyway. And if you ever figure out a way to crack the algorithm, it will soon change and you’ll be left behind again.

When you add it all up, you spend more time donating your time to social media platforms than spending it on your business. How ridiculous is that?

Few entrepreneurs ever calculate how much time, money, and effort they invest on social media. They don’t even know if they get a positive return from their investment.

That’s insanity. Not only you’re dedicating most of your business life to tasks that may not even be worth it. You’re also putting more effort building other people’s companies rather than yours.

Let me reiterate it because I find it f*cking incredible: did you start your OWN business to spend more time building somebody else’s?

How much do you enjoy being an unpaid Meta, TikTok or Twitter employee?

Is this what entrepreneurship comes down to these days? Filling the pockets of big, censor-happy corporations who don’t give two shits about you just so you can brag about your follower count?

2. You’re Only Getting Scraps

Even if you do everything right, at most maybe a few percent of your followers will see your posts. Out of them, only a few percent will take any action. Out of them, a few percent will do what you want them to do—buy your stuff.

In other words, you’re only getting scraps thrown at you by the social media platforms. And the more the platform grows, the less you get. It’s a natural growth cycle of every social media company. You can always count on the fact that they will grow at your expense.

You’re like that poor dog begging for food underneath the table. Only as time goes by, there are even more hungry dogs and less food on the table. Most goes into the mouths of the obese owners.

Moreover, social media platforms have a short lifespan so all your efforts are eventually for nothing. Ask anyone who has built a big following on Facebook how useful it is today. Meanwhile, a high-quality article on your own site can provide value for years.

3. You’re on a Never-Ending Content Treadmill

Social media gurus get on my nerves because their solution to any marketing problem is to post more. More, more, more, until you can’t do it anymore but you can’t stop because you’re afraid that if you stop, your business will end.

You become trapped on a content treadmill, posting endless amounts of content, begging to get some attention like an old wrinkly prostitute in flashy clothes.

The more you post, the faster the treadmill is. Since you can’t stop, you never have time and energy to reconsider what you’re doing and whether it’s the best strategy for your business.

Strategic thinking drowns in the sea of content you’re forced to produce every day just to stay afloat. And the worst thing is that whatever you produce, it’s often unsearchable and irrelevant the next day.

4. You Fail to Build What’s Most Important

The ONLY valuable asset in every business is a customer list. Yet, if you focus on social media, you fool yourself that your follower count is what defines your business.

You either spend time building your own platform or you build time spending other people’s platforms.

This forum is a great example of a platform standing on its own. I didn’t join it because I saw MJ on social media. I joined it because I read MJ’s book. I stayed because it’s an independent platform owned by a person who cares. For all I care, MJ may never post anything on social media. I want to read his content HERE, on his OWN platform.

Would your clients say the same about your business? Would they still work with you if you had no presence on social media?

Would you rather have 100,000 followers on social media or 1,000 loyal customers? (If you chose the former, sorry but there’s no hope for you LOL.)

5. You Judge the Value of the Business by the Number of Followers

My girlfriend has a podcast. She had a call with a potential guest today. The woman told her that she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be featured in my girlfriend’s podcast because “nothing happens on her Instagram profile.”

My girlfriend only posts images with new episodes on her Instagram profile. But if you checked the podcast’s archives, you’d see over 75 episodes posted religiously every week, featuring dozens of recognized in her niche guests.

That poor guest is so brainwashed. She thinks that an Instagram profile counts more than your real-world track record. To make matters worse, she was SHOCKED how my girlfriend got podcast listeners through something else than Instagram.

My girlfriend is not an Instagrammer. She owns a podcast. That’s her business, not posting daily vlogs or other bullshit from her everyday life. She doesn’t even want Instagram followers who spend a tenth of a second liking her random images. She wants real listeners who invest hours listening to her episodes.

There are so many businesses that have few, if any, social media followers, yet kill it WAY, WAY more than brands that obsess about social media.

Do you help people through selling your products or do you chase status through posting meaningless social media posts?

6. You Waste Time and Mental Energy on Drama and Addiction

Social media thrives because it appeals to our most basic instincts.

Everything is designed in such a way to get you hooked and keep you there for as long as possible. Notifications, real-time updates, live stories. Then there’s inevitable drama and bullshit politics that’s impossible to opt out of.

Instagram will always pester you with profiles of plastic surgery enhanced half naked models of both genders.

Twitter will always pester you with annoying politics no matter who you follow.

Both Facebook and TikTok will always steal your attention through idiotic short clips designed to captivate your brain whether you want it or not.

Even if you’re strong-willed, there’s NO WAY you won’t waste your life each time you visit any of the social media platforms for “business” purposes.

Is this how you want to spend your valuable time?

7. You’re Contributing to Producing Mountains of Garbage

Most content on social media is f*cking garbage. I need to swear here because there’s no other way to describe it.

Twitter relies on bullshit, supposedly clever, one-liners that say nothing. Yet, our brains like these empty platitudes. So, like idiots, we retweet them. Long form, well though-out content is rare these days because it’s too hard for most people to read something longer than 280 characters.

Instagram relies on even more bullshit soft porn pictures or other depictions of a “perfect” life along with even more idiotic empty quotes. Yet, we fall for this, too. It’s in our genes. There’s no way a healthy male is able to look away from a perfect pair of photoshopped boobs.

TikTok relies on cringeworthy, self-absorbed, completely retarded videos of teenagers thinking they do something meaningful. Yet, in their stupidity, they’re so captivating you find yourself watching one video after another. Later, you feel disgusted with yourself only to do it again the next time you “work” on TikTok.

Can you find valuable content on social media? Yes, you can. Not everything is garbage.

It doesn’t change the fact that most of social media content is utter junk. These platforms don’t reward in-depth content. They reward simplistic, controversial or straight up idiotic posts and videos.

Since people are so addicted to social media today, their attention spans are so short you have to transmit your message in a few seconds. What valuable things can you say in a few seconds? By default, you’re forced to contribute to this mountain of garbage every single day.

8. You’re Building an Unsellable Asset

It’s rare for most small businesses to succeed on social media. So, instead, most founders post under their own names. Their business becomes them. Yes, a personal brand may be valuable but a personal brand, as the name implies, is unsellable.

If this doesn’t bother you, then this point doesn’t apply to you. Yet, I’d urge every entrepreneur to think about a potential exit strategy. If you’re building your business through promoting yourself, then most likely you won’t be able to sell it in the future.

9. You Fail to See Other Opportunities

People new to business, particularly those who don’t remember the world before social media, assume that EVERY business needs to be on social media. They focus only on those business ideas that have a social media presence, ignoring the wealth of other possible opportunities.

Boring, but essential B2B businesses? Nah, where will I get my followers?

Offline businesses without an online presence other than a simple website? No way, how will I brag about my biz?

Low-key business models that rely on joint ventures and deal-making rather than social media content? No thanks, I’m too busy building my “credibility” on social media.

10. You Do What Everyone Else Is Doing

Being an entrepreneur means full responsibility for your decisions but also complete freedom over how you want to run your business.

Unfortunately, most people let the prevailing narrative dictate how they’ll approach their ventures.

If the “only” way to succeed is through fifty social media posts a day, let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through showing your boobs to horny teenagers (who will not buy your products anyway), let’s do it.

If the “only” way to succeed is through being a complete idiot dancing like a drunk moose, let’s do it.

Don’t be a sheep. Use your brain. Create YOUR business on YOUR OWN terms rather than letting social media corporations bully you into using their toxic platforms.

There, I said it.

Thoughts, love, hate—all welcome.

I 100% agree with this. I was considering hiring a VA just to handle social media, and then I just used Google Shopping Ads. I got a 20x return..... and it just brought people, looking to buy a product like mine, to my website...

 

[Xeon]

I think eventually its the younger generation who sets the agenda and trend in the future not the older crowd.

Always have been the case. To see where the world is heading or what's the next big thing, just need to look at the young crowd. FB and all these things all started from the young folks initially (people in their 20s and below were the main audience during FB's early days). It is never the old folks starting a trend and the young ones follow that lol

 

[KushShah9492]

Twitter has been a helpful platform for me. More so because of the community that I’ve joined.

Pursuing writing and showing work online has given me immense benefits that I otherwise wouldn’t have such as:
- instant feedback
- a huge community of writers
- potential clients lurking around
- holding you accountable
- meaningful connections

BUT…

That’s not to say that I love it. Like MJ said, it’s a necessary evil. It’s too distracting and manipulative.

I’m posting an essay a day on twitter for the past 35 days, and it definitely has helped me grow as a writer.

But one shouldn’t get too sucked into it and be there all the time. Things you do offline are more meaningful and fulfilling.

It really depends for what purpose are you using it, but most of the time it does feel like someone else is holding the strings and you’re dancing on their tunes.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Thinh]

The clickbait version of this title post could be « You won’t believe no. 7 »

But seriously, the #7 is soooooooooooo true.
You see everyone and their grandmother telling you to « produce », write, write, write, and publish stuff at all costs.
The result: as you perfectly described, a mountain of garbage. The amount of content pollution on the internet is only second to the real pollution on earth.

Also, social media is the perfect tool for wantrepreneurship. A great way to procrastinate yet fool ourselves into thinking we’re doing something for our business.

 

[lludwig]

I agree with the sentiment and wrote about this years ago.

You Don't Own Social Media...You Are Renting

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.. are all great social media platforms to reach your tribe. BUT you don't own them.

larryludwig.com

I think social media should be used but only as a channel to get to something you do have control over (ie a blog)

 

[Andy Black]

Great post and excellent replies.
One way I think about social media, such as instagram, is that it is an 'evidence library' for building trust with potential new clients.

So if they are in the 'consideration phase' before contacting you or buying from you, they can check out 'who' you are. Quickly browse your instagram from a link on your website or newsletter for example. See that you are a humble family man with 2 kids and like cycling, whatever. It builds trust, 'knowing' your doing business with someone you like. Or at least giving the customer No red flags / reasons NOT to call you...

The best part of this purpose. Is that it doesnt matter how many followers you have, or comments etc. Evidence library only.

The other purpose similar to this is for high value educational content. Again for your evidence library, so potential customers can see that you know your stuff, are going the extra mile, etc.

I hope that helps someone. Thanks.

This is exactly how I use social media. I even wrote something up this morning along those lines:

Contrary to what some might believe, I’m not trying to grow a big personal brand. My forum and social media handles are all the same, with the same avatar.

It helps when people referred to me go online and check up on me. Google for “andy black google ads” to see what I mean.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[MTF]

In this video the guy mentions how some of the biggest business social media names (Gary V, Grant Cardone, London Real) ironically killed their channels because of uploading too much stuff (up to 3:00 mark):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFv-6j-q_To


I agree with that and usually when I see someone posting too much, I stop paying attention. That guy posting thought-out videos once a week will keep my attention. The social media obsessed guy who posts bullshit shorts and other stuff every day? Unsubscribe.

 

[David Fitz]

In this video the guy mentions how some of the biggest business social media names (Gary V, Grant Cardone, London Real) ironically killed their channels because of uploading too much stuff (up to 3:00 mark):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFv-6j-q_To


I agree with that and usually when I see someone posting too much, I stop paying attention. That guy posting thought-out videos once a week will keep my attention. The social media obsessed guy who posts bullshit shorts and other stuff every day? Unsubscribe.

That guy does a funny David Goggins impersonation in one of his videos.

I agree with this. If you see these guys making too much content you just unsub. It's like getting daily emails from someone and after 2 weeks you're just like "na go away" - unsubscribe.

 

[TonyStark]

Any advice on how to move Instagram followers to another platform? Say a personal website of slack channel ?

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Fabe Mithcell]

That guy does a funny David Goggins impersonation in one of his videos.

I agree with this. If you see these guys making too much content you just unsub. It's like getting daily emails from someone and after 2 weeks you're just like "na go away" - unsubscribe.

When it comes to daily emails or making too much content, I can see what you're saying.

I think it depends on the individual. Daily content from someone may not be your thing. Others may want to hear from that person daily.

It's all relative.

For me, certain content I do post daily. But I am very upfront about my content habits so people know from the jump what to expect. That way, before they even go deeper with me they can decide if it's for them. Makes for better people in your pipeline I think.

 

[doster.zach]

That guy does a funny David Goggins impersonation in one of his videos.

I agree with this. If you see these guys making too much content you just unsub. It's like getting daily emails from someone and after 2 weeks you're just like "na go away" - unsubscribe.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEAs8NRVfYE


Lmao this is great

 

[Ed Schimmel]

Like others, I think social media like Facebook and Instagram can be helpful but not equally for all businesses. My wife works as a tour operator, and it has been beneficial to post on social media. It is also easy because she has new images to show every time she has had another tour. It is the same thing with art. Every new artwork, or the process, can become a post.

If your product is something tangible, like doors, or a service, your posts will quickly become less interesting. There is only so much you can tell about your product. Especially, in those cases, flooding your public with posts will quickly bore them.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[David_299]

I completely agree. I was just talking about this the other day. Actually having a real quality product has become an afterthought and people think all they need to do is find some cheap POS from alibaba, buy 10k fake followers and everyone will see this and be eager to give them a follow.

In my opinion, before social media is touched you should focus on SEO, it could be bringing you loads of useful traffic.

Social media is complete garbage, and people go there to watch dumb shit. Once you have traffic coming in from SEO then the next logical thing to do would be to use google ads. Why not target people who have a credit card in their hand eager to buy what you are selling.

Once you grow big enough and have a budget that could handle it, then I guess I don‘t see a problem in hiring someone to manage your social media for you and run ads to create awareness.

This is a view I have many others may or may not have, but the complete lies and deception surrounding covid, and the big tech company’s behavior throughout this ordeal has been enough for me to want to completely boycott them and never use them.

 

[Guest1413tpa]

i hate social media. I cannot wait for the day where I walk away from my twitter profile and leave it as a museum of success and life.

with that said though, its the BEST thing ever. I have gotten a ton of business through Twitter.

With that, for businesses, I barely do any social media as its not worth it. I would rather build my personal brand and grow vs create content for businesses.

loved this post.

 

[MTF]

Here's another high-profile story of someone who realized how terrible the content treadmill is:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy6urKkCer4


They scaled down from 45 people to a team of 6 and cut out ALL social media. Before they posted all the time on social media along with never-ending paid ads. Now their two main sources of traffic are YouTube and their newsletter.

The craziest thing is that before, his 45-people company made $30m a year in revenue yet made less in profit than he does now ($4 million) with just a few million in revenue and a 6-people team.

In the video below he says around 5:00 mark that when he stopped posting on social media channels 2 years ago they all died. The only exception was YouTube which, as I mentioned in my original post, I don't count as "true" social media.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQ5WuEtsMt0

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Xeon]

Interesting article about Instagram, content creation and the IG algorithm:

Is Instagram dying? (Yes, but not for everyone — and not for the reasons you’d expect)

More users will begin to lose followers and/or find it much harder to generate reach, engagement, and growth

bettermarketing.pub

In this video the guy mentions how some of the biggest business social media names (Gary V, Grant Cardone, London Real) ironically killed their channels because of uploading too much stuff (up to 3:00 mark):

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFv-6j-q_To

GOOD! Best news of the day! Can't stand his douchiness.

 

[MTF]

Interesting article about Instagram, content creation and the IG algorithm:

So essentially they're saying that it'll get more and more concentrated so unless you're already well-known, there's no way you'll ever succeed with organic growth alone. Quite similar to what is happening in self-publishing.