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Social Media Destroys Entrepreneurs. Grow Your Business Without It.

MTF

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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.
 
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doster.zach

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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).
Great post!

I agree, with these distinctions too. Only nit I think is that Reddit is both. The large subreddits are just as bad as other platforms in regard to meaningful content. If you niche down into smaller subreddits there is a massive distinction.

But yeah a year ago deleted all the social media off my phone and haven't missed it a bit.
 
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MTF

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This is extremely good

Will revisit this after work

Thank you.

Great post!

I agree, with these distinctions too. Only nit I think is that Reddit is both. The large subreddits are just as bad as other platforms in regard to meaningful content. If you niche down into smaller subreddits there is a massive distinction.

But yeah a year ago deleted off all the social media off my phone and haven't missed it a bit.

Yeah definitely Reddit has some terrible subreddits though it has the benefit that if you write something there once, people will be able to find it and read it for years (and it ranks well in search engines).
 
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Mathuin

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Excellent post @MTF , I had been thinking a lot about this recently.

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.
I'll admit i did join from watching MJ on social media/ podcasts, buying his books and then joining the forum.

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.
Reminds me of when MJ said he spent years building 150k fans on Facebook and Zuckerfuck shows his content to like 300 people.

I have been using social media as described in Unscripted to find needs, but as I'm looking at B2B, I'm finding a much better ROI on my time through reading Trustpilot Reviews, Articles and speaking with business owners.

I think they key is to just be very intentional when using social media. Also, still obvs great for paid traffic.

Mainstream social media summed up:
socialmedia.jpg
 

MTF

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I'll admit i did join from watching MJ on social media/ podcasts, buying his books and then joining the forum.

I consider podcasts their own platforms, in the same way as blogs.

Reminds me of when MJ said he spent years building 150k fans on Facebook and Zuckerfuck shows his content to like 300 people.

Yes, that's why I mentioned it.

I have been using social media as described in Unscripted to find needs, but as I'm looking at B2B, I'm finding a much better ROI on my time through reading Trustpilot Reviews, Articles and speaking with business owners.

You're taking the less traveled path which means figuring things out on your own but ultimately more rewards.
 

Black_Dragon43

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5. You Judge the Value of the Business by the Number of Followers
I’m a bit autistic I guess, so the quotes are all over the place heh. I agree with a lot of your points but also disagree…

Having followers is valuable in its own right. If I have 1M followers on Facebook, I can transition them to any other platform, and build a cross-platform following. Then wherever I go there my fans are going to be.

Having followers, ie eyeballs, is, maybe, in this day and age, MORE valueable than making sales, because it makes making sales MUCH MUCH easier.
1. You’re Putting More Effort Building Somebody Else’s Business Than Yours
You go where your customers already are… you’re not building anyone’s platform, you’re just following the money. I’m not on Facebook to bring customers to Facebook, I’m on there to interact with the people who are already on there. Sure, that’s going to get them to stick on FB longer, maybe, but that’s about it.
7. You’re Contributing to Producing Mountains of Garbage
I agree. But whose fault is that? People are retarded. I honestly believe that. So should I try to make them read long content because it will do them good even though they spit on it, or should I rather accept the fact that they are retarded and can’t concentrate for more than 2 seconds on things and deliver things that they enjoy consuming, the way they enjoy it? You can fight the world, or move along with it. I think it’s smarter to move along with it, since you can’t defeat the world. Even if you disagree with them, it’s better to diplomatically be on their side. Look at Socrates - got suicided as they say nowadays, because he thought he could change the world…
 
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MattR82

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Depends on the biz. But even then, I agree with you about how much it can be a time suck.

Post once every week or two but get really good at using influencer collabs. Let them do it for you.
 

Andy Black

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My thoughts on social media are similar, and different.

Off the top of my head:


1) "Don't tell the same people lots of things. Tell lots of people the same things."

I'm not getting on the content marketing treadmill and posting different things daily to the same people. I did it for a bit on Twitter and it got old quick. I did it a bit on a podcast for about 15 episodes always wondering why we "needed" to publish every week. Surely we'd be better to create a few exceedingly good pieces of evergreen content and publish when they're done rather than keep to a particular schedule?

My takeaway is that I'd rather develop a bit of content that works and then put ad spend behind it so it reaches more people every day.

Saying that, there are people who can post organically in such a way their message spreads to many new people. I suspect they have to post regularly though.


2) I develop those bits of content that work by repeatedly helping people.
  • I often help people on 1-2-1 calls, and in communities such as forums, Facebook groups, etc.
  • I'd rather not have to build my own platform, community, or audience just so I can help people.
  • I find it helpful that others have done that and I can join in, contribute, and be a part of the community they've pulled together.
  • On those platforms I can help people with XYZ and can get known as "The XYZ Guy".


3) Building a personal brand.

Sure, I've got one in the forum. Not so much outside the forum. I think I'd prefer to build non-personal brands at the mo.
However, we all have a personal brand, whether we intentionally build it or not.

We can't sell our personal brand, but we can leverage it to start and grow other businesses. We have our personal brand for life and as @Kak stated... it's also not taxable. It's a hell of an asset if we look at it that way.


4) For some, having an engaged audience on a platform allows them to do things they otherwise couldn't do.


5) I personally like being a consumer on each social media platoform for a while so I at least understand if from a consumer's viewpoint. That's because I have marketing clients and I don't want to just know about Google Ads. I tire of the platforms pretty quick though, and naturally drop out. If you're not wired to naturally get bored of them then yeah, be careful - the platforms are designed to get you addicted to the little dopamine hits.


6) Business for me is about making friends, building relationships, and creating win-wins. I don't mind meeting people on social media platforms. I don't feel I have to own the coffee shop to meet someone for a coffee and create a relationship. The platforms don't own that relationship.


7) I don't believe we *need* to build an audience to build a business. It can be a great way, but it's not the only way.
 
G

Guest-5ty5s4

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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.
Amazing post, wish I could like it 1,000 times.

It depends heavily on what your product or service is of course, but the message is important. This is a big part of the Commandment of Control.
 
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ekateriv

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Great post!

I agree, with these distinctions too. Only nit I think is that Reddit is both. The large subreddits are just as bad as other platforms in regard to meaningful content. If you niche down into smaller subreddits there is a massive distinction.

But yeah a year ago deleted all the social media off my phone and haven't missed it a bit.
I agree. I am growing and getting user feedback from reddit and there is a meaningful difference in engagement between 3k to 30k to 300k groups. My advice would be to start prototyping with the 3k group, do only extremely useful posts that are less frequent on the 30k group (major product milestones and helpful responses only), and avoid the 300k+ groups altogether.
 

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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 great!! I recently deleted most of my social media because it really takes a lot of time off. Though I do disagree about reddit. It really is no different than Twitter imo. Like the big subreddits are very political and pretty toxic at times, but the small ones are really valuable.
 

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Well done @MTF great post. I hate these social medias so much.

I couldn’t agree more. This is precisely why I like my text message community. It’s mine.

I have a Facebook, I don’t post on it. I have it because of a mens group at my church and nothing else.

I have a Twitter, and it’s a waste of time, but I felt like “I needed something” and I hated it the least.
 
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Xeon

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Good post in theory but I respectfully disagree. What about all those folks who got traction for their business on social media?

The world has changed. Social media are now the touchpoints / entry points of the Internet.
You get the traction and amass an audience there, then funnel them to your own site / email list whatever.

That said, social media is not suitable for all businesses.
 
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Good post in theory but I respectfully disagree. What about all those folks who got traction for their business on social media?

The world has changed. Social media are now the touchpoints / entry points of the Internet.
You get the traction and amass an audience there, then funnel them to your own site / email list whatever.

That said, social media is not suitable for all businesses.
Damn haven’t seen you here in awhile! Yeah, there are a lot of good uses for it, I think you just need to diversify it just like how you don’t want to depend on one customer, platform, or supplier.
 

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Having followers is valuable in its own right. If I have 1M followers on Facebook, I can transition them to any other platform, and build a cross-platform following. Then wherever I go there my fans are going to be.

How are you going to transition them to any other platform? You don't have their email addresses, phone numbers, or anything.

Almost nobody will see your post announcing your move to another platform (if Facebook will allow it at all).

How many of your 1M followers will realistically move with you to another platform considering the above? Maybe a few thousand at most if you pay Facebook to show your post.

Having followers, ie eyeballs, is, maybe, in this day and age, MORE valueable than making sales, because it makes making sales MUCH MUCH easier.

Making sales makes making sales much easier because people trust you more once they buy something from you :)

My argument is that people look at followers instead of a real relationship. The eyeballs don't mean much if they only look at your stuff but never do anything.

You go where your customers already are… you’re not building anyone’s platform, you’re just following the money. I’m not on Facebook to bring customers to Facebook, I’m on there to interact with the people who are already on there. Sure, that’s going to get them to stick on FB longer, maybe, but that’s about it.

Of course I agree with going where your customers are. And there are other ways to get them to your own platform rather than feeding someone else's platform with content (including simply paying for ads).

I agree. But whose fault is that? People are retarded. I honestly believe that. So should I try to make them read long content because it will do them good even though they spit on it, or should I rather accept the fact that they are retarded and can’t concentrate for more than 2 seconds on things and deliver things that they enjoy consuming, the way they enjoy it? You can fight the world, or move along with it. I think it’s smarter to move along with it, since you can’t defeat the world. Even if you disagree with them, it’s better to diplomatically be on their side. Look at Socrates - got suicided as they say nowadays, because he thought he could change the world…

That's a matter of ethics I think. Because this thinking is also along the lines of "People are so stupid that they smoke so I'm going to sell them cigarettes because you can't defeat the world." And then talented entrepreneurs waste their talents selling something that kills people or makes their lives worse.
 

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Depends on the biz. But even then, I agree with you about how much it can be a time suck.

Post once every week or two but get really good at using influencer collabs. Let them do it for you.

I don't mind influencer marketing at all. Let them spend as much time on social media as they want while you pay them to promote your platform. That's a MUCH smarter approach.
 

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My takeaway is that I'd rather develop a bit of content that works and then put ad spend behind it so it reaches more people every day.

And that's a smart approach. The default would be to keep posting hundreds of pieces of content without ever thinking about this alternative.

I'd rather not have to build my own platform, community, or audience just so I can help people.

Helping people on platforms you don't own may eventually become an obstacle on your path to help people. What if a platform disappears? What if they ban you for some arbitrary reason?

I don't think that the coffee shop example works here because there are thousands of coffee shops but only a few major platforms.

We can't sell our personal brand, but we can leverage it to start and grow other businesses. We have our personal brand for life and as @Kak stated... it's also not taxable. It's a hell of an asset if we look at it that way.

For sure.

I only wonder here if what we need it a personal brand as evidenced on social media or a personal brand as evidenced by strong relationships. I bet there are A LOT of people who are friends with the biggest names yet you don't know about them. And they don't care because they don't need a personal brand and status among "regular" people.

Would you rather meet new people because a high-value friend of yours told their friend about you or because someone saw you have 100,000 followers on social media and through this silly metric decided you're worthy of their interest?

4) For some, having an engaged audience on a platform allows them to do things they otherwise couldn't do.

Like for example?
 
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Amazing post, wish I could like it 1,000 times.

It depends heavily on what your product or service is of course, but the message is important. This is a big part of the Commandment of Control.

Thanks. And yes, like I mentioned in the original post, it depends though I think that most entrepreneurs should think hard before assuming that social media is indispensable.
 

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I agree. I am growing and getting user feedback from reddit and there is a meaningful difference in engagement between 3k to 30k to 300k groups. My advice would be to start prototyping with the 3k group, do only extremely useful posts that are less frequent on the 30k group (major product milestones and helpful responses only), and avoid the 300k+ groups altogether.

I guess the bigger the subreddit is, the less specific it becomes. So eventually it becomes like "regular" social media with people talking about everything.

Case in point: r/davidgoggins (27k members) is super solid with cool people making shit happen. r/GetDisciplined (998k) is your general self-help subreddit with much less value.
 

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This is great!! I recently deleted most of my social media because it really takes a lot of time off. Though I do disagree about reddit. It really is no different than Twitter imo. Like the big subreddits are very political and pretty toxic at times, but the small ones are really valuable.

Definitely, and exactly like I pointed in my previous post.

One benefit Reddit has is that people trust advice from it so much that Google prioritizes it in search results. I myself often look for something and add "reddit" to the search query to get better results. And even posts from more than several years ago will appear there, so your marketing efforts there may bring long-term results.
 
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I guess the bigger the subreddit is, the less specific it becomes. So eventually it becomes like "regular" social media with people talking about everything.

Case in point: r/davidgoggins (27k members) is super solid with cool people making shit happen. r/GetDisciplined (998k) is your general self-help subreddit with much less value.
Taking that to the (a) logical conclusion, maybe the most productive subreddit would be /r/mynotestomyselfaboutworkstuff :rofl:
 

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Well done @MTF great post. I hate these social medias so much.

I couldn’t agree more. This is precisely why I like my text message community. It’s mine.

I have a Facebook, I don’t post on it. I have it because of a mens group at my church and nothing else.

I have a Twitter, and it’s a waste of time, but I felt like “I needed something” and I hated it the least.

I think that Twitter is the most relevant social media channel for your podcast but ultimately you'd do way, way better as a guest on as many similar podcasts as possible because that's where your perfect audience can be found. As a bonus, you'll develop new relationship with other business podcast owners.
 
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Taking that to the (a) logical conclusion, maybe the most productive subreddit would be /r/mynotestomyselfaboutworkstuff :rofl:

Lol obviously there's a limit to it. The group needs to be active with engaged members. Often these smaller groups are more engaged percentage-wise than the big ones.
 
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Good post in theory but I respectfully disagree. What about all those folks who got traction for their business on social media?

The world has changed. Social media are now the touchpoints / entry points of the Internet.
You get the traction and amass an audience there, then funnel them to your own site / email list whatever.

That said, social media is not suitable for all businesses.

Like I said in the first post, I'm not saying it doesn't work for anyone. I'm not denying that you CAN get traction on social media. And it may be even smart AS LONG AS you do send them to your own platform. But most fail to do that and sooner or later pay for it.

The world has changed and it keeps changing. The new trends I see are:
  • More digital ownership (largely fueled by blockchain solutions but also cultural reasons). People want to own their platforms.
  • Less trust in centralized solutions, and particularly social media. These platforms hurt themselves a lot by censoring people so much in the last two years.
  • The reemergence of newsletters as a viable business model. I might be biased here but I'm signed up to some newsletters I really enjoy and look forward to but I don't have the same relationship with any creator on social media.
  • The rapid growth of podcasts. Each podcast is a separate media company and usually marketing it on social media doesn't work that well. It's a more closed environment where you do better if you interact within it (as I mentioned in my response to @Kak's post).
 

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Good thread. It gave me an alternative, besides social media, to introduce my SaaS product to the market.

If it's a B2B SaaS product you'll do WAY better somewhere else than on social media. I had two small B2B SaaS businesses and I grew both without any social media (and eventually sold them both).
 

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Also interesting is that big names who have amassed a huge social media following are also expanding to their own platforms.

For example, Dua Lipa started her own newsletter and podcast:

Standing on top of the social media ladder, do they perhaps know something others choose to ignore? (hint: that your social media presence is built on rented land that can be reclaimed at any moment)
 
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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 would say from the business pov it is quite straight forward. On the long term basis is it going to be worth it for your business? Everyone is different and every business is different.

There are people who like social media and they are likely to find reasons to justify why they need social media for their business. I have seen good outcomes on that and as a result their business grows. It could also be a hindrance and time waster. I think it is a double edge sword.

The part I couldn’t get is why people spend a lot of time on social media for “social” reasons. I find hard to get addicted to where my acquaintance went for dinner or international travel.

I do take photos of my own life and update in Instagram maybe once every 3-6 months. I do it to not to lose out. I treat it like a “task”. I totally don’t find the need to check it daily.
 

MTF

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There are people who like social media and they are likely to find reasons to justify why they need social media for their business. I have seen good outcomes on that and as a result their business grows. It could also be a hindrance and time waster. I think it is a double edge sword.

I think that one of the factors may be whether you like "socializing" this way with people or not. If you're forcing yourself to do it and have no idea why people do it without a business purpose in mind, then better not do it at all.

I do take photos of my own life and update in Instagram maybe once every 3-6 months. I do it to not to lose out. I treat it like a “task”. I totally don’t find the need to check it daily.

What do you mean by not losing out?
 

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