🟢 Bye LinkedIn
Now it's down to just Substack.
(2.5 min read)
This week I wrote my most popular social media posts ever1 (which isn’t saying much):
I’d mentioned in January:
If you haven’t watched The Social Dilemma documentary yet, I highly recommend it.
Social media isn’t 100% toxic, but it’s toxic enough that I expect I’ll enjoy life most if I consume ~0% social media.
I quit Facebook, Instagram, and others years ago and feel much better.
I’m still on LinkedIn but imagine a day when I’ll quit that too.
I agree with the Social Dilemma documentary that social media is dangerous.
Executives at these companies don’t even let their families use these apps that they build.
When companies like Facebook and LinkedIn and others all thrive based on controlling your attention and getting you to spend more time in the apps, it incentivizes gross behavior.
Well, the day has come, and I quit LinkedIn.
(So, now I’m down to just Substack. Substack Notes is definitely social media.)
You probably have lots of questions about this decision.
Or when you put yourself in my shoes, you might have doubts or fears.
Let’s zoom out and look at the bigger picture.
From 2010-2016, I lived in San Diego among a bunch of entrepreneurs.
Friends attracting enormous followings.
I did NOT put in the effort to attract a following.
Meanwhile, those friends’ lives got easier and more luxurious.
Companies would ship them products for free. King mattresses, even.
If I knew then what I know now, would I post every day on LinkedIn and maybe even start a podcast or YouTube channel?
Probably.
I’d try to eliminate consumption of social media. But I’d be a producer of it.
But getting views was easier in 2010.
Based on my sense of social media these days, I don’t think I’m willing to put in the work that is now required to attract attention.
In 2024, I gave it a solid effort for 4+ months.
But was it really a solid effort?
And should I really have expected to see visible results in only 4 months?
Well, what I noticed is:
I was willing to show up nearly daily. I’d probably be willing to try doing that for 1-2 years as an experiment.
But posting daily in the way that I was, in the way that felt acceptable to me does not seem to be what the LinkedIn platform wants.
The 4 main behaviors I wasn’t interested in trying:
sending lots of connection requests
commenting on big accounts’ posts, ideally right when they were new
writing posts that ride the current trend of what’s popular
immediately replying to comments on my posts
To me, the original promise of having a large following was leverage.
I now wonder if there is actually very little leverage.
People need to put in extraordinary effort to gain a following, and then they need to KEEP putting in the effort.
Are there exceptions to this?
Yeah.
If you’re obsessed about one topic in particular, and you know a narrowly-defined ideal reader, and you feel compelled to teach them, go for it!
E.g. Justin Welsh religiously shows up every day posting on a laser-focused topic.
If you have that kind of discipline, then the only other factor you need is patience.
“If you don’t quit, you can’t lose.”
For me, though, the daily habit of showing up in social media comments felt soul-sucking.
LinkedIn is full of people tooting their own horn.
Substack comments might be a bit better.
Substackers seem more likely to be eager learners.
We’ll see.
The risk
Then Tuesday I had a fun conversation with
(who writes —check it out).He joked:
“Is it even possible to get a job without having a LinkedIn profile?”
I don’t know. 😬
If I had plenty of money and were retired, I wouldn’t be reading posts on LinkedIn, and I doubt I’d even be writing posts either.
Right now, I’m getting a taste of what that’s like.
I recently decided to focus less on trying to start a business and instead get a full-time job as a software engineer or manager.
Fingers crossed 🤞 that I can get some interviews despite my lack of LinkedIn profile.
Good news
Obviously, this is a reversible decision.
2-way doors are easier to walk through without worrying too much.
I like the idea of not being addicted to social media.
If I can thrive without it, great.
Transparency
You might say my 33 newsletter issues so far in 2024 are causing you whiplash.
I’ve loved the idea of having a following and starting a business as a solopreneur, and now I’m giving up on it.
I committed to you that I’d share openly along the way.
It’s time to (try to) find a job and earn a stable paycheck again.
I can reevaluate from there.
Plan A was never to quit my job before starting a business.
Getting laid off in December was an unfortunate surprise.
So I’m figuring out what I can handle as I go.
🕙 What we learned in recent posts:
🟢 Risky
🟢 $20M profit by talking to yourself?
💬 Conversation starters:
What are your thoughts on social media and whether / how it could make a net positive impact on your life?
Reply or leave a comment!
As measured by “likes”, and relying on my faulty memory, since I don’t really know the performance of my past posts on various platforms.
I also have love and hate relationship with Linkedin. And especially when I see how shallow content get recognition and followers, I immediately feel like I really don’t want to send cold DMs and pretend my companies millions in in income are result of my marketing strategy only (because THEY AREN’T). I feel you.
Man, I respect your honesty and transparency so much.
Was a pleasure chatting with you and hope to do it again sometime!