What you’re about to read is an excerpt from this month’s edition of the Alley-Oop on advanced prospect bonding.
And the only reason I am sharing it is that after writing it (and re-reading it over)… I realised it’s simply too important not to share with everyone (regardless of whether you’re subscribed or not)…
But I need to warn you…
If you’re a social media fanboy/girl getting high off faux engagement, trending audios or the latest change to the aLGoRiThM… then GO BACK NOW…
Because what I’m about to share may very well just shatter everything you love about social media…
And I have no interest in giving you withdrawals (never had them but they look awful)…
So before I start, if you think your life, attention span, and brain power are better off for social media, please press back and forget this ever happened.
Ok.
For those still reading, I’m going to assume you want the truth…
Because if your head is running circles trying to get a grip on the beast that is social media, then this one is worth sitting down for.
Enjoy.
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While we’re on the topic of engagement…
Have you ever wondered where the following headlines come from?
“Reels are in”…
“Carousels are making a comeback”…
“Use this trending sound”…
“Post 3x a day”…
“You need to engage more for the algorithm to favour you”…
It’s exhausting, hey?
Does it feel impossible to keep up?
Well maybe… just maybe, we are all being conned by the social media monster.
Yes, I know, a bold claim.
Let me make my case and then you can decide for yourself.
To start off this thought experiment, the first question we need to ask ourselves is:
Who is telling us this stuff?
Who pushes these headlines on us?
Who is saying we need to spend all this time posting on social media so we can become a “reel expert” (aren’t we business owner????)
Well, the first question is relatively easy to answer — we get this advice from content creators. We watch their content, see their engagement, and wonder how they do it. We marvel at the likes, followers and shares and follow their lead… because evidently, they’ve figured it out.
But here is where it becomes interesting.
Who is paying the content creators’ bills? Where are they making their money?
You probably already know that too…
The platform pays them… as a percentage of the revenue generated from the ads that show when their content plays on YouTube…
Or as a % of watch time on reels (since IG was so desperately trying to stay relevant with TikTok).
Now…
Who were those ads being shown to?
Well, that’s easy… it is us… and the only way we see those ads is if we stay on the platform.
Who pays the platforms?
BUSINESS OWNERS…
…who are paying guys like Zuck to promote their ads (despite ads irrefutably becoming less effective* as the market becomes more tired, immune, and numb to the same old advertising $hit they’ve seen for years).
So let’s get this right…
We (the business owner) pay the platform to show users our ads…
Who then pays the content creators who tell us that we should be making more content…
And following some certain trend that was out of fashion last month, but is apparently back in fashion, this month…
So we run around like a headless chook trying to create whatever is trending…
Until the algo changes its mind and optimises for something else.
All the while being distracted from our actual responsibilities as business owners…
Just so we can stay on a platform…
A platform that continues to charge us for the impressions they put in front of eyeballs who are at this point, so hooked to these platforms they need to go to device-rehab and get clean.
If you haven’t realised this yet, we’re not the consumer in all of this… we’re the goddamn fucking product.
Do you see what’s happening?
All of us are running around without our heads worrying about BS that we’re told we need to do to stay relevant on socials so we can get likes from an account in Costa Rica that will never be our customer.
We are wasting so much goddamn time chasing faux engagement that we’re missing the actual point… which is to bond and engage with real prospects so we can move our business objectives forward while serving authentically, wholly, and dominantly.
This gets me to my point.
Trending audio will never cut deeper than the surface. It’s a fleeting blip on the radar that goes away as fast as it came.
Giving advice to your market, in a time of need, and telling them not just what they want to hear… but what they need… does, and always will, strike a chord with your prospects.
Because building better prospects is NOT about hacking an algorithm for attention that you will never be able to properly monetize unless you pivot and become a content creator.
And building better prospects is NOT about feeding the social media monster only for it to get bigger, hungrier, and more demanding on your time, focus, and energy.
What it IS about is building real, meaningful connections leveraging the only viral medium that has ever lived…
Human beings.
The medium for virality that always has, and always will be, who and what you should focus on first.
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Hope you enjoyed that.
Not sure who needed to hear that, but I needed to get it off my chest.
If you’re wondering more about this elusive Alley-Oop Newsletter I write…
Well then this is just one idea of many in this month’s edition, so if this struck a chord, there is still so much gold left for any of you who want to jump on board before it goes to print (on the 1st of the month).
You can join here:
F*ck the algorithm,
– Karl Goodman
