2 years of creating independently
Lessons learned and observations observed
Hey there,
It's been just a little over 2 years since I decided to go independent.
And I also decided to not take up gigs where I'm expected to post on LinkedIn “how excited I am to join xyz startup” or that “we're just getting started even after being in business for years”.
So sharing a quick summary of how it's going working independently full-time as compared to a full-time job:
I've made significantly less money 🥁
I've had significantly more free time – to learn, to experiment, to fail – to find my partners in crime – and to find what drives me every day – to find my groove 🥁 🥁
I've never had more conviction that the work I do makes a difference 🥁 🥁 🥁
In a world where instant gratification is becoming the norm, I have a strongly-held belief in delayed gratification. I've seen it work before, and it's working again.
May 18 is the worst day of my life.
Yet, here I am – sober, optimistic, and open to sharing my story – a story full of contradictions.
On being a creator…
As a creator, it's easy to get caught up in the mechanics – brand, tools, analytics, and so on. But mechanics matter, they are important if you're in the business of creation – where the creation fuels your economic engine. Aesthetics matter. Maybe not when you're getting started but in the long run, it certainly helps you stand out.
All that said, there's something really freeing about not having to worry about any of this stuff and just creating for the love of creating – not to gain subscribers or likes or shares or traffic or revenue but just to put something out there.
As someone obsessed with getting everything right – the messaging, the positioning, the branding, the words, the images, the colors, the punctuation, the formatting, the structure, the readability, and the skimmability – I have struggled, I really have, to create for the sake of creating, to find pleasure in the process.
But I've finally managed to change that. And for the first time, I'm discovering how rewarding it is to be able to "just create" without worrying about pleasing the algorithm or as I like to say "feeding the beast".
And all that talk about quality and aesthetics?
Well, since I'm all about contradictions, I'm doubling down on the quality and aesthetics of
.Because it fuels my economic engine, and because I believe that quality trumps quantity, every day of the week.
That said…
There are two types of creators I’ve come across:
Type A likes to boast numbers – they're all about big numbers. They measure success based on followers, subscribers, views, downloads, and revenue.
Type B like to, well, tell stories that resonate – they're all about educating, inspiring, and entertaining. They measure success based on replies, conversations, partnerships, and recommendations.
Today, in-house marketers are a lot like creators. However, while engaging with the broader community, most tend to only represent their current employer, unable to maintain an identity that's not too tightly attached to their organization's identity – a mistake (that I've also made).
It's easy to forget two things:
The day you quit, you might not have much to talk about or you might find yourself talking about something completely different
If you're consistent with your message and your beliefs, and if you manage to build an audience of your own, you're actually a LOT more valuable to employers, both current and future.