An Anxious Person's Guide To Growing An Audience
No gimmicks. No tricks. No idea if this is going to work but trying it anyway
Hello and welcome back to the Writers Secret Weapon. This is the newsletter for creatives who want to write and produce better work, but don’t want to hear the same old advice over and over. I’m John, and I would love to help you write better.
Today, I got something a lot of people have requested over the years, and I finally sat down and organized all my ideas into one place. Today, I want to talk about your audience and how to grow it.
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I need you to forgive me, because I’m about to make an assumption about you.
I’m going to assume that you don’t have a particularly large audience right now (let’s say under 1,000 total people if you add up all your subscribers, viewers, active social media interactions, and customers) and I’m going to assume that you think about growing your audience in the same way I think about cleaning out my gutters or how I should really stop watching the same 10 shows over and over and try to embrace something new: You know you should, but you kinda don’t want it to be a whole thing, and it’s exhausting to think about, so let’s just deal with it later, but you know it’s important but the particulars of how you’re gonna do it seem really vague, like you kinda know, but finding out more would mean doing something about it, and who has time for that.
Off the top of my head, I can think of a dozen people, myself included, who’s expressed that idea in a conversation lately.
And if I just let this keep being a thing that’s more unspoken and under-explained, it’s going to remain a monkey on my back … so here I am talking about it.
Storytime with John, baybay
There are few “experts” (note the quotes) in my field who love to talk about how they can grow your audience quickly or exponentially or whatever other sensational adverb sounds appealing that week. Some of them are even on Substack, and if you’ve ever scrolled through the writing spaces looking at people crowing about publishing on Substack and how great Substack is and how much they’re licking boots and swallowing corporate loads, you’ve seen these people.
As you might expect, I don’t like them. I think they’re a little predatory, I think they’re masters and mistresses of blowing smoke and false hope, and I think if they’re that smart and good at their job, they should be 100000x more transparent about their methods and their costs rather than how great their last vacation was or how much they really love running yet another Facebook “training” to gull people into a sales pitch.
And as you might expect, I envy their success. A thousand total active people in audience is something I don’t have and something I want very badly, but through a combination of anxiety and ego, I don’t want to do what they’re doing and ape their efforts. I won’t prey on FOMO. I have no gimmicks. I’m too giving.
I’m about 90% sure they’ll see this post, and if they do, I will give a polite hello and then tell them that while I am so happy they’re successful, I will renew my commitment to being an alternative to their hoodoo. I still think “the experts” need to be out on front street about the failures, the prices of their services, and the inherent privilege they count on along with the lack of material that applies or works for marginalized, disabled, or any audience that doesn’t conform to skin tone and gender palette they tend to focus on. (Ever notice they have a lot of case studies of people named “Susan” or “Diane” or “Cathy”?)
Growing an audience isn’t and shouldn’t be exclusive knowledge held by the few so that the many have to fight for scraps or reverse engineer some strategy on the fringes. There are 5 parts to it, and I’m going to do what the “experts” won’t and tell you how you can use them - no matter the platform, no matter what you’re creating, no matter who you are or what you’ve tried in the past.
Part 1: Consistent Investment
Your audience, like your lawn, a fire, your relationships, any kind of financial system, and your craft, prospers when you regularly tend it. This seems obvious, but it’s often the first place people fall off the audience-building path, because they’ll say something like “I’m going to end up spending all my time doing this and not writing,” which isn’t true. It’s not. But you keep telling yourself it’s true so that you don’t have to do it.
Investing in your audience means making sure you’re interacting with them. You’re responding to comments, you’re thanking people for reviews, you’re doing as much to lift them up as they’re lifting you up. That’s going to look different depending on person and context, but anywhere you can give back to them, do it.
Follow back on social media. Leave them a nice comment when they’ve done the same for you (fuck haters, don’t try and change an asshole’s mind). Say something supportive. Put more good out into the spaces that are too often dominated by cynicism, bitterness, Nazis, fascists, boomers, and shitheels.
Think of sourdough starter. You want that burbling dough ball to grow, you have to feed it.
If you’re 1000% sure that doing something like that a few times a week (honestly, how long does it take you to tap out Thanks for checking out my book, I hope you have a great day while you’re sitting there in the bathroom?) is too much work or it’s too removed from the book you’re writing — are you sure you want to be a writer?
Sometimes yes, you’re going to do these things and you won’t get any response. That doesn’t mean what you’ve done was “bad” or “wrong” or “wasted” - you weren’t doing it only because you needed the response, you were doing it because you wanted to express yourself, right?
Feed your creativity and your audience at the same time by giving out a big serving of good and care and compassion into the world.
Part 2: Consistent Production
Let’s turn our focus back to the work now. You need to be writing, creating, making, producing, doing the work so that the audience, whomever they might be, can be your audience for it.
And before you start saying “Yeah, yeah, I know” and then offer me some weak-sauce excuses about why you haven’t written lately because you’re super mad that the Wheel of Time series isn’t like the books or there’s moon somewhere 200 bajillion astronomical units away leaning in the wrong direction, spare us both the hot air and agree with me that the whole point in having an audience is so that there are people who can receive and react to your material.
It’s really hard to build an audience when you’re not doing anything.
I say that and people use it to justify the idea that you can only grow an audience after the book is written. On its face, that makes sense, and yes, it can be sometimes easier in some spaces to finish the book first before heading out to see if there are people out there who could be down for it. But that’s not the only way to engage with other people. You don’t have to do it just with a finished book.
You can meet them where they’re at and talk about how you’re on your way to a goal and how this is a great time to join you, right? They want a book, you’re writing a book, or they like music and you’re about to record some tunes, so why don’t they walk along with you so you can both see where the journey and the road goes?
But that means you have to do the writing. Yes, even when you don’t want to. You need to have something to offer something.
Part 3: Being A Few Steps Ahead
This is something that doesn’t enough coverage with the “gurus” of audience building. They don’t talk about it probably because this is where they have their own magic explanation or system that they can sell.
This is also something you won’t see a lot of writers talking about when it comes to their own development because it’s not something a lot of people typically put energy or focus into.
To grow your audience, you don’t want to be playing catch-up, you want to be somewhat out front on a thing, and stick with it.
Rather than finally getting around to having a newsletter or eventually making that podcast, you can look for opportunities and chances to do things that nobody else is doing. Yes, you should do a newsletter or that podcast if that’s what you’re wanting to do, but a lot of writers and creatives feel like they’re racing to start something other people have been doing for ages. This puts them on a path to always feeling inadequate because the space is so full of options and they don’t have the confidence to believe their work can stand next to someone else’s.
And this doesn’t mean you have to be out there with the productivity gurus and alpha tech bros getting on board “the next big thing” either. This isn’t about joining the arms race to get apps, services, and platforms off the ground.
This is about you looking at what tools are a good fit for you, especially tools that other people aren’t using or using often, and giving yourself a chance to be seen or heard or read in new ways by people.
Like me streaming. Or the Positivity Newsletter on Patreon.
Yes there are other people streaming. Yes there are other people on Patreon. But they’re doing their own thing, and this is my thing.
Take some hockey advice - “Go where the puck is going to be, not where it is right now.”
Part 4: Be Relatable
I wasn’t expecting to say a lot about this one, but here we are. There isn’t some way of “being a writer.” You don’t have to sound a certain way, you don’t have to put on some persona, you don’t have to do things in a certain way at a certain time. You’re you. You’re always you.
Yes, you’re possibly saying right now that you feel like you’re not good enough or not worth it as you are, but you’re wrong. I love you, but you’re wrong. You’re plenty good enough and so very worth listening to as you are.
What you have to say, it might not be the most monumental thing to revolutionize the center of the writing universe, but nobody is expecting you to say stuff like that all the time, even if the impression you get from social media is that you have to be on that level 24/7 to stand out.
Don’t focus on standing out. Focus on relating to people. The “connection” that everyone evangelizes is the ability you have to be yourself and reach out to someone who’s in the same space, going through something similiar and maybe feeling the same sorts of feelings you are.
Put the writing aside for a minute and make it not the whole of you are, but one facet of who you are. How do you interact with people? And then from there, how can you incorporate writing into it?
We’ll talk about building a bridge to your reader next week.
Part 5: Balance The Positive & The Negative
Here’s a fun exercise: Think about all the creatives and all the writers you know. How many of them default to self-deprecation, self-doubt, downplaying their work?
Did you just think of a lot of people? Did you include yourself?
People tend to treat an audience like a skittish animal, stepping out of the woods and ready to sprint away at the first sign of anything they don’t like. And then people treat themselves like the worst abomination whoever had an idea to be creative. Then they wonder why no amount of attempts seems to get any audience growing.
I’m not saying you need to be relentlessly and solely positive. Toxic positivity is a real problem within writing adjacent spaces, but toxic negativity is equally corrosive and a problem.
Yes, things aren’t the way you want them to be. Yes, at present, it seems like you might be a long ways off from reaching your goal. Yes, at present you’re in a position where you still have more work to do.
All of things can be true. But you’re choosing to discount the idea that they’re also temporary.
Your audience isn’t coming to you and growing around you because you’re always and only positive, the same way they’re not orbiting you because you’re all negative either. They’re looking for a balance between the two, because in their own lives, they’ve got to balance the good and the bad and still keep moving.
Your art, whatever you’re making, is made out of your balance of good and bad, of stress and elation, of lust and boredom, of tedium and novelty, of work and rest, of logic and illogic, of heart and mind.
It’s never going to be 50-50. You don’t want it to be 50-50. It’s an ever-fluid, ever-moving current in your life. Your art is your expression of wherever it’s at on a given day.
And on any given day, you’re a mix of positive and negative, for reasons ranging from capitalism to trauma to snacks to sex to potato skins to playlists to finding $5 in a pocket to wrestling to cozy sweater weather and beyond.
This is what you need to relate to other people, because this is the medium they’re passing through to relate to you.
There’s no shame or reason to hide the bad stuff or hyperbolize the good. Yes, there’s a danger in dwelling on how shit some shit has been, but in that case, maybe take a breath and find a different vector to make your point.
The audience isn’t looking for the first chance to run, they’re looking for multiple reasons to not only stay but get more engaged and invested.
Bonus!! Do The Work
All of the five things I just brought up won’t matter at all if you’re doing a sixth: actually putting in work to connect to people. That means going out and maybe having conversations with people you’ve never really spoken to online. That means sending that email. Or joining that Discord. Or signing up for that platform that you think might be a good fit for you.
You won’t know until you try. You’re good enough to let people know who you are, what you’re doing, and what your art is.
Love you. Talk soon.
Fabulous! just fabulous! and thank you. and please don't stop saying these things. the more I hear this the more I listen. No, I don't mean I didn't listen the first time, I only mean the concepts become 'listenable' to me (like if you are in a conversation where they are not speaking your own native language).