Your content creation allocation
We all have the same amount of time, it's what we create with it that drives results
There are two fundamental things you need to understand.
We all spend most of our time creating content
Our success hinges on the type of content and where we put it
We are all prolific content creators.
I don't think most of us realise to the extant at which we are creators. There is a lot of power in controlling and shifting our focus of content creation areas to suit what we want to achieve.
There are three broad types of content we create.
Public content
Social media
Blog or YouTube or a podcast
Books, Music, TV / film
Work related content
Startups - pitch decks, presentations, sales and marketing materials, competitor analysis' etc...
Scientists - hypotheses, experiments, data, papers, reports, grant applications, presentations, pitch decks...
(I could go on for students, bankers, doctors, politicians, accountants but you get the point)
Communication exchange content
Outside of your key work deliverables, most of your interactions are content:
Voice - Phone calls, video calls, IRL conversations
Text - Emails, Slack, messages.
That is all content!
Your day is stuffed full of creating content. Our economy and our own livelihood is completely reliant on us being creators.
The value of public content
The level of our success often comes down to how much of the different style of content we create and where we put our energy.
Example
I can easily spend all day in my email writing long replies to convince various people that I am worth talking to.
Allocating some of that time to creating public content of value, is more likely to mean that people have already heard of me.
This means I can get away with less email because the people I reach out to have already heard of me. They want to reply.
Time horizons
I believe we should try to optimise for longer time horizons.
Working on communication exchange is lower value:
Short term - Direct reward + transactional
Long term - Does not scale + get’s forgotten
Working on the public content is higher value:
Short term - Little reward + giving
Long term - Infinitely scalable + lasts forever
As we know, getting stuck in an instant reward loop is for chumps. It is not something that provides compound interest. We hear about this all the time for our other life choices.
The error is that most of us don't think of ourselves as prolific content creators.
We don't realise that we are daily wasting time creating the wrong content.
Invest in yourself
With private communication exchange content, no one outside of the people you directly exchange content with will know about you or receive any value from you.
With public content you are creating a body of work and social validation.
You can not point back to an amazingly insightful point you made in an email chain.
If you write a blog about a brilliant insight you can point back to it.
If you consistently create content about your interests things start coming back to you. It is exactly like karma, the more content of value you put into public, the more opportunities that come back to you.
Anyone might view public content, this could lead to:
Being asked to do a TEDx - (happened to me)
A book deal - (this hasn't happened to me... yet 🤪)
An awesome job in your area of interest - (happened to several friends)
Getting your startup idea funded - (happened to me)
If you are spending your day in email and meetings and calls, it might be hard to wean yourself off the instant reward loop of direct communication.
Start making public content in anyway you can. Don’t overthink it, do stuff and optimise later.
Build a healthy content creation habit
We are reminded regularly to avoid sugars and eat more healthy fruit and vegetables. We aren't reminded daily what sort of content we are creating.
You will have to look at your content creation allocation yourself. Make a point to review it regularly.
Then start making public content.
It might change your life.
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Sam
Your content creation allocation
This is great Sam. Love the way you breakdown the different types of content and the 'why' for getting our ideas out there. Looking forward to more content from you in 2022 :)
Excellent post and topic as usual Sam. Since you’re especially good at public content and sharing, I’d love to hear more about the specific positive outcomes you’ve experienced from giving the TED talk or running not one but two podcasts.