Can we say F*ck U to the metrics and just Follow Our Guts?
exposing the inner workings of my mind and how Substack keeps your mind in a state of confusion
Here’s the thing… I cannot not write. Period.
Every time I try to reason with myself, to resort to logic as to how I should spend my energy in my business (Follow Your Gut is my second art biz), I always come back here. It’s like a magnetic pull.
Not to Substack. No, not at all. To writing. That’s the pull.
The urge to express.
The power of words.
The way you can create entire new universes simply by combining letters in ways that another person can receive them somewhat coherently.
I’m a visual artist by main profession, but when I think about it, my love language has always been the written word. And to a large extent it is what has driven my income from the visual art works too.
I’ve been able to sustain an independent art career for almost a decade thanks to writing and sharing about my art. Email marketing came as a God sent invitation to not have to feel as though I was selling my soul every time I shared my art in public on social media.
The public display and energetic scrutiny can be killing.
Not necessarily in relation to what you actually share, but more so towards the (oftentimes) lacking metrics that are supposed to cuddle our egos (but does the opposite when we deem them insufficient).
If you’ve been reading Follow Your Gut for the past year you know that I am in a somewhat complicated relationship with Substack.
I am grateful to have discovered it and been able to grow this publication from scratch to a somewhat significant readership in a relatively short time. This time as a gift to my love for writing.
But the more it turns into a social platform, where metrics remain the focus front mid and centre, the less I enjoy it.
I love the community aspect, the way we can connect and discover new incredible writing (AND GET DISCOVERED IN RETURN!). But I don’t love how one’s value feels reduced to a bestseller badge, number of readers or engagement on a post.
Because how much do those things really matter for your business (as in cash collected)?
Clearly, if you want to fall into the category of “teaching the platform” it matters. You want to be able to display that you know how the platform works…
But if you don’t fall into that category, which THANK GOD is still the majority of publications on here, then how much does it matter?
I thought for the past year that it mattered a lot for me.
That it would somehow catapult my growth as soon as I got it (happened June last year), but in truth that hasn’t been the case. If anything, I almost feel like it slowed me down! (You can read a little reflection about the experience here).
So, as I’ve been tuning inwards these past couple of months (as if I don’t do it usually… urhm…), being unapologetically too much and my own creative LOVER, I reached the epiphany that I don’t like the badge. I don’t like that the number of readers for my two publications is on display. It serves me, I’m sure. But it doesn’t mean I like it.
I have 500k+ across social media platforms and I use this metric in my advantage, but do I enjoy it? I DON’T KNOW ANYMORE!
In summary, I’m writing this heart-felt piece in the only way I know how to process these things: As a way to better understand my growing urge to put everything private. Hide the badge. Hide the subs and just write. F*ck it.
After some digging into my Human Design I know that I am doing the right thing. I know that I am meant to follow my gut (didn’t realise how well aligned that name was when I picked it though…), which in turn will create magic.
Not only that, it’s soon a year since I launched my second publication ( I broke down the results here). I know I can stand tall knowing that I truly tried to create a great thing.
But I want to make some audacious changes in response to the experience. Something which may become even greater.
Yet I haven’t done them yet mostly because of imagined metrical limitations… How silly is that? Or is it just strategic? I hardly know the difference anymore, because this platform keeps your head at a state of confusion.
The question remains: How much do the metrics matter? And should I just turn them off?
I was one of the large Instagram accounts that IMMEDIATELY hid the likes as soon as Meta rolled out the option. As much as social media is a blessing for the artist soul who doesn’t fit into the neat employable box, it’s a curse when it keeps us distracted from what really matters.
Do your metrics actually make you money?
Social proof is a real thing, yes. But to what extent?
Here’s something that has blowed my mind:
Work opportunities that have come my way since I started Follow Your Gut, have not been directly affiliated with the achievements I’ve had previously. It has mostly been a response to the work I’ve been doing RIGHT HERE.
It’s amazing really and it has got me thinking more deeply about how much we put emphasis on fancy pants shit that probably doesn’t matter as much as we think they do.
It matters in theory, it matters in strategy and it matters perhaps from a mass psychology perspective. But does it matter for the people you’re actually trying to reach (and how do they make you feel in the creative life you’re carving out for yourself?).
I’ll ask again: Do your metrics make you the money?
Mine doesn’t. Not directly. I can’t pay my bills with likes or comments.
I make money through private emails. Always have and it seems like I still do here on Substack too.
I’ve grieved the effort I put into making the public blog bit work. But I’m positive and optimistic in making changes that align with my way of operations: Actual real email marketing.
Does it mean that I’ll stop publishing publicly altogether? NO!! I’m just shifting the energy around it.
I hope you’ll enjoy the ride and find it both inspiring and enriching to get a first row seat on the road.
Love, Elin xx
Ps.
I’d love to know:
→ What are your thoughts about focusing on getting a Bestseller Badge? Is it distracting or encouraging?
Metrics aren’t inherently bad.
I don't even monetize my Substack because it was created as a response to all the algorithms and metrics and everything elsewhere in my life that made me say F*CK IT, I'm writing whatever I want! So... I'm really not paying attention to them here.