How to Create Content That Sustains a Career | Tim Ferriss Video Lecture | Understanding the art of Public Speaking: Become a better speaker - Self Help Learning

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they're many different approaches to
making content and I'm very often asked
how do you create content that is
popular that will be popular and I don't
think that's a very good question to
start with in fact I think you should
ask yourself first and foremost why do
you create content so there are many
potential answers to this what I would
consider a bad answer is to get likes
and favorites and subscribers that is an
intermediate step and you can get
trapped in what I would consider in
other people like Eric Ries might call
vanity metrics alright you're chasing
metrics because they're highly coveted
by many people we're only looking at the
symptoms of potential success ie the
likes and so on but not looking at the
ultimate objective so what might a good
objective view a good objective might be
I'm creating content to determine or
hone in specifically target my 1,000
true fans if you read one article on
content creation or marketing I would
make it 1,000 true fans by Kevin Kelly
to determine who my diehard fans are
whose behaviors beliefs likes dislikes I
understand because I'm part of that
market whatever niche it is even if it's
a one in a million niche that can still
be a sizable audience you could have
some type of social agenda so I want to
not appeal to all of the readers
listeners in the world but instead I
want to actively call and filter my
audience so that only the people I want
to connect with directly actually wade
through ok these are very real tangible
measurable outcomes and I would
encourage you to think about what you
want to do with your content what do you
want to achieve beyond what we would
consider vanity metrics right and there
are some vanity metrics that can be
converted into dollars if you're an
Instagram celebrity or you are
interested in becoming one and you know
that if you have a million plus
subscribers or you have
million that you can earn 50 to 70
thousand dollars per promoted post okay
that is an objective it's an objective
also dependent on a lot of variables you
don't control I remember talking to
someone who had a very successful
content based business built on Facebook
as he said it's like having the most
profitable McDonald's in the world built
on top of a volcano and you don't know
when it's going to erupt
so my preferences are always clear
objective what you want to achieve
perhaps can be financially driven that's
fine I don't consider Fame in and of
itself to be a very useful objective and
there are a lot of downsides to that
then you have identifying your 1,000
true fans and I will tell you right now
that if you try to make something that
appeals to everyone try to make
something that everyone will like it
will be something that no one loves all
right so you want to first identify the
thousand die hearts once you have your
die-hard true believers they are your
strongest unpaid marketing force they
will then recruit your casual listeners
casual readers and widen out the
concentric circles of your access so you
start with a thousand people and you end
up with a readership of a million or
three million or ten million and that's
exactly what's happened with me and I
began in a very narrow narrow niche and
then over time as I built a larger
readership expanded topically but I
didn't begin with a wide variety of
topics this is really really important
point do you enjoy it
in other words do you have a deep
attraction to a given format so that you
will have the endurance necessary to get
through all the trials and tribulations
and learning hurdles to build a large
audience if not choose a different
approach because you will fail otherwise
with all of this I encourage you to
think about the long game and ask
yourself if I were in this for the long
game if I commit this is not a
three-month endeavor it is a minimum
three-year commitment to mastering this
craft how does that change your
decisions and what does the path
potentially look like it doesn't mean
you have to be wedded to a three-year
plan but it means that at least you are
committed to doing the thought exercise
of putting it down on paper and specking
out what it might look like so if you
want to not just create popular content
that is ephemeral and disappears like
the flicker of a firefly in the internet
landscape then if you want to convert
your efforts into a sustainable career
with fans who will take a bullet for you
and travel with you wherever you go
you have to think about it differently
do not get caught up in the vanity
metrics and ask why ask so what and ask
and then what for what many many many
times and challenge not only your own
assumptions but the assumptions of other
people who give you advice so feel free
to completely disagree with what I say
however recognize that my beliefs and
tenets that I follow are born of many
experiments over a long period of time
so if you're going to disagree guess
what those are hypotheses you have to
test and it is through the testing that
you will find your own unique path
you