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070 – 7 Reasons You Shouldn’t “do” Social Media [Spark Infinity]
Okay, so you’ve decided that social media growth is for you. You’re committed to the process, and you’ve started putting effort into it.
But should you be doing social media at all?
It sounds like a dreadful existential question, but knowing why you shouldn’t be putting any time into it might just strengthen all the reasons why you decided to engage in the first place.
So, let’s delve into “7 reasons you shouldn’t ‘do’ social media.”
Download the PDF Transcript
Sponsors:
Productivity, Performance & Profits Blackbook: Get a free copy of the “Definitive Guide to Productivity for Artists and Entrepreneurs.”
The Renegade Musician: David’s magnum opus on building an independent music career is here!
Highlights:
00:17 – Today’s topic
00:41 – Let’s avoid “purgatory infinity”
01:50 – It’s one more thing you have to get good at
05:06 – Social media is a horrible hobby
06:30 – Social media is addicting
08:57 – An open invitation to the comparison game
10:59 – Social media may not be the solution
15:13 – Social media sets false expectations
17:44 – There isn’t a guaranteed effort-to-reward ratio
19:28 – Closing thoughts
Transcript:
Welcome to Spark Infinity Office Hours. This is David Andrew Wiebe and it is October 10th, 2024. Today's presentation is seven reasons you shouldn't do social media.
Do is in quotes for a reason. I'm not going to explain that reason, but if you pay careful attention to this presentation to the very end, I think you'll figure out why I'm not here to burst anyone's bubble, the reason Spark Infinity and this team and this group exists because we have that common goal of wanting to grow on social media. So today I'm not going to be discussing reasons to quit.
That's not what this is about, but we need to remember that if you're going to say yes to something, you're saying no to other things as well. And being mindful of that choice and that trade off is really important in life. I also think it's a really good intellectual exercise to explore arguments against whatever your chosen path is, because it facilitates critical thinking and it helps you refine your beliefs.
Ultimately, I want everyone involved, including myself, the participants or the leaders in Spark Infinity, as well as the viewers to be in Spark Infinity mode, not Spark Purgatory mode or Purgatory Infinity, that sounds even worse. That's not what we want. We want to see and get results and to put effort into things that do get results.
So let's move into those reasons. Number one, it's one more thing you have to get good at. If you're already good at several things or a couple of things, or maybe just one thing, whether that's guitar or taking photos or programming, whatever it might be, if you're already good at one thing or a couple of things or three things, remember, if you want to get results with social media, that's one more thing you've got to add to the plate and actually get good at to get results.
Author and blogger Seth Godin was getting started as a blogger in the early days of the internet. If he had chosen to, he could have had first mover advantage on Twitter and he was considering it. He decided against it.
He saw it as one more thing he would have to get good at. Trying to get good at more things he felt would have diluted his focus. He opted to focus on his writing, thereby increasing his chances of becoming the best in writing, or at least in his category.
The term best might be subjective here, but I think Seth Godin's influence speaks for himself. For a long time, if you put the term Seth into Google, he was the first result that showed up. May not be anymore, but he's definitely in the top 10 results still.
And he's probably one of the people that has influenced more thought leaders on the internet than anyone else. Ironically, it's interesting. I don't know why no one seems to want to point this out, but Seth is on Twitter slash X. It's just that he's not active on it.
His daily blog posts automatically publish to you and appear on his X feed. And in his case, that is really more than sufficient because he has a following of over 761,000 on X. I don't think he's going to. But if he ever did change his mind about being popular or doing well on X, he would have a pretty good foundation to stand on.
Is that going to work for every blogger? I don't think so. I don't think merely having your posts re-shared to X, unless you've built your authority and credibility and your prominence in other ways, is automatically going to boost your views or help you grow a following on X. But for Seth, it worked just fine. If he had focused on X, I don't think he would have just 761,000 followers either.
He'd probably have many more. Key lesson, there's actually two here. First is if you want to become the best at anything and want to have any hope of becoming the best at it, again, best being subjective, you've got to strip away all distractions and give yourself the best chance possible at making that happen.
Meaning you'd probably be saying no to a lot more things. So you can say yes to the one or two things that you ultimately want to be good at. And number two, and we will talk more about this later.
So I'm not going to expand on it a lot right here. There are pathways other than social media to get to where you want to go. Seth is proof of that.
Number two, social media is a horrible hobby. When I was a network marketer for about four or five years, my mentors often said this business makes for a horrible hobby and one more quote, if you treat it as a hobby, you will only ever earn a hobby level income. And I think social media really is the same way.
If you treat it as a hobby, you are never going to see better than hobby level results. So if you're on the fence about social media, there will be pain and the pain will only increase over time. There is no pain when you're a decisive yes or a decisive no, regardless of the consequences.
But the maybe people will suffer and so will the results. So the key lesson here is if you're committed to growing on social media, no price will ever seem too high. If you're deliberately and intentionally choosing not to do social media, there is no quote unquote missing out.
No FOMO, only JOMO, joy of missing out. But if you're wishy-washy about it, there's a chance you'll get swallowed up in the next wave of trolling, criticism, hardship, or something else because life happens whether you're doing social media or not. And there are plenty of things that could take you out.
Number three, social media is addicting in the worst way possible. Social media and smartphones are addictive by design. You can find many articles on Google corroborating this notion as well as many studies.
According to Addiction Help, social media addiction is growing year by year. Research shows that roughly 210 million people are addicted to social media worldwide. As I understand it, only about 4 billion people, in other words, about 50% of the population is even online yet.
What happens when an additional 4 billion people come online? What will the addiction stats look like then? Addiction Help seems to indicate that these numbers are rising year by year. Gary Vee said, social media is more addictive than cigarettes and alcohol. Yet, I have a hard time imagining anything that could leave you feeling as empty and unfulfilled.
Those dopamine highs let you down every time. I'm not advocating anyone become addicted to anything. Although, if we're honest with ourselves, we all have addictions of minor or major forms.
I'm not necessarily talking about clinical addiction, which is a whole other thing. But I can think of other things that would have a little more payoff than staring at social media. In fact, I think that's the lowest payoff there is.
Key lesson, if you are easily distracted by the posts you see on social media and forget why you opened the app in the first place, you are likely addicted. If you frequently find yourself doom scrolling and can't seem to control it, you are likely addicted. The question is, and this is really key, are you a creator or consumer? My coach and anyone that I respect is pretty much in the category of a creator.
They make things, they prioritize making things over consuming things. I even heard, I think it was Ralph Smart, and I love his channel as well. I think he was the one that said successful people for every hour of content they consume, they create two hours of content.
So they create double the amount they watch. Think about that. Number four, social media is an open invitation to the comparison game.
Comparison is the root of all unhappiness. If you look up that term on Google, it seems to think I came up with it. I simply summarized a sentence that effectively said the same thing, and I'm pretty sure it was Joe Vitale who originally said that, but thank you, Google.
It's nice to be known for something. JED says social comparison can lead to increased depression, decreased wellbeing, poor body image, and even eating disorders. I don't know why they separated increased depression and decreased wellbeing, because if you read the article, you find out that by decreased wellbeing, they mean depression, I guess, because depression leads to decreased wellbeing.
But it seems to me, they're kind of in the same category, either way, more often than not, we are comparing ourselves unfavorably to others, their highlight reels to our bloopers, virtually anyone you can name has gone through hardship. And if they haven't, they will. People aren't exempt from difficulty or challenge just because they're rich, famous, good looking, or otherwise.
Many so-called social media influencers will tell you they don't even know what they're supposed to be influencing. And in fact, many of them earn an aggressively mediocre income.
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By David Andrew Wiebe
5
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Okay, so you’ve decided that social media growth is for you. You’re committed to the process, and you’ve started putting effort into it.
But should you be doing social media at all?
It sounds like a dreadful existential question, but knowing why you shouldn’t be putting any time into it might just strengthen all the reasons why you decided to engage in the first place.
So, let’s delve into “7 reasons you shouldn’t ‘do’ social media.”
Download the PDF Transcript
Sponsors:
Productivity, Performance & Profits Blackbook: Get a free copy of the “Definitive Guide to Productivity for Artists and Entrepreneurs.”
The Renegade Musician: David’s magnum opus on building an independent music career is here!
Highlights:
00:17 – Today’s topic
00:41 – Let’s avoid “purgatory infinity”
01:50 – It’s one more thing you have to get good at
05:06 – Social media is a horrible hobby
06:30 – Social media is addicting
08:57 – An open invitation to the comparison game
10:59 – Social media may not be the solution
15:13 – Social media sets false expectations
17:44 – There isn’t a guaranteed effort-to-reward ratio
19:28 – Closing thoughts
Transcript:
Welcome to Spark Infinity Office Hours. This is David Andrew Wiebe and it is October 10th, 2024. Today's presentation is seven reasons you shouldn't do social media.
Do is in quotes for a reason. I'm not going to explain that reason, but if you pay careful attention to this presentation to the very end, I think you'll figure out why I'm not here to burst anyone's bubble, the reason Spark Infinity and this team and this group exists because we have that common goal of wanting to grow on social media. So today I'm not going to be discussing reasons to quit.
That's not what this is about, but we need to remember that if you're going to say yes to something, you're saying no to other things as well. And being mindful of that choice and that trade off is really important in life. I also think it's a really good intellectual exercise to explore arguments against whatever your chosen path is, because it facilitates critical thinking and it helps you refine your beliefs.
Ultimately, I want everyone involved, including myself, the participants or the leaders in Spark Infinity, as well as the viewers to be in Spark Infinity mode, not Spark Purgatory mode or Purgatory Infinity, that sounds even worse. That's not what we want. We want to see and get results and to put effort into things that do get results.
So let's move into those reasons. Number one, it's one more thing you have to get good at. If you're already good at several things or a couple of things, or maybe just one thing, whether that's guitar or taking photos or programming, whatever it might be, if you're already good at one thing or a couple of things or three things, remember, if you want to get results with social media, that's one more thing you've got to add to the plate and actually get good at to get results.
Author and blogger Seth Godin was getting started as a blogger in the early days of the internet. If he had chosen to, he could have had first mover advantage on Twitter and he was considering it. He decided against it.
He saw it as one more thing he would have to get good at. Trying to get good at more things he felt would have diluted his focus. He opted to focus on his writing, thereby increasing his chances of becoming the best in writing, or at least in his category.
The term best might be subjective here, but I think Seth Godin's influence speaks for himself. For a long time, if you put the term Seth into Google, he was the first result that showed up. May not be anymore, but he's definitely in the top 10 results still.
And he's probably one of the people that has influenced more thought leaders on the internet than anyone else. Ironically, it's interesting. I don't know why no one seems to want to point this out, but Seth is on Twitter slash X. It's just that he's not active on it.
His daily blog posts automatically publish to you and appear on his X feed. And in his case, that is really more than sufficient because he has a following of over 761,000 on X. I don't think he's going to. But if he ever did change his mind about being popular or doing well on X, he would have a pretty good foundation to stand on.
Is that going to work for every blogger? I don't think so. I don't think merely having your posts re-shared to X, unless you've built your authority and credibility and your prominence in other ways, is automatically going to boost your views or help you grow a following on X. But for Seth, it worked just fine. If he had focused on X, I don't think he would have just 761,000 followers either.
He'd probably have many more. Key lesson, there's actually two here. First is if you want to become the best at anything and want to have any hope of becoming the best at it, again, best being subjective, you've got to strip away all distractions and give yourself the best chance possible at making that happen.
Meaning you'd probably be saying no to a lot more things. So you can say yes to the one or two things that you ultimately want to be good at. And number two, and we will talk more about this later.
So I'm not going to expand on it a lot right here. There are pathways other than social media to get to where you want to go. Seth is proof of that.
Number two, social media is a horrible hobby. When I was a network marketer for about four or five years, my mentors often said this business makes for a horrible hobby and one more quote, if you treat it as a hobby, you will only ever earn a hobby level income. And I think social media really is the same way.
If you treat it as a hobby, you are never going to see better than hobby level results. So if you're on the fence about social media, there will be pain and the pain will only increase over time. There is no pain when you're a decisive yes or a decisive no, regardless of the consequences.
But the maybe people will suffer and so will the results. So the key lesson here is if you're committed to growing on social media, no price will ever seem too high. If you're deliberately and intentionally choosing not to do social media, there is no quote unquote missing out.
No FOMO, only JOMO, joy of missing out. But if you're wishy-washy about it, there's a chance you'll get swallowed up in the next wave of trolling, criticism, hardship, or something else because life happens whether you're doing social media or not. And there are plenty of things that could take you out.
Number three, social media is addicting in the worst way possible. Social media and smartphones are addictive by design. You can find many articles on Google corroborating this notion as well as many studies.
According to Addiction Help, social media addiction is growing year by year. Research shows that roughly 210 million people are addicted to social media worldwide. As I understand it, only about 4 billion people, in other words, about 50% of the population is even online yet.
What happens when an additional 4 billion people come online? What will the addiction stats look like then? Addiction Help seems to indicate that these numbers are rising year by year. Gary Vee said, social media is more addictive than cigarettes and alcohol. Yet, I have a hard time imagining anything that could leave you feeling as empty and unfulfilled.
Those dopamine highs let you down every time. I'm not advocating anyone become addicted to anything. Although, if we're honest with ourselves, we all have addictions of minor or major forms.
I'm not necessarily talking about clinical addiction, which is a whole other thing. But I can think of other things that would have a little more payoff than staring at social media. In fact, I think that's the lowest payoff there is.
Key lesson, if you are easily distracted by the posts you see on social media and forget why you opened the app in the first place, you are likely addicted. If you frequently find yourself doom scrolling and can't seem to control it, you are likely addicted. The question is, and this is really key, are you a creator or consumer? My coach and anyone that I respect is pretty much in the category of a creator.
They make things, they prioritize making things over consuming things. I even heard, I think it was Ralph Smart, and I love his channel as well. I think he was the one that said successful people for every hour of content they consume, they create two hours of content.
So they create double the amount they watch. Think about that. Number four, social media is an open invitation to the comparison game.
Comparison is the root of all unhappiness. If you look up that term on Google, it seems to think I came up with it. I simply summarized a sentence that effectively said the same thing, and I'm pretty sure it was Joe Vitale who originally said that, but thank you, Google.
It's nice to be known for something. JED says social comparison can lead to increased depression, decreased wellbeing, poor body image, and even eating disorders. I don't know why they separated increased depression and decreased wellbeing, because if you read the article, you find out that by decreased wellbeing, they mean depression, I guess, because depression leads to decreased wellbeing.
But it seems to me, they're kind of in the same category, either way, more often than not, we are comparing ourselves unfavorably to others, their highlight reels to our bloopers, virtually anyone you can name has gone through hardship. And if they haven't, they will. People aren't exempt from difficulty or challenge just because they're rich, famous, good looking, or otherwise.
Many so-called social media influencers will tell you they don't even know what they're supposed to be influencing. And in fact, many of them earn an aggressively mediocre income.