Writing Online and Becoming a Digital Creator
Digital writing is by far one of the coolest things out there in the world. And what’s mind boggling about it is how different it is from other forms of writing, and how closer it is to an entrepreneurial mindset. It’s really a two way formula starting with writing as a form of intellectual art, and completing with building the audience and analytical insights.
You will never think about writing the same way again.
Dickie Bush & Nicolas Cole
One of the 1st articles I encountered that really shed some light was the Ship 30 for 30’s Digital Writing 101 free course. It had 7 key lessons that stood out for a good starting point in terms of perspective and mindset. Here we go:
- Legacy writers vs digital writers, in the digital world being a legacy writer hidden away in a cabin somewhere is but a mere pipe dream. Digital writers make writing a daily habit, and practice in public. They gather data and iterate a little bit everyday. Legacy writers hide their work to reach perfection, digital ones invite the whole world to their journey. Social Media posts become short essays, then on to long form articles and ultimate guides, to books and courses. They test and move faster, and uncover more and better ideas with their audience.
- The mindset of a prolific creator, everyone can be prolific and generate an endless stream of remixed ideas. Ideas that are good enough and that are half way between what you like to write about and what your readers like to read about. The Endless Idea Generator is a great tool to find prospect ideas to write about. It involves three steps, What do you want to write about, picking a proven approach, and reflecting the credibility.
- How to overcome the 10 biggest fears writers have, all writers face the same challenges. Distractions, over-editing, imposter syndrome, and writing consistently to name a few. They are more common than you think, and not that hard to overcome.
- The benefits you Don’t know you’re going to unlock by writing online, we all have reasons for why we want to start writing but there are more to this story than you think. Building a daily writing habit helps you build other consistent habits. Creativity begets creativity, the more you write, the more ideas you generate. Writing online is one heck of a way to scale yourself, once you do something it is there for the long haul. You wouldn’t need to repeat yourself over and over. Like fishing in the sea, every published digital touchpoint is a hook ready to reel some real opportunities in. And brace yourself, the network effect is one powerful creator outcome.
- Where you should be writing online (Don’t start a blog), I admit I’m still a bit skeptical about this one. I like having my library in a blog format, as in one centralized place for all future phases. But oh boy did they get it right, digital writing happens on social platforms. People don’t like leaving them, and the audience is already there. If the stage is ready, why build another one and expect people to randomly show up. My advice is do both, publish regularly on social platforms though have a blog to curate everything you published already. This way, the curious ones can always find more of your content to consume.
- How to start writing online, 250 words at a time, This is by far the most awesome advise! Any idea and I do mean any idea you have can be distilled and explained to the point in only 250 words. This is the best test you can make to find out if your ideas are worth investing in or not! They call it the Lean Writing Framework, sounds a bit familiar my fellow entrepreneur? The atomic essay format helps you write more often, simple, consistent, and more powerful. Yo, that’s how digital writers write books!
- The power of writing within an online community, here comes the secret ingredient. “All prolific creators join supportive, digital communities”. Friends, interest-based groups, mastermind chats, and my personal favorite online cohorts where you embark on the same journey together. You don’t have to do this alone, nor should you! the digital world is full of tiny villages and islands, they did say it’s the dawn of a new age.
🎧 What I’ve Been Up To Lately
Steady pacing, balancing things out, responding rather than reacting, focusing on important rather than urgent, doing less but doing it well. These are some of what I’ve been focused on lately, why? Cause I can be somewhat of a stubborn idiot sometimes, and only learn by making mistakes. At the beginning on 2022, I put forth an ambition plan with a tight timeframe full of so many initiatives. More like three years worth crammed into a one year timeline, Yah my boss did tell me to spread them around though I didn’t listen. Simply because I didn’t want to listen and was too focused on reaching for the stars. Well, fast forward today things started getting jammed on each other and the load was getting scarier by the day.
I called my boss a couple of weeks back and told him he was right, of course he loved hearing it and laughed his ass off. Lesson well learnt! Then I took a step back and started recalibrating everything, personal and professional cause it’s one life we have, and focusing on One Thing at a time. My advice, do less but do it well. Your brain will thank you for it and even give a few unexpected gifts here and there. We are more creative when we remove all the stress and clutter in our heads. Let me know if you ever felt the same way, and feel free to hit me up by replying to this email. Yah dude, I finally have an email for this newsletter 😁.
📚 Additional Resources
How To Start Writing Online is Ship 30 for 30 ultimate guide and updated version on the above free course. Seriously, don’t miss out! This was my starting point into the digital writing verse.
Ship 30 for 30 is a cohort-based course for digital writers and a global community, I’m an alumni and ever grateful for the enlightening journey. The program gave me the push needed to jump start the digital creator within.