The Biggest Mistake Most Creators Make

Atomic Essays

One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned growing a newsletter over the past 6 months:

Promote your work.

Why? Because how will anyone see/read/hear about your work if you don’t promote it?

What I’ve noticed is many people...

→ feel “icky” about self-promotion
→ publish their work and then wonder why nobody is seeing it
→ will do one lonely promotional post for their work—and that’s it
→ avoid promoting due to Imposter Syndrome

I get it. It feels weird promoting yourself. And a little... icky?

You feel like an imposter. You feel like you’re yelling at people through a bullhorn while they sprint in the other direction covering their ears.

But if you don’t promote yourself, your work won’t get seen. You won’t have the same positive impact on the world that you otherwise could.

SO PROMOTE YOURSELF.

“But Dylan, what’s the worst that could happen?”

Some of your audience may turn and run—and that’s good. Weed out those who aren’t interested in your work. Not everyone needs your help. But the truth is: most people won’t even notice your self-promotion at first.

A snowball is tiny when it starts rolling down a hill. But it builds the more it rolls.

Keep rolling, keep promoting. Your work will get attention the more you promote it. If not, that’s a signal that...

→ maybe your work needs a tweak
→ maybe you need to approach it from another angle
→ maybe you’re not speaking to the right people, on the right platform, at the right time, or in the right way

But you’ll never EVER know if any of that’s true if you don’t promote your work.