This is a meta post
How important is social media in building a brand?
I’ve felt a lot of internal resistance to using social media (both personally and for my new upcycled knitwear brand Next Season) and I’ve been trying to self-analyze and unpack the reasons why. I don’t have a fear of putting myself out there. I’ve done a lot of that this past year (in person, in this newsletter, cold DM-ing people on LinkedIn, pop-ups, etc.) and it’s been energizing and rewarding.
But when it comes to posting online (most specifically on Instagram and TikTok) I continually get bogged down and feel blocked. After cogitating on this topic for ~2 weeks (and re-writing this newsletter 3 times) I think my frustration ultimately comes down to these dueling feelings:
social media feels required (do you even exist if you’re not online?)
social media feels futile (you can only either gamble your time in the hope of going ‘viral’ or pay the platforms $$$$ for reach)
Is social media required? Is it futile?
There’s overwhelming societal pressure to use social media - certainly for all of us as individuals, and even more so for small businesses / consumer startups / fashion brands like mine. As an individual, I feel like I have a relatively healthy relationship with social media - moderate consumption, and pretty good self control r.e. mindless scrolling & doom scrolling. But now I feel a lot of pressure to use social media for my brand, and it’s on my mind a LOT more often.
My first instincts with Next Season were to invest my time and energy into direct connections and in-person conversations. I started this newsletter as a direct email to friends and family, months before setting up on Instagram. I prioritized running a few (in-person) pop-ups before I even thought about starting a TikTok.
But one of the most challenging parts of these early days of a startup (or say, a newsletter) is finding your very 1st, 10th, and 100th customer. Mostly these are people you already know and / or meet 1:1. I remember reading this about the very successful Substack newsletter deez links (also the first Substack newsletter I ever subscribed to, back in 2020): The writer’s first ~2,000 subscribers were people that she had met (mostly in person) and signed up one by one. It feels excruciatingly slow at times. Rewarding, but slow.
And I think social media presents a shimmering mirage of ‘reach’. In theory: post content → many people see it → react / follow → and eventually become customers. Sounds a lot easier and faster than finding customers one by one! And the barrier to entry is seemingly low, because anyone can create content.
Notably, I moved my newsletter from direct email onto Substack with the idea that publishing on this platform would increase my ‘reach’. Substack has evolved from what was originally a newsletter publishing tool to a quasi-social media platform with a Notes feed that is algorithmic (and Twitter-like). And while my experience with Substack has been positive so far (and I’ve been excited to gain some new subscribers from the app), I do occasionally catch myself writing for the Notes audience (who doesn’t even read my newsletter) vs my actual subscribers (you all - thank you so much for reading!). My goal is not to ‘go viral’ on Notes (I’m not a cultural commentator), but clearly the lure of this outcome seems to seep into my subconscious at times.
When I’ve organized in-person pop-ups, again the process feels painstaking. I find myself calculating: how many people walked by, how many people commented ‘oh that’s cute’, how many people stopped to look, or even to chat, and how many people actually bought something. Increasingly small numbers. In those moments, again social media *seems* like an easier, faster option. I can create a post and so many more people will see it! Surely that makes more sense and is more efficient than sitting outside with a table and a clothing rack, hoping my pieces catch a passerby’s eye?
But in reality, the content you post on social media is not actually seen by a lot of people (and it’s not even always shown to people that already follow you) unless you spend a lot of money (and time) to expand your reach. Fun fact, I recently learned that big / fast fashion brands are amongst the largest spenders on social media advertising. There’s just no way to compete with that head to head. And, even if I had the money to do so, would I want to spend it with Meta? Sure, setting up shop on the sidewalk feels like a shot in the dark, but I know in my case it’s not really. I live in a neighborhood in Brooklyn where people tend to care about the provenance of their things (at least about as much as people do anywhere, I think) and have discretionary income to spend on expensive products like mine. My pop-ups were hosted at a local, sustainable fashion boutique that’s an established destination for a well-curated selection of clothing and accessories. I know that I have many prospective customers right in my own backyard.
So after swirling on these thoughts for some time now, I’ve concluded that it’s time to stop procrastinating, and to find ways to unblock myself. In that spirit, I’m attempting to reframe how I think about social media.
Tactical things I’m doing
I want to test and learn: can I shift from feeling like SM is ‘required but futile’ and find ways to make it more valuable and rewarding?
I recently started a 100-day challenge for myself to experiment with social media (specifically Instagram, TikTok, and Substack):
Comment and / or messaging 5 people per day, per channel
Post on IG & TikTok ~3-5 times per week
Get back to publishing this newsletter on a weekly basis
So, I’ll check back in at a later date to let you know what I’ve learned!
And don’t worry - direct connections and IRL community remains very top of mind for me. I’ve got a few leads on custom knitwear commissions, and Next Season will be at the FAD Holiday Market in Cobble Hill the weekend of December 14th & 15th. More to come (and lots of knitting to do)!
I know this newsletter is a slight deviation from the deep-dives into my unraveling and re-knitting process, but I like to think of this as space for me to share a behind-the-scenes look at running this business. I’m planning on experimenting with this newsletter more in the coming weeks, so I’d greatly appreciate your feedback as I go!
If you’re new here, or just curious to learn more about circular knitting specifically, here are a couple of past posts to check out:
🙌🙌. I love seeing your insights / processes on the biz side of it all (and it feels v familiar!) i think there’s definitely a place for social media, but how to make it work for you is a tricky balance… good luck with the challenge!
LOVE this - such a big question for startups and small biz. I think it’s possible to build without using the reach of socials but you have to get the brand out there in other ways which are usually slower (which is sometimes a ok!).
In my experience using one or two social platforms as tools to get that awareness of your brand into the world is usually worth it for new businesses to build connections and community and get feedback on what you’re doing.
I love Lydia Bolton’s approach to instagram as a sustainable fashion designer - she does lots of stuff on how other people can upcycle etc so it’s building community > a hard sell