You're too boring to be heard.

What brought you here?

Did the thumbnail jump at you? The aggressive title made you curious? did it annoy you? Did the mystery trigger you to click? (seriously, let me know!)

I’m sorry for that, I was trying to make a point. In any case, I’ll solve your curiosity right away and tell you what this article is about, depending on who you are:

• If you are a content creator then this is a reflection about the struggle to create or maintain a digital audience, and how you’re so easily forced into a “popular” format that feeds social networks’ needs rather than yours.
• If you are a content consumer then this is hopefully a thought-provoking perspective that helps you find more valuable content in the middle of all the noise.

Since you’re likely both, now you get to choose which hat to wear while reading this. Bear with me, these thoughts have been built up and bottled up for many years…

(Last time I spoke publicly about social networks back in 2010 at the Plone Conference)

You’re either with us, or alone

The harsh reality is that your content’s reach depends directly on how well it fits the network’s purposes, even if you already have an audience. Social network algorithms dictate what gets seen and what gets buried. Besides directly paying the networks for exposure (or attention), these algorithms prioritize only engagement metrics that match the network’s business model (which, let’s be honest, makes sense).

There are two main goals that guide most of these algorithms: Gather profiling data that allows them to better target ads and improve conversion rates, and amount of ads consumed. Entertaining the world and allowing information sharing between people is only a means-to-an-end at this point.

It was not born this way

Social networks were not initially designed around the attention economy (term coined in 1971¹); it was rather hacked into social networks to capitalize on their surprising potential. Early platforms like SixDegrees.com (1997), Friendster (2002), and MySpace (2003) emerged and went “viral” before monetization was a thing. Even Facebook, launched in 2004, initially focused on user growth rather than monetization². Twitter launched in 2006 but didn’t introduce ads until 2010. The main incentives for launching and using these platforms was the strong instinct that we have to communicate and share information (and a bit of vanity…)

So what works?

In a nutshell, content that tends to “do well” is content that is at the intersection of what a lot of people are attracted to and the type of content that benefits networks.

So for example:

People are generally attracted to entertaining facts or jokes, controversy, conflict, mystery, but also to knowledge, deep dives into topics, nuanced articles, and of course, stories.

Networks want you to consume lots of content and stay on their platform. They don’t want you to get distracted and leave (unless you click an ad). Short, shallow, and funny content works best for them, especially if it’s controversial because it generates comments and discussions. Longer, more nuanced content is risky because it makes people think, research, and potentially leave the platform while doint it. So they do everything within their reach to keep you from consuming those. When people focus on one topic for a while, there are fewer opportunities to show them ads.

Is everyone just stupid?

Short answer is no, of course not. It’s not that networks decided to force us to be shallow and short-attention spanned. It’s been evolved from us, they hacked the human brain by listening to its behavior and evolving the algorithm to optimize for monetization. It’s emergent and it’s just the way it is. And, let’s face it, our modern lifestyles beg for it. Plus, the networks are full of really amazing content, by amazing creators that find themselves in the realization that the only way to spread their beautiful message is by disguising it in a format that forces the users to benefit the networks. It’s a strange symbiotic relationship between creator, distributor and consumer.

So what do I do about it?

I don’t want to tell you what to do with your content, so I’ll just share what seems to work for me:

As a creator:

• I try to understand the system the best as I can, gather data and study the techniques of other creators (yes, specially the ones I don’t like). I know I’ll have to hack my way of doing things into the existing infrastructure.
• Realize that the monster that makes everyone addicted and mindless is also the miracle that allows us to share and live in a connected world. And it won’t survive if it’s not profitable, so we need to find a balance.
• I want independence, so I use the mass distribution networks as an audience pond, but drive traffic to my own controlled source (my own website, my products, etc.)
• Play into the algorithm, it might be cringy and feel awful but what I am creating is a beacon for my audience (hopefully…), once people clicked “me” from the sea of noise, I try to give them my best. But also try really hard not to abuse my audience. One thing is being flashy and formatting content to maximize reach, another is being deceiving. It seems to pay to do so, but I would be ruining it for all of us, me included. Clickbait is not sustainable.
• Pick my efforts, some networks fit better my type of content then others, I need to be in all of them but I can put more effort into the ones that match better.
• Capture my audience. Email really works! Social networks are great to acquire that first attention but they are very unsustainable when it comes to maintaining the audience, my followers don’t see my stuff, but my subscribers mostly will. So please subscribe to this blog :)

As a consumer:

• Awareness is key, I bias myself towards longer format, consume mindfully, consume what really makes me happy, or improves me in any way.
• Resist clickbait, it’s there because it works, I try not to click vague or extreme title sentences or thumbnails (Like the one on this article).
• Save interesting stuff for further research, come back to my favorite content, create my corner of content outside of the network while navigating it for “future me” to consume.
• Stop for a second before opening a social app and try to decide what/or who am I going to see first. And actively look for it.
• It’s also fine to just indulge, watch short and silly content when I need it (or want it) but do it by my own conscious choice as much as possible.

If you read this far, your attention span is way longer than what they make us believe. Thank you so much and wish you an amazing next piece of content.

References