back in Nov last year i started creating content when it was introduced to me by social media guys and they saying why you should start creating content and all that things that you probably see also,

it was good motivation for me that made me start creating content, so i started create content about notion templates and productivity only.

i was copycat tbh, nothing was original, the only thing that was original that i have knowledge in notion as i learned it to create templates solve my situation and hopfully fits my followers situation too.

in that period i was following and learning from people on X(twitter),

i realized that the successful ones have one thing in common

“they talk about what they want and nobody would tell them what they’re doing.”

the thing that hold me back then is niching down and thinking if i was talking about more than one topic i would be criticized, and i was wrong thinking like that.

i also wasn’t clear about what i was posting, that fear of criticized kept me as failure.

I always wanted to create content without limitations, and to have unlimited ideas, but unfortunately

by listening to others i did what they wanted me to do, and not what i wanted made me waste my time all this period, unfortunately i was knowing nothing about how social media even works. i was so beginner and average.

the solution was lying under this statement for me. “doing what i want to do, not what others want me to do, without even care about what they criticize.”

and that’s bring us to one solution which you probably guess it, it’s “personal branding”

Why you should take this path in content creation.

before that, I’m not selling anything to you right now, it’s just row opinion & learnings from my own, and to tell you about why i have taken this path in the first place.

here’s 3 reasons should make you to start personal branding instead of anything,

1. talk about whatever you want (real)

This was a dream for me, to combine business and personal things(not too personal) together to create content that it’s me, not creating content that worked for someone in my niche so i need to do it and be copycat all time.

I’m not saying taking what works is wrong, no but depending to be copycat is wrong, and you’ll burnout out for sure, that beside the niching down advice. which i will cover later.

2. future of digital economy evolves around it.

it just crazy to see 15 years old make living out of this digital world, it even crazier when they use them as micro-influencers for their companies and products promotions.

and the thing that more people are using their personal brands to build and promote their companies or others companies.

when someone like Dan, he’s building his software startup above his personal brand.

with just this reason i can tell that are personal brands aren’t a trend and will never be collapsed.

3. it’s your digital resume.

The way some of creators if not most of them doing, is to share their work, like design for a project, free things etc.. then they get clients and when they apply to a startup or cold outreach some other clients they get “yes” because there’s something proofs that they’re worthy to work with that skill.

it’s how personal branding works, you can get any king of jobs, freelance project, startup offers you a deal or contract, and if you

4. Best Way to be human, and not using AI.

This brings us to something complicated, is using AI wrong or not? again, full depending on AI not your own things, like expertise, opinion, and thinking is the wrong.

you can use AI to plan out you course idea, then you add your own taste to it, or remove things you see as outdated.

but for the people who click one button to generate +2k words in 1 second is boring and not usefull as using your mind, because:

1. It’s not actual human, so no one would feel in the content and say “yeah that’s so deep”,”i wish i understand it this way” etc…

2. You yourself will not have an authority over it, like you just hit generate button and essay appears that you don’t what the fk in it, then claim the knowledge to be from you.

3. it’s tool to help you do the job better, not to replace yourself, emotions, life lessons and many things you have that AI don’t.

4. it’s tool to minimize unnecessary work, and repetitive tasks. not to replace your job.

and you’ll have better control over you memory when some topic is mentioned, because you already experienced, learned or even being mentored about.

you can connect more ideas to each others and being real.

it’s actually crazy to see people who uses their minds to earn with, not AI or time...

The plan.

create topics tree for personal branding.

this content topic tree was inspired by Dan Koe, and everything in it was out of my interests not copying him or others.

and that’s what i need you to do, need you to find the things you most love, have experience with & that topic have good market.

this looks like the ikiagi concept, but for content, and by far it’s the best approach around creating content, because it make you have unlimited ideas and most of them are from your real life if you really wrote what i told you to do.

so you never run out of ideas never ever, except when you die or when you decide you ran out of ideas.

Let me break it down more to make you understand it more, to start really create meaningful content:

First, Choose three main topics from your interests, experience and you’re willing to learn(be open minded about that)

For me it’s health, improvement and business.

Then out of each one, break down 3 more smaller topics

For me it’s

1. Healthy body, bodybuilding and lifestyle for health topic.

2. productivity, self-awareness and finding purpose in life for Improvement topic.

3. Personal Branding, Design as skill and Marketing & Sales for business topic.

then now you can go as broad as you can inside this list, take time building this topic tree as you’ll never run out of ideas because of it, invest more time in beginning and get roi faster.

If you don’t have any of these three fundamentals, then you need to find, learn and experience with things by time you’ll have it clear.

but i don’t think that someone don’t know what he want, especially if you’re human then you have many things you love doing, experienced or tried at least from your childhood to this time.

content strategy

This includes many things, and you may heard that not doing it you’ll burn out as content creator, and from my experience i would say yes, you need strategy to follow.

but why? i will tell you.

The reason behind setting a content strategy.

1. Organize your content

keeping track of what you’ll post will help you boost your efficiency so much, like now i have 1 month of content planned for me, just from my notes in notion alone.

i keep adding notes and ideas to my ideas bank until i fill it up, then i choose 4 main ideas to write newsletter about and take out more ideas from the newsletter itself. which is very helpful and depend on how you systemize it.

2. You will know what performed well.

with time you’ll have more posts, and more performing posts, around different topics.

because of this data you’ll know what performed well and what not.

and by that you can create more of the content that have been performing well.

3. have a good base for future iteration.

going deep on this soon.

The amount of content i will create.

1. For Newsletter/Blog (online version of that newsletter)

   1. 1 a week.

2. For Social media, I will stick to one platform at the same time. Which is X(twitter) because i don’t want to waste time in the beginning, i need to invest the time in the beginning to learn the important skills, then i will hire video editor to expand to the other platforms.

   1. For threads, 1 a week.

   2. For tweets, 2-3 times a day.

   3. and replying to every possible comment.

i will stick to two challenge, read below to know what king of challenge.

After growing, i will expand to other platforms to grow more naturally(organically).

Sharing everything in public

This something should everyone know, it increase the chances of inbound clients, and getting more authority around your skills, and knowledge.

and for me i love to share in public, for this reasons.

1. To feel so guilt if i haven’t did the thing i promised.

i set a 7 day challenge, and designed a post about the dates of the products will be launched in this period.

if i haven’t set this challenge in public i wouldn’t even do one product in these 7 days. but i launched 6 of them on time. better than nothing for me. :)

2. to get feedback around my work and improve faster.

when you get criticized for the bad things you’re doing it actually improve your ability to learn more.

i share my design work and ask for feedback, then improve around the criticized parts, and repeat for unlimited time.

3. To get more cilents to see my work, as i said earlier, it’s your resume.

i will not talk more around this but you can see it as opportunity to do so, going deep on this soon.

Learn while you build.

I’m obsessed with learning, and one of the best things i came to realize is direct building make you learn faster and deeper if done write.

like i was having design project, and i was designing a website for local client, he requested a complex page , although i wasn’t knowing how i can do it, i just said yes to take on the challenge and learn.

i faced a problem, learned specific knowledge to overcome this specific problem, and handled the project to the client, when i say faster it’s.

let’s say for example:

when you start building, you’ll face one problem or two at the same time, and the solution is available online, that you can search for the exact problem to solve it in less than 30 minutes. >

than taking 9-18 hour course, or watching endless videos about the same skill for unneccessery knowledge, that could help you but not now, you need knowledge that help you today to move faster.

a friendly reminder, always accept negative feedbacks if you’re building in public, not an advice like that repetitive bs online, no. you actually need to hear the negative feedback to fuel your self, know the problem from another perspective, and improve faster.

Practice Writing.

if you read this article, newsletter or twitter thread. then it was written.

all starts with writing, and it’s the only way to show of to people who you are, what skills you have, and what solutions you have for their problems(product) and writing used for almost everything.

• Newsletter? writing.

• social media content? writing.

• landing pages? writing.

• digital products? writing.

• Youtube scripts? writing.

and as i see the importance of this skill i decided to practice writing for 30 min a day, to clear my mind, find valuable ideas, meaningful project outline, journaling(yes considered as practice) and anything in between.

as for above the main reason for mentioning writing is just because we will relay on it for our growth in social media and finally building the best personal brand.

you may find this advice as overrated one, but i encourage you to ask yourself these questions:

• why i need writing?

• do i need it?

• and what aspects of my life should have writing? isn’t it business? personal branding?.

for me, just the first question has enough answers to start practice and learn writing

if you want to take step into creating content and being the next big creator then learning writing is the first step, and I’m not referring to that academic writing for essays or something, but the writing that make you grow, clear your mind, and create meaningful content and projects, skipping it will defiantly make you regret.

Starting a challenge, to stay constant and grow with time.

i was always looking for a way to self-improvement, studying the things 1% of people do and what things will make someone a successful.

from habits, routines, workouts, focused work, and much more that i need another letter for this. ← Note.

with what i learned from this things i came across concept, you could call it monk mode, but i prefer leaving it blank until i find proper name.

this concept is to lock yourself in withing 60-90 days, praying everyday, doing what you always told yourself to do, improve in every aspect of your life, remove distractions, replace bad habits with good ones, and learn continuously during this period.

so to prove that this works, i will make this challenge in public, to hit three birds in one rock. 

1. grow on social media

2. prove this concept works

3. improve my own life.

the second challenge is to redesign landing pages and websites for limited period, i think 100 days, or redesigns? not sure but I’m doing this to improve my skill in design and get more clients by doing that, as Nick did, i will.

this will be simple, every week, or more i ask in X(twitter) people who want a redesign for free, yes for free, and for limited time. will focus on SaaS, and startup founders, to grow together.

Some advice from my experience.

don’t skip two days in row.

this is the worst thing you could do in any aspect of life, if you’re building new habit, or leaving a habit, or sharing content. it will cause a loop of not doing this thing you skipped for two days.

and i need you to find way to track these habits, content and thing you want to do in life, track it in any possible way.

constant efforts are the only way to really grow, both in yourself and content quality.

don’t niche down, instead create topics tree for personal branding.

i talked about this above, and how it could limit your potential, if you want to niche down, then you should cover every inch of the chosen topic alone first and be expert in it, then move to the nearest topic, the most important thing is to show people that you’re worth to talk about this topic(authority).

don’t be afraid

at the beginning no one will see your content, or few will see it.

if you put the hard work or not, the beginning is hard, and it’s good.

in this period you try as much as you can from frameworks, advices from creator and things to make it work.

to grow, you need to improve, and no improvement if you haven’t started yet.

Finally constant daily reps.

to wrap this plan up.

in order to build successful personal brand you need:

1. Create topics tree, to never run out of ideas.

2. content strategy, to be constant.

3. sharing everything in public, to increase authority.

4. Build to learn, Faster path to knowledge.

5. Practice writing, base skill.

6. Challenge yourself to commit to it everyday, hit 3 birds in one rock.

and that’s it for today’s letter. see you next Sunday.

Ali.