The problem with Storytelling

I've seen a lot of people use storytelling wrongly.

Sometimes they tell irrelevant stories with weak generic lessons.

Like someone talking about how a foot injury gave him 5 big business ideas.

As interesting as that sounds, you'll be surprised that most of the time, these “5 big ideas” are just generic everyday top of funnel stuff.

Leaving you underwhelmed and sometimes forced to just compliment the post to complete your 50 replies-per-day goal.

So how exactly do you tell a story that turns heads and leaves people begging for more?

Well to tell you. I'd have to tell you a story

An apology to you 

But before I tell you the story, allow me to apologize.

I have been thinking about the future of this newsletter and my duty as a creator over the past month or so.

The reason why I haven't posted any email in 2 weeks or so is because I feel like a fraud.

Yes. The good ol imposter syndrome.

And to top it off, it feels like most of the people I know on X have abandoned me.

Some of which were close friends of mine last year.

So yeah. Sometimes it's hard to keep going alone in this whole industry. Even when I try to link up with others, they end up being super shallow and unable to bring anything useful to the table.

To be honest, that can be very demoralizing.

But that's just an excuse really.

I'm back and I'm here to stay

I'll be ramping up my output from one email a week to two and then test to see if I can go to three.

It wasn't fair leaving you hanging for two weeks like that and I deeply apologize.

Alright, with that out of the way. Let's dive back in

Sometime last year…

I came across a thread on audience building.

But unlike the generic “how to get 1000 followers” threads. This one focused on how the writer himself got his first 1000 followers.

He was teaching with a story.

He went over the normal tips we know like replying, writing threads and sending DMs but with a twist.

He wrote about them through his own lens.

He went over exactly how he did it rather than just giving random tips and expecting you to magically get the full picture.

• The tools he used

• The people he talked to

• The courses he bought

• The type of posts that did well

• How he wrote his replies to other tweets

• The type of people/tweets he replies to

The WHOLE THING. Full transparency.

This is how you sell with a story.

That thread of course went viral and many people started copying that style of writing.

And that's where the problem began

Countless threads about people's successes starting coming up left and right. It became a well known strategy for getting more clicks.

So much so that people started lying about their achievements.

They'd talk about how they got hundreds of followers over a week and not reveal to you that they pay for retweets.

They'll just go ahead and post the same list that everyone already knows.

• Write threads

• Comment 1000 times a week

• Send DMs to people like you

• Sun your balls

(Okay, maybe not that last part)

But you get the idea.

They just show their audience a fake guide when in reality they're buying their way to the top.

That's not cool.

The goal here is to write genuine stories that inspire and educate others.

Did you finally get the ultimate tool for productivity for 9-5 workers?

Tell the public what it is and share the story of how it's helped you.

9 times out of 10, you'd be helping someone else out there because they'd be able to resonate with you and your ideas on a much deeper level.

That would be all for today and I will say in a few days time.

Oh and before you go…

I've been able to get an average of 15% conversion rate on my X profile over the past 30 days.

I carefully ran a few experiments and came up with a guide to a perfect X profile.

It'll be a video course that I'd be sharing soon (for free) and I'd like for you to be the first ones to get it before the people on X.

I'll be sharing the link to the waiting list with you within the next 24 hours.

Don't miss the email.