The Reality of Growing on Social Media - Part 3

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Welcome to another issue of Passionate Income.

In Part III of this week’s Three Part Series, we’ll be discussing the reality of growing a social media following in 2024.

If you didn’t see it, Part II - which discusses Facebook and IG - is here.

And in today’s final issue, we’ll cover X and LinkedIn.

Let’s dive in.

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In our previous issue, we discussed the Pros, Cons and areas of opportunity for growing a following on Facebook and Instagram.

While there’s some potential to grow a Facebook Group with written content - and you could in theory grow with photos and written text on Instagram - generally speaking the four platforms we’ve covered depend on video.

Meaning, if you suck on camera (like I do), odds are you haven’t been too excited about the previous options. If that’s you, you’ll enjoy today’s issue.

Mainly because X and LinkedIn are text-first. So if you’re stronger as a writer than you are on camera, you’ll likely want to focus on one - or both - of today’s options.

With that said, here’s our breakdown of each:

#5 - X (fka Twitter)

Difficulty Level: 9/10
Expenses Involved: $ - $$
Skills Required: Writing, Filming, Video Editing
Leverage Points: Replying to Comments, Spaces
Value of Followers: 3/5

As someone who spent 2023 doing Twitter / X ghostwriting, this is yet another platform I’m highly familiar with.

See, in 2021 and 2022 people absolutely exploded on Twitter, racking up 100s and even thousands of followers per day. And because of that, marketer types that typically focused on Facebook jumped over.

On top of that, Twitter growth and Twitter Ghostwriting were booming, with course sellers and coaches printing money by teaching people how to grow and how to make money by helping other people grow.

Sadly, after Elon Musk took over the platform, they made some major changes to the algorithm. Changes that made it exponentially harder for small accounts to grow.

And because of that, the Twitter growth / ghostwriting niches collapsed.

Today, growing on X is incredibly difficult. Especially if all you’re doing is posting written content.

No, to succeed today, you have to host Spaces, reply to 50 - 100 comments per day, and (ideally) post video content. Mainly because the algo today is much more akin to TikTok’s algo.

Meaning, Time on Site is all that matters. The longer your content gets people to stay on X, the more organic reach it gets.

Further, unless you sell B2B (freelancing, consulting, coaching, etc.), X is most likely a waste of time. While it’s true everyday consumers are on there, very few B2C brands achieve meaningful sales from X.

Instead, it’s much more B2B-oriented given the number of CEOs, founders, and self-made entrepreneurs on there.

Further, with how competitive the timeline has become, injecting personality into your content is critical. Vanilla “How to…” content just isn’t engaging enough to get traction these days.

Instead, you need to be polarizing. And the more controversial you are, the better.

With that said, I know people making serious bank off X. So if you serve a B2B audience and have serious proof your service works, X could still be a good bet despite how difficult it’s become.

#6 -LinkedIn

Difficulty Level: 5/10
Expenses Involved: $
Skills Required: Writing
Leverage Points: Daily Posting, Engaging on the Feed (commenting)
Value of Followers: 5/5

If all you did was compare the above metrics with the other platforms we’ve covered, it would be obvious LinkedIn is the biggest opportunity of 2024.

And for better or worse, one could argue it was the biggest opportunity last year as well (or at worst tied with TikTok).

See, for some reason or another, LinkedIn just doesn’t get saturated. Yes, there are way more people posting now than there were in the past.

But in my opinion, there are three reasons it remains strong:

1. It’s B2B, and therefore doesn’t appeal to the masses

2. There’s a very unique vibe on LI, which many people hate

3. The User Interface is painful to use, making it unenjoyable to scroll for long periods of time

These are just my guesstimates, but I’ve heard the same from others.

Either way, when it comes to organic reach for written content, LinkedIn is the King and has been for a while. And if you can combine that content with a commenting strategy and outreach process, LinkedIn can be an absolute goldmine.

The downside?

Doing so is harder than you might think.

First, while organic reach is high, it’s entirely dependent on your follower count. Meaning, you’ll have to start slow and build those followers up.

While doing so will happen much faster than it would on X, it still takes time. And because of that, most people give up.

Second, while this is subjective, you’ll still have to get used to their quirky ass User Interface and “Stick up the Ass” corporate vibe. Both of which scare most people away.

Last, you’ll need to combine cold/warm outreach with your content efforts. Depend on inbound alone and you’ll likely starve (during the first six months at least).

If you can brave the above challenges, however, LinkedIn has some of the highest-quality users on Earth. Mainly because most of its users are CEOs, founders and executives with good-sized (if not gigantic) budgets to allocate.

💡 Takeaway: Similar to what we said last week, both X and LinkedIn present unique challenges and opportunities. But if you’re willing to put in the work and be patient, the payoff can be massive.

I'll leave you with this quote…

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