They open Claude, type something like “Write me a post about [topic]”, read back what comes out, and start tweaking. Then they reprompt.

With each iteration, the prompt degrades a little, and the output does the same.

What started as trying to write one post turns into a 60+ minute loop, ending with something they still have to rewrite themselves anyway.

The real problem is that they have a context issue that they’re trying to solve with better prompting. They’re outsourcing the thinking that should have built the foundation of their personal brand. There’s no positioning, no narrative captured, and they’re not really clear on their ICP. They think they are, but its surface level stuff.

Claude as it is, “out of the box”, knows what a run-of-the-mill “founder” sounds like. It’s absorbed millions of founder posts, business books, and everything else “founder” branded on the internet. So when you give it a vague brief, it produces a mash-up of all of those.

There’s no magic prompt to fix this. Prompts are instructions, not your identity. You can tell Claude to be direct and specific, but it doesn’t know what “direct and specific” means in your voice or using your methodologies.

Asking for better output without giving better input is like asking a new hire to represent you in a pitch meeting an hour after they joined.

The effort doesn’t matter when the context isn’t there.

📌Quick distinction:

Context isn’t a voice guide you fill in once. It refers to your real-life vocabulary, your stories, your specific methodology, and your worldview. Once you have an idea of what these are, you can load them into your personal operating system so the AI knows who you really are.

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What’s Happening in the Feed

Go ahead and spend 5 minutes on LinkedIn today and count how many posts feel like they could have been written by anyone. Not just AI-assisted posts, but posts where there’s zero identifiable perspective and no specific experience behind the claims made.

Sure, a lot of these posts might be well-structured and sound decent, but they could be attributed to any founder in any industry. There’s no identity.

The founders who stand out are those who have really given their AI something to work with. A real foundation of their voice, positioning, experience, and proof of that experience.

That gets built into a system that uses the same foundation every time they produce new content.

That’s what a Personal Brand AI Operating System is.

An OS Raises Information Density

A well-built OS produces denser content, built on real frameworks and with the weight of specific experience behind every claim.

It uses ideas that can’t be replicated because they come from your methodology and your Story Bank, not from Claude’s general understanding of generic founder knowledge.

Generic posts = generic results.

Your OS raises information density because it builds from real material. Your material.

💡Worth knowing

Information density is the best indicator of whether a personal brand is building real authority or just generating activity.

A post with a proprietary framework and a specific proof point will outperform a post with borrowed ideas and vague mentions of experience with no proof every time.

What the OS Produces

Stronger, more unique ideas:
The process of naming your frameworks and stress-testing them forces a level of intellectual clarity that’s never articulated. The OS brings up connections across your work that you might not have made on your own.

Sharper methodology your ICP understands:
When you’re forced to articulate your methodology clearly enough to publish it week after week, it becomes something your prospects already understand when they approach you.

Framework density:

By month 6, there’s a growing library of named, proprietary frameworks and IP that you own. These are reusable concepts that move out of your content and into your business. Content production is significantly quicker and the information density is significantly higher. Your frameworks will come up in sales calls, proposals, internal comms, and product decisions.

The Difference Between a Claude Project and a Personal Brand AI OS

If you’ve got a Claude project with a knowledge base, like a voice guide and a few sample posts, you’re likely already getting better output and less generic content.

But you’re still getting 5-10 likes and less than 500 impressions on every post.

Because that’s not an OS.

The biggest functional difference between a Claude project and an OS is memory + context.

You can dump all your brand files into a Claude knowledge base. The problem is they all sit in a flat hierarchy, with no structure and no routing. Every task reads everything (your Voice Card, ICP, Story Bank, and positioning), whether they’re relevant or not.

That’s the problem. Claude’s output quality degrades the more context you load in. It’s helpful at 5 files, but it’s working against you at 20. (not 100% true, but just making a point)

An OS routes instead of dumps. The Claude.md file tells Claude which files to read for which task.

Writing a LinkedIn post? It loads your voice and ICP.

Updating your Story Bank? It loads the story format only.

Context has a purpose. It’s never just a dump of information.

The knowledge base holds onto what you uploaded when you set the project up. The AI doesn’t know what’s changed since then, though, since it can’t self-learn.

Context you share inside a session, like a correction you made mid-draft or a new insight that came up, doesn’t get stored in the knowledge base. When you close the window, it’s gone, and the next session will start from whatever was in the project files before.

As a result, month 6 of a Claude project looks pretty much identical to month 1.

The system has no record of what posts you’ve published, what landed, what flopped, what your audience responded to, or what you’ve decided to stop saying. You’re essentially starting from scratch every time.

An OS compounds by improving after every piece of input it gets.

Every post that goes out gets archived with performance data attached to it, and every correction you make to a draft gets written into the Memory. Every call transcript that comes in adds to your Story Bank, and your Voice Card sharpens with each version of a post.

By month 6, your system will know more about your personal brand than you consciously store in your head at any given moment.

The Anatomy of a Personal Brand AI OS

A Personal Brand AI OS isn’t a single folder of files. There are 10 distinct parts to it, each with a specific job, plus the external systems it reads from and writes to.

1. CLAUDE.md: The rules file

Every action your OS takes will start here.

Claude.md is read before every task the AI runs. It doesn’t store your brand information; it routes Claude to the right files for each job.

Dumping everything into one flat knowledge base means Claude wades through all of it every time you prompt it. But quality degrades as that pile grows.

Claude.md solves that by making sure the AI only reads what it needs, when it needs it.

Without it, every action starts with Claude guessing what you need.

With it, every action it takes is already pointed at the right context.

2. Context

Context is the most important layer of your OS and the one that does the most work. It’s everything that makes your personal brand specifically yours, i.e, the stuff that can’t be copied and pasted into another OS without it producing the wrong output.

🗣️ Voice

Your voice is your actual vocabulary.

So rather than saying “I want a post that sounds direct and conversational” (which means nothing to an AI), your OS will use your exact voice to flesh out your sentence rhythm and the phrases you use most often.

You can build this from real writing samples, recorded voice notes, speech patterns, and podcast clips rather than a one-page brief on language that vaguely resembles how you speak.

👥 Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)

Your ICP is a precise model of who you’re talking to.

Instead of targeting a demographic of people, you need to have a specific person in a specific state of awareness with specific language for their problems in mind.

The ICP file tells your OS who to write for and what they care about, which means it knows what the content needs to do in order to get your ICP to take action.

🏦 Story Bank

This is the material behind the claims you make.

Every founder has a handful of useful stories to tell, like the failure that taught them something they’d never read in a business book or a client result that proved their methodology.

The Story Bank captures each of these properly so the AI can draw on real proof rather than producing false, over-exaggerated, or generic posts about your “experience” that your readers will know aren’t real.

🌏 Narrative Deck

Your Narrative Deck is your worldview.

The beliefs or ideas you have about your industry that other people in your space aren’t talking about, and your contrarian takes.

These are the kinds of positions you take or things you decide after spending years in the industry, not something you come up with overnight.

It creates a real, developed viewpoint instead of just throwing another opinion out into an already overcrowded platform.

🧍Positioning

Positioning is where you sit in the market.

Who you serve, who you don’t, what you’re the best option for, what you’re not.

There are 10,000+ ghostwriters. How many are speaking about building a Personal Brand AI OS? Me? Maybe a couple more?

The clearer this is inside your OS, the more every piece of content it produces does double the work.

It builds authority with the right people and disqualifies the wrong people all in one go.

📋 Operating Standards

These are the guardrails, like banned phrases and formatting rules.

They exist so your brand doesn’t drift over time as you make slightly different decisions in different sessions with your OS.

Even when you step outside of your usual set of rules for a specific outlier post, your next one will still follow the same standards that your ICP knows you for.

3. Intelligence

Context is brand-specific. It’s about you. But intelligence is about how personal branding works.

It’s the methodology that’s embedded in the system and applies to every Skill and Playbook you own that runs inside your OS.

This changes the AI from producing content in your voice to producing content that understands what the content is supposed to achieve.

The Intelligence aspect is the same across every OS we build. It’s why a well-built OS produces better results from a jumbled folder of brand files being dumped into a Claude project.

You can have the most accurate Voice Card in the world and still produce generic content if the AI doesn’t understand what it’s supposed to accomplish.

Intelligence is what gives it that understanding.

There are a few frameworks that work inside this layer:

KLTB maps out how audiences move from discovering your personal brand to buying from it.

Know → Like → Trust → Buy

Every piece of content fits somewhere in that buying journey. When your OS knows how to use this, it produces content that does the right job at the right stage rather than giving you content at the same pitch level.

Feed Salience is how you measure whether your personal branding is working. It encompasses whether the right people (the specific founders and decision-makers in your ICP) stop scrolling when your name appears in their feed.

Narrative Arc is the quarterly strategy. It includes what thesis is being pushed, which proof points go in which sequence, and how the content builds to a coherent argument over time rather than producing disconnected posts that go nowhere. Without a Narrative Arc, you’re posting a lot and just creating noise. This helps to narrow everything down into a case.

Hook Mechanics is the framework for the opening lines of your posts. They’re the specific structures that help you to earn attention from a cold audience using patterns that stop the scroll and avoid the mistakes that cause people to keep moving.

When you’re posting faster than quality can keep up with or producing content that’s too thin, you’re putting in more effort while your results are going down. This is the Content Vacuum. Your OS should be designed to catch this kind of pattern rather than just optimising your posts for output.

The Approval Process. You write the brief and approve the output. AI handles production, but the taste and thinking belong to you. The moment a reader can tell a machine wrote your content, trust drops.

Source Extraction is how you pull original thinking from your own calls, voice notes, wins, and losses, so the content is built from real material instead of Claude’s general sense of what founders are supposed to believe.

4. Skills

Skills are the verbs of your OS.

Each one has one job to do, like writing a hook or stripping each draft of your post of AI-isms.

Skills also build up on one another, since the output of one feeds directly into the next. Each Skill does one job deliberately.

When a Skill needs updating, you can change one file, and the whole system picks it up. You don’t have to rebuild a prompt every time something needs to change.

5. Playbooks

If Skills are individual actions your OS takes, Playbooks are sequences of these actions.

They chain the Skills together into a full end-to-end sequence for a specific content type, whether it’s LinkedIn posts, newsletters, or anything else that needs to be produced.

Each step feeds into the next, and the whole thing runs automatically from a single brief at the start of the session.

6. Workflows

Playbooks tell the AI what to do, while Workflows tell the human what to do.

No matter who is running your OS, they need to follow the process docs or the Workflow. This includes the approval process that every draft needs to pass through within the publishing handoff checklist.

Systems that mix Playbooks and Workflows up usually end up delegating important judgment calls to the AI, which drops operational details that need a human touch.

7. Memory

Memory is where a Claude project turns into a Personal Branding AI OS.

It tracks 3 things:

1. Corrections made to drafts

2. Patterns that produced strong results

3. Patterns that flopped

The corrections help to capture any voice rules that pop up through feedback or specific guidance that was given every time a draft was changed.

For instance, when you say “Never open with a statistic” or “Always name the framework”, these changes live in your OS permanently so that the AI doesn’t unlearn them after every session.

The patterns tell the AI what’s working based on the feedback it gets after a post is published. If a certain structure meant you got the right type of engagement or a specific story type helped to generate more DMs, the AI will lean into them.

The AI also learns from what didn’t work, like content types that look good on paper but end up doing nothing for your business.

Without Memory, every session you have starts fresh.

That means the corrections you made last week aren’t being implemented this week, and patterns your AI learned in month 2 aren’t guiding your content in month 5. So, your OS can produce content, but it can never improve.

8. The production queue

The production queue, or the Brief layer of your OS, is there to prevent half-baked ideas from turning into half-baked posts.

You can’t go straight from an idea to a prompt. A half-formed thought doesn’t turn into a strong post just because it gets typed into Claude.

In the production queue, every idea gets captured first, whether as a voice note after a call or a DM question worth answering publicly. Then it gets developed into a proper Post Brief before anything gets produced.

A Post Brief tells the AI the angle, the audience, the proof point, the framework it needs to use, and what the post is supposed to do (generate a DM, build authority with a specific ICP, etc.).

So while a prompt is an instruction, a Brief gives the AI something to work with to produce better output for your ICP.

9. Output

Everything that gets published gets filed in the Output folder by week, with the performance data attached. This gives your AI a record of what your brand has already published.

Output also feeds directly into Memory.

The end-of-week review reads exactly what went out and when and identifies what worked and why.

Those insights are absorbed by the Memory, so the system keeps learning what works and what doesn’t, without you having to tell it manually.

10. Sync

Sync keeps your OS up-to-date without requiring you to manually update everything.

It pulls ideas and articles you’ve tagged during the week, and pulls call transcripts and formats them for Story Bank updates. That way, real material from your sales conversations and client calls doesn’t stay locked in a recording that nobody goes back to listen to.

Without Sync, your OS will only ever know what someone has typed in. But when it’s added to the Context layer, it continuously takes in information from your personal brand to get better over time.

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How to Build Your Personal Brand AI OS

Instead of trying to build all 10 parts of your Personal Brand AI OS at once, focus on the 3 files you need to get started:

1. Context

2. Intelligence

3. Claude.md

Everything else will build as your system runs.

Step 1: Set up your Personal Brand OS folder

Create a folder called “personal-brand-os” or something similar, then open it in Claude Code or AI Content Pal.

That’s your OS, and every file you build from here will live inside it. The operating model or harness reads from this folder every time it runs, so whatever you put in here is what the AI works from.

Step 2: Build your Voice Card (Week 1)

This is the most important file in the OS. Everything else is useless if this is wrong.

Writing something about how you’d like to sound (“Direct. Conversational. No corporate jargon.”) means nothing to an AI.

You need to give it raw material.

• Pull 10-15 posts you’ve written that felt like you and copy them in.

• Record 5-10 minutes of yourself talking through a client problem using the same language you’d use in a client call. Transcribe it.

• Pull 5 DMs or email threads where you were writing without thinking too hard about what you sounded like.

Dump it all into a document and ask the AI to:

“Analyse everything here. Identify my sentence rhythm, the phrases I use often, how I structure an argument, how I open and close a point, my default level of formality, and any patterns that show up across multiple samples. Using this, build me a Voice Card that’s specific enough for another writer to reproduce it.”

Then test it. Ask the AI to write a short post about something you know really well.

If you’d need to rewrite more than 20% of it, the Voice Card needs more raw material.

Keep feeding it samples until the output needs as little correction as possible.

💡Your Voice Card is never really “finished”. It gets sharper every time you make a correction. But it does need to be functional before you start producing content with your OS.

Step 3: Fill the Story Bank (Week 1)

If you rush this, you’ll end up with summaries. Summaries are useless.

Go through your sales calls, client wins, failures, pricing decisions, hiring mistakes, and even breakthroughs you’ve had. Build 10-15 stories before trying to produce any content.

Without a deep Story Bank, every post is going to rely on the AI’s general idea of what a founder’s experience looks like.

A usable story has 4 things:

1. What was happening (specific context)

2. What occurred (the event)

3. What it produced (a concrete result)

4. What it means (the framework or belief it created)

❎ An unusable story

“I once took on a client I knew wasn’t right for my business, and it nearly destroyed the team.”

This is too vague and gives your AI nothing to work from.

“Once” doesn’t tell it the when.

Why wasn’t the client right?

Why did you take the client on?

How did it nearly destroy your team?

📖 A usable story

“We signed a £ 12k/month client in 2022 because the cash looked good. Their brief changed 3 times in the first month. In week 6, two of our best people were threatening to quit. We parted ways with the client in month 4 and refunded £8k. We wrote our ‘no misaligned clients’ rule that week [explanation of the rule]. It’s the reason we turn away around 1 in 4 inbound leads now.”

This version of the same story could carry an entire post (or three) on its own. And it gives your AI more context, more understanding of how you think, more knowledge of your brand, and a framework it can reference in future posts.

Step 4: Write your ICP file as a real person (Week 1)

An ICP isn’t “Founders with £1-5M revenue, 5-20 employees, professional services.”

The format that works:

• Who they are: A 42-year-old agency founder with £3M revenue. Team of 12. Bills at £1,200 per day. The business runs on their reputation, but she’s barely visible outside of her network.

• What they’re trying to do: Build inbound so deals aren’t dependent on who they had lunch with last month.

• What they’ve already tried: Posted on LinkedIn for 4 months. Got engagement from peers, but zero client interest. Hired a ghostwriter. Got posts that didn’t sound like them. Cancelled after 6 months.

• What they believe about the problem: They need to post more consistently. LinkedIn doesn’t work for their business.

• What they actually need to hear: Their foundation is wrong. They need a Personal Brand AI OS.

When the AI “knows” the person you’re targeting, it stops producing content for a vague audience and starts writing for someone specific enough. The right reader should think, “This is written for me.”

Step 5: Write Claude.md last (Week 2)

Starting with Claude.md seems like the logical thing to do. But Claude.md routes Claude to the right files for each task. If the files aren’t populated yet, there’s nothing to route to.

Once your Context is built, write a Claude.md that does 3 things:

1. Names the brand and ICP in one or two lines

2. Lists the rules (tone, formatting, what to avoid, etc)

3. Routes Claude to the right files for different jobs (For LinkedIn posts, read context/voice.md and context/icp.md first. For Story Bank updates, apply the four-part story format.)

Keep it short. This file is going to be read before every action, so it should be scannable in 30 seconds.

Step 6: Run your first brief (Week 2)

Don’t add the Intelligence layer or build skills just yet.

Take one real idea, like something you said on a call this week, and build it into a Post Brief manually. Include the angle, who it’s for, what proof backs it up, and what the post needs to do.

Run it through your OS with just the Voice Card and ICP loaded.

Read what comes back.

That’s your diagnostic.

If it sounds generic, the Voice Card needs more raw material.

If it makes the right argument in the wrong voice, the ICP is fine, but the Voice needs work.

If the argument itself is weak, the Story Bank doesn’t have enough specific proof yet.

The first brief tells you what to fix. If you build infrastructure on top of these layers, it’ll be harder to pinpoint if something isn’t working later.

Step 7: Add the Intelligence layer (Week 3)

Once your OS can produce a first draft that sounds roughly like you, load your methodology frameworks like the Narrative Arc and Hook Mechanics into the Intelligence folder.

These don’t need to be built from scratch. They come with the OS we build.

What matters is making sure Claude.md points to them at the right moments.

Playbooks reference Feed Salience when choosing angles or the Narrative Arc when you’re building a quarterly content plan.

This turns your system into something that produces content that adds to your business, in your voice.

Step 8: Skills and Playbooks (Week 4 onwards)

Skills and Playbooks are mostly inherited from My Content Pal’s library. But brand-specific add-ons are built as they’re needed.

Workflows get written once and updated when processes change.

Briefs, Output, Sync, and Memory start empty and fill up as your system runs.

These are the multipliers that enable your OS to compound. But if they’re added to an empty Context layer, they’re going to produce nothing worthwhile.

What the first month looks like

Week 1 is entirely spent on Context, with no content production.
It’s adding your Voice Card, ICP, Story Bank, and Positioning.

Week 2 is Claude.md and the first diagnostic briefs. Every correction you make to a draft goes straight into memory/corrections.md.

Week 3 is the Intelligence layer and the first Narrative Arc.

It’s the ideas you’ll be pushing and the frameworks you’ll end up naming this quarter.

Week 4 is your first production run from brief to published post. This is when your OS is live.

From here, one habit matters more than anything: the end-of-week review.

Read what went out and log what worked in patterns-that-work.md.

Log what flopped in patterns-that-flop.md.

Log every correction in corrections.md.

Your OS won’t automatically compound. Someone needs to run this review every week without exception. And, really, that’s the only discipline this system needs. Everything else is handled on its own.

The Operating Model

The Operating Model is the outside view of your OS, including who runs it, what it runs on, and how a piece of content moves from a rough idea to a published post.

The OS

Your OS is where your intellectual property (your voice, ICP, frameworks, memory, etc.) lives in a portable markdown.

The rest of the system depends on this, but it’s also the piece that most agencies never give you ownership of. That’s why the agency graveyard exists.

You spend 12 months with a ghostwriting team before cancelling the retainer and walking away with nothing to show for it except a folder of posts you can’t reproduce because the context that they came out of is in someone else’s head.

The Harness

The Harness is the interface that loads your OS.

AI Content Pal is built for teams, with a clean interface that’s designed for founders and operators who want to run the OS without needing to learn how to code.

Claude Code is great for more direct and technical work, and gives you maximum control. This is designed for founders who want to see exactly how the system runs and be able to change it themselves.

The Harness is swappable. So when better interfaces pop up (and they will), you can load your OS files into a new one.

That prevents your investment in building your own OS from depreciating when tools change, which is why the OS isn’t tied to one tool.

Your files move. The platform doesn’t matter.

The Operator

Someone still has to run it. A real human needs to take the brief, approve the output, and hit publish on a post.

Founders

This gives you high autonomy and full ownership of the process at the cost of around 2-3 focused hours a week. It works well if you want to stay close to your content and treat it more like a strategic activity, and it’s viable long-term if you have the time.

Personal Branding Assistants (PBAs)

A PBA is a VA who is totally trained on the harness you’re using and on your OS. They run the system day-to-day and manage the production queue, from producing first drafts to presenting the work for approval.

You review and approve. The PBA handles everything else.

A done-for-you team

The team is fully outsourced. Once you approve your team, they run everything.

This is ideal when you’re billing at a rate where your time is literally too expensive to spend on production.

How content moves through the system

When content is produced, it moves through the three rings in a sequence.

The Operator takes the brief and names the angle, the audience, the proof point, and the format. It gets developed into a Post Brief and queued for production.

Then, the Harness loads your OS. Your system reads the instructions, pulls the relevant Context files, checks the Memory for applicable corrections and patterns, and runs the matching Playbook. That’s when it produces a first draft that matches your brand.

Lastly, the Operator reviews the content. They check for voice accuracy and cut anything off-brand. Once everything checks out, they approve and give it back to the Harness. The platform formats and routes the content, applying the necessary formatting before publishing it or handing the file back for scheduling.

The output gets filed, and the end-of-week review updates the Memory.

Your system keeps learning your brand with every draft, and the quality will keep improving post after post as a result.

What Progress Looks Like

The real measure of whether a Personal Brand AI OS is working is how sharp the layer underneath your content is getting.

Can your PB AI OS produce a first draft that sounds like you without a full rewrite?

If every draft still needs a lot of work before it’s usable, the Voice Card isn’t landing correctly.

Is the Story Bank full of specific, usable proof?

If it’s too vague about your experience, your stories aren’t specific enough to carry a post on their own or too abstract to use directly.

How many of your real sales-call objections have been turned into content?

How many frameworks have you named? Is the Narrative Arc for this quarter clear enough to create a brief from? If not, your AI OS can produce content, but it’s only working with half the picture.

All of these things compound, so a founder with 400 followers, a strong Voice Card, a deep Story Bank, and 8 named frameworks is in a better position than a founder with 4,000 followers and nothing to show for it.

2️⃣ The two-iteration rule

A calibrated PB AI OS produces drafts that are ready to be approved after 2 rounds of corrections or fewer.

If you’re still rewriting every draft from scratch, the Voice Card needs work before any more content is produced.

Stop Prompting. Start Building.

Personal branding depends on leverage.

The question is never “How do I produce more content?”

It’s “How do I build something that captures what I already have and turn it into the authority and the pipeline I don’t have time to manually build?”

A Personal Brand AI OS is an answer to that question.

Posting consistently is what comes out.

Personal branding is what goes in.

Your OS is the in.

If you’re ready to build your OS, there are two ways to do it with My Content Pal.

Build it yourself. If you want to build your own OS with the right methodology behind it, we have a course that walks you through each step, from Context to Memory.

You build it. You own it. You run it.

Have us build it for you. When your time is limited, our done-for-you service builds the full OS for you. Your Voice Card, ICP, Story Bank, Narrative Deck, and everything in between are in place and ready to run from day one.

You approve. We do the rest.

We’re looking for people to trial our new "with you" programme. If you want us to build your own Personal Brand AI OS, book a call with me here:

Let's Build Your Personal Brand AI OS

- Craig

Not things you read and agreed with or frameworks you borrowed from someone else.

I’m talking about actual ideas that came from your own actual experiences.

Ideas that only you could have.

If the answer is “Not many,” you’ve found your problem.

Most founders I talk to are asking the same thing these days:

“How do I create original content when AI can write anything I can write?”

It feels like the obvious question, but it’s not the one that actually matters.

The one that hits closer to home is:

“Why am I running out of things to say?”

Because you’ve been living the same week on repeat for six months.

Information is everywhere now and basically free. AI can remix it endlessly.

What it can’t do is sit in the sales call where a prospect says something that completely reframes how you think about your offer.

It can’t notice the pattern across five client conversations that suddenly becomes your best piece of content.

It can’t make the pricing decision you agonised over. Or feel the quiet satisfaction when it turns out you were right.

Those personal experiences and the problems you solve are your edge.

That raw material becomes your content.

Meaning, the fastest way out of that “nothing to say” rut is to stop relying on the same old stories and start creating some new ones.

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Three questions. Be honest with yourself.

When you’re running low on ideas, these three questions will help you figure out exactly where you’re missing the mark.

1. Are you exposing yourself to enough variance to generate new experiences?

Unique ideas come from exposure to new problems and unfamiliar situations.

But most founders stay in the same bubble:

• The same workspace

• The same handful of people on Slack

• The same weekly cycles

• The same decision patterns

Then wonder why they run out of things to say.

If AI has flattened information access, then variance is the new leverage.

Where in your calendar is variance scheduled?

If I looked at your last 30 days, how many new environments, people, and problems did you actually collide with? If the number is low, that explains the content drought.

2. Are you spending time in the room where things are breaking?

I’ve found the clients who struggle the most with new ideas or explain concepts with real depth are often the ones who’ve been removed from hands-on client work for more than two years.

When this happen, I often end up talking to someone on their team who’s still in the trenches. That’s the person with the current, lived context.

You need to keep some proximity to the actual work if you want to speak about it with authority and freshness.

In my experience, two years is roughly the longest you can step away before your insights start to lose their edge. Except for industries that are currently evolving (e.g. SEO → GEO).

The founders with the best ideas are the ones who:

• Take sales calls

• Occasionally sit in on client delivery

• Read unfiltered feedback

• Listen to confused or hesitant prospects

• See what systems break when scaling

AI cannot get the context that comes from being in those situations yourself.

Most of those moments hurt in the moment. Business tends to be uncomfortable a lot of the time, and many of the pain points you encounter are shared by hundreds or thousands of other founders.

The difficulties you work through become your content moat, something that anyone else (even any AI) can’t replicate authentically.

So ask yourself honestly: are you collecting enough of those real scars right now, or do you avoid most of them?

3. What real bets or experiments did you run in the last 30 days?

Unique ideas follow this path:

Test → Feedback → Synthesis → Insight → Content

If you haven’t tested a hypothesis in the last month, you haven’t generated new experience. You’ve simply recycled the same old lessons you already knew.

Without experiments, your content becomes commentary. But when you experiment, you have evidence-based material that carries more weight.

A lot of founders avoid this because they don’t want to be proven wrong in public (or even privately). That’s why their content starts sounding dated or repetitive.

Real bets bring volatility, something most small businesses are built to keep as low as possible.

To even run a worthwhile experiment, you usually need a few things lined up:

• A cash buffer so a failure doesn’t sink the ship

• A bit of operational breathing room so the team doesn’t implode

• Enough emotional bandwidth to handle uncertainty

• Quick-enough decision-making so you can adjust on the fly

Most businesses are running thin on at least two or three of those.

So if you’re feeling stuck right now, don’t open another blank doc.

Instead, ask: “What can I test this week, even if it’s small?”

Every real test gives you more to say than a hundred polished posts ever will.

How To Generate Raw Material

Let me share the process for generating the raw material that you can turn into content.

1. Run more real reps with real humans

You’re already creating content.

The moat gets built by noticing patterns that other people miss.

The best creators write patterns they observed from talking to 200 humans.

So, if you want the tap of ideas to open wider, increase the volume of:

• Client audits

• Intro calls

• Nurture conversations

• Customer interviews

• Founder-to-founder exchanges

You’ll notice patterns emerge quickly.

• Three prospects ask the same question? Write about it.

• Five clients hit the same roadblock? Document how you solved it.

• Someone objects to your pricing in a way that makes you rethink your positioning? That’s a framework forming in real time.

This is the most reliable source of unique ideas.

2. Solve harder problems than your market

The market listens to whoever is furthest along the path they’re on.

When you take on the problems your audience is terrified of facing, your content automatically becomes more valuable.

Here are some examples:

• Scaling output by 5x a month

• Building a more effective hiring system

• Fixing retention collapse

• Restructuring pricing without losing clients

• Doubling MRR in 90 days

If YOU are solving harder problems, you automatically create rarer insights.

Your lived pain becomes your audience’s shortcut.

3. Deliberately put yourself in uncomfortable positions

You want to generate a unique context?

Put yourself in situations where you’re uncomfortable:

• Take a sales call for a new offer you’ve never sold before

• Audit a company doing 10x your revenue

• Host a live workshop where people can challenge your thinking

• Chat to 5 founders who failed at what you’re trying to do

• Join a mastermind where you’re the least experienced person

• Hire for a role you don’t fully understand yet

Comfort breeds clichés, so do one of these this month and document what you learn.

That’s your content sorted for the next couple of weeks.

4. Build systems that Break, then rebuild them

Every time a system breaks, it creates:

• A story

• A lesson

• A framework

• A “How I solved it” post

• A “Never do this” warning

• A “Here’s what changed” insight

Those operational problems can then be turned into authentic posts that carry weight because they’re not theoretical.

Other founders read them and think, “That’s exactly what I’m dealing with right now,” or “Okay, at least I know what not to do.”

AI can describe best practices all day, but it can’t tell the story of the actual failure and the fix that followed.

That gap is your advantage.

5. Consume less content, observe more reality

Most people who create content spend way too much time consuming other people’s content.

They scroll feeds, read newsletters, watch videos, then try to remix what they just saw into something “original.”

That’s how you end up sounding the exact same as everyone else.

The better move is to spend less time consuming and far more time observing what’s actually happening around you.

You get more unique ideas from:

• One difficult conversation

• One broken system

• One unhappy client

• One hiring mistake

• One pricing experiment gone wrong

• One sales objection you couldn’t overcome

Than from reading 50 tweets, 10 newsletters, or 3 books.

Because what’s happening in your own business is primary source material.

It’s unfiltered, current, and specific to your context.

You’re in the trenches, and that’s where the best data is.

So, How Do You Beat ChatGPT?

If you want to produce content that AI can’t imitate, increase the stakes in your working life:

• Make bigger bets

• Scale faster than you know how

• Talk to clients you’re scared of

• Pitch offers you don’t feel ready for

• Hire before you’re comfortable

• Break your own systems on purpose

• Audit companies bigger than yours

• Get in rooms you feel underqualified for

Your lived experience becomes uncopiable.

Become the kind of founder whose everyday work naturally produces material worth sharing.

- Craig

So you do what most people do.

You start by rewriting your hook. Then you test a different format. Hell, you may even hire someone to punch it up a little for you.

But nothing you do is going to move the needle until you realise it’s time for serious change. And by that, I mean doing something structurally different.

That’s where a little something I like to call “pairings” comes in.

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What Pairings Are (and Why They Matter)

Every time your audience sees your name, their brain is making associations with you.

They aren’t doing it consciously. It happens automatically through constant exposure.

The idea that they arrive at over time is totally dependent on what you’ve paired yourself with.

Alex Hormozi describes it as the bouquet.

In this analogy, flowers are associations people have made with you, and you’re the person holding them.

These associations come from things like:

• What you post about

• Who you reference

• How your profile looks

• The language you repeat

• The environments you’re seen in

If you manage to tie the right flowers together (consistently), your audience’s brain learns a shortcut.

Your bouquet isn’t going to get better by adding more flowers, though. You’ve got to start pruning the wrong ones instead.

I’ve come across 7 pairing types in the strongest personal brands on LinkedIn. And I learned that the people who are converting inbound are stacking six to eight of them, deliberately.

1. Identity Pairing

This is all about pairing yourself with who your audience already believes they are.

Labels take care of this pretty quickly.

The right phrase creates a sort of belonging before they even read your posts all the way through.

“Solopreneur”

That’s it. That’s all he used.

The idea of a “solopreneur” wasn’t even a thing when Justin Welsh started building his brand. He adopted it as an identity signal before the word had any mainstream recognition.

Because of that, his ICP (young entrepreneurs figuring things outs) saw themselves in his content.

How to achieve it

Write down exactly who your ICP believes they are, and think out of the box.

Ignore their job titles. Think about a label that they would want to use.

Then, make that label visible in your bio and the language you repeat.

You’re not describing yourself here. Instead, you’re letting them recognise themselves in you.

2. Aspirational Identity Pairing

If you shift focus a little, you can pair yourself with who your audience wants to become.

In my opinion, this is the more powerful version.

With this pairing, you’re showing your ICP who they’re actively trying to be in the future.

Sahil’s audience is made up of high achievers who want to leave their day jobs behind (on their terms).

He left his finance career on Wall Street and documented his transition into his dream life in real time. And, rather than telling people it was possible, he became the proof himself.

How to achieve it

You need to start being specific about the future version of your ICP.

“Successful” ❌

“SaaS CEO who closed $500k from inbound alone last quarter” ✅

Before you can really make the transition, you need to ask yourself:

Does your content prove that version of life is achievable?

If it doesn’t, that’s the gap you need to fill.

3. Authority Halo Pairing

Imagine borrowing someone’s status and using that to build your own. That’s exactly what this is.

You don’t need to actually know someone to do this, either.

If you’ve been on LinkedIn for more than a day, you’ll have seen the thousands of “What Hormozi’s pricing model taught me” posts.

The people who post these breakdowns don’t know Alex Hormozi personally. They just had something to say about his content (and benefited from his ICP’s trust in him).

Let’s use Hormozi as the example, though…

I found all of these accounts namedropping Alex Hormozi in the last 24 hours alone.

And I can bet that they got some serious credibility just from talking about his frameworks.

How to achieve it

1. Find someone your ICP already trusts

2. Break down their framework publicly or analyse a decision they made

3. Pick out a few more people

4. Disagree with their takes and explain why

5. Post your content

6. Use the status you gain to build your own trust

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4. Environmental Pairing

The physical environments you’re seen in tell your audience a lot about your life.

Look at Matt Gray.

Almost everything he posts ties back to the idea of being out in nature.

Just by seeing those images, your brain has made the association he’s learned how to escape the chaos. He isn’t sitting behind a desk. He has freedom.

If that’s how powerful an image can be, imagine what that would train your brain to believe over months of seeing his content.

How to achieve it

Look at the last 10 photos or videos you’ve posted. What does the background condition your audience to feel?

You want to pick a consistent environment that shows (not tells) your ICP the life your work can produce and start posting from there.

After all, a picture’s worth a thousand words, right?

5. Insider Truth Pairing

I want to be known for saying the thing that everyone thinks, but that nobody actually has the balls to say.

That’s one of my pairings. And I’m super intentional with it.

I want people to see me and think, “This guy gets it. This guy gets me.”

The most popular posts are usually opinions. People love rallying together for (or against) something.

This pairing is about the whispered frustrations of your ICP. It positions you as an insider, as someone who shares their pain and who can help them eliminate it.

Check out a post I wrote:

I’m calling out how my ICP feels. They don’t want to waste their lives behind a screen. They actually want to live.

How to achieve it

Start by writing down three things your ICP believes about their industry but would never admit to.

Pick the sharpest one and say it directly. Cut all the bullsh*t. Cut all the noise.

Then, write a post that vocalises what your ICP thinks at 11pm on a Sunday.

It’ll position you as the one honest person in the feed. And that’s a more sustainable position than being the best educator.

6. Behavioural Residue Pairing

You want to make your invisible wins visible.

Jonah Berger calls it behavioural residue. This turns your “I Voted” sticker from a private action into a public signal.

Your post about your midday walk does the same job.

It doesn’t say “I’ve made it”. It actually demonstrates it.

This post from Iman Gadzhi is about the cost of keeping up appearances, right?

Sure. If you want to look at the technicalities of it.

But what do you see? Look at the image he used. Expensive suit, nice car…

It shows off his success without him having to scream it. And his brand is super consistent.

The images of jets and penthouses he posts are deliberate residue for an audience that’s buying into a version of life.

How to achieve it

Make a mental note of what your ICP is ultimately buying into.

Do they want time freedom? Or are they after financial control?

Whatever it is, post a private moment that implies you’ve already achieved that outcome. Your ICP doesn’t want to see the work or the process behind it. They want to see the output.

7. Anti-Pairing (Strategic Pruning)

Let’s tie back to Alex Hormozi’s idea of the bouquet. Forget forming new pairings. You can make your existing pairings more impactful by refusing certain associations.

For instance, I watched tons of the creators on this list actively prune the content that didn’t fit their bouquet.

But one person in particular stuck out to me the most.

Instead of silently removing posts and trying to quietly remove the association of being a ‘female entrepreneur’, Lara Acosta cut ties with that pairing by telling her audience that’s what she was doing.

It was a bold move. But it worked.

Nobody associates her with her gender anymore. They think of her as an example of what hard work and determination can help you achieve.

How to achieve it

There are way too many founders who never prune their bouquet because dumping out content over and over again feels like progress.

Reality check: It’s not.

Go through your last 20 posts and mark anything that doesn’t directly support the identity you’re building.

Be brutal, because every off-brand post trains your audience to associate you with something you didn’t choose.

How the Strongest Brands Stack Their Pairings

All of the biggest brands I follow have around six to eight associations that they consistently and deliberately stack up.

Here are my top three:

Alex Hormozi: Discipline. Anti-pairing. Authority halo. Insider truths. Warrior archetype. Industrial aesthetic. Behavioural residue through restraint.

Matt Gray: Environmental. Aesthetic. Discipline. Aspirational identity. Anti-hustle insider truth. Outcome pairing through visible freedom.

Iman Gadzhi: Luxury aesthetic. Wealth outcome. Rebel archetype. Scarcity. Aspirational identity.

If you want to really sell your personal brand, it’s time to put your effort into doing the same thing.

- Craig

My answer is always the same: No.

That might surprise you, coming from someone who runs a personal branding agency.

But personal branding only works when you have something worth amplifying.

I see it every day. Founders with broken marketing funnels dropping $3K/month on ghostwriters, praying for a miracle.

They think personal branding will save them because Facebook ads didn’t work. Cold email flopped. And their webinars convert at 0.2%.

So they bet everything on content because it looks like the strategy that works for everyone else right now.

I get the thinking.

But the timing is usually waaay off. T

hey try to build influence before they build proof.

So when IS the right time?

Well, it depends entirely on where you are.

I break it down into two stages. Most founders are stuck in the first one.

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Stage 1: Finding Your Voice ($0 – $500K/year)

This is where you’re still finding product–market fit, proving results, and shaping your worldview.

You’re not ready to “build a brand” yet because you’re just finding your voice.

That means:

• Post to learn, not to teach. Use content to explore your own thinking, share experiments, and ask questions. People connect with curiosity more than they connect with confident advice from someone still finding their footing.

• Share your journey, not your “expertise.” Talk about what you’re doing right now: the wins, the failures, and the messy middle.

• Build in public and test ideas as you go. Throw thoughts out there and see what gets a response. You’re finding your voice but also learning what your audience cares about.

At this stage, don’t expect your content to deliver a steady stream of leads.

I’d recommend keeping the daily time commitment low, roughly 30 minutes:

Talk about what you’re building.
Share what’s working.
Ask questions.
Engage with others in your space.
Reply to a few comments.
Draft one short post or note
Think about what landed (or didn’t).

I find people in this stage are often so desperate to make LI work as a growth channel that they chase “hacks” and become obsessed with “growth content.”

Let me tell you now: This pretty much always fails.

If you want to win on LI, you need to play the long game.

Reframe what you expect from this first stage, and you’ll feel less pressure to get leads right away. You’ll move at a realistic pace and focus on what actually helps you grow.

Stage 2: Scaling Your Voice ($500K+/year)

At this stage, you’ve got the case studies, the measurable results, and the lessons from actually doing the work at scale.

Now it’s time to shift your content from exploration to execution.

That means:

• Your voice is sharper.

• Your lessons are hard-earned.

• Your brand becomes a revenue driver.

This is also the stage when it makes sense to invest real time and money into your content: 2+ hours per day, or delegate it to a team that gets it.

This is when a ghostwriter actually earns their fee. Because now everything is backed by real proof, and you’ve developed enough of your own thinking to hand off.

Word of warning: Just don’t try to skip straight here.

That’s the biggest mistake I see founders make: hiring a ghostwriter while they’re still in the proof-building stage, still nailing their offer or first case studies.

Posting during that earlier phase has value, of course, just not the kind you might expect.

It lays the groundwork, sharpening your skills and helping you get a better read on what your audience wants.

But once you’ve built something real (clients, results, a clear offer), those same efforts start paying off differently. Your posts carry proof. They attract opportunities, partnerships, and talent because they’re rooted in lived experience.

That’s where the ROI curve bends upward. When personal branding starts to multiply your effort instead of just express it.

Why Personal Branding Is Harder Than It Seems

Here’s something you might not want to hear:

The skill gap between a founder who posts occasionally and one with a real personal brand is like comparing someone who jogs to an Olympic sprinter.

We’re talking:

• Level 2 vs Level 10 content quality

• Random thoughts vs strategic narratives

• Hoping for likes vs engineering trust

When you’re under $500K/year, spending 2 hours daily on content is a terrible ROI. You could be:

• Talking to customers

• Fixing your offer

• Building systems

• Testing channels that convert faster

Those activities build the foundation that makes personal branding work later.

The Proof Problem

You know why Hormozi blew up? He built Gym Launch to $100M first.

You know why Rogan became Rogan? He had decades of comedy and commentary experience.

You know why my content resonates? I’ve spent years in this industry.

I built 3 agencies, served some of the biggest marketing agencies, and have been in the industry for 10+ years now. I understand this world.

So, I can confidently say that the personal brand comes AFTER the proof. Not before.

Your audience will see right through you if you don’t.

So, What Should You Do Instead?

If you’re under $500K/year:

1. Fix your fundamentals first:

   • Pick one marketing channel and focus on creating core material; make every new piece better than the last

   • Test and refine your messaging over time

   • Build case studies that sell themselves

2. Post to document, not dominate:

   • Share what you’re learning

   • Ask questions publicly

   • Engage with people ahead of you

3. Build your skills:

   • Write daily (even if you don’t publish)

   • Study creators who resonate with you

   • Find your natural voice through reps

Once you pass £500K and have real results to talk about, go all in.

Bring in help when it fits and let your personal brand become a true business asset.

What if You’re Somewhere in the Middle?

For founders in that transition zone (making good money but not ready to hire a full ghostwriting team), My Content Pal’s built something different.

Instead of doing it for you, we teach you HOW to do it:

Month 1: We Write for You

First, we hop on calls together to define your strategy and surface your unique angles.

We add ideas to your personal Notion dashboard and run bi-weekly calls to keep drawing out new insights and stories from your current work.

We then write your first 10 posts. You see what “great” looks like and start absorbing it.

Month 2: You Write, We Edit

You draft, and we shape your voice, tighten your storytelling, and build your writing rhythm.

Month 3: We Give You the System

You get the AI framework and workflow we use internally, so you can keep showing up consistently without relying on anyone else.

The goal is to help you develop your voice and master content early, so when you’re ready to scale, the foundation is already there.

The bottom line is this: Everyone should have some presence online these days, but not everyone needs or should be building a full personal brand

Yet.

Figure out which stage you’re in. If you’re stuck in Stage 1, build proof before you build influence.

And when the time comes to make that shift?

We can show you exactly how to turn your hard-won expertise into content that keeps working for you over time.

But only once you’ve earned it 😉

Craig

A lot of you replied with “okay but HOW do I be funny without becoming the numpty who gets destroyed in some Gen Z’s Slack channel?”

Or worse…. NO ENGAGEMENT. Not even hate.

FAIR. Nobody wants that.

And that’s why I did something really weird.

I went through every type of B2B meme I’ve posted, seen my clients post or watched die a painful public death on LinkedIn… and I ranked them all.

On a scale of :
“this meme got me a sales call” to “I lost 3 followers, got a hate comment, and my boss forced me to delete the post”.

(and yes I’m including my best and worst memes too lol)

One stat before we start, because it’s too good to skip: Kantar tested thousands of ads and found that only 33% even attempt humor. But 50% of their Creative Effectiveness Award winners use it. Read that again.

Half the winners are funny. Two-thirds of brands are too scared to try.

Are you going to be part of the winners or the losers?

… thought so. Let’s begin.

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🏆 S TIER: “I feel personally attacked”

The meme so specific to your ICP’s daily suffering that they screenshot it, send it to a colleague, and go “this is literally us.”

Nobody else gets the joke. That’s the whole point.

• When a founder sees a meme about waiting 51 days for a procurement approval and their eye twitches… that’s S tier.

• When a sales leader sees a meme about the CRM nobody actually updates and tags their entire team… S tier.

• When someone DMs it to their business partner with zero context because they both just know… S tier.

This is the dark funnel at work. You’ll never track that DM in your analytics. But you’ll feel it in your pipeline.

Why it hits: Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins coined "meme" in 1976. His point: ideas spread through culture the same way genes spread through biology. The strongest survive. S-tier memes survive because they're so specific they feel like insider knowledge. Sharing one makes the sender look smart, in-the-know, and part of the tribe. That's what Berger calls "social currency": the most powerful sharing trigger there is.

The test: If someone outside your industry sees it and says "I don't get it": congratulations. You nailed it.

A TIER: “Tag someone who does this”

Workplace humour. Marketing vs. sales. The meeting that should have been an email. Your boss’s boss’s boss asking for “a quick update” at 4:57 PM on a Friday.

This is where Gong lives. Where Kinso’s “POV: Marketing team meets Software Engineers” gets millions of views. Where Hootsuite and Asana and every B2B brand with a personality posts the stuff that makes LinkedIn feel briefly human.

A tier is your reach engine. It won’t close a deal directly. But it puts your brand in front of 10x the audience. Every view builds a tiny layer of familiarity and trust.

Research on brand humanisation found that just sounding casual and human (versus corporate) increases both engagement and purchase intent. A-tier memes do that at scale, whether you realise it or not.

The test: A colleague in a completely different industry sends it to you. “Lol this is so true.” Broad, but earned.

B TIER: “Okay that’s pretty good”

You take a trending meme format (Coldplay kiss cam, ChatGPT caricature, Punch the Monkey, by the time you read this it’ll be something new..) and remix it with your industry’s angle.

The format does half the work because people already know how to read it. Zero cognitive load. Fast laugh. Quick share.

But here’s why B tier isn’t higher: timing is everything and most of you are too slow.

By the time your meme has been through your approval chain, your manager’s “hmm can we soften this,” and your designer’s “I’ll get to it Thursday”, the format is already in hospice care. A trending template posted three weeks late signals the opposite of cultural awareness.

As the Content Marketing Institute put it: the point of memes these days isn’t to go viral. It’s to go relevant.

The test: If you have to explain the template to anyone on your team, you’re already late. Close the doc. Move on. Wait for the next one.

C TIER: “...Sure”

The “Raise your hand if you love coffee ☕” of B2B memes.

It’s not wrong. It’s not offensive. It’s just... beige. A mildly relatable observation about Monday mornings or inbox zero, paired with a stock meme image that could be posted by a SaaS company, a coffee brand, or a dentist’s office without changing a single word.

You’ll get a few polite likes. A “so true 😂” from someone who comments on everything. But nobody is screenshotting this. Nobody is DMing it. Nobody is thinking about your brand 30 seconds later.

Why it flatlines: Remember Berger’s research: contentment is a low-arousal emotion that suppresses sharing. C-tier memes make people feel mildly amused. Mildly amused people don’t take action. They sit still. They scroll. Your meme enters their brain and exits through the same door without touching a single wall.

The test: Could a coffee brand post this? Could a fitness account? Could literally anyone? Then it’s C tier. You haven’t earned specificity yet.

D TIER: “Who approved this”

You know the one.

Someone on the team read an article about meme marketing and decided “we should do memes.” So they took a product feature, put it on a meme template, added the company logo in the corner, and bolted a CTA on the bottom.

“When you finally find a CRM that syncs with your calendar 😏 [Learn more: link]”

No.

This is the B2B equivalent of your dad dabbing at a wedding. The intention is good. The execution makes everyone in the room look at their shoes.

People can smell forced humour from three scrolls away. Not only does it fail to land, it also erodes trust. One creative director said it best: “It’s not about turning your LinkedIn into a meme page. It’s about using humor strategically to humanize your brand.” The second it feels like a tactic, it’s dead.

The test: Remove the logo. Would anyone know (or care) that a brand made this? Would anyone share it? If the answer is no to both, D tier. Start over.

❌ F TIER: “Delete this before the client sees it”

The hall of shame. The meme crimes. The things that get screenshotted for the wrong reason and passed around group chats with the caption “look what [brand] just posted lmaooo.”

You’re in F tier if you:

→ Slapped your logo on a trending template three weeks after it peaked and thought nobody would notice (they noticed)

→ Joked about layoffs, data breaches, or a recession during an actual layoff / breach / recession

→ Used a meme format from a subreddit that none of your audience has ever visited

→ Overexplained the joke. With a disclaimer. In parentheses. (”This is not financial advice. Please consult your CFO. Terms and conditions apply.”)

→ Punched down at a specific role or team instead of punching at a shared frustration

→ Posted something edgy at 11 PM, woke up at 7 AM, and felt your stomach drop

A fintech company once posted “When your API crashes faster than the stock market” during a recession. The engagement was not the kind they wanted.

The rule: If anyone on your team says “this might be too much”... they’re right. The 24-hour rule exists: make the meme, sleep on it, look at it with fresh eyes. If it still feels funny and safe? Post it. If there’s a flicker of doubt? Kill it.

HOW TO MOVE UP

Okay. You’ve located yourself on the tier list. (Be honest. I know most of you are somewhere between C and D. That’s where everyone starts. That’s where I started.)

Here’s the cheat code for climbing:

C → B: Get faster. Stop running memes through a three-person approval chain and a legal review. Build a “meme safe zone” - pre-approved topics, tones, and boundaries your team can riff within without calling a meeting. The best memes are reactive. If it takes you a week, the moment is gone.

B → A: Get more specific. Stop making memes for “professionals.” Start making memes for your professionals. What’s the inside joke in your industry? The whispered frustration? The thing everyone thinks but nobody posts about? That’s your material.

A → S: Get braver. S tier feels risky. The meme is specific enough to alienate anyone who isn’t your audience. It calls out a real pain point by name. Most brands never reach S tier because S tier requires you to stop trying to please everyone. And most marketing teams are hardwired to do the opposite.

THE TIMING CHEAT SHEET

A meme’s tier isn’t fixed. Timing can move a B to an A.. or an A to an F.

• Trending formats: You have 24-48 hours. Max. If your approval process takes longer than that, build a faster one or don’t play in this category.

• Niche pain-point humor (S tier): Timeless. The procurement process will still be broken next quarter. The CRM will still be a mess in six months. Post these whenever. They don’t expire because the pain doesn’t expire.

• The hidden variable: When your audience scrolls matters. Study your analytics. Tuesday 8:47 AM when the VP of Marketing is avoiding her inbox? Gold. Friday 5 PM when she’s already mentally on weekend? Graveyard.

THE 5-SECOND TASTE TEST

Before you hit post, run through these. Fast.

1. Would my ICP screenshot this and send it to someone? No? It’s C tier or below. Back to the drawing board.

2. Am I making fun of a shared frustration or a specific person? Punch at the situation. Never down.

3. Is this still funny without my logo on it? If yes: good, it’s genuinely funny. Now make sure the brand is still somewhere in the picture.

4. 4. Is the format still breathing? If you have to explain the template, it’s already in the ground.

5. 5. Would I be embarrassed if a prospect brought this up on a sales call? If yes, pause. If “slightly nervous but weirdly proud”.. that’s the sweet spot. That’s where all the good stuff lives.

YOUR MOVE

Next time you’re about to post something safe, polished and forgettable... stop. Ask yourself where it lands on the tier list.

Then ask: what would the S-tier version of this look like?

That’s the post worth making.

- Craig

…and you opened with ‘I am thrilled to announce…’.

Or ‘In the ever-evolving digital landscape…’

Or ‘You don’t have a content problem…’

… and you have no idea why it didn’t pop off.

But you will by the end of this newsletter.

You might think that your B2B product is too boring to make interesting.

Here’s HARD PROOF from my clients that that’s wrong..

CLIENT A: Head of Ops at an agency. Industry: link building…

Before she came to us, she was making posts like this:

6 likes. One from her boss btw.

Then last week, we posted this for her:

See the difference?

Same topic (hiring), same expertise. Different angle, wildly different results.

Why This Is Happening

In 1971, Nobel Prize-winning economist Herbert Simon put it this way: in an information-rich world, information consumes the attention of its recipients. Abundance of information doesn’t create abundance of understanding. It creates scarcity of attention.

^ 54 years ago btw. Before the internet. Before LinkedIn birthed the insufferable AI-slop thought-leader gurus. Before your competitor posted the same carousel template you did on the exact same Tuesday morning.

Now add this to the mess: since ChatGPT launched, AI-generated posts on LinkedIn have surged 189%. Over 54% of long-form LinkedIn posts are now estimated to be AI-generated. And AI-generated posts receive 45% less engagement than human-written ones.

Read that again.

More than half the content in your feed is machine-written. And it gets nearly half the engagement of real human content….

…yet everyone keeps milking lukewarm AI slop out of their robot slaves.

And now the feed is drowning in the stuff. It’s hollow, it’s soulless, it has 0 original data, no real opinions, no voice.

We’re greeted with a boring wall of “leveraging synergies” and “I’m thrilled to share” written by the same language model.

And all our brains are running a filter. Neuroscientists call it habituation - where the nervous system tunes out consistent, predictable stimuli. Same blue-and-white brand colors. Same Canva carousel. Same headshot-and-hot-take format. The brain sees the pattern and says: lame, boring, skip.

Proof That ‘Fun’ Isn’t Just A Gimmick

The same VP who scrolled past your post about “5 Pillars of Operational Excellence” just devoured a 22-second video of a golden retriever doing job interviews for a tech startup.

That video was made by Kinso. A messaging app with a marketing team of four people. They rake in 12 million impressions a month. They built a waitlist of 16,500 people in six months. Their intern account alone has racked up 93 million views.

Or take Ramp: a corporate expense management platform. Not exactly the sexiest category. They hired an actor from The Office, put him in a glass box in Manhattan, and livestreamed his “first day as CFO”. They didn’t mention product features until several videos into the series.

That got over 100 million views across platforms. And their clients started bringing up Ramp unprompted in meetings.

Your whitepaper didn’t stand a chance. It was fine, just… expected.

And expected is the most dangerous marketing strat today.

Don’t Get Me Wrong Though!

I’m not saying post memes all day. That won’t get you results either.

Most people hear ‘be fun’ and think it means ‘become a meme account. Post jokes. Abandon your expertise’.

That’s not it.

There’s 1000 ways to be fun. You just need to pick the ones that are right for YOUR brand.

The brands doing it right aren’t replacing their knowledge with humour. They’re wrapping their knowledge in something the human brain can’t ignore. And there’s actual science behind what that ‘something’ is.

Wharton professor Jonah Berger spent years studying why certain content spreads and other content dies. He analyzed nearly 7,000 pieces of online content and found something that should make every B2B marketer’s heart race:

Content that triggers high-arousal emotions - amusement, excitement, awe, even anger - is way more likely to be shared than content that triggers low-arousal emotions like contentment or mild interest.

Contentment decreases sharing.

(duh…)

Your polished, on-brand, stakeholder-approved post made people feel content. Informed. Maybe even “satisfied”. And then they kept scrolling. And probs forgot about it 5 mins later.

In one of Berger’s experiments, people who simply jogged in place for 60 seconds before seeing content were twice as likely to share it. The arousal didn’t even come from the content… it spilled over. That’s how powerful the activation effect is.

The posts that spread - the ones that get forwarded in Slack channels and screenshotted into group chats - make people feel something sharper. Surprise. Recognition. The jolt of “OMG, someone finally said it. I feel seen.”

Why Workplace Humour Beats Corporate Slop

There’s a reason “POV: Marketing team meets Software Engineers” and “POV: Your boss thinks he’s Alex Hormozi” get millions of views.

It gives your audience something to relate to and identify with. It makes it easy for people to be like “that’s sooo me” and tag their fave colleague.

A 2024 study on parasocial relationships found that perceived authenticity and similarity build trust that directly affects purchase intention and brand credibility. People don’t just watch the interns for fun… they start trusting the brand through those characters.

People. Buy. From. People. Not. From. Chat. G. P. T.

Psych 101: The Holy Trinity of Fun B2B

Final Boss 1: The Pattern Interrupt

Humans tune out consistent stimuli. We only focus when something unexpected happens. Fun acts as a biological alertness trigger. It breaks the predictive loop your audience’s brain is running.

This doesn’t mean you need to be a comedian. It means your content needs to violate expectations in some small, delightful way. A fintech company talking about spreadsheet anxiety in a soap opera format. A consultant who opens a case study with a disaster story instead of a success metric.

Aim for “I didn’t expect that” over “hilarious”.

Proof LI froths for this: Instagram’s three key distribution signals are watch time (did it hold attention?), likes (quick positive evaluation), and sends/shares (the closest behavioral proxy to word-of-mouth). Pattern interrupts boost all three.

Final Boss 2: The Arousal-Sharing Loop

Berger’s research proves that high-arousal emotions - whether positive (amusement, awe) or negative (anger, anxiety) - physically activate your nervous system. And when you’re activated, you share. Sadness, by contrast, actually suppresses sharing - sad articles were 16% less likely to make the New York Times most-emailed list.

B2B guys - informative is OUT. Being felt is IN.

Teaching + feeling = virality. Teaching alone = 9 likes.

Final Boss 3: The Identifiable Person Effect

People care about individuals, not abstractions. We donate more to one named child than to “millions affected.” The same principle applies to B2B.

When Ramp made their campaign about “Brian” (the actor playing CFO), they weren’t selling software. They were telling a story about a person.

When Kinso posts videos of their interns, they’re not marketing a product. They’re making you care about characters.

Recurring characters create parasocial familiarity. Your audience starts feeling like they know your team. And people buy from people they know. They scroll past logos.

The Fun Framework: How To Actually Do This

Step 1: Find the shared frustration. Every industry has pain points everyone feels but nobody’s brave enough to post about. The meeting that should’ve been an email. The approval process that takes 47 days. The CRM no one uses. These are your raw materials.

Step 2: Exaggerate it just enough. Push the frustration 10% past reality. Not into absurdity… just past the line where people go “okay, that’s too real.” Start with something that catches attention (the exaggeration), land on something true (the insight). That’s the “Huh? to Aha!” effect.

Step 3: Deliver the insight underneath. You need fun MIXED WITH insight. Ramp’s glass box stunt was funny yeah, but it also showed that manual expense reporting is painfully slow compared to their product. The teaching was embedded in the experience, not bolted on as a caption.

Before & After: Boring B2B → Fun B2B

The Fear You Need To Get Over

Yeah, I get it. You’re worried it’ll flop and you’ll be embarrassed. Or you’re worried people will take you and your company for a joke.

But take it from me. Because this silly lil post performed better than all the educational content I posted that month. Combined.

Let me kill your ego quick: no one’s thinking about your brand as much as you think they are. It’s more risky to be invisible than ‘seem unprofessional’.

The person reading your content at 8:47 AM is the same person watching comedy clips at 8:48 AM. They don’t have two brains. They have one. And that brain rewards surprise, punishes predictability, and shares what makes it feel something.

The One Minute Test

Before you click post next time, ask:

“Would I stop my daily doomscroll for this?”

If the answer’s no, you already know what to do.

- Craig

PS - next week I’m serving you the specific content formats that work for fun B2B (memes, short-form video, character-driven series etc etc). If you want to see how to apply this to your brand, you need this.

Have fun!

Sounds crazy, right?

Yet, Pieter Levels built a flight simulator game using AI and hit $75K MRR in months by sharing every step on X, turning his raw process into a massive audience and a thriving business.

The old playbook of hiding struggles and only showing wins is dead. Building in public has become a powerful strategy for authentic connection that’s helping B2B founders turn their raw journeys into massive audiences, strong communities, and thriving businesses.

So why isn’t everyone building in public?

The truth is, sharing your struggles feels risky. Most founders are locked in a cycle of perfectionism, only willing to share when everything is flawless.

But here’s the kicker: audiences connect with authenticity, not perfection.

By showing your real journey, struggles, wins, and all, you build trust, foster loyalty, and create a community invested in your success.

In this playbook, I’ll show you how to ditch the fear, embrace strategic transparency, and use building in public to supercharge your B2B brand.

Ready to stop overthinking and start building in public? Let’s dive in.

Why Build in Public?

Building in public is the practice of sharing your product or business journey as it unfolds.

This approach was pioneered in the early 2010s by companies like Product Hunt and Buffer, and has since flourished as a powerful way for professionals, creators, and founders to cut through the noise with authenticity.

Here’s why it’s a game-changer for B2B brands:

• Builds a powerful personal brand: A strong personal brand amplifies your business, as seen with Brett Adcock, founder of Figure AI. In 2024, Adcock shared weekly X threads detailing Figure’s humanoid robot development, from prototype challenges to raising $675M in funding. His transparency built a 100K+ following, attracted top AI talent, and secured partnerships with OpenAI and Microsoft. Building in public grows your brand by showcasing your values, expertise, and journey, making you a magnet for opportunities.

• Drives authenticity in an AI world: In an era where AI-generated content is everywhere, genuine human experiences stand out. Building in public showcases the authentic journey that algorithms can’t replicate, creating stronger connections with your audience.

• Creates a market before your product: By sharing your journey, you attract an audience of potential customers before your product is even ready. This builds a ready audience, eager to engage with your offering from day one.

• Keeps you accountable: Public commitments drive action. As Seth Godin notes, “Saturday Night Live goes on at 11:30 because it’s 11:30, not because it’s ready.”

• Improves your product through feedback: Public sharing invites input from your audience, helping you spot flaws and refine your product early on. This collaboration ensures your product meets real market needs.

Here’s how building in public helped Marques Brownlee refine his product:

Overcoming the Fear: A Mindset Shift for Building in Public

Sharing your struggles as a B2B founder feels risky.

What if competitors exploit your weaknesses? What if your audience loses confidence? These fears are valid but manageable with the right mindset shift. This means moving from perfectionism to transparency and embracing vulnerability as a strength.

Here’s how to make the shift:

• Adopt a teaching mindset: Building in public is about sharing knowledge, not just progress. Turn every challenge or decision into a lesson, showing your audience how you solve problems. This positions you as a trusted guide, strengthening your authority and building deeper connections.

• Let go of perfectionism: Iteration beats perfection. Share prototypes or ideas early, refining based on feedback. At My Content Pal, we’ve seen founders struggle with overthinking posts. Our new Skool community, free to join, offers a safe space to do just that! Share what you’re building, get feedback and advice, and iterate!

• Develop resilience to criticism: Focus on your supporters’ encouragement, not critics’ noise. Use negative feedback to refine your approach, but stay confident in your vision. Criticism often signals you’re gaining traction, not failing, so keep pushing forward.

As Daniel Dalen put it:

Even someone like Sahil Bloom gets hate. He comes across as one of the friendliest guys on the web, and yet somehow people still get their backs up.

Listen to the next 5 minutes of this podcast: How Sahil Bloom Built an Agency by Going Viral. Sahil talks about an incident where he posted a thread that went viral for the wrong reasons and how he views “the downsides that present themselves”.

Here’s a success story to inspire you to make this mindset shift:

How to Build in Public: A Strategic Framework

Building in public is about taking your audience on a journey, sharing the highs, lows, and lessons in a way that resonates. Let’s break down how to do it, with examples and a framework to ensure your posts are strategic, not reckless.

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Here are a couple of examples of how this looks in practice.

Bhanu Teja P.’s RAGaaS Launch

In January 2025, Bhanu Teja P. launched RAGaaS, a privacy-first RAG-as-a-Service platform, and gained thousands of views on X through a transparent build-in-public strategy:

1. Bhanu announced his plan for 2025:

Source: X

2. A few days later, he launched RAGaaS:

Source: X

3. Then, he did a post-launch update.

Source: X

4. Then, he talked about product updates.

Bhanu has taken his audience on a journey.

Building trust, building fans, and gathering thousands of views with a few quick tweets.

Marin Istvanic’s Ad Agency Growth

Here’s another example of how Marin Istvanic used the build in public approach to turn his struggling agency around and hit $150K a month, all while gaining a huge following on X:

1. In March 2025, Marin shared his agency’s near-crash story:

Source: X

2. Before building in public, Marin relied on one client (80% of income), grew their ad spend to $100K daily, but lost them. With only two other clients and failed outreach, he faced a stressful handover and sleepless nights, pushing him to try a new strategy to save his agency.

After joining a program from @wizofecom, he was advised to turn his ad account audits into tweets:

3. So, he started to do this:

4. In just 3 months, he grew his Twitter following from 400 to 5,000:

5. By posting two to three times a day, he landed invites to podcasts and speaking gigs, bringing in some top-notch leads:

Through transparent tweets, a growing X following, and community trust, Marin turned challenges into opportunities, transforming his agency from near collapse to $150K monthly revenue.

Here’s another entrepreneur who takes massive action and builds in public.

Meet Jacky Chou:

He also regularly shares his business metrics on X. Look at the engagement these transparent posts generate.

Being open about your numbers builds credibility and attracts an audience interested in your journey.

Here’s another great example from Sam. When Breaking B2B lost $15K MRR in two months, he didn’t ghost his audience. Instead, he shared the brutal truth and his exact comeback strategy:

This is building in public at its finest. Sam’s transparency became a trust accelerator during the exact moment most would lose credibility.

Now that you’ve seen real-life examples of the transformative effect building in public can have on a brand, here’s how you start.

The Journey of Building in Public: What to Share When

As Arvid Kahl outlines in the Bootstrapped Founder podcast, every B2B business evolves through stages:

• Preparation Stage: Conceptualising and planning.

• Survival Stage: Finding a repeatable business model through experimentation.

• Stability Stage: Building systems, processes, and optimisation.

• Growth Stage: Scaling to serve more customers.

How you build in public will depend on your current stage. Let’s look at what to share at each stage.

Types of Build in Public Posts by Business Stage

Stage

Post Type

Example

Why It Works

Preparation

Public Pledge

“I’m building a SaaS for freelancers, follow my journey starting today!”

Sets the stage, builds anticipation, and commits you publicly.

Product Development Updates

“Day 3: Struggling with the UI for my SaaS, here’s my prototype so far.”

Shows authenticity, invites early feedback to refine your product.

Survival

Pricing/Product Experiments

“Experimenting with a $29/month tier for my course platform. Too high? Too low? Vote below!”

Engages audience for input, aligns product with market needs.

Shoutouts to Early Supporters

“A BIG SHOUTOUT goes to the $DIONE community for helping with the open beta testing for the Odyssey Cross-Chain bridge. We have had nothing but positive feedback.- X”

Builds community, shows gratitude, and encourages more early adopters.

Stability/Growth

Milestones (Big and Small)

“Just hit $10K MRR, here’s how we did it!”

Celebrates progress, builds credibility, and inspires your audience.

Lessons Learned

“Scaling to 1,000 users taught me to automate support. Here’s my process.”

Positions you as a teacher, sharing actionable insights.

Any Stage

Business Decisions

“Chose AWS over Google Cloud for scalability—here’s why.”

Demonstrates expertise, invites discussion, and builds authority.

Stack Sharing

“My tech stack: Notion for planning and Figma for design. What’s yours?”

Sparks engagement, provides value, and fosters community collaboration.

Remember, building in public is storytelling, not stream of consciousness. For narrative purposes, it’s key to give your audience context.

You can create a template that you follow. Having a consistent format helps your audience know what to expect and makes creating content much simpler.

Here’s a great example by Kieran Drew:

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Here’s another that’s very ambitious.

Milestone posts work when they combine celebration with a forward-looking strategy. Sam’s 12-month update shows exactly how it’s done:

See the balance? Sam acknowledges the milestone (hitting $50K MRR), but the post focuses on what’s next.

Post Templates

Here are some post template ideas to inspire your next X post:

1. Public Pledge Template (Preparation Stage)

Kick off your project with a public commitment to build anticipation and invite followers along.

• Template: I’m launching [project/idea] to solve [problem]. Follow my journey as I build it in public! First step: [specific action]. What do you think?

• Example: “I’m building a SaaS to simplify invoicing for freelancers. Follow my journey as I code the MVP! First step: designing the UI. Thoughts?”

2. Experiment Results Template (Survival Stage)

Share the outcome of a test or experiment to demonstrate progress and invite your audience to weigh in on next steps.

• Template: Tested [experiment] for [project]. Results: [key findings]. Here’s what we’re doing next: [next action]. What would you try based on this?

• Example: Tested a freemium model for our SaaS. Results: 20% more sign-ups, but lower conversions to paid. Next, we’re tweaking the free tier limits. What’s your take on freemium?

3. Team or Collaboration Highlight Template (Stability/Growth Stage)

Shine a light on your team or partners to build trust and show the people behind your project. This brings a human touch to your build-in-public journey and gives credit where it’s due.

• Template: Meet [team member/partner] who’s helping [project] by [their role/contribution]. Today, we’re [current task]. Got any advice for [related topic]?

• Example: Meet Sarah, our UX designer for our CRM SaaS, making our dashboard user-friendly. Today, we’re testing new layouts. Got advice for creating an intuitive UX?

4. Milestone Celebration Template (Stability/Growth Stage)

Celebrate achievements, share your strategy, and set future goals while thanking your supporters to build credibility.

• Template: Just hit [milestone] with [project]! Here’s how we got here: [key actions]. Next up: [next goal]. Thanks to [supporters/community] for the support!

• Example: “Just hit $10K MRR with our CRM tool! We got here by streamlining features based on user feedback. Next up: scaling to 1,000 users. Thanks to our beta testers!

5. Customer Feedback Spotlight Template (Any Stage)

Use feedback from your audience or users to show you’re paying attention, making changes, and open to even more ideas. Keep it conversational and provide clear examples of what the feedback led to.

• Template: Got great feedback on [project/feature] from [audience/customer]: “[quote or summary].” Here’s how we’re using it: [action taken]. What else should we improve?

• Example: Got great feedback on our SaaS from a beta user: “Love the analytics, but need simpler reports.” We’re adding a one-click report export. What else would make reporting easier?

6. Lesson From Failure Template (Any Stage)

Talk about what didn’t work out, and how you’re using that to move forward. This shows growth, builds trust, and provides value to your audience.

• Template: Tried [action/strategy] for [project], but it didn’t work: [what happened]. Learned [lesson]. Now, we’re [new approach]. What’s a failure that taught you something?

• Example: Tried cold emailing for our SaaS leads, but got low responses. Learned we needed more personalized outreach. Now, we’re testing targeted LinkedIn DMs. What’s a failure that helped you grow?

7. Question to Community Template (Any Stage)

Pose an open-ended question to your audience to engage them in a conversation and gather insights. This also shows that you value their input.

• Template: Working on [project/task] and need your input: [specific question]? Here’s where we’re at: [brief context]. Share your thoughts!

• Example: Working on pricing for our B2B SaaS and need your input: what’s the biggest factor when you choose a subscription plan? We’re debating tiered vs. flat pricing. Share your thoughts!

8. Tool or Resource Recommendation Template (Any Stage)

Share a tool or resource that has been valuable to your project. Explain how it’s helping and encourage your audience to share their recommendations.

• Template: Found [tool/resource] super helpful for [task] on [project]. Here’s why it works for us: [brief explanation]. What tools do you use for [related task]?

• Example: Found Trello super helpful for managing our SaaS dev sprints. Its boards keep our team aligned. What tools do you use for project management?

9. Monthly Transparency Template (Stability/Growth Stage)

Share a balanced view of your month with honest wins and losses. This builds credibility and shows you’re transparent about the ups and downs of building in public.

• Template: Month [N] at [project]. Here’s the Good, Bad, and Ugly.

UGLY: [1-2 real issues]. BAD: [what didn’t work or missed targets]. GOOD: [wins and milestones]. Next month: [3-4 experiments or priorities].

• Example: “Month 11 at my agency: $52.7K MRR. Here’s the Good, Bad, and Ugly. UGLY: 1 client churned (lesson: set regular calls with hard deadlines). BAD: I’m still solo (lesson: talk to agency friends about hiring). GOOD: We broke our $50K MRR goal and locked in renewals for 2025. Next month: hiring and ops overhaul.

10. Comeback Plan Template (Survival/Stability Stage)

Turn a setback into a strategic post by sharing what went wrong and your plan to recover. This shows resilience and invites your audience into your problem-solving process.

• Template: Lost [X metric] in [timeframe]. Here’s the plan to bounce back. What happened: [brief context]. The plan: [3-5 specific actions with timeline]. What would you try in my shoes?

• Example: “Lost $15K MRR in Feb-March. Here’s the plan to hit $50K again and push toward $100K MRR. What happened: one client moved in-house, others paused, but that’s agency life. The plan: SEO revamp, podcast push, LinkedIn ads tests, SDR hire, cold email refresh, and partnership outreach. What would you try in my shoes?”

11. Quick Win Experiment Template (Survival/Any Stage)

Highlight a specific test or tactic that delivered results. Keep it punchy and actionable so your audience can learn from what worked.

• Template: Tried [experiment] after [context/problem]. Results: [key outcomes with numbers]. Here’s the breakdown: [2-3 tactics that worked]. Questions? Drop them below.

• Example: “Tried two strategies after a tough February and added $13.5K MRR in March. Results: 2 new deals from refreshing our SEO money pages and 1 deal from podcast guesting via ListenNotes prospecting. Questions? Drop them below.”

12. Anniversary Milestone Template (Stability/Growth Stage)

Mark a significant time milestone (6 months, 1 year, etc.) by reflecting on the journey, sharing key moves, and setting your next goal.

• Template: [Timeframe] of [project] today. Started from [starting point] and hit [achievement]. How we got here: [3-4 key strategies]. Next [timeframe] goal: [ambitious target]. [Soft thank-you + CTA, e.g., Thanks for following along / Book a call / Join the journey]

• Example: “Today marks 12 months of my agency. From worrying about the mortgage to hitting our $50K MRR goal early. How we got here: focused on B2B/SaaS SEO for revenue not vanity, made mistakes, learned fast, built solid processes. Next 12 months: double revenue via partnerships, ads, and content. Thanks for following along!”

13. Launch Behind-the-Scenes Template (Growth Stage)

Take your audience inside a new launch or offer. Show your strategy, the tactics you’re testing, and what you’re betting on.

• Template: Launching [new thing] for [target audience]. Why now: [context or gap you’re filling]. The plan: [2-3 specific tactics or channels]. The offer: [value prop with proof]. Check it out: [soft CTA].

• Example: “Launching LinkedIn Thought Leader and Google Ads for B2B SaaS with a 90-day pipeline offer. Why now: growth so far came from organic, podcast, and SEO, so it’s time to amplify. The plan: amplify top content via LinkedIn ads + high-intent Google search terms The offer: “90 Days to Pipeline” video review landing page packed with social proof + guarantee. Check it out if you’re curious.”

14. Content Playbook Template (Any Stage)

Package up your best content tactics or creative plays into a digestible list. This positions you as resourceful and gives your audience ideas they can steal.

• Template: [Number] content plays that [result you achieved]. Here’s the list: [brief title and context for each, with emojis or numbers]. What’s working for you right now?

• Example: “Here are 6 content plays I used to get remembered on a shoestring budget: 1️⃣ Ask-the-public style B2B marketing & SEO questions. 2️⃣ ‘Son asks dad’ B2B questions. 3️⃣ Reworked classic memes. 4️⃣ SEO video skits. 5️⃣ Mad experiments. 6️⃣ Everyday drivers: newsletter, podcast, SEO blog. What’s working for you right now?”

15. Event or Field Day Recap Template (Growth Stage)

Turn a single event into a momentum post. Show the scope, the results, and why it mattered beyond just metrics.

• Template: How we turned [one event/day] into [X views/assets/leads]. Here’s what we did: [timeline or agenda]. The results: [metrics and intangibles like mindshare]. Why it worked: [strategic reason]. Worth it? [reflection].

• Example: “How I got 60K+ views and 20 pieces of content from ONE day in London. Here’s what we did: street interviews, sandwich-board stunt, shoot with Tom Hunt, and founder collabs. The results: 60K+ views, 2 founder interactions, and prospects mentioning it on sales calls. Why it worked: it’s fun, memorable, and gets Breaking B2B talked about. Worth it? Absolutely (plus beers).”

Our new Skool community features examples of all these build in public post types, plus templates you can use for your own building-in-public journey!

Principles of Effective Build in Public Posts

Building in public thrives on posts that connect, inspire, and invite collaboration. These core principles ensure your updates stand out in a crowded digital space, turning followers into an engaged community.

• Consistency: Share updates often (once a week is a good start) to keep your audience engaged and show you’re reliable. A steady schedule builds confidence in your leadership, reassuring clients and partners you’re committed. Planning posts ahead with scheduling tools prevents missed days, so your progress stays on track and your momentum keeps growing.

• Storytelling: Share the full story of your journey, including challenges, choices, and lessons learned, not just the wins. Honest posts about how you tackle problems feel real and relatable, showing clients and partners you’re a problem-solver they can trust. This openness makes your content engaging and builds stronger connections.

• Engagement: Build a community by replying to comments and hosting AMAs (Ask Me Anything). Listening and responding turns followers into supporters who cheer for your goals and share your vision.

If you look back at levelsio’s comment history, you’ll see he constantly engages back. He never posts and ghosts.

AMA posts can be as simple as:

These principles ensure your posts resonate, but optics matter. Let’s explore how to share safely.

Optics and Perception: What to Share (and What to Avoid)

Being vulnerable doesn’t mean sharing everything. It means sharing strategically.

The Strategic Vulnerability Checklist

Before posting, run your content through this checklist:

• Tone Check: Does this come across as authentic rather than complaining?

• Perception Risk: Could a screenshot of this be taken out of context?

• Competitor Advantage: Would this information give competitors an unfair advantage?

• Customer Confidence: Will this maintain or enhance customer trust?

• Lesson Focus: Does this emphasise the lesson rather than just the problem?

• Strategic Value: Does sharing this provide value to my audience?

• Future Impact: Will I be comfortable with this being public in 1, 5, or 10 years?

Examples of Effective vs. Problematic Sharing

Avoid Sharing

Better Alternative

“We lost our biggest client today.”

“Losing a major client taught us to diversify our client base. Here’s our new strategy...”

“Our cash flow is terrible this month.”

“We’re implementing new financial forecasting after facing a cash flow challenge. Here’s what we’re learning...”

“My co-founder and I disagree on everything.”

“Here’s how we’ve structured our decision-making process to leverage our different perspectives...”

“Our churn rate is skyrocketing.”

“We identified a pattern in our customer feedback that’s helping us address retention. Here’s our approach...”

“My competitors suck.”

“Here’s how we’re solving X differently.”

“I’m building something new.”

“I’m launching a SaaS for freelancers, follow for updates!”

Be cautious with what you put out. The following post might work for a freelance consultant on the rise, but imagine if the CEO of an established agency shared this? It wouldn’t work.

Here’s another bad example. Sure, this post got 16,000+ likes, but not all attention is good attention. Much of this engagement is likely people sharing it ironically.

Compare that to this strategic post by Marc Louvion, sharing a pivot with clarity and purpose:

Sam Dunning’s post is a great example of how to share setbacks without tanking your credibility:

He doesn’t sugarcoat the churn or his solo-founder reality, and immediately extracts the lesson. This format works because it’s honest about struggle while demonstrating competence.

Setbacks + solutions = credibility.

Our Optics Proofer GPT helps you refine posts before sharing.

It checks tone, flags perception risks, and suggests reframes to ensure your message lands professionally while staying authentic.

For example, it might flag “bloated teams” as harsh and suggest “optimising team efficiency” to keep the punch without alienating your followers.

Building in Public: Standing Out in an AI-Dominated World

With so much AI content out there these days, building in public helps you stand out as a real, authentic person.

By sharing your authentic journey, you create human stories that AI simply can’t match. This transparency is what sets you apart, turning followers into loyal supporters and clients.

Why authenticity matters today:

• Builds Trust: As people grow wary of polished, AI-crafted posts, your honest voice stands out, earning confidence from clients and partners who value real experiences.

• Breaks the Mould: AI content often feels predictable, but your unique challenges and wins are one-of-a-kind, making your posts instantly recognisable and engaging.

• Creates Emotional Bonds: Sharing your struggles and successes sparks genuine connections, resonating with audiences in ways AI struggles to achieve.

• Delivers Value Through Openness: Being open about lessons learned fosters loyalty, as your willingness to show vulnerability builds stronger, more meaningful relationships.

Sam Dunning proved that building brand recognition on a shoestring budget is possible without any use of AI:

Sam’s audience doesn’t follow him because of perfect copywriting but because his posts are unmistakably his.

When you build in public with real creativity and authenticity, you become the founder people remember, trust, and eventually hire.

Our Optics Proofer GPT in the Skool community extracts your unique insights and frames them in a way that’s unmistakably you, something that’s impossible for generic AI to replicate. Join us today!

Action Plan: Start Building in Public Today

Building in public is your chance to stand out as a B2B founder, connect with your audience, and grow your business through honest, open sharing. By starting today, you’ll build trust, attract clients, and create a community that cheers for your success.

First 30 Days: Your Build in Public Kickoff Plan

Start building in public today with this concrete 30-day plan. It’s designed to kickstart your journey, build momentum, and overcome the fear of sharing.

Let’s make your first month count!

Week 1: Set the Stage with a Public Pledge

Goal: Announce your project and invite your audience to join your build-in-public journey.

Why It Works: A public commitment builds anticipation and holds you accountable. It invites your audience to invest in your journey from day one, creating early buzz that can attract potential clients, partners, or beta testers.

Post Idea:

• Template: “I’m launching [project/idea] to solve [problem]. Follow my journey as I build it in public! First step: [specific action]. What do you think?”

• Example: “I’m building a SaaS to help B2B startups automate client onboarding. Follow me as I code the MVP! First step: sketching the core workflow. Got any tips for user-friendly onboarding?”

Week 2: Share a Product Development Update

Goal: Show progress, highlight a challenge or early prototype, and invite early feedback via comments, polls, or DMs.

Why It Works: Sharing early work proves you’re taking action. It also invites real-time feedback from potential customers, helping you refine your product to meet market needs while showing you value their input.

Post Idea:

• Template: “Day [X]: Working on [specific task] for [project]. Here’s where I’m at: [describe progress/challenge]. Any feedback?”

• Example: “Day 10: Struggling with the dashboard UI for our SaaS. Here’s a screenshot of my prototype. Too cluttered? What would make this easier for you to use?”

Week 3: Run a Pricing or Product Experiment

Goal: Test an idea and involve your audience in the decision-making process.

Why It Works: Experiments demonstrate you’re iterating based on real data, which builds credibility with B2B audiences who value evidence-based decisions. Involving your audience in choices like pricing creates buy-in, turning followers into potential early adopters or advocates.

Post Idea:

• Template: “Testing [experiment] for [project]. Here’s the plan: [details]. Too [high/low/risky]? Vote below or share your thoughts!”

• Example: “Testing a $49/month tier for our client onboarding SaaS. Includes automated workflows and analytics. Too pricey? Too cheap? Vote or let me know what you’d pay for this!”

Week 4: Celebrate a Small Milestone and Thank Supporters

Goal: Share a win to build credibility and show gratitude to your growing community.

Why It Works: Celebrating wins, even small ones, shows progress and reliability, which B2B audiences trust. Thanking supporters fosters loyalty, turning casual followers into a tight-knit community that amplifies your reach and opens doors to new opportunities.

Post Idea:

• Template: “Just hit [milestone] with [project]! Here’s how we got here: [key actions]. Big thanks to [supporters/community] for the support! Next up: [next goal].”

• Example: “Just got our first 10 beta sign-ups for our SaaS! We reached this by sharing weekly updates on X. Huge thanks to everyone who gave feedback! Next up: polishing the onboarding flow.”

Tips:

• Choose Your Platform: Select where you’ll share your story (LinkedIn, X, blog, etc.). Choose what feels right for your audience to make your posts easy to find and engage with.

• Set a Posting Schedule: Decide how often you’ll share and stay consistent. A regular schedule keeps your audience hooked and shows clients you’re reliable and committed to progress.

• Engage Actively: Reply to every comment or DM within 12 hours to spark conversations. Ask follow-up questions (e.g., “What feature would you add?”) to build trust and community.

• Document As You Go: Keep notes, take screenshots, and record metrics. These details help you share honest, meaningful updates that show your audience how you’re moving forward.

The Payoff: Why It’s Worth It

As you can see, building in public isn’t just a powerful strategy—it’s a mindset.

I’ve yet to see a founder commit to it and fail. Some see traction in 30 days, while others take a few months.

The key is consistency and courage. The compounding effects of consistency will grow your audience, establish your authority, and create opportunities you can’t even imagine yet!

B2B founders, let My Content Pal build your personal brand on LinkedIn and X while you focus on your business. Book a call with us today!

Stop hiding and start building in public now.

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Running an agency while trying to create content for my brand used to take serious effort. Even though it’s one of the highest ROI activities for me, finding the mental bandwidth was a real challenge some days until I figured out ways to make it work.

As a B2B founder, you’re pulled in so many directions. You’re dealing with client work, operations, hiring decisions, and then you’re supposed to squeeze in time to be creative and insightful on top of all that.

Yet some people pull it off, and I’ve seen it work firsthand.

• Cold IQ built most of their pipeline through content and hit meaningful revenue fast.

• Sam Dunning, the guy behind Breaking B2B, scaled past six figures with only two people while still running a YouTube channel and posting on LinkedIn daily.

• Max Sturtevant scaled his email marketing agency past $300k+ p/m and writes 60+ posts per week.

So how do they do it?

Before I break it down in this newsletter, let me tackle the biggest objection first.

You’re probably thinking they must have ghostwriters and huge teams handling everything. And while I’m a big advocate of ghostwriting, the reality is that there are people like Max and Sam who have done it all by themselves. I’m pretty sure the Cold IQ guys started the same way and only scaled their team later.

Here’s Max’s actual posting schedule that he maintained while building his agency:

• YouTube video once per week

• Newsletters 3x per week

• LinkedIn post once per weekday

• Instagram carousel post once per day

• Instagram short form once per day

• Tweets three times per day + three retweets from past tweets

My take on it?

With the right routine / workflow, it’s totally possible.

Plus…

If you’re a solo consultant pulling in under $100k per year or running an agency under $500k, I really don’t think you should outsource this yet. Your content represents your thinking made public, and outsourcing your thinking too early can slow your growth in ways you won’t spot right away.

Hold off until your worldview is so concrete that a writer is just documenting what you already believe, rather than trying to invent a personality for you.

Now, let me show you exactly how to build a system that actually works without burning out.

🧠The Brain Science Behind Content Creation

First thing you need to understand is how your brain works when creating content, because most founders get this completely wrong.

Writing and ideation use completely different neural networks in your brain.

When you’re brainstorming and coming up with ideas, you’re using what scientists call the default mode network. This is the same part that becomes active when you’re in the shower or taking a walk and suddenly get hit with great ideas.

But when you’re actually writing and structuring your thoughts, you switch to your executive control network. This handles focus, logic, organization, and problem-solving.

Most founders try to do both simultaneously. They open a blank document expecting ideas to flow while they’re editing and structuring everything at the same time.

This is why your drafts folder is full of half-finished posts with a few bullet points and paragraphs you rewrote five times before giving up. You’re forcing your brain to create and analyze at the exact same time, which kills all your momentum.

The solution is much simpler than you think. Separate your thinking time from your writing time completely.

Build Your Schedule Around Your Brain

When I write heavily for several hours, the front of my brain literally starts aching. I get tired eyes, foggy thinking, and hit a total cognitive wall.

For the longest time, I thought this was burnout, but after researching it, I realized it’s just your prefrontal cortex hitting its daily limits.

This part of your brain handles focus, language, and executive control. It’s the same area that gets completely taxed when you’re deep in strategic thinking or handling complex client work.

So I completely restructured my schedule to work with my brain’s natural rhythms instead of fighting them constantly.

I realize this schedule is a lot. But with a 10-month-old at home and trying to push through the messy middle of growing this business, this level of structure is what keeps me productive, at least until things settle a bit more.

Monday and Tuesday became my heavy writing days.

Wednesday turned into my relational day, where I handle meetings, calls, and conversations but avoid any deep focus work.

Thursday and Friday, I return to writing feeling fresh and clear-headed again.

Wednesday gives my prefrontal cortex a complete break so I can hit the end of the week with creative energy again. It also means I’m not constantly context-switching and taxing myself with different types of cognitive work throughout each day.

This schedule follows natural circadian rhythms instead of working against them. Most people experience two distinct energy peaks during each day:

• One happens in the morning and works best for creative and deep work.

• The second comes in late afternoon or early evening and handles analytical work better.

I schedule my writing during morning peaks when my brain feels naturally alert. Then I use afternoon energy dips for recharging activities like walking, scrolling LinkedIn for inspiration, or just letting my mind wander and think.

I also work in 90-minute writing sprints followed by short breaks. Each break resets my attention span and gives my brain time to recover before the next session.

✅ What to do now:

Track your energy levels each day for one full week and notice when you feel most creative versus when you completely crash. Then restructure your schedule to reserve those peak creative times for content production.

The difference in output when you write during an energy peak versus when you’re drained is massive. You’ll produce more quality work in 1 peak hour than 3 hours when you’re running on empty.

And don’t feel guilty about using mid-day for a recharge activity, whether that’s exercise, walk, or a quick nap. Think of it as refueling your creative engine so it can run at full capacity.

TIP: There’s an app called Rise that helps you track and understand your circadian rhythm. It shows when your natural energy peaks and crashes happen throughout the day, which makes scheduling a lot easier.

Fix the Real Objection

Most founders don’t actually hate writing. They hate the feeling of complete incompetence that comes with staring at a blank page for 30 minutes.

There’s this widespread myth that content creation should feel “easy” somehow. It’s simple in concept, but mastering it demands serious focus, clarity, and deep thinking that most of us rarely make dedicated time for.

The default response becomes “I’m just not good at writing” or “I don’t have anything interesting to say.”

But writing is really just clear thinking made visible on a page. The clearer your thinking gets, the better your writing becomes naturally.

Here’s why you shouldn’t outsource this work yet. You’ll struggle to find any ghostwriter who can think at the caliber you need them to. Plus, you’re missing the real value that comes from the writing process itself.

Writing forces you to think deeply about your business, your customers, and your industry in ways that nothing else does.

When I write about ideation processes and content systems, I’m actually working through real problems in my own business. It makes my service offerings better and helps me understand my customers at a much deeper level, which dramatically improves my marketing and sales conversations.

Outsourcing that thinking process too early means losing all those business insights.

For More Reading: How fixing your bottleneck = unlimited content ideas

🕳️ Pitfalls to beware of:

• Expecting immediate expertise: Writing well takes practice, just like any other business skill. So, give yourself permission to be bad at first.

• Perfectionism paralysis: Publishing imperfect content that helps your audience beats perfect content that never gets published.

The Ideation System That Actually Works

You can be a complete expert in your field and still struggle with generating content ideas. If you sit down to write without knowing what to cover, you’ll spend the entire session staring at blank documents while frustration builds and momentum dies.

The solution is making the starting process easier by doing ideation work before your writing sessions even begin.

This is how I set myself up for success:

Idea Capture System

I use a simple Notion document for storing and developing ideas over time.

When I get a rough concept like “building resilient systems,” I might not have enough material to write about it immediately. So I’ll spend the next few days or weeks thinking about this concept and progressively adding references, examples, personal stories, and different angles to explore.

I do most of this ideation work while I’m prospecting for new clients or going for walks. Your brain makes unexpected connections when you’re doing other activities.

Environment setup

Before writing sessions, I completely clear my environment of distractions. Phone gets turned off, Slack stays closed, and I find a quiet space where I can think clearly.

Writing requires mental stillness, and chaotic environments produce chaotic thoughts.

Tools and resources

I also prepare all my tools and resources before starting any writing. GPTs, research documents, and reference materials get organized beforehand so I can stay in creative flow instead of context switching to hunt for information.

Voice-to-text tools like Wispr Flow can dramatically increase your output because speaking often flows more naturally than typing.

Creative incubation

Most of my best ideas actually come when I’m away from my desk completely. While prospecting, walking, or working out, my brain connects dots subconsciously because that’s when your default mode network becomes most active.

TIP: Schedule in active recovery. It will do wonders for your health but also free up space for your creativity to come back to life.

✅ What to do now:

Set up your ideation system this week. Create a simple document where you can capture and develop ideas over time. Start carrying a notebook or use voice memos to capture thoughts when you’re away from your computer.

You can download the capture system here:

[ Link to My Content Pal Resource ]

Develop Your Content Taste

Knowing what to create matters just as much as creating consistently. You can have perfect systems and solid writing habits but still publish content that completely fails to connect with your audience.

That’s why developing taste becomes so important.

Taste is what helps you separate decent ideas from truly great ones. It’s that invisible quality that makes people stop scrolling because something just feels right and worth paying attention to.

Taste isn’t something you’re born with. It’s something you deliberately train and develop over time.

I train mine during afternoon energy dips when I’m going to be scrolling social media anyway. Instead of mindless consumption, I make it intentional and educational.

I’ll analyze DTC Instagram ads or YouTube thumbnails and ask myself:

• Why did this particular piece catch my attention?

• What emotion does this headline trigger in me?

• How could I adapt this approach for LinkedIn posts or newsletter content?

You start noticing patterns in pacing, hooks, visual design, and tone of voice. Then you borrow the underlying principle without copying the actual post.

For example, I might see a brilliant DTC ad that uses identity or humor to connect with their audience, then think about how that same psychological principle would work for B2B founders. That observation becomes my next content idea.

The goal is to change how you consume content so you’re learning instead of just killing time.

✅ What to do now:

Transform your content consumption into content education. Instead of mindless scrolling, start analyzing what catches your attention and why. Keep a running list of patterns and principles you can adapt for your own content.

🕳️ Pitfalls to beware of:

• Copying instead of adapting: Take the principle behind what works, not the exact execution.

• Analysis paralysis: Study patterns, but don’t let analysis replace actually creating content.

The Power of Batching

Once you separate ideation from writing, the next step is eliminating context switching across different content formats.

Most people wake up and try to “make something” that day. Maybe a LinkedIn post, a video, or a carousel, depending on what feels easiest in the moment.

That approach leads to inconsistency and creative fatigue because you’re constantly switching between different types of creative work.

Instead, I batch content either by medium or by core idea.

Medium batching

When I’m batching by medium, I stay locked into one format for extended periods.

For example, I’ll spend an entire day creating all my carousels for the next month, handling the writing, design, and scheduling in one focused session. Or I’ll dedicate a full day to filming short-form videos, shooting multiple scripts in different outfits and setups so I can distribute clips over several weeks.

Idea batching

Sometimes I switch to batching by idea instead. That’s where I go deep on one concept and repurpose it across every channel I use.

I’ll take a single insight and turn it into a newsletter, short-form video script, LinkedIn post, and maybe even a lead magnet, all during the same creative session.

Both approaches eliminate what I call creative startup friction.

You stay in the same mental flow, protect your cognitive energy, and build systems that let your creative output scale without burning you out.

✅ What to do now:

Choose one batching approach to test this week. Either batch by content format (spend one day creating multiple pieces of the same type) or batch by idea (take one concept and create multiple formats from it).

Turn One Idea Into Multiple Posts

Most founders don’t burn out because they create too much content. They burn out because they start from scratch every single time.

They treat every post like a brand new project instead of realizing that one solid idea can stretch much further than they think.

A truly good idea deserves 5 to 10+ different angles and formats.

If you write a post that really connects with your audience, don’t just move on to something completely different. Go deeper with that same concept.

• Rewrite it with a new angle.

• Turn it into a detailed X thread.

• Record a short video explaining the personal story behind it.

• Design a carousel that breaks down the concept visually.

• Use it as the foundation for your next newsletter, then pull quotes from that newsletter for Twitter and LinkedIn posts.

That’s how you get real leverage from your creative work.

Founders who produce huge volumes of content aren’t writing 50 completely new ideas every week. They’re taking 5 great ideas and distributing them across 10 different formats and platforms.

They’re also constantly listening to their audience. Comments, direct messages, and questions from readers become new content ideas. Every interaction provides a signal about what your audience actually cares about. Every question becomes a writing prompt.

• When someone asks, “How do you find time to write so much?” that becomes next week’s post.

• When someone challenges your perspective, that becomes your next response video.

• When someone shares your post with a comment like “this really hit home for me,” you screenshot that social proof and repackage it.

This approach solves one of the biggest content creation problems most founders face: running out of things to say.

When you keep revisiting and expanding on your strongest concepts, you’re creating more content, yes, but also developing a deeper understanding of your market, your customers, and your unique value proposition. And that’s always good for business.

✅ What to do now:

Start treating your best-performing content as content libraries instead of one-off posts. When something resonates, create a systematic process for extending that idea across multiple formats and platforms.

The Waterfall System

Let’s take this leverage concept even further with what Matt Gray calls the Waterfall System.

It’s about repurposing one core idea across multiple formats and platforms instead of constantly generating new material.

Each format should flow naturally into the next one.

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

• He writes a single tweet that performs well with his audience. This is the initial spark.

• Then he screenshots that tweet and posts it on Instagram.

• He records a short-form video discussing the same topic from a slightly different angle.

• He includes a version of that insight in his next newsletter, providing deeper context and background.

• Then he takes the full concept and expands it into a long-form YouTube video. The video tells the complete story with personal examples.

• Same core idea.

• Five different formats.

• Five separate platforms.

• Five touchpoints with his audience.

That’s the Waterfall System.

What’s brilliant about this approach is that you’re not diluting your ideas by spreading them around.

You’re actually deepening them by giving people multiple ways to consume the same concept based on their preferred medium and attention span.

Matt Gray popularized this system, and it’s one of the smartest frameworks I’ve seen for founders who want to scale content without burning out.

✅ What to do now:

Design your own waterfall system. Start with one platform where you’re most comfortable, then map out how you’ll adapt that same content for 2-3 other formats on different platforms.

🕳️ Pitfalls to beware of:

• Exact replication: Adapt the core idea for each platform instead of copy-pasting identical content.

• Overwhelming yourself: Start with 2-3 formats before expanding to more complex waterfall systems.

How to Fuel Your Brain for Better Creative Output

Mental stamina isn’t purely cognitive. It’s also chemical, and most founders completely ignore this part.

When your blood glucose crashes, your focus and creativity crash right along with it. This is why you might feel sharp in the morning but struggle to form coherent thoughts by 3 PM.

I’ve learned to work with these natural fluctuations. I delay my first coffee for about 90 minutes after waking up because it helps keep my natural cortisol rhythm stable throughout the day.

Then I start each morning with small amounts of fruit like blueberries, grapes, or strawberries. This gives me slow-release glucose without the spike and crash that comes from processed foods.

I also don’t consume any processed carbohydrates or sugar-loaded snacks during my writing sessions. Just clean energy sources and lots of water throughout the day.

Sleep quality is another thing that directly impacts creative output.

When you’re sleep-deprived, your brain has trouble making the unexpected connections that lead to interesting insights. This is why I aim for 7-8 hours and try to keep consistent sleep and wake times, even on weekends.

Your brain is an organ that needs proper fuel to function at its best. Feed it correctly and give it adequate rest, and your creative output will follow naturally.

Ready to Get Started?

The founders who scale past six figures while maintaining consistent content have systems that work with their brain and body instead of fighting against their natural rhythms.

I recommend picking one thing from this newsletter and testing it for a few weeks.

Don’t try to overhaul your entire approach on Monday morning. Maybe batch your ideation sessions or redesign your weekly schedule around your energy peaks. Once that becomes a habit, add the next piece.

Your content creation routine should not be a sprint that you can only maintain for a few weeks before burning out completely. It should be sustainable over months and years, and make running your business easier, not harder.

So, start small, and most importantly, stay consistent.

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