Filed Under: 21st Century Branding, Intrinsic Branding, Leadership
By Chris Klonoski
No one is excited to sit down and write their 22nd post of the year. There is no rush. It doesn’t feel fresh or path-changing. You’re likely worried you sound the same as you did for the last 21 posts. Posting regularly is the brand equivalent of filling your gas tank. Or brushing your teeth.
It’s Important. But. Meh.
Here is what you need to keep in mind: the reward will not arrive the day you do the work.
The payoff happens months later, and likely in a form you did not expect. Someone messaged to say they look forward to reading your stuff. A prospect casually mentions she’s been following you for a while, and she is halfway sold. (And when you check later, she has never liked a single post.) A journalist/influencer/thought leader calls you for a quote/podcast/speaking opportunity because you are the one who keeps talking about that one thing.
This is what consistency buys. Not applause, but the next step: the next customer, the next partnership, the next opportunity.
The space between the dull work and the desired outcome is exactly where most brands give up. Here is how you close the gap.
Where will you be consistent?
Consistency is not about posting on the same day every week. That is frequency, and it is the easy part of planning. True consistency means someone mirrors a phrase you use all the time back to you. Consistency means people you respect recognize your voice. Consistency means you become known for something. It is the theme that identifies as you.
Three things to commit to:
- A point of view: The thing you believe that not everyone in your market believes. If you cannot finish the sentence, “Most people in my industry think X, and they are wrong because Y,” you do not have one yet. Identify and name that before you worry about a posting schedule, because a schedule with nothing behind it just produces noise.
- Three or four themes: Not twenty. If someone asked what you talk about, you should be able to answer instantly. Everything you post sits under one of the themes.
- A voice and a look: Same tone, same colors, same energy across LinkedIn, your website, your newsletter, your ads. People rarely notice consistency, but they definitely notice inconsistency, and they interpret it as instability.
Grow comfortable and confident in these three things, and the work will be lighter. You stop asking what I should post? and start asking what do I have to say about one of my themes this month? This is a more manageable question.
The nuts and bolts
Pick a cadence you can commit to, even on your worst week. Not your best week. Once a week, every week, for two years, beats daily for three weeks, followed by total silence. Be honest about your capacity. You are not being graded on volume.
Batch your entries. Sit down once a month and write four entries. Getting into the right headspace is the hardest part, not the writing. Once you’re in the groove, it’s easy to stay in the groove.
Keep a capture file. Ideas arrive at the strangest times. On calls, in the shower, while driving, during a meeting. They do not arrive when you need to post something in the next hour. Use voice memo, your notes app, the back of a receipt, whatever you will actually use (and can easily locate). Writing then becomes simply editing, and editing is so much easier than starting cold.
Steal from your own memories. Every question you are asked is potential content. Every objection you encounter is a piece of content. If you’ve explained something twice this month, that’s explorable. Think about brief case studies. Decisions you’ve made and why. Growth moments. Moments you’ve thought about quitting. All of it counts towards content.
Reuse formats, not just ideas. Find three or four approaches and run them repeatedly. A question and answer. Starting with a wrong, but common, assumption. The short case study. The decision you made. A video. Using these formats repeatedly addresses the blank-page problem before it starts.
Don’t worry about repetition. Most people underuse their best material because they are afraid of repeating themselves. You are far more bored with your message than your audience is. Most of them missed it the last time you used it.
Block the time as if it were a client meeting. If writing lives on the list of things you will get to, you will not get to it. An hour and a half, same time slot, in the calendar, functions as its own prompt. Treat it as unmovable.
Five mistakes to avoid.
- Skipping a month and assuming nobody noticed. Momentum is linear. Three weeks off is harder to bounce back from because you are re-entering a cold room. Now you have to rebuild the warmth and engagement before your post will land properly. If you are going to miss one, miss one, not a month.
- Letting comments sit with no response. Someone took a moment out of their day to respond to you in public. Leaving it unanswered reads as indifference. Remember that you posted something publicly because you were asking people to be interested in it. Also, early replies keep a post alive and in front of other people. Set a simple rule: reply within the first hour after posting, then check again that evening.
- Never showing up on anyone else’s posts. If you are only broadcasting, you are talking to yourself. Conversation is a two-way street. Commenting thoughtfully on other people’s work is how new audiences find you.
- Changing your message every time you get bored. You will get sick of your own positioning long before your market has absorbed it. That feeling is not a signal to reinvent. Every time you reinvent, you reset the recognition you are slowly building. You can change how you say the thing you stand for. But don’t change the thing you stand for.
- Judging it on the wrong numbers, too early. Likes are not the point. Reach is not always the point. The numbers that matter are inbound conversations, how warm people are when they arrive, and whether they already know what you do before you tell them. These things are measurable in quarters and months, not weeks.
Consistency is not glamorous. It is repetitive and almost invisible while it is working. Then one day someone describes your business back to you in your own words, and you realize the impact was compounding the whole time.
CTA: If you find this overwhelming or unmanageable, we can help. R+R loves to collaborate with people and brands on content, offering everything from monthly interviews and article writing to newsletters, LinkedIn strategy, and the metrics behind it all. Interested?