Audience Building Strategies For College Students | Ship 30 For 30 Espresso Hour Q&A E5

Any tips on how to build an audience as a college student on Twitter?

Focusing merely on "building an audience" = Likely to prioritize short-term metrics (likes, follows, shares) that you can't monetize

Building a skillset = Mastering knowledge and skills that you can eventually monetize & build an audience with

Knowledge & skills compound over time.

• Fastest way to learn: Learn from those who've already done it
• Best way to learn: Thinking about the content deeply and making notes for your future self to understand

Curation achieves both of the above. Some tips:

• Have a genuine desire and curiosity to learn
• Distill the best insights & learnings from big creators in your domain
• Curate with the intent to add value to someone's life, not with the intent to attract the creators' attention

Share your learnings online—social media, text/audio/video mediums, or whatever you're comfortable with.

Why?

• Accountability. If others are going to see it, you're less likely to do a sloppy job for your notes.
• Get feedback on your work. This exposes knowledge/skill gaps that you can work on.
• Generate conversations with like-minded people. People might reach out to you if your stuff really resonates.
• Proof of work & skills. Your online profile effortlessly becomes your portfolio. People start recognizing you for your ability to crystallize and communicate ideas (among other skills)

I am going to learn (by curating), whether they see it or not.