4 things you need to understand to succeed on social media

i got 214K views and 2.5K bookmarks on a TOTALLY NEW account in 2 weeks.

besides that, I’m the co-founder of a few pretty popular cartoons: one has 3M followers, and another was just approved for Amazon Prime. before that, I scaled a few X accounts to 330K and 800K followers.

this won’t be another guide telling you to reply 15–30 times a day, make a clean bio and banner, tweet consistently, etc.

fuck that. everyone has already written that shit.

i’ll give you something much more valuable: an understanding of how the system actually works.

1. think from the perspective of the team behind the platform

if you truly understand this point, it gives you a huuuge advantage.

the product teams and shareholders behind every social network have their own goals and KPIs.

once you start thinking from their perspective, you immediately understand what actually matters: which metrics, which formats, which behaviors, and why.

let’s use X as an example. some of the things they care about:

• bringing new users to X. when someone copies a link to your content and sends it somewhere else, that can potentially bring a new user to X. that makes it valuable.
• increasing time spent on the platform. LTV directly depends on this. if people spend time reading and discussing your tweets, you’re contributing to that.
• getting people to come back more often. this affects retention. that’s why network effects (follows, replies) and things like bookmarks matter. you should actively communicate with people and give them a reason to return, whether it’s to read your content or reply to you.

you might say: yeah, everyone already knows this.

okay, then let’s talk about something less obvious.

when you’re a market giant with hundreds of millions of users, that audience becomes a free distribution channel for every new product or feature you launch, which can directly affect growth, valuation, and profits.

so the playbook becomes:

launch a new product/feature -> move as much of the existing audience as possible from the core app -> if the test works, scale it through the usual channels

and the part we care about is:

move as much audience as possible from the core app.

you can only do that through user incentives and algorithms.

exactly what we need for our own growth.

X launches Articles? you should be among the first people testing them.

Instagram launches Edits or Threads? you should already be there actively using them.

competition is minimal at the very beginning, while traffic from the core app gets pushed toward the new product.

and you get pushed along with it.

2. always know the purpose of your content and what problem it solves

if you’re writing about what a brand is and why branding matters, and you’re not the Head of Branding at Nike, nobody cares.

Same with tweets like:

“who is building?” or “hot take: AI is evolving really fast.”

there’s a very simple exercise to understand whether your content is actually useful:

• would you save it yourself?
• can this problem already be solved with existing solutions?

if you’re a beginner creator, your job is to find something small that nobody is writing about but that makes some process easier.

don’t focus on huge topics just because they seem important. they’ve probably already been covered 1,000 times. you probably won’t say anything new, and there are people far more trusted and popular than you talking about them.

but if you spent real time solving one small problem, that can work.

for example, if you write about SEO, instead of writing “what is SEO?” or “how do you get traffic from SEO?”, research every tool available for SEO, break down how much each one costs, and explain the pros and cons.

you can do the same with search engines.

which search engines are actually best for SEO in 2026?

give people real value: numbers, comparisons, specific details.

and don’t do the whole thing with AI.

do it manually. add screenshots. actually test things.

that’s where the value comes from.

because if you do everything with AI, we come back to the same question:

can this problem already be solved with existing solutions?

everyone knows how to use AI now. anyone who needed this information could already ask Claude, so your content adds very little value.

but if you did the work manually, you’re useful even to someone who already researched the topic with AI.

they probably didn’t have enough time to test everything manually and took the easier route.

now you’ve done the work for them. they can compare your findings with their own, and in most cases, the quality will be much better.

also, don’t forget about market depth.

you can create the most useful piece of content ever written about the best welding tools and it still might not get millions of views.

it can be genuinely valuable while simply not having a big enough audience.

3. distribution to the right audience

if you think you can just show up on X and it’ll give you its audience for free, you’re deeply mistaken.

you work for the social network, not the other way around

so your job is to figure out where the people who will actually find your content useful can discover you.

that’s why everyone recommends replying, networking, and sending DMs.

it gives you an initial small circle of supporters who should ideally be the ICP for your content.

they interact with it.

then X understands: okay, we should probably show this to more people like them.

it tests the content with a few more people. if they also find it useful, it expands the audience further and further.

but that initial push is critical.

social network can’t perfectly analyze every piece of content and understand whether it’s genuinely useful or complete bullshit.

it figures that out through the behavior of specific users.

and you need to work on that.

beyond the basics like DMs and replies, there’s a much more interesting method:

get into communities around your topic on other social networks Telegram, Discord, etc. and share your content there.

the key is that it actually needs to be useful.

if it is, people will start sharing it themselves and will actually be grateful that you brought it to them.

that’s distribution.

4. be unique. everyone is the same

people need to remember you, talk about you, and think of you later.

never write something so generic that it could apply to everyone.

it creates zero emotion and gives people no reason to respond.

just like with your content, define your circles of interest and your type of people, then post for them.

think the founder of Nvidia is doing something stupid?

write about it.

your people might agree with you. others will come in and tell you it’s complete bullshit.

and that’s great for you.

the algorithm gets engagement, and people remember who you are.

almost nothing is absolute, so there’s little point in pretending everything is universally right or wrong.

something works one way for one person and completely differently for another.

express yourself everywhere you can: your profile design, writing style, content, replies.

be different, because 95% of people look exactly the same.

your job is to stand out in any way that doesn’t destroy your reputation.

those are the core principles behind pretty much every social media platform and what they’re designed to do.

of course, if you’re already famous and have 100K followers, your content should still be valuable, but the game is completely different compared to being a nobody with 0 followers.

famous person has already proven everything they need to prove. a lot of people already admire them.

they can post a one-word tweet every day and people will think:

“wow, he’s a genius”

if a nobody does the same, everyone will think:

“what a dumbass”

so you need to prove yourself first.

there are many different levels and strategies, but they all come back to the basic principles above.

just be honest with yourself.

if you’re constantly writing about your product when 1,000,000 similar products already exist and you think somebody cares about your journey. unless you’re famous or you invented something that reduces energy costs by 10x, the only person who cares about your journey is your mom.

and since i’m trying to follow my own advice, i’d love to connect with more great founders and investors.

hit me up! always happy to support good people and make new connections.