How I built a sustainable marketing strategy without social media

If you’ve ever wondered whether you actually need social media to market your small business—this video is my answer.

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A few years ago I left Instagram. Not strategically, not with a plan, and not with a big audience waiting for me anywhere else. When I eventually came back to marketing my business, I knew I didn’t want to return to social media. This left me having to figure out how to market my business without social media, which used to be a big part of it. A few years on, the system I ended up with is better for me, better for my business, and, somewhat to my surprise, more effective than what I had before.

My solution was to formulate three rules for myself by which I decided where, how and how often I market my business.

How (and why) I left

In October 2021 I launched a new product (my Boundaries for small business owners guide), and I’d spent more time on Instagram in the run-up than usual. When the launch was over I took a two-week break. That break quietly turned into forever—first because I became ill and spent a couple of months unable to touch my business at all, and then, once I was well enough to pick things back up, because staying off simply felt good. It still does.

So when I returned to marketing, I wanted to be intentional about it. I set myself three rules. Having these rules gives me incredible calm and focus in my marketing.

–> Read this deep dive into How I quit social media for my business

Rule one: I don’t want to serve a platform

I was tired of the game, of trying to work out what the algorithm wanted this week, then next week. With Instagram I’d tried all of it: the hashtags, the posting times, posting five times a week, posting less. And the feeling that kept growing was that I was working for Instagram rather than for my business.

Of course, every platform involves some exchange. I run my website on WordPress, so by paying them I support them too. But that’s a clean, clear trade to me. What I felt on Instagram was something murkier, and I didn’t want to keep paying it.

Rule two: people should be able to find me—and go beyond the platform

I wanted it to be easy to discover my business, and just as easy to click through to something that mattered: my website, my newsletter, my products. Social platforms are built to keep people on the platform. I wanted the opposite. I wanted people to go beyond it. That tension between what Instagram wanted and what I wanted was a constant irritation that turned into frustration and annoyance.

–> Read more on the 4 benefits of marketing my business without social media

Rule three: the platform has to fit my strengths and needs

This is the big one. Before I explain it, a quick note on what I mean by “social media”, because a few of the channels I use now might look like social media. I see YouTube and Pinterest as search engines, not social platforms: I am not rewarded for my attention, which for me is a key part of how platforms like Instagram work.

When I thought about marketing that fits my strengths and needs, three things came up.

The first is that I do my best work in longer form. Snappy, quick, clever little posts are really hard for me to make. Long-form is what I love to read and what I love to create. So I started with my newsletter—the thing I most enjoy writing—and looked at how to make it work harder: more sign-up forms on my site and in my email signature, a few Pinterest pins pointing to it, and going from sending it twice a month rather than once a month.

That same desire for longer content is what eventually drew me to YouTube, despite years of being sure video wasn’t for me. When I pictured video as reels and shorts, all of it loud and fast, video indeed didn’t fit. The slightly slower, longer format YouTube (also) allows is a different thing entirely, and one that I’m enjoying playing with.

The second thing that is important to me is that I want my marketing to be evergreen. The average social post lasts a day or two, if that. For content I found hard to make, watching it vanish felt like a small heartbreak every time. So I looked instead at what was evergreen instead: my blog, SEO, Pinterest. Before writing this I checked my top pins: the best three are three to four years old and still quietly bringing people in. My blog does the same. I did the work once, and now it ticks along in the background, getting richer rather than disappearing.

The third thing I focused on is the ability to schedule. What bothered me most about social media was the exchange of attention for reach: the more time you spend on the platform, the more it tends to show your work. That just doesn’t work for me. I get overwhelmed easily, I’m neurodivergent, I’ve had stretches of poor mental health, and spending a lot of time on social media isn’t good for me. So I schedule almost everything: the newsletter, the YouTube videos, my blog posts, my pins. I can write or record whenever the energy and the creativity are actually there, and let it go out later. This isn’t a productivity hack. It’s how I look after myself.

–> Curious about moving your business away from social media? Sign up for my popular free 4-week email series “Move your business away from social media” 💌

Something to try

The question I’d leave you with is the one I answered myself: which rules are you setting for how you market your business? What is important to you?

I’d love to hear your thoughts–leave a comment here.

If this resonated, come join the waitlist for Grow, my marketing programme. You’ll get gentle, non-overwhelming tips for building a marketing system that’s intentional, sustainable, and actually yours — and you’ll be first to hear when it opens again.

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